Ash Bond - The Handstanding Yogi: The Hows, Whys & Wtfs of Being Upsidedown

Copyright 2017 Ash Bond and Gabrielle Parker

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

Matador

9 Priory Business Park,

Wistow Road, Kibworth Beauchamp,

Leicestershire. LE8 0RX

Tel: 0116 279 2299

Email: books@troubador.co.uk

Web: www.troubador.co.uk/matador

Twitter: @matadorbooks

ISBN 9781788034296

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd

This book is written as a guide to help you on your individual journey upside down. It is not meant as a replacement for a good teacher.

Especially if you are new to inversions or are on a healing journey, please check with a medical professional as to your fitness and suitability for exercise.

Handstands are magical things. Please use this magic wisely with no other intention than to increase your own unique brand of awesome.

You are awesome.

In gratitude,

To our parents and housemates who let us use their kitchen tables to write this book.

And to our students, who will always be our best teachers.

Why do you want to climb Mount Everest?

Because its there.

George Mallory in

Climbing Mount Everest is work for Supermen,

The New York Times, 1923

Contents

The Handstander: Gabby. 411. Professional acrobat and handstand teacher. Gabby is a terrible yoga student, although she tries.

The Yogi: Ash. 52. Yoga teacher and writer. Ash can not really handstand, please dont ask her to.

Prologue

BRISTOL, FEBRUARY 2015

D ont cheat, I see everything.

I was squeezing everything. I looked at myselfupside down in the studio mirror, the person staring back at me was red-faced and noticeably twitching. Oh my god, that person also looked like she was crying.

Calm down, you absolute moron. I tried to blink the tears away, the tears which were mercifully at least indistinguishable from the sweat rushing from my toes all the way to my sticky fingertips.

I was tired, I was embarrassed and I was 100% sure I had made the wrong decision in coming here. I mean, what was I doing in a handstand class?

This was all coupled with the increasingly obvious truth that I had made very bad handstand clothing choices my voluminous tee that I had attempted to stuff into my running leggings had managed to wriggle free almost immediately and fallen to expose my trusty sports bra that was working, and failing, to stop my boobs escaping defeated by gravity. This is how people die upside down, I thought: ineffectual sporting attire. A few haggard breaths later and I crumpled gracelessly to the ground.

I had arrived that rainy Bristol evening to local teacher Gabrielle Parkers popular and infamously humbling handstand class. An hour before Id been supervising Homework Club, handing out pencils, tackling algebra equations and policing the photocopier (dont even think about printing that in colour) but in the jog from school to studio I had transformed tired yet confident teacher was now delicate and bricking it student.

Actually I had arrived late, and my first interaction with Gabby Gabbatron Parker was her asking me politely, yet firmly, to do push-ups as recompense. I stared at her. She stared back as if to say glaring at me is all well and good but it wont make you better at handstands. You know what will make you better at handstands? Push-ups. I decided absolutely in that moment that her, me and most certainly handstands were not going to get on.

It was now 6 months later and I was only just beginning to forgive her.

Love is a temporary madness, it erupts like volcanoes and then subsides. And when it subsides, you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is.

Louis de Bernires, Captain Corelli's Mandolin

So seriously, tell me, what is the big deal with handstands in yoga? Gabby still hadnt looked up from her phone where she was flicking quizzically through sunset-filtered photographs as if they were profiles on a Tinder account. Would I want to date this handstand? Swipe right for yes, left for no.

I shrugged, suddenly intently interested in my latte as I swirled it with a spoon. Yeah, thats alright for you to say, I thought enviously. You can do a handstand. Only people who can actually do handstands are allowed to say theyre not a big deal.

Wed met in Bristols rapidly gentrifying hipster hub of Stokes Croft. Our new favourite caf was squeezed between a pop-up bakery and a place to buy artist prints and hand-painted cushion covers. It was our favourite because it sold avocados, eggs and coffee all of our favourite things in all possible permutations. The cafs clientele consisted predominantly of squads of students and the self-employed, the ranks of which Gabby and I joined gleefully. Occasionally, only very occasionally, a customer would try and charge a non-Apple product under one of the large rustic tables and they would be stared at, the onlooker confused as to why they would make their life so much harder than it actually had to be. No, really, ignoring the eye-rolling, Gabby waved her (Apple) phone at me: an Instagram picture of an upside down Beach Yoga Girl flashed before my face. Its like if you have a good handstand, it makes you some kind of Yoga god. I mean, is it really that impressive?

Well yes, I thought, yes it is.

Gabby tapped the screen pointedly. You know what is impressivelook at those insane hamstrings, so freakin flexi!

I felt cornered. Myself and my yoga compadres were getting called out and I did not have an answer. Gabby was right of course posters for handstand workshops cover the walls of studios, quietly yet earnestly multiplying and pushing the yinner offerings out to the fringes, like big fat papery acro-cuckoos.

For some, these acrobatics represent a shallow temptation to students stuck in the lower limbs of the yoga hierarchy, drawing them with promises of extreme strength, flexibility and fame. For others, a handstand is a celebration of freedom, a tantalising physical goal that deserves its place at the yoga table due mainly to the disciplined practice it takes to achieve.

It is however a truth that within this fast-growing yoga biz the handstand is held up as something of a pot of gold, an elusive reward at the end of the yoga asana rainbow. Those who have achieved it are revered as epic heroes, returning from a long and treacherous voyage and are showered with appreciative nods, Instagram likes, sponsorship deals and guest spots at festivals.