Very interesting that although you claim to be agnostic you practice yoga. You would think that such a strong self-avowed aggy would not be “saluting” and aknowledging the sun as her god. Do a little research, yoga is inseperable from the hindu religion which has a pantheon of gods. Why does every pose have the name of a prayer .Double standards people!! At least just call it stretching if you want to retain your cred.

We’ll pray for you…

Whether you like it or not.

Rob, how sad that you feel you must exclude something healthy from your life just because it’s originators wrapped it in religious hindu beliefs. I do not believe the hindu gods exist. But I can recognize the physical benefits of the exercise. When I do sun salutations I am greeting my morning and welcoming a new day. The “prayer” is symbolism and nothing more.

And why would I “just call it stretching” when it is more than that? The difference between you and me, Rob, is that you feel a need to run away from other gods and hide from them. I suppose you fear them. The gods mean nothing to me. I can enjoy my yoga and have no worries about accidentally praying to them because they’re not there.

Nature selected both my Overly-Sensitive-To-Stimuli Gene, and my Anal/Obsessive Gene, and passed them, magnified, to my son. These tendencies like to manifest themselves when I take off Aiden’s shoes but not his socks, when his pants are too long, when he has to wear a jacket, when I want to cover him in bed with a blanket, and when I need to put him in the car.

This is bad, considering we do these things everyday.

Fortunately, despite his proclivity toward vehicular hysterics, Aiden is actually an unusually calm soul, inclined toward observation and thought.

I have found the following method to work very well when he has these oubreaks:

#1 A one-word yell, one notch louder than Aiden’s screaming, such as “HEY!” This has the effect of momentarily stunning him into short-term amnesia. While I have him staring at me, I proceed to the next step . . .

#2 Instruct him to take a deep breath. I breathe with him, remembering that his deep breaths are twice as short as my own. Aiden picked up on the deep-breathing technique while watching me do yoga. He’s been doing it for a year now, so he has that advantage. He is now in a calm state, ready for guidance.

#3 Empathize.

“I know your shirt isn’t straight, honey.”
“Not straight.”
“You don’t like it.”
“Don’t like it, Mama.”
“But it’s not hurting you.”
“Not hurting.”
“You don’t like it, but you will be okay.”
“Okay.”

Somehow, this works. I don’t recommend it to other parents. It probably wouldn’t fly. That is, unless your child has the same strange combination of genes that mine has.

Yeah, I know it’s super-cheesey. But you can be cheesey with kids. That’s the fun part of being a parent.

It had occurred to me that I do sun salutations many mornings by myself. Why not involve my kids? It’s a nice way to begin the day with the family. It’s healthy. It teaches them mind-body awareness, deep-breathing, and introduces a positive outlook to their every day.

This morning, I asked the kids if they wanted to do Sun Salutations with me again. Trinity and Aiden jumped up from their lounging positions on the sofa, and made a circle with me. Blake, my oldest, stayed right where he was.

“You don’t want to do it today, Blake?”

His answer was one I never expected, “I already did it this morning in my room when I got up.”

Oh, how sweet is that? My 8 year-old boy initiating his own yoga Sun Salutation first thing in the morning! This is my boy, who needs very little sleep. He spends one quarter of his time in bed at night reading (I even found him reading at 3 am. recently), then hops out of bed around 5 am. as awake as a human body can possibly be, as if he’d had 5 cups of coffee and a Full Throttle to top it off. And now, after one quick lesson of Sun Salutations, he’s doing it himself in his room.

I love that kid.