Limp Mouth

Last week, I left my full-time job and the fabulous health benefits that accompanied it.  My benefits officially ended yesterday, February 28, 2011 (rest in peace) so I was scrabbling to get every health appointment possible before then. Yesterday, my last day of benefits, I went to the dentist to get SEVEN cavities filled.

Before going on, let me give you the top five reasons why my dentist is fabulous:
neck warmers
at your request, they reheat the neck warmers
dentist and assistant discussed Oscars while doing the work
the decor of the waiting room is such that you might mistake it for a hotel
free bottles of water, tea, coffee and cookies

Now that you have a sense of why my dentist is amazing, I'm in the chair and they are numbing me up. And everything the dentist does makes me grateful.  Like, I appreciate how he surreptitiously hides that long ass novocaine needle at his side so I don't have to look at it.  I'm a good yogi so I notice how I'm tensing up my neck and head and I'm wondering where I can engage my body to relax - udiyana bandha people!  That's right, I sucked my gut in and it did wonders.

As the first 8 shots of novocaine are sinking in, and I'm chatting with the assistant, I realize that I was so focused on getting my appointment in on time to teach my noon yoga class that I didn't consider my mouth would be numbed when I went to teach that class.  Hmmm.....

Sure enough, 1 minute before the class I'm scheduled to teach begins, I've got a limp mouth, as if I've had a stroke.  I hear my pronunciation of f, m, w and b as awful however two test subjects (people I pulled to the said and said, "flat back," "downward dog," and "om" in their face) couldn't discern an issue.  I went in to the studio, I taught my class and somehow, this limp mouth became my ally and I taught a great class.

But, this is what I'm talking about:  an Infinite Radar.  All that I was paying attention to, and man was I committed, was getting this appointment done in time to teach my class.  Somehow, in that context, the numbing never entered my awareness.  What could I put in place, what could I practice, such that I would be available to that consideration, too?  This isn't an inquiry from the position that something was wrong - my class went great and Lord knows the world won't end if I forget details here and there.  The inquiry is coming from a place that this lifetime is a magnificent game and I want to play well.