yoga is…

Teenage life can be a torturous experience especially if you have a low self esteem. My life as a teenager was not as pleasant  as most of the girls would say, first learned that  I have special skin , the one that is not so smooth, I had bad pimples, crooked teeth, a body shape like a boy. All my friends were the girly girls if you know what I mean! I   gave myself  a new name because i thought my biological names did not suit my personality. (JOY) was the name i gave myself, it sounded fun, loving, happy , pretty, and so I was called Joy. My mother was shocked to hear my friends calling me with that name, she actually asked whom they were talking about, and my answer to her was ” mom you wont understand”. It was true she wouldn’t understood that i felt ugly, unloved, not girl enough! Joy was really fun, I made so many friends in a short space of time but they were all male. I felt like they didn’t judge me or laugh at me, I became part of them… I felt cool, like I belong somewhere. By the time I turned 18 I totally transformed into a different person, Joy was alive and rocking. At the age of 21 I started dancing, that was also a different enviroment altogether I met people who looked like me and worse. Artists, thats what we called ourselves or were classified under. I lost myself even more because I was more freer to express to do whatever i wanted in the name of art. Sometimes something in my head would tell me that what i was doing was wrong but my mind kept on saying follow your heart. I met a friend who till today is still my friend who used to ask me what I wanted in life, I could never give an answer because I didn’t know what i wanted. My career as a dancer succeeded, I started to even earn out it and travel as well. Joy is doing well, you know passports require your biological names…Bafikile,  Johannah Sedibe  is what (Joy’s) parents named her. My friends were surprised to hear of my real names but i justified and told them that they couldn’t fit three names in a passport. I was ashamed of my own name, my identity, i was afraid to loose friends and my coolness. To cut the long story short I took so many wrong turns for 9 years, good turns were there but… I’ve always wanted to travel and i did, throughout my journey I wanted to change something about myself but I didn’t know what, how and where to start therefore I would end at the same spot. My career took me to Singapore which is where I currently live and work, this is my 9th month in the country. My name is Bafikile Rapoo because I’m married now, but i carried (Joy) on my shouders all the time. You could say i have double personality, maybe, I can say i’ve been to hell and back since I came to  Singapore. Its not as scary as you think, my hell has nothing to do with the country but myself. I had a wake call, a very intense one if I may lightly put it… it completely turned my world upside down. I bought motivation books, cut my social life but I was still 6 feet in hell. Where I live they send us these home magz so one day I was just browsing through and I saw a school that offered Pilates training within a month so I called them agreed to go there the next morning, before I hung up the phone I inquired about the fees then I said there’s no way I’m paying that amount of money. Next day I  went to the school to see how they conducted the class, but they were doing yoga at that time so I asked to sit in, and so I did. Something was speaking to me in that class and before I knew it I was part of the course. Coming back to what YOGA IS… Remove all my inhibitions, doubts, thoughts , feelings be it positive or negative.I learned to know myself fully and truly! I can see my inner self, I can hear my own breath, yoga is teaching me to Trust myself. I finally took out (Joy ) out of Bafikile and the relief ! its amazing, I am transcending and growing not physically  but mentally , spiritually soulfully. I can bravely say that I Fierce. my whole being is balanced by practicing yoga, and not just any yoga Ashatanga yoga.I don’t need anything motivation from any book, I’m my own motivation. The quote ” actions speak louder than words” is true , I’m doing instead of saying I will do. I have direction because my mind and body are united with my soul and for the first time in 9 years I’ve taken the right path and its lonely but I’m content and at peace. that for me is what Yoga Is…I have gone up to come down.