f headstands. He was like the Eiffel Tower in his sinuous expansion and grace.
And then, it happened:
He fell over! Spectacularly!
In fact, he almost took me out! I had to side-scoot to get out of the way!
He smiled at me apologetically and I gave him a generous, if not downright beneficent, “It’s all good dude.”
Almost done with class now, I congratulated myself for the dozenth time for my maturity and wisdom.
Second place is Cool Dave! You have learned so much! You Go!!!
And then it hit me. I had won. I had won the class.
Jesse blew it!
He wiped out and almost crushed me. That’s a major yoga faux pas, a critical mistake!
And this could only mean one thing: I WON FIRST PLACE!!!
With my mellow attitude and my caution, with my wisdom and maturity, I was the better yogi today!
I WON FIRST PLACE!!!!
I have to say, realizing this felt damn good.
All my training, all my personal work, my meditation, my hard won moxie, it had all led to this place. To my Yoga Victory!
As, I smugly lowered myself down to do shivasana, the corpse pose, the blissful ending to our work, I came to my senses with a snort.
Crap! I did it again! My ego got me! I was doing yoga like a Dude again! In fact, I was doing it the whole time!
At this humbling realization, I started to laugh out loud at my own silliness… at my tricky, manipulative ego. At my ever-present striving teenage masculinity.
At this point, as everyone else was resting in corpse pose, I was laughing and laughing. Indeed, I laughed all the way to that last Namaste.The Dude in me honors the Dude in you.
Thanks for reading this far.
I am curious, When has your inner competitor made you laugh?
Please write me and let me know!
Dave Klaus
King Bee, Fire-Tender
