Yoga Anyone?

When I first stepped into my local yoga studio three-and-a-half years ago, at the peak of my gender questioning phase, I was simply trying to get over a breakup. A couple trans guys had invited me to an ass-whooping, spiritually eye-opening class that was also quite the event with tambourine-led chanting and a soundtrack that mixed the Jackson 5 with devotional music.

Class was fun and challenging, but I’d be lying if I said I liked the experience. I fidgeted excessively. I gazed around completely confused. I excused myself to the bathroom to check the clock. I berated myself for sucking. But I continued to go back to this class because it was kinda better than missing my girlfriend, and a voice from deep inside told me that committing to it once a week was the best thing I’d ever done for myself.

Had I been able to shut down this voice, I’d probably still be living as a woman, for this was the steady whisper of my own knowing. Listening to it would transform everything. I would slowly come to embrace myself as transgender, and through my yoga practice, I would clear the path to my own internal sense of gratitude, compassion, and love. I would arrive here, now, desiring to share with you all that I know, and all that I don’t, in a short series of posts on yoga.

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The word yoga means “to yoke,” as in fastening a wooden crosspiece over the neck of an animal pulling a cart, plow, or chariot. Vocabulary and lifestyle were different in ancient times, so those early sages couldn’t really say yoga means bubbly, ponytailed, suburban moms stretching out their hammies.

Personally, I prefer the first definition, so let’s take it a step away from animal cruelty and toward metaphor. The horses are like our mind — wild, fast, powerful — and we’re going to yoke those hurtling thoughts to our chariot, our body. That’s why some people say yoga means “union” – of body, mind, and spirit.

Calling all transfolk… Does this sound familiar? Union of body, mind, and spirit. Integration. Maybe it’s just me. I tend to focus, combine, and see connections between the things that interest me most, like trans and yoga.

The yoga that most people recognize is full of poses, or asanas, with Sanskrit names and their English counterparts like downward dog, upward dog, eagle, tree, pigeon, and fish. Sometimes I like to pretend like I’m playing in the jungle or ocean, embodying these various creatures. I can get into it, forget that I am me and a tree is a tree, and the mind that separates things into form and language quiets enough for me to disappear into connection with it all.

There are a ton of physical benefits that come from twisting, balancing, and inverting. There are poses to improve blood circulation, digestion, organ function, muscle strength, and endurance. But there are a ton of ways to take care of the physical body and get your sweat on. As a lifelong athlete with a few beer break sabbaticals, I probably would’ve gone with bench presses over chaturangas (similar to push-ups) had this practice not offered something more, like the incorporation of the breath.

I used to breathe like a pug—short, shallow, uneven, and a bit snorty. I may be exaggerating slightly, but my shit wasn’t yoked. My mind was off to the races, stirring up a dust cloud that my breath spun around. Half the time, I was in a panic state, adrenaline pumping, my thoughts so frenzied my nervous system responded as if I were being chased by a bear.

I’m very much a beginner when it comes to breathing techniques, called pranayama, so I focus on the old stand by, Ujjayi. I’ve heard this described as Darth Vader breath as a ploy to lure dudes into the studio, or as “ocean breath.” The deep inhale and exhale through the nose sounds like the ebb and flow of the waves.

Did I mention some audience participation would be required? How about three ocean breaths: Inhale/exhale, inhale/exhale, inhale/exhale. Sweet, now we are all practicing yoga together. Try to be annoyed that I’m tricking you into becoming a SNAG (Sensitive New Age Guy), but when the breath is calm and steady, it’s hard to get worked up.

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About a month ago, I participated on a panel at the Butch Voices Conference for a workshop called Expanding Us, focused on building community between transmen and butches. We talked about coming to understand and embrace our own identities and the constant fight to be seen and respected, a fight that is so all-consuming that we too often end up invalidating each other in the process.

During the workshop, another panelist said that the one thing that unites us all is our pain. I was immediately taken aback by this statement, despite its truth. Pain is a theme that runs through all of the trans conferences I’ve attended this year, that runs through the trans experience. It’s there. It’s not going away. Or maybe this pain can be transformed into strength and compassion, turning us into leaders of our communities and the world, if we are earnest and dedicated in our efforts for individual and collective healing.

For me, releasing (in fleeting moments) my attachment to my sense of self has been a powerful part of my healing through yoga. It seems counter-intuitive to drop my guard and stop fighting for myself, especially as a transgender person. But there is a great paradox at play here — the story I carry about who I am, my identity, is a sham, a distraction, and a barrier to connecting with others. We all know what it feels like to connect, and most often this results when we tap into our own vulnerability rather than protecting ourselves in a stance of defense.

The best way I’ve found to get over myself is to dedicate my yoga practice away, like an offering, to do the work not for myself but for those around me, and those around them. It’s pretty cool to think that there are other people in the room, and others out in the world who might be doing the same for me. And even if they aren’t, just starting with the assumption that I have enough to give away has changed my internal constitution, recalibrating my baseline state to that of wealth rather than lack.

If I haven’t lost you yet, perhaps we could end with some final audience participation. Think of something you love – maybe you are a DJ, poet, bicyclist, runner, painter, singer, photographer, baker, hiker, or gardener. What if you set an intention (maybe you already do) before you engage in your activity, infuse it with meaning, offer it away to someone else.

There are hundreds of ways to practice this thing called yoga. Next post, I’ll bring you something new. Until then… Inhale. Exhale.

Nick Krieger is the author of the new memoir Nina Here Nor There: My Journey Beyond Gender. A native of New York, Krieger realized at the age of twenty-one that he’d been born on the wrong coast, a malady he corrected by transitioning to San Francisco.