Somewhere in between

Theoretically, I should be reacclimated to my life here in Wellington again. I've taught four yoga classes now, taken a few more than that. My clothes are unpacked, the jet lag is gone, and I've said hello to and hugged everybody who missed me while I was gone.

I feel completely out of place here. I feel reasonably centered while I'm teaching yoga class - that feels good. But everything else just feels vaguely, slightly wrong. Or, I think more precisely, it feels like I'm slightly wrong for everything/everybody else. I am more quiet, more observant, and I feel much calmer in social situations, from spending time with Clodagh to hanging out with my friends, but I am coming across as, or being interpreted as, having no energy, being unenthusiastic, not being "the old me". Also, I have difficulty resisting the temptation to talk about yoga all the time, and it's making me into the Amway Salesman of Yoga, which sucks. It's making people less interested in trying or going to yoga. Gack.

Work is another whole episode of weirdness. I find that I'm sorta stuck in this "taking a step back, looking at the big picture" mode. I went to a meeting last week - normally I avoid group meetings because they're unproductive time wasters, but I figured I'd go as part of reentering work society. I found myself looking around the room and seeing people in various states of boredom, fatigue, disinterest, anger, agitation. A few smiles here and there, but largely the crowd seemed genuinely displeased with the goings on. Lots of looks of frustration - I know this is not an original or new observation, but it seemed so silly to me. Getting frustrated and angry over abstract things like the names of directories on file systems. I know those abstract things transform into non-abstract work and frustrations for people that are very real, but it was difficult to take seriously. Except that I can feel little tiny tendrils of that stuff creeping into me - I feel myself getting upset by the little abstractions too, if only in a small way. I still don't feel like I know what I do here anymore.

I take comfort in knowing that the rest of my fellow teacher trainers are experiencing something similar. Another thing I've noticed is the way that the return to "normal life" pulls me away from the place of health. It's not any single person, not any single thing that I can easily decide is no longer a healthy part of my life. Rather, it's a general inertia - a slide away from that place of feeling like my body and mind are coming towards some balance. It's a cup of coffee here, an early dinner there, a second helping, yeah why not have dessert, and so on. I'm letting myself slip back into comfort foods and missing yoga. I just don't want to feel like I am losing the gift that I gave myself over the last few months.

The cold and dreary assault of southern wind and storms upon Wellington are no doubt contributing to this feeling of despair.