A is for Angst

This poor girl…she just wanted to do yoga without being confronted by the very real problems of the privileged, and then BOOM!  she had to look at a black person in her yoga class.  Obviously, the woman attended her yoga class only to direct her rage at poor Jen.  How could Jen tell?  The vibes man, the vibes…

“Because I was directly in front of her, I had no choice but to look straight at her every time my head was upside down (roughly once a minute). I’ve seen people freeze or give up in yoga classes many times, and it’s a sad thing, but as a student there’s nothing you can do about it. At that moment, though, I found it impossible to stop thinking about this woman. Even when I wasn’t positioned to stare directly at her, I knew she was still staring directly at me. Over the course of the next hour, I watched as her despair turned into resentment and then contempt. I felt it all directed toward me and my body.

If only someone had told her that the woman behind her probably couldn’t give a care about her.  Stereotyping the woman in your yoga class as a rage-filled depressive isn’t enlightenment.  You were all alone in that,  Jen.

Author: Susan X Jane

Susan X Jane is a diversity educator, speaker, and trainer and coach. A former professor and media literacy activist, she now consults with organizations looking to make sense of our current cultural shift. She thinks a lot about media and race…a lot...and writes and speaks about media…and race... and encourages everyone she meets to think about the way our identity shapes our experiences, ideas, and beliefs about the world. If you're reading this, she wants you to think about it too. Want to talk about it? Let's go. View all posts by Susan X Jane