"Comedy is there to basically show us we fart, we laugh, to make us realize we still are part animal."
Robin Williams
Picture you are teaching a one-on-one class with a student.
In my case, we were working on breath work and energy work in a moving meditation class.
We started by sitting in chairs facing each other.
We had closed our eyes and were taking some DEEP breaths to help us relax.
All of a sudden I felt that my student was not sitting across from me anymore.
I opened my eyes and he was standing in the back of the room.
I said, "What's up?"
He said, "I gotta fart."
I tried to be as cool as possible with that statement.
What I mean by that is I tried so hard not to laugh about it.
It was funny and endearing and...
FUNNY!
When is anyone so REAL with someone they don't know well; someone they are just beginning to trust?
Mind you, the young men who I taught in juvenile justice took my class after they having their dinner and a shower.
YOU KNOW that gas will sneak up on you after you eat; especially if you are eating a more institutionalized diet.
He said he wanted to be respectful of me and not "stink me out" with the smell. I said that it was perfectly OK and not to be concerned about it at all.
Then he said: “Yea, it's a natural body function."
I was so proud of him for having that attitude.
My students could be so real and genuine, that is why I loved teaching them. They've been through tough times and can still be honest.
Sometimes VERY honest!
So he stood there waving his gym shorts around and actually very discreetly taking a whiff to see if it smelled.
Can you imagine?
All out of respect for me AND so he wasn't holding it in struggling with pain for an entire class.
Maybe we ALL can take a lesson from that.
Then he simply came back to the chair and we finished up the session.
It happened to him again at the end of the class, but by then we were completely relaxed about,
I chuckled because little did I know that it would become an all too regular occurrence in ALL of my classes.
I would be teaching and all of a sudden someone would yell "Oh man, that's disgusting." then there would be a parting of the Red Sea away from one of the students in the class. There was no hiding who actually committed the "offense".
"Sorry, Ms. KaZ."
"Come on, that's ok. It's natural. I hope you are feeling better."
"Yea, A LOT!"
I would then tell the story about someone I knew who hated when women burped or farted. Women, not men, women.
Or maybe it was just me.
This person said it was gross and unladylike.
He could fart and burp away but for me or another woman to do it - absolutely not!
It makes it difficult being in a relationship with someone and not being able to be yourself. Much less get any kind of relief from holding in the building gases until the "opportune" time to release them.
To this day I'm pretty shy about that.
My student looked at me with a very quizzical expression and said: "well, that sounds stupid".
All I could think of was the quote from the film Forrest Gump about stupidity. It says it all.
That leads me to the timeless and wise saying from the movie Shrek : "better out than in".
Maybe holding in our burps and farts is a metaphor for life.
Sometimes "better out than in".
Words to live by on many levels..
As always thanks for reading.
See you next week.
Or sooner!