burning bridges

Despite how large and daunting this world often feels, the mystery of coincidence shows us time again, by forces unknown, that it’s actually rather small.

And with a nod to this smallness we are advised to not burn bridges, the connections that exist between us and other people. A dreaded co-worker could be the hiring manager at your dream job one day. A bad conversation today can come back to haunt you years later… That sort of thing. By keeping our bridges noncombustible, we are doing our future selves a favor—unless we aren’t.

In this context, bridges are a metaphor for opportunity. They’re the mechanism of getting where we are now to a supposed better place. My question is, why are we mistaking bridges for one way roads?

Just like bridges are the infrastructure for moving us forward in life, they also give our feet a convenient crossing for moving backward. For returning to experiences that don’t actually serve us; that were meant to dwell in the past; that actually, might have been better off up in flames.

The advice to preserve our bridges most often serves the religion of professionalism. And professionalism, while entirely functional, is not known for nurturing or even allowing human feelings. It’s not the soul’s favorite -ism. Preserving a bridge might be the professional thing to do. And maybe, just maybe, that bridge will unlock some future door for you. But I'm going to argue that more often than not, the cathartic value of [respectfully] burning a bridge greatly outweighs the professional benefit of keeping it erect.

We don’t talk enough about the benefits of burning bridges when necessary. First and foremost: How good does it feel to put an indisputable end to something toxic? To take a bold stand before something that was shriveling your vivacity and compromising your values?

Second: when the unexpected happens in our life, the first thing we often do, in a frantic search for familiarity and discomfort, is look into the past. When we’re on shaky ground, suddenly returning to that past job or relationship looks a lot more appealing, despite a field full of red flags. “Better than nothing,” we think.

But what does a single bridge have to offer compared to the infinite possibilities of the unknown? It’s far more uncomfortable to sit, bridge-less, on the shores of total uncertainty. But in every way we’re closer to creating the thing we actually want.

May the bridges I burn light my way.

As a collective, we don’t do endings very well. We like them sugar-coated, polite, quickly forgotten, and a bridge that’s on fire in a dark night is anything but. A burning bridge is illuminating, fierce, and severe. Most importantly, it’s an image that lives in hindsight. The burning bridge is always seen behind our shoulder, crumbling into the past, implying both a promising path forward and the courage required to walk it.

in question

I took my first yoga class when I was nine years old. It was in a dimly lit, lofty sanctuary with an older woman named Genie, and I don’t remember much except that the incense smelled both foreign and nostalgic, and at the end we laid on the floor with little pillows over our eyes.

When I consider the many twists and turns my yoga path would take from that moment, looking back feels wild. Yoga soothed me, opened me, and healed me, until it hurt me. (Which, spoiler alert, was more healing in disguise).

Group fitness classes have been around for decades. The term “aerobics” was coined in 1966, and without that understanding—it’s unlikely the fitness world would look the way it does today. From there it was jazzercise in the 70’s, step aerobics in the late 80’s, tae bo and spin in the 90’s, zumba in the 00’s, and we’re all familiar with the eclectic array of group fitness options today.

But why the tangent on group fitness?

Realistically, the way that most of us understand yoga in the West is closer to the notion of group fitness than the larger ideology of Yoga from which it came. I wouldn’t call myself an expert and I certainly am not a descendant of the culture, but I have spent hundreds if not thousands of hours studying Yoga.

To a degree, it’s important to consider westernized yoga as a type of group fitness because the same issues are present. A group fitness class is, inevitably, generalized. Hard as we try, instructors cannot cater to the anatomy of every student’s body.

If we each knew how to accommodate for the unique challenges of our physiology—an inflamed SI joint, a bulging disk, shoulder instability—that would be one thing. We could modify based on our needs and enjoy a safer practice. But most of us don’t obtain that knowledge until we have to—in other words, until we get hurt.

That was my story. Starting in my late 20’s, the hyper flexibility I’d acquired over years of practice started disagreeing with my already compromised low back. I could no longer practice yoga without pain or throwing my back out. I will save the details of the ensuing identity crisis for another day, but it was a challenging and heartbreaking curveball.

The physical practice of yoga (or asana) here in the West maintains quite the reputation. Just because it’s yoga, we’ll contort ourselves into knots. We’ll back bend with abandon and forward fold ourselves into the next dimension. Few things are as gratifying as working into a challenging posture—slowly, over time. But that’s not the same thing as defying our body to get there.

Bold statement—I’d go as far as saying that the benefits of the yoga practice (and the many doors it may open) outweigh the potential of injury. Anyway, injury is a possible outcome for any kind of physical activity.

But we’d benefit from remembering a few things: that you never have to do anything a teacher is telling you to; that if your body is in pain, it’s telling you to stop; that ignoring pain tends to lead to injury; and most importantly, that yoga is a practice of Self-realization.

Yoga is not a practice of forearm stands and deep folds—or, that is 1% (likely less) of the big picture. The yoga instructor is a guide, but your body is the teacher. So who are you listening to?

moving toward / moving away

I’m moving toward discomfort, as a teacher of mine recently reminded me that discomfort says you’re on the edge of something new. We can only ever create the life we want from the space of “new.” And yet, as humans we are wired for comfort. Being evolutionary means swimming upstream against our subconscious preferences for familiarity—which our mind can paint as impossible. But, isn’t discomfort just a sensation to be felt? Isn’t it true that if we just sit in discomfort, we do survive it? I’m moving toward embracing discomfort as a paradoxical sign that actually, things are going well for me.

I’m moving away from the need to impress—and I suspect this one will take some time. I feel the pressure to be impressive deeply woven into my conditioning—as a woman, as a professional, as a human. I want to do everything of the highest caliber, but that’s different from doing things to impress. Add this to the pile of things I wish I would’ve known ten years ago… But awareness works on its own timeline. I believe that seeking to impress is just caring a lot, in the wrong direction. It’s not even “the only person you have to impress is yourself.” Impressions are ephemeral. As soon as they’re formed, they’re gone with the wind. Instead, I think it’s about choosing how fully to exercise our potential, and therein lies the lasting reward.

creative health