Even though I saw it coming. Even though we all saw it coming. There was an element of stunned surprise as we watched it happen.

It’s morning. I’ve had my coffee. I’ve watched Stephen Colbert’s opening monologue from last night (it’s worth fourteen minutes of your life). I’m flipping between CNN, MSNBC and Fox (yes, I am). What I believed, what I thought was right and my innate optimism is scattered across the floor this morning like a bucket of spilled Lego blocks. And now I’m left to figure out how to put my faith in who we are as a nation back together. How the Legos stack. They’ll never align the same way. I’m shook.

Are you? You should be.

But before I dig out my pink pussy hat from 2016 and run off to the nearest march, I have yoga classes to teach. People to coach. Papers to write and a Noom account to manage.

So. As yoga teachers, what do we do? When we log into Zoom today do we pretend it never happened? Is this the day we pull out the Ahimsa trope and rehash all the cliches’ we’ve gathered about non-violence over three decades of teaching? Do we set aside the vigorous flow we had planned and trade it in for quiet reflection? I don’t know. I guess it depends on who we are as teachers. 

Something is happening. We preach ‘be here now’ without ever really understanding what that means. Be here now. Stay awake. Remain present. Do not sweep what is happening in our country under the yoga mat.

This morning I’m reactive. I’m responding thoughtfully (I hope) to comments I see in my Facebook feed from strangers across the Atlantic who are describing yesterday as ‘amusing’ or ‘not as bad as…’ (choose any atrocity in Northern Ireland).  I sent a lengthy text to a dear friend wondering why the stock market is up today because my brain is filled with images of gleeful brokers in suits and Italian leather shoes surrounded by money and oblivious to the carnage around them. Every time I hear a talking head say, “this is not who we are” I ask myself, “then who are we?”

Like I said. I’m reactive. I’m reactive when I want to be active. Reactivity is impulsive and not well-thought out. We witnessed reactivity yesterday. And while we watched the capital stormed by thousands of maskless souls, three thousand nine hundred other souls died of COVID. But that’s another story.

I don’t want to react. I want to act. By that I mean I want to be informed. Even when that means tuning into news that may lean toward a political philosophy that is different from my own. I want to be responsive and responsible.

As a yoga teacher, as a yoga therapist, as a coach – it’s an obligation I intend to fulfill.