The Only Living Yoga Cynic in New York...or, the Yoga Cynic Meets Dharma Mittra

Half of the time we’re gone but we don’t know where,
We don’t know where...
Paul Simon, The Only Living Boy in New York

...always found Manhattan kind of intimidating...so big, so uptight, arrogant, and loud, so much flagrant wealth and power, so many people so driven, so ambitious and competitive...ain’tchoohungry for success success success success...

...I like to get out on the rich-but-still-incessantly-hungry streets and just walk...

...walked the High Line...lovely, artistic, and green in a post-apocalyptic sorta way...from 14^th to 23^rd, then headed in past 6^th to get to the Master Sadhana yoga class at noon...finding a room full of hardcore New York yogis relaxing with feet behind their heads...if you can reach enlightenment theeeere, you can reach it anywheeeere....and just sat their doing my usual neck rolls, feeling even more intimidated, thinking the famous yoga master we were waiting for was gonna make organic vegan mincemeat outta me...

 ...(gotta admit, when I’ve encountered yoga bigwigs, they’ve been awesome, but, in the area of actually overcoming the ego, have seemed, if anything, generally a step or two behind the rest of us)...

 ...until this unassuming, gentle, and totally unpretentious older dude I barely noticed ‘til he was up at the front of the room started the class...making jokes in a heavy accent, smiling at the little kids running around the room (the kinda thing that drives me nuts, trying to teach yoga at the homeless shelter, but which seemed to be perfectly welcome, here)...as well as giving time to my generally neglected inability to fully relax, the hands that won't fully unclench in savasana...reminding me that, despite all that fast-forward-moving energy down in the streets, the path leads to where I already am, wherever that might be...