The Fat Girl Inside

Jennifer Fields wrote a lovely post at The Elephant Journal the other day about the weighty dilemma of being a yoga teacher who is not stick thin. Though she is not overweight, she is not waif-like. At 5'9",  a fairy-like physique is not available. "Tall bones" translate into broader shoulders and hips and they need padding, people.

Oh, it's possible to be painfully thin, but let my emphasize the "pain" part. Tall is angular. Pointy elbows and ribs and hipbones that poke and settle poorly on the mat. And the sadder reality of those who are "naturally" coat-hangerish is that they eat far less than their bodies really need to stay healthy.

At my absolute thinnest, I was closing in on a size six and I am nearly 5'10", my blood pressure was slightly above the low end of alarming and I nearly fainted every time I stood up too quickly. My blood sugar was just shy of needing an intervention. Exhaustion was my middle name.

And how did I achieve such glorious thinness?

I couldn't eat. A malfunctioning gallbladder, probably a result of thyroid issues I have only recently become aware of, made it literally impossible to eat without making myself sick.

But in spite of the tribulation, I really liked being - for the first time in my life - the physical epitome of the stick-figure our society admires and holds up as perfection for all women. Even though I was often in tears when I tired to eat and desperately hungry. Thinness was indeed its own reward in the approval I got for so many and our culture in general.

Having been an overweight tween and teen, runway model thin was a revelation. People truly look at you differently and treat you accordingly. I can see why so many women my age sacrifice aging gracefully to maintain impossibly low weights and take on the hard angular look of a females trying to hard to hang onto youth that is clearly absent.

Fields, however, pointed out the slightly different problem of not being Yoga Journal model perfect and still teaching. Students expect a certain look and Gumby flexibility because they really don't understand what yoga is.

Sure, fitness and many will never see it as anything other than a way to a hard body, but there is more. Yoga sways the mind and spirit, so much so that how much one weighs - stops being an issue.

While I certainly would love to be more fit - I am not as flexible or strong as I feel would be optimal for me as I approach my half-century mark - I don't think I am fat. And it's not denial, I see the pouch belly needs a bit of attention and progress of the saddle bags that are toning nicely. I have noticed the transformation from runner's legs to yogi's foundation. I am not blinded at all to what I really look like. I am just okay with it.

"Judge me by my size, would you?" Yoda asked Luke Skywalker once in a galaxy far, far away. He demurred and Yoda replied, "And well you should not, for the force is my ally." And I would echo that yoga is mine.