You Need to Claim Your Space
By: Rose Bak
Tags: Teaching, Yoga, Life Lessons, Body Image, Self Love

For years I hid in the back of yoga classes, making myself as small as possible.

As a plus size person, I was always very aware that I was the largest person in any yoga class. It made me uncomfortable. I would see people moving into positions that I could not access easily, either because of the size of my body or because half of my spine is fused and does not bend.

Back then I thought that everyone had to look exactly the same in yoga poses, like those synchronized swimmers you see in the Olympics. I was the oddity, the one who didn’t fit in. So, I tried to be invisible.

For the most part, my yoga teachers ignored me hiding back in the corner, because they didn’t know how to teach someone like me.

Someone whose stomach got in the way in a forward fold. Someone whose spine can’t bend to do a wheel pose. Someone who needs an extra step to bring their feet to their hands when moving in and out of lunges. Someone who needs blocks and straps to move into certain poses. Someone who can’t do yoga the “right” way.

Yoga teachers did not know how my larger body worked — and they seemed to have no interest in learning, even though plus size people can benefit from yoga just as much as thinner people do.

Eventually I found a studio that specializes in accessible yoga. At my new studio every pose was offered with numerous options. The teachers encouraged the students to select the variation of the pose that worked best for them.

The teachers talked about bone structure and injuries and working with your own unique body mechanics. The teachers were unique as well, some larger, some older. Never in twenty years of practicing yoga had I heard teachers talk like this. It was revolutionary.

Because the studio had a motto of “unconditionally welcoming,” for the first time I was in classes with other larger people, older people, and people with disabilities. I looked around and for the first time I saw a yoga class full of people who did not fit the young, thin, Pinterest yoga model stereotype.

It was like coming home.

I felt empowered and gradually I moved away from the back corner. I began to take up space. When I stopped worrying about how I looked, my practice flourished, and I started connecting more with yoga.

One day in yoga class we were talking about this concept of taking up space. It was a “Curvy Yoga” class for larger people, taught by someone who is also curvy. As our teacher talked about the ways larger women in particular are trained to make ourselves as small as possible, I could see every head in the room nodding.

The teacher encouraged us to stretch our arms wide, widen our legs, to breathe deeply using our diaphragm, and to use all the props we wanted. Seeing the women in my yoga class use the expansiveness of their poses to take up space, I was heartened. I was energized.

Taking up space isn’t just about the physical space around your mat. Taking up space is also speaking up when the teacher asks if anyone has any requests for class. It’s about asking questions or waving the teacher over when you need assistance. It’s about deciding that a few moments in child’s pose is a better option for you than what the rest of class is doing.

Taking up space is about getting all that you want and need out of your practice.

Two years ago I decided to become a yoga teacher. I enrolled in the very first “accessible yoga” teacher training cohort at the studio where I practice, and there we learned how to teach people of all shapes and sizes and abilities.

“How would you adapt this pose if someone recently had a knee replacement?” our instructors would ask. “What would you suggest as an option if the person can’t get down on the floor? What if they only have one arm?”

The central focus in our training was on how to make the practice work for everyone’s unique body.

We were encouraged to teach the “heart” of the pose instead of one perfect shape for the pose. We learned that it’s not about doing a magazine-cover perfect pigeon pose, it’s about stretching the hip; we learned that you can do a sun salutation without ever getting up off the floor and still get the same benefits.

I teach classes at two studios now. The owners at both locations share a commitment to fully accessible yoga and creating an inclusive and welcoming environment. They have classes for larger bodies, BIPOC students, people who identify as LGBTQ, people who are in recovery from addictions. They strive to make their classes a safe space for people who don’t always feel safe in the typical yoga class.

When I used to practice at more mainstream studios, I was usually crammed into a room with thirty or more students, our mats only a couple of inches apart. It was difficult to claim any space in those classes, even if I had felt comfortable doing so. For me, the crowd was distracting, and it took away from my practice.

Both the studios I work and practice at now intentionally keep their in-person classes small, with as few three students, but never more than fifteen. This gives us all a larger “bubble” around our yoga mat so we can stretch out, use a chair or other props, move and reach without fear of intruding on another student’s space. We can each take up as much space as we like.

As a teacher, the small classes allow me to provide individual attention to each and every student. It gives me the ability to truly focus on guiding my students, to answer questions, offer options, and provide assistance when needed.

I was a substitute teacher at that same Curvy Yoga class a few weeks after the class where we talked about claiming space. I wore a tank top despite my jiggly arms, because part of taking up space is allowing my body to be comfortable in hot weather.

As we moved through the practice, we spread our arms wide and reached up towards the sky, without worrying about if our shirts were riding up and showing our stomach rolls. We widened our stance to allow space for our stomachs in forward fold. We used blocks to support our knees as they opened wide into cobbler pose.

I looked around the room, and every single student looked different in their poses. This was not “perfectly synchronized yoga!” All the students were focusing on the heart of the pose in a way that honored each of their unique bodies.

The practice was expansive, fun, and joyous.

At the end of our time together, I asked the students to put one hand on their heart and another on their stomach. I encouraged them to take three long, slow deep breaths, and to offer gratitude to ourselves and our bodies for the gift of our yoga practice.

We made space for ourselves and it was beautiful.

(A version of this post was originally published in the Accessible Yoga blog).