Linda
In class Tuesday, Mr. Iyengar took a woman in a wheelchair up to the stage. She was missing her right leg below her knee. Mr. Iyengar's senior teachers helped her up to the tressle (the horse). He took a Halasana bench and many blankets, and put this woman, with one leg, into Ardha Chandrasana (Half Moon Pose). On both sides. Then he took her into Virabhadrasana III (Warrior III). On both legs. I saw how kind Mr. Iyengar was with her. How gently he touched her. And how her body opened under his touch.
I found her later that night. She told me her name was Linda, that she lived in New Mexico, and has been practicing for 35 years. I asked her to tell me her story.
She lost her lower right leg in a car accident in 1990. She was coming home from a yoga workshop in Durango, CO, and ran into a Spring snowstorm. Her car rolled over and down 20 feet into a ditch. Her two companions weren't hurt, but her leg was instantly severed below her knee. That was in April. By September, she was back teaching yoga.
"This accident was about spirituality," she said, "not physicallity. It taught me to go into my yoga practice in a different way, and that my path was not to help other people, and to teach that yoga can work for any body".
This woman in a wheelchair looked at me with soft eyes and said, "As a teacher, it's been a blessing."
