Fifteen years ago, when I became a yoga teacher, I loved the creativity involved in planning my classes by blending the right songs and my newly imagined posture sequences. I’d spend hours in the evening gathering chants, folk music, and new age sounds. These playlists were meant to serve as a bridge between the outside world and the beautiful and profound space within. Most enjoyed what I chose for them, but as my classes grew so did the feedback. “That song brought me out of my practice.” Or “That reminded me too much of my last boyfriend.” To rectify, I compiled playlists with no lyrics, or only lyrics in the ancient language of Sanskrit.
But after everyone went home, in an empty studio, I floated to my own rhythm. Cat Stevens, Deva Premal, Gregorian Chants, Reggae. and that one yogic cover of Buffalo Springfield’s “For What It’s Worth”, oozed into me and hugged my heart.
hanges came, I made subtle shifts to my music choices. In darker times, I pushed into edgier sounds to match my mood. But I always stuck with the same genres. I knew what I liked, and what I didn’t. I didn’t like fast techno sounds or Heavy Metal. It made zero sense for me to consider it an option. Metal hurt my ears and poked at my brain. It was for testosterone riddled teenage boys filled with rage and defiance. Not for me. Never for me. But then a life change came that catapulted me into the worst kind of nightmare. What I feared the most had happened. The catastrophic event of losing my child.
Everything I knew for certain, changed the day Christopher died. Just writing these words brings me to disbelief. How could I live in this world without him? How does a mother do that? How could I even think about yoga and music when he would never enjoy the things he loved again. I shared my life with three adult children, then suddenly, there were two. What I knew, I didn’t know anymore. The tools I used didn’t work anymore. No song, sound, or cry could reach the depths of my pain.
Before the nightmare, Frank Sinatra would belt from the kitchen speaker as I made Sunday Gravy and swayed. Now I mostly stir the wooden spoon in silence. There are just too many memories of Christopher impatiently leaning over the pot wafting tomatoes basil and garlic with Sinatra’s smooth Sunday voice playing in the background. “Mack the knife” now feels like a gut punch.
Before, when alone in the car, old school rap, like Biggie Smalls and Snoop, howled from my core.
“I love it when you call me big pappa.”
“Drop it like it’s hot, drop it like it’s hot.”
Now My Nissan Rogue absorbs piercing, guttural screams from the pits of the darkest, most painful places inside of me.
The other day, I opened my Spotify to a random playlist, while out walking my dogs. Podcasts are my usual go-to when I walk. Things You Should Know, and The Ted Radio Hour are two of my favorites. It’s fun to learn new things, like that Rolly Polly bugs eat their own poop, and how one time a boy scout built a nuclear reactor in his mom’s potting shed. I then share this new-found information with my husband who is a walking encyclopedia. It feels like a win when I can tell him something he didn’t already know. But the other day, out for a walk I wasn’t in the mood to learn, so I switched to music.
With my phone resting in my right pocket, and tiny dog treats caught in poop bags in my left. My right thumb found the exact spot to skip to the next song. Two notes of “Borderline” by Madonna…No thanks…next, Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believing” …..nope…next.
Next…. next…next…. Nothing fit. Not even Bonnie Rait’s “I can’t make you love me.” Which was one of those songs that floated into my cells and made them smile. Then a heavy metal song…. a hard NO! Two “nexts” later I felt something tug me. I scrolled back to the heavy metal song and stopped. For some reason, it was hitting me in could it be the right way? Loud screaming voices and electric guitars ping ponged through me, and it felt right.
When I returned home, I told my husband, and he immediately wanted to know what band I came across. I searched but could not find it. He went through his teenage brain file box and started naming bands I had pretended didn’t exist.
“What was your favorite when you were a teenager?” I asked him.
“Pull up Black Sabbath, Paranoid.”
I typed Paranoid in the search bar on my Spotify, synced it with my Bluetooth in the basement, turned the volume up, and rolled out my Yoga mat. For the first time since my son left, I didn’t want to fly away from myself. I felt somewhere, and I wanted to stay a while. Black Sabbath had me at “Iron Man.” The distorted guitar and eerie echoing voice matched my fear and dismembered life. I soared through aggressive sun salutations, threw myself into forward folds, shook my head and my hair in a frenzy. punched my way through twists, forced my tree pose to stay put, and the music kept up. My Pigeon pose could have been renamed Vulture Pose. Warrior two renamed street fighter pose. On the second round of the album, I settled into the final pose of savasana with “Planet Caravan” one of the gentler songs out of the bunch. It burned a new pathway in my brain and all of my cells. Light crept through in a way I had never imagined. Seated hands at prayer center, I thanked Black Sabbath for creating music that I so desperately needed.
I had honored the sacred practice of yoga, by creating a sacred space for my emotions to unfold without judgement. The “Purest” of Yogis might say this is not yoga. That one should enter their practice with no music at all. I’m not a fan of the word “should” Yoga is the practice of moving mindfully through specific postures with the breath. Black Sabbath knew me already, found me on the mat, and helped me to find flexibility around what life had become. And I could finally breathe.
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