Yoga, the Flu, and Changes. Oh My!

I love yoga.
Even when I don't.
Yesterday I went to a class that was really, really, REALLY HARD!!!!!  The instructor is young, and she was very excited about the 2 young professional gymnasts/equestrians who were taking the class. I kinda felt like she geared the class toward them, while the rest of us were left to our own devices.  I could be wrong, I'd never taken a class with her before. But unlike the other instructors at the studio, she didn't give many modifications.  Luckily I knew enough to only go as far as I could and not try to overdo it.  The class description says it's for all levels, but it's really not.
But that's OK: live and learn, and everyone's style is different.  Now I know.  I still felt really good after class, even if I'm (hella!) sore today.
I also went for a walk after dinner.  A constitutional, you might say.  To help with digestion.  I've been getting a lot of stomach pain lately, and am trying to figure out why.  Right now I'm cutting out gluten to see if that helps.

As I'm sure you're aware, there is a NASTY flu going around.  I haven't had my flu shot yet, and neither have the kids (Hubby gets his at work), so I'm worried.  Especially since my B-I-L seems to have it, and he lives with us.  I guess the kiddoes & I better get that shot.
If we DO get sick, I'm hoping we all get it at the same time, and in the next week.  I'm not teaching again until the 24th, and it'd be great not to have to lug one sick kid with me when I drop the other one off at school. Or worry about getting a sitter, as my in-laws are going out of town.

I must say I've been feeling a bit guilty about all the time off I have right now.  But then I remember that I haven't really had any time off in the past 20 years, and suddenly I don't feel quite so badly.  This is time for ME.  For figuring stuff out.  For yoga, meditation, and quiet time (at least while the kids are in school).  Because, while there have been many, many changes over those 20 years, I haven't had time to process them.
At the beginning of 1993 I was 18 months out of college.  I'd joined the Shakespeare company, but was not working with them at that moment.  Instead, I'd temporarily moved back home with my parents, had just closed a show, and was rehearsing another.  While waiting to hear from said company as to whether or not I'd be hired to do the spring tour, which started rehearsals in February. I was 23 and unencumbered: No kids, no significant other, no permanent place to reside.  It was a very heady time, and I felt free. It was all about My ART. I was, unbelievably, a working actor. Something I wasn't sure, while in school, would ever happen, let alone so soon.
I was also teaching.  High school kids.  Which felt a bit odd, as I wasn't much older than many of them.  (Although they knew how to make me feel old, let me tell ya!  "You know who Pearl Jam is?!?!?!"  Yes, you wisenheimer!  Although, come to think of it, using words like "Wisenheimer" probably didn't help.)
At the time I assumed that this is what my life would be: Teaching, performing, traveling to jobs, and maybe a love affair here and there.  I didn't think I'd get married or have kids.

But I was 23.  The plans you make at 23 are usually not the ones you stick with.

At 24 I was accepted into grad school, on the other side of the country.  "Don't worry" I glibly informed my friends and colleagues "I'll be back as soon as I have my degree!." So I packed up and left my sublet apartment (having managed to move out of my parents' house) and in to a very nice place in La Jolla.
Yeah, turns out the plans you make at 24 aren't the ones you stick with, either.  Because I'm still here. Not La Jolla, but in California.  Married.  With 2 kids.  Teaching, but not, at the moment, performing.
If you'd told me then that this is where I'd be in 20 years, I'd probably have had a screaming panic attack. Because back then, acting was The Most Important Thing In My Life.  It WAS my life.  In a way that, looking back, was not very healthy.  I didn't have ANY other interests or hobbies, other than the gym and reading.

Before the kids came along and after grad school, life was still about acting and teaching, but also trying to Get The Next Job.  For a while it was about simple survival; keeping our heads above water financially while persuing our acting careers. Then the kids came along and, since then, for me, it has been all about them.  With some Pilates teaching thrown in.

Now I'm coming back to me.  I want to work, but I want more than a paycheck.  I want it to mean something, to be useful.  And enjoyable.  It doesn't have to be perfect.  But I don't want to do something that doesn't contribute in some way.  I realize that in this economy I might be pushing it, but I also know that if I put my focus on finding the meaningful stuff, I WILL find it.

So, I'll spend the next little while enjoying life & being thankful for some free time.
And we'll go from there.