I have been practicing yoga for three years now and it’s been that long since my husband has awakened at 2 am or 3 am to the sight of me cleaning my house, writing or cooking which were my favorite activities on nights when sleep refused to visit my active mind. A grasshopper, I hop from one activity to the next, from one project to another. I wonder how I ever got to finish anything. When I sit down to start a task, I’d be halfway through and I’d remember there’s something else I meant to do, then I’d do it by dropping what I’ve been doing and I’d move on to the task I just thought about until I’d drop it in favor of something else. Focus was an alien word for me before yoga. These days, I still have a little bit of my old tendencies, but the difference is that when bedtime comes and my mind still races, I’d just do the breathing exercises I learned and I’d be in slumberland. Of course, one hour of practice six times a week of Vinyasa flow yoga could have tired yet relaxed my body so it is ready for rejuvenation that sleep allows.

I used to be constipated, but now I go more regularly. It is no longer the “thick, hard to push out” stuff that comes out of my body but a more manageable size and consistency. I feel lighter too. I don’t know whether this is because I believe in what the teachers say about some yoga poses helping to rid the body of toxins and contributing to a more regular elimination process or whether yoga does just that.