Risky business

A couple of weeks ago I suddenly learned how to stay upside down. I'm not being weirdly metaphorical here, the upsidedownness being part of my (nearly daily) yoga practise. The thing is, I've been doing yoga for years now, and I've never been able to do headstands. Or those crab things. Or for that matter most things involving significant upper body strength. I could do all sorts of things which came easily to me but somehow managed to forget to practise the difficult stuff, the stuff I didn't feel I had the confidence to try. As my yoga teacher pointed out to me, we all have a position which comes naturally to us, that we can't imagine not being able to achieve effortlessly, and the rest we have to work towards. It kind of helped every time I felt like everyone else could do something which completely stumped me, realising that I had my own secret power too.