How yoga creates vandalism and why canoeing is super stressful.

I am a failure at relaxation. And having a peaceful mind. And being able to touch my feet. And sitting still.

Also, I find yoga to be one of the most stressful and anxiety-inducing forms of exercise around. And for real, you guys, I don’t even know if I have a Zen place to go to.  To be honest, every time I start thinking of where my Zen place is, I get nervous because I can’t think of anything and then I think “But you have to have a Zen place” and then I get all judgey with myself that I don’t have a Zen place, and everyone has a Zen place, and then I feel like I’ve failed yoga. And potentially all of life.

However, my sister is like a yoga black belt. Wait, is that a contradiction of terms because black belt is something associated with fighting and yoga is supposed to be all peaceful and Zen-y? Whatever, she totally got all of the yoga genes and didn’t leave any for me because she’s still punishing me for that one time I bit her when I was, like, 5. So to get me back she has decided to selfishly take all of the flexibility and focus all for herself. Thanks a lot, Amanda, I’m pretty sure that’s not one of the tenets of yoga. I’m pretty sure it’s not “be super selfish and really good at something that your sister fails at repeatedly.” But whatever, I’m not going to be as judgmental as yoga, and so I’ll let it go.

Obviously, I had much better core strength at 6 months old. Also, my dad was holding me. Meanwhile, my sister was being all braggy about being able to stretch her leg out like that. Whatever, I could totally do that if I wasn’t busy focusing on not falling over.

Also, I dare you to tell me that you can center your mind. Because it’s for real impossible.

Yesterday, I decided to take a yoga class at my gym. Shockingly, my doctor thinks that I need to relax more and find an alternative to running and core training once or twice a week. So fine. I’ve tried this a few times, without success, but figured yesterday I’d give it another go.

So we’re in some sort of unnatural pose for people who are inflexible, and I’m all nervous and sweaty while standing there hoping we move to the next pose. And then the instructor tells us to clear our minds, which immediately makes me start thinking of how stressful it is to try to clear your mind, because who can clear their mind? It’s your mind, it’s supposed to be working at all times.

But whatever. Ok. Think of waterfalls. Yeah, waterfalls. But that could be the opposite of peaceful because water can for real be dangerous and if I fell into a waterfall by accident I’d, at the very least, paralyze myself, and at the most, die. And I guess death could be relaxing, but I don’t think that’s the point. 

Ok, clear your mind. 

How does graffiti get to the top of a building? I mean, if there aren’t any ladders or anything to balance on nearby, how on earth do people get really elaborate graffiti towards the top middle part of a building? That’s fascinating. And how do you learn how to do that? And do you do it at night so as not to get caught? Because that seems really dangerous. But some graffiti is really artistic. I wonder if I would ever be able to successfully draw something on a building at night without getting caught? How would you even figure that out as a person?

And I wonder why Mark Zuckerberg decided that the art on the walls at Facebook would be graffiti. That’s kind of a cool, hip thing, so I guess that makes sense, but I wonder if it’s all graffiti or just certain parts of the wall? Is there other hanging art? Can just anybody create that graffiti? Like, if you work at Facebook and decide you want a giant picture of a duck on the wall, can you just go graffiti it on there?

No, that can’t be the case because all of the graffiti was done by that guy who ended up being an accidental millionaire when Zuckerberg paid him to paint it on the wall and he took stock of Facebook instead of cash. Genius. I wonder if I would’ve had the forethought to do that? Probably not. Also, what’s an IPO? I need to look that up.

Oh crap, I missed the last two poses and now I’m the only one standing.

And so yoga and I don’t get along is the moral of this story.

Also, for real, how do you get graffiti all the way up there?

I was clearly thinking about how I hoped we wouldn’t go under a waterfall while canoeing down the Crystal River. I mean, I’m just a little girl with cartoon animals on my life vest. That for sure won’t save me. Oh man, canoeing is stressful.