“Good morning, everyone,” Jack said to his students in the studio later that week. “How are we today?”
“Good” resounded in the studio.
“Glad to hear it,” Jack responded. “Personally, I’m on a high. My Auntie Arts charity benefit at The Glass House is coming up. I’m so excited for that night and to deliver the money raised to the women and children of West Bengal. And I’d like to say a special thank-you to Adair, who has devoted so much of her time and energy to making the event a success.”
Jack looked over at Adair and smiled warmly. She looked haggard but beamed, obviously thrilled by his acknowledgment.
“This morning I’m going to share with you what brought me to yoga and how it redefined my life. It may help you on your journey to find greater daily peace. I know from our interactions that many of you sought out yoga as a way to find greater happiness in your life. I sought it for the same reason. I was at a desperate breaking point when I did. Nothing in my life had worked out as I had hoped and planned.
“I grew up in a wealthy suburb in Massachusetts very similar to Cannondale. My father was a general practitioner, and my mother didn’t work outside the home until my four brothers and I were in middle school. Then she started selling real estate, which she still does today. Sadly, my father passed away several years ago.
“As a child, we lived near Nantucket Sound, and I spent most of my free time sailing. I was fortunate enough to attend Georgetown on a sailing scholarship. Needing to get serious about a career, I went back to school for an MBA, and at the end of my second year at Georgetown, I started my professional career on Wall Street working on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. It was brutal.
“I quickly realized that I was not cut out for it, and although I worried about disappointing my parents, I quit. After some soul searching, I decided to work for a nonprofit. I knew I wouldn’t make enough money to support the same lifestyle I had growing up, but it was the beginning of my awakening to how limiting that life is; the myopic focus toward making more and more money it creates, the related limitations, and all the things you miss when money is your goal.
“So I joined Boston’s CANstruct, which builds schools in impoverished countries, as a product manager. Time passed and I eventually rose to be the head of Global School Production in its India division. I enjoyed the people I worked with and felt I was doing some good although the poverty and disease there is endemic. But we were providing education to a number of them and employing others.
“Then there were a series of very violent monsoons that caused flooding. Buildings were destroyed and hundreds of people died. We lost a number of our Indian and American workers, including my fiancée, Sarah Wells, who was the VP of Global School Production.
“I was devastated by her loss, and I sank into a depression so deep that I was eventually asked to leave CANstruct. I moved home and, thanks to a combination of therapy and yoga classes, I started to get better. I knew of yoga’s physical benefits—I practiced in college with my sailing team and developed a love during my time in India—but during this awful phase of my life, when I felt so lost and like such a failure, it gave me great peace.
“I wasn’t raised to run away from a tough job, but I did. I wasn’t raised to get fired from a nonprofit, but I did. I wasn’t raised to turn into a lost soul when someone I love dies, but I did. Everything had gone opposite of the expectations placed on me. I knew my parents loved me, but when I was growing up, my achievements were always closely tied to that love and their reactions to me. I was supposed to become a success in the classic New England way and accumulate a bunch of adjectives that would define me as a winner: educated, esteemed, athletic, and successful—all the things praised in men in our society.
“At that time, I felt nothing but athletic. Yoga and its teachings taught me to value myself simply for myself, beyond my adjectives, my accomplishments, beyond societal expectations. It taught me to not fool myself into thinking that impermanent things are permanent. To not place importance or faith in them. That was about fifteen years ago.
“Although I will never go back to working in the financial world, I have missed my nonprofit work since becoming a yogi. To fill the void, I set up the charity I’ve been telling you about called Auntie Arts. Its first major benefit is coming up and the night is going to be fantastic! Amazing people just like you mingling in the beautiful setting of the historic Glass House, enjoying classic and pop Indian music, hors d’oeuvres provided by Katherine’s—my good friend Kate Musto’s catering company—and cocktails, all for a good cause. The event’s proceeds will fund a large building where the women will work as well as an on-site daycare and school for their children. I’ll tell you more about it as we get closer.”
His speech finished, Jack smiled broadly. He glanced around the room before positioning himself onto his knees. “Now, let us begin the movement part of class by shifting into the gentle child’s pose, balasana.”
From that pose, Jack led the class through a series of sun salutations: mountain to tree to triangle to half moon to warrior. With each pose, with each repetition, the students’ bodies became a bit more limber, their stretches a bit deeper. Eventually, Jack instructed his students to move into downward-facing dog.
“Stay in this pose for a few minutes,” he said. “It’s one of the best shoulder stretches in yoga.” Minutes passed. The class was then told to move to plank and then to cobra, and finally to rest prone on their stomachs with their heads down on the mat.
“Given the difficulty of holding downward-facing dog for that long, we are going to indulge in two rests during class today,” Jack said in a loud whisper. “We are going to take five minutes here and then do a series of seated poses for fifteen more minutes before shavasana. Close your eyes. Breathe. Take this opportunity to be still. You have nowhere to go. You have nothing to do. Allow your mind to wander. Dream.”
Jack moved to Kate. He straddled her, first massaging her lower back and then moving his hands to her buttocks. He pressed his thumbs deep into her gluteus medius muscles.
“A few more moments,” Jack shared with the class. “Breathe in long, deep breaths,” he said, stressing “long” and “deep.” Jack’s hands curved under Kate’s body and, as he leaned forward, moved toward her breasts, lightly brushing them.
With the exception of breathing, the room was silent. A few women had fallen asleep.
As Jack pulled his hands back along Kate’s torso and rested them on her hipbones, he said, “Let go of who you think you are. Let go of the stories you tell yourself—the stories that you think define you. You are not just a wife or a mother. You are not just an employee or a daughter. You’re not the sum of your possessions. You are you. Embrace the beauty of who you really are, who you really want to be.”
Jack gently lifted his hands from Kate and moved back to the front of the room.