Estimated Read Time: 5-6 minutes
MOVEMENT + MOBILITY
I Thought I Was Bad at Yoga Because I Hated Pigeon Pose
I used to think I sucked at yoga because I hated pigeon pose.
Like...
HATED IT.
My hips felt “tight.”
My knee felt some weird shit.
Everyone else seemed to be melting toward the floor in some blissed-out state while I was basically counting the seconds until the teacher told us we could get the hell out of there.
And naturally, I concluded:
My hips are tight. I need to work on them.
So what did I do?
More pigeon. 😂
Because somewhere along the way, I had gotten the idea that being “good” at yoga meant getting my body farther into the shapes.
Deeper forward fold.
More open hips.
Bigger twist.
Straighter leg.
More impressive balance.
Better pigeon.
And if my body didn't want to go there?
Obviously, I needed to work harder.
Yoga became a little...competitive
When I first got into yoga, part of me treated it like another workout.
Guy next to me takes his hands into prayer in half moon?
Touché. Challenge accepted.
Someone folds completely over their legs?
Surely if I pull a little harder, I can get there too.
I used straps to pull myself deeper into poses.
I've had teachers physically take me farther into twists.
I practiced hot yoga—which, for the record, I freaking LOVED, particularly in winter because: COLD.
And I spent a lot of time trying to make my body do the pose the way I thought the pose was supposed to look.
I'm pretty sure I even pulled a hamstring somewhere along the way.
Apparently, teachers used to actually SIT on people's backs to get them deeper into forward folds.
Thankfully no one ever did that to me because...
WTF.
But the mentality wasn't really that different:
Farther = better.
And I believed it.
But better at WHAT?
This is the question I never thought to ask.
If I can touch my toes, what does that make me better at?
Touching my toes.
If I can get my shin perfectly parallel to the front of the mat in pigeon, what does that make me better at?
Doing that version of pigeon.
If I can pull myself farther into a forward fold using a strap...
Okay.
But what do I actually want my body to be able to DO?
That's a very different question.
Maybe you want to run.
Lift weights.
Box.
Garden.
Play tennis.
Pick up your grandkids.
Travel without feeling wrecked.
Get down onto the floor and—rather importantly—get yourself back up.
Walk for miles around a new city.
Keep doing the activities you love as you get older.
Or maybe you just sit at a computer for eight hours a day and would like your body to experience something other than...
chair.
Your body needs enough range of motion to do the things you want to do.
More isn't automatically better.
This doesn't mean stretching is bad
I want to make this VERY clear because apparently I've spent the last few weeks coming for posture AND stretching. 😂
I stretch.
I like stretching.
I teach stretching.
Pigeon on the bed is currently one of my absolute love-hate favorites.
Sometimes a stretch just feels freaking fantastic.
And feeling good is a perfectly valid reason to do it.
The thing I've changed my mind about is what stretching means.
Feeling tight doesn't automatically mean something is wrong.
Being less flexible than the person next to you doesn't mean you're worse at movement.
And getting yourself farther into a yoga pose doesn't necessarily mean you've accomplished something your body actually needs.
Stretching is one way to move.
It isn't the entire movement vocabulary.
There's the range you can get into—and the range you can control
Years later, I learned a distinction I hadn't really considered during my competitive-pigeon era.
There's the range of motion I can access when something else is helping me get there.
Gravity.
My hands.
A yoga strap.
A teacher pushing me deeper into a twist.
And then there's the range I can actively move myself into and control.
Those aren't quite the same thing.
Try this:
Lie on your back and bring one leg into the air.
Put a strap around your foot and use it to bring your leg toward you.
Notice where it goes.
Now take the strap away.
Can you actively hold your leg in the same place?
Maybe.
Maybe not.
Neither answer means anything is wrong with you.
It's information.
And these days, I'm interested in a LOT more than how far I can passively get my body into a position.
Can I move there?
Can I control myself there?
Can I get myself out of there?
Can I produce force?
Can I balance?
Can I coordinate different parts of myself?
Can I move in directions my body hasn't experienced all day?
Can I actually use the range I have?
That's much more interesting to me.
Which explains all the weird shit I make you do…
If you've taken class with me, you already know.
Sometimes we're doing something that looks very much like yoga.
And sometimes you're looking at me like:
Jenn. What the hell are we doing?
😂
There's a reason.
I want us to reach.
Rotate.
Balance.
Push.
Pull.
Squat.
Move our hips.
Move our pelvis.
Move our shoulder blades.
Explore our necks.
Move the part of our spine behind our rib cage.
Use our bodyweight to get stronger.
Move slowly enough that we can't rely entirely on momentum.
Explore positions we don't encounter while sitting at a desk, driving a car or scrolling our phones.
Sometimes I borrow from yoga.
Sometimes from mobility work.
Sometimes from strength training.
Sometimes I make you do some weird shit I learned somewhere and you all look suspiciously at me...
and then you do it anyway.
Secretly, I think you love the weird shit.
I'm not trying to make you better at yoga
That may be the biggest change in how I teach.
I love yoga.
I practice yoga.
I teach yoga.
But my goal isn't to make you really freaking good at yoga poses.
I want to help you become more capable in your body.
And capable will look different for every single person in the room.
Maybe you already box and strength train and what we do together introduces movement you aren't getting elsewhere.
Maybe you haven't intentionally exercised in years and bodyweight strength is a really approachable place to start.
Maybe you spend most of your day sitting and discover that your thoracic spine has apparently forgotten it's invited to the party.
Maybe you love stretching.
Great.
Stretch.
And then let's explore what else you've got.
Because I don't want you leaving my class with another list of things your body can't do correctly.
I want you discovering:
Oh. I can move this way.
And this way.
And maybe even this weird way Jenn is making us do today.
Your body doesn't have to win at movement.
It doesn't have to look like anyone else's.
And you definitely don't have to love pigeon pose.
Let's just give it more ways to move.
UPCOMING EXPERIENCE
MOVE WELL: LOW BACK · OCTOBER 17th
We're taking this exact idea and exploring the low back—and all of its neighbors.
Mobility. Bodyweight strength. Breath. Balance. Varied movement patterns. And yes, probably some weird shit. 😉