Yoga from the Inside Out: Part 4

I met this elderly woman this summer named Lu.  She’s one of those people you meet and think to yourself, “I thought you people only existed in the movies.”  She and her husband are in their late 70s, the head cheerleader who married the captain of the football team.  Lu is simultaneously the epitome and the antithesis of what you would expect.  She is beautiful and giddy, and yet stubborn and passionate as hell, unafraid to call you out in a moments notice.  After meeting her for the first time, she hugged me and said, “I already love you more than I should.”  I’ve always thought that sentiment was the best example of who she is as well as what her and I have in common.  After reading Christina’s chapter on gurus, I realized that is exactly what Lu is to me.  In the later years of her life Lu decided to take her faith more seriously.  She learned how to read and write in Greek all on her own, and began translating the New Testament from its original language.  Now, she is a source of a wealth of knowledge whenever I feel like I’m reading the Bible but not exactly getting anything from it.  Lu encourages me daily, and roots for my faith and my studies constantly.  I really liked how Christina explained that everyone’s path is their own, and that it really is okay if your particular spiritual path does not lead you to pursue a relationship with a guru.  My relationship with Lu is not traditional.  I don’t sit and soak up all of her words as truth, and I don’t think she would want me to.  Her and I disagree on many topics, but the point is she allows me argue.  Lu knows that I grasp concepts best when I write about them and then discuss them with someone.  Most of the time when we’re debating, my ideas are not fully formed, and thus my opinions are weak.  Lu allows me to babble back and forth with myself until I finally get across my ideas or, more often, realize that I don’t actually believe a word I am saying and have to start from scratch.  She never treats me like I’m ignorant for disagreeing with her or for having half-baked sentiments about my faith, which always amazes me since she is so concrete in hers.  Lu is there to keep me moving.  She knows that any sort of stirring in me, even if it is struggle, is better than apathy towards my faith.  She knows that with every disagreement we have I am led to think more deeply about my faith, and that is progress to her.  Lu does very much what Christina suggests we all do for ourselves, and something I struggle doing for myself.  She accepts me where I am at.  She doesn’t expect anything from me.  She just cares, and she wants me to grow in all areas of my life.  Although, I’m sure she’d have a heart attack if I told her she’s my guru haha.