Today I was asked at the last minute to cover a pilates class at a local gym and I met: Pilates Woman! Pilates Woman has no sense of humour. She has no awareness of her fellow human beings, their feelings or existence. Pilates Woman is here to have a pilates class that gets the job done and she knows what that job should look like. She’s been doing pilates for 20 years! Pilates Woman (PW) does not like change, she believes in her rights and she is no wallflower when it comes to voicing an opinion. After all, if she doesn’t speak the truth, how can the world of common sense and order be maintained? The world will end in chaos if the thin end of the wedge doesn’t get nipped in the bud. Falling standards, PW has noticed them all and she’s written the complaint emails to go with them. She is a fighter alright! Her timid, passive husband used to be amused and even aroused by her feistiness but now he just gets embarrassed and yearns for his crossword or garden.
Don’t get me wrong, PW has her place. If the nation is invaded she would make an excellent head of the home guard. You could even chain her up in your back yard and I don’t think you’d get any intruders be they burglars, Jehovah’s witnesses or friends.
I digress, but you know me and what I’m like, obviously really nice right!! LOL!! And now you have an idea about my spiritual opponent today.
I arrive early outside the studio, PW rocks up next to me. I smile and say hello. She immediately looks concerned but smiles back in a way that troubles me.
“Are you here for pilates?” I ask.
She replies in the affirmative.
“Lovely, ok well I’m taking the class today because (instructor) has to take her son to hospital. I hope that’s ok?”
“Well I hope it's ok.”
Arrow to the stomach!
“Are you an actual pilates instructor?” She twists it deeper.
“Well yes I can do both, I’m mostly a yoga teacher.” I simper.
This is too vague, wishy-washy yoga nonsense and pilates woman wants me to know.
“I don’t like yoga.”
And so it began.
The difference between pilates and yoga.
I tried valiantly to defend my beloved subject and to reinforce the many similarities but pilates woman had cloth ears and was standing her ground.
“I completely disagree.” she assured me.
“It will be pilates with a yog- ish twist. I’m sorry, I’m just trying to help today. I hope you enjoy the class.”
“So do I.”
Arrow to the heart.
“ Well, I’m in a bad mood anyway today,” I beam hoping to get her sympathy.
“ I just drove my husband’s car under the barrier and broke the roof box which I forgot was there.”.
She finds this mildy diverting. But really it is all left hanging in the air like a very bad smell.
I walk into the studio, roll out my mat and prepare to feel crucified by judgement in an unfamiliar setting with a class of total strangers.
I can act, but I don’t like to. I had to fake it this time to get through. All the time the projected judgement of PW filling my head. That and the fact I get paid £25 per class for this. “What a loser!”, I tell myself.
I have PMT today. My metaphorical skin is paper-thin. I was already all- out busting rain clouds before PW entered my life.
£400 for a broken roof box to make £25 and come home in a bad mood. Bad vibes!
So how do I rescue this failing mind-set?
I cannot let PW defeat me! I must pity her, that she is rude and narrow-minded. I cannot be the first feather she has ruffled in life. So, as a trainee yogi, I must love her. I must take out the arrow heads and throw them to the ground. It wasn’t personal. It never really is.
I hope most sincerely that before her journey is done, she will learn the gift of living a compassionate life. I fear that if she doesn’t she is destined to return in another life-time as a Head teacher in a school which fails its OFSTED inspection (she can’t be the OFSETD inspector as that would be too much fun for her), or Donald Trump’s P.A or Putin’s therapist, or….. possibly a cockroach.
Positive thinking then. Have I abandoned it?
No. I’m so happy to say that I’m already over Pilates Woman.
As I sit at home typing this I’ve enjoyed a good chuckle at our human foibles and I’m thinking about the friendly people in the class this morning. I received compliments and gratitude from a couple of people and that makes me feel that I did my job.
And, more importantly, the little boy got to the hospital for his X-ray without having to wait another hour with a painful foot for his hard-working, multi-tasking mum to take him. That makes me feel good.
Now I just need to prepare an explanation for my darling husband about what happened to the roof-box!!!!
And breathe.
Much Love
Katy X