Yoga is weird. It illuminates all kinds of issues that you don’t anticipate when you step on the mat. Like today, for example, and how my reaction to realizing that I utterly stunk of garlic, highlighted how I tend to prioritize other people’s comfort over my own needs or health.
When I was a child (and even now) my father behaved as though stinking of garlic was a form of chemical warfare. “Someone ate garlic last night. I can smell it. I hope you didn’t go out in public stinking like that. I feel sorry for your friends at school who had to sit next to you.” That kind of feedback.
My husband oddly enough doesn’t smell garlic on me at all, so over the years I’ve only really panicked about eating garlic when I realize that I’m going to be around other people (or my father). When I first took up yoga a year ago, I would sometimes think to myself, “Gosh, maybe I shouldn’t go to yoga this morning. I ate garlic last night. I’m sure to stink of it even though I showered.” But I’d decide that my health was most important and going to yoga, getting on the mat, was more important than stinking of garlic. And I was also assured by my husband (who can’t seem to smell it on people, mind you) and my wonderful sister-in-law that I was ridiculous about this garlic thing and it was no big deal.
Cue several months into my yoga journey when I overheard three teachers discussing another student, saying, “…and she always smells like garlic. Sometimes when I go to adjust her, whew, it’s tough.”
BOOM.
Since that point, I’ve actually skipped yoga class sometimes if I ate garlic the night before. This is true facts right here. I HAVE SKIPPED YOGA BECAUSE I ATE GARLIC SO THAT I WOULDN’T MAKE ANYONE ELSE UNCOMFORTABLE. Anyway, wow, I blew the epiphany I had today and the climax of my story, because it’s basically that sentence right there.
But, yeah. So last night I went out to dinner with a friend who attends yoga with me and had tons of garlic. It was delicious. Mmmm. And only at the end of the meal did I realize that we had a yoga class in the morning. I gasped and said, “Oh no! We have yoga tomorrow and we just ate all this garlic!”
She looked at me like I was an insane person, because apparently her fears about garlic are much more right-sized than mine. Heh. “So?”
“We’ll stink of garlic.”
“So?”
“Well, yeah. So…yeah. Okay. Well, we’ll stink of garlic.”
“I guess we will.”
And she was done with that because, unlike the subject of ticks, which makes her a blubbery mess due to her phobia, she isn’t at all freaked out by garlic or stinking of garlic.
So today in class, despite showering both last night and this morning, I could actually taste the garlic in my sweat. Yep! That’s how much garlic I ate! And I could smell garlic rising around me as I worked up a sweat, as though I’d actually been dipped in an aromatic garlic oil.
And as I continued with my yoga, I had this realization that I live my life this way. I often neglect my own needs or health in order to prevent other people from being uncomfortable. And sometimes that priority has to change. There are times when it’s okay to be selfish and to say that my priority should be my health. That it’s more important for me to be on the mat, doing my yoga, even if I smell like garlic, than it is for everyone else in the room to be comfortable.
To clarify, though, this is only true if the issue causing discomfort is an occasional thing. Like, I don’t intend to start eating gobs of garlic every night and going to yoga every week reeking like a string of garlic is hung around my neck. I’m just saying that there are times when my priority should be me, especially when the outcome for me is health-related vs someone else merely being uncomfortable for a few minutes.
I’m also saying that I shouldn’t let concerns like this interfere with my yoga practice. Sometimes I don’t have to be the appealing, smiling, powdered, shiny creature that attracts people and draws them in. It can be okay to occasionally be stinky, sweaty, and repellant in the name of a larger good.
As per the usual with my yoga posts, I always think I’m going somewhere profound with them when I start, but they sort of peter out at the end. I can’t see how I can wring more meaning out of eating garlic than this, so let’s just leave it at that.