So I showed up on time for my yoga class, feeling down in the mouth and fat. Class began and I moved through the sun salutations, focused on my unattractiveness. Too heavy. Too old. Oh woe, woe, woe.

It’s amazing how focused a woman can be when she’s hating herself.

Then I spied a younger woman in a sexy leotard working through her postures on the other side of the room. “Now SHE is beautiful,” I said to myself. Was she a dancer? Small features, lithe body, intelligent face. I wanted to be her.

Somehow, I managed to get through class, moving through down dogs, warrior poses, inversions and shavasana. The yoga made me stronger, but there was still a wound remaining, a propensity to feel like hell.

As I was rolling my mat and folding my blanket, low and behold the beautiful woman came up to me! She hesitated before she spoke. What did she want? I felt fearful. “I was watching you the whole class and your postures were so beautiful,” she said to me with total frankness. “Oh gosh, how nice,” I stammered incredulously.

Then she said, “And I kept telling myself that if I kept at it, I’d someday do my postures as beautifully as you do yours.”

I left the studio in a daze.

How hard it is to see and truly love ourselves!

BEST OF CHATTERING MIND.