Beginning again

Lately my ordinary clumsiness has become more pronounced. My handwriting has deteriorated. The actual content of what I write fails to hit the nail on the head. I drop stuff. I have to throw away sewing projects—and cooking projects too. At first I thought it was the inevitable downward slide into age-related feebleness, or residual neuropathy with a side of chemo brain. And perhaps it is. 

But I'm thinking that the solution is a return to what yogis and Buddhists call "beginner's mind," an attitude of openness and absence of preconceptions. In yoga, a wide-eyed beginner is superior to a seen-it-all adept.

So I'm trying to approach even the most mundane tasks afresh, as though I were learning them for the first time, slowing down, paying attention to all the details, refraining from multitasking. Not easy for a Type A-minus woman with a to-do list extending into next year. But I'm trying. 

And I'm trying to apply the same method to yoga, which I'm re-entering after another herniation-induced hiatus. Go slow, pay attention to details, watch the transitions, get it right—but forgive myself if I get it wrong.