It’s Monday morning at the Winfield fairgrounds. The leaves of an enormous cottonwood quake and rattle in the cool September breeze. Cars hum by on U.S. 160, but few campers are stirring, even at 10 a.m.
Except for a group of yogis gathered under a large green- and white-striped tent in the Walnut Grove.
“I started this because of being a musician,” says, Lucy Weberling, a Kripalu-style yoga teacher from Tulsa who runs a studio called Inner Smile Yoga.
In the quieter days leading up to the start of the Walnut Valley Festival, Weberling offers festival goers morning yoga sessions ? and a much-needed chance to limber up their bodies before another hard day of playing music.
Weberling plays rhythm guitar, mandolin and upright bass and says sitting in a chair for hours playing an instrument can wreak havoc on shoulders and hips, so she leads her group of students in a series of hip flexes and arm stretches.
“The hips get pretty tight from sitting and pickin’,” she says, instructing everyone to get on all fours and point their derrieres skyward. “Wag your tail…explore your hips.”
Just shy of one dozen, the WVF yoga class is one of the smallest festival groups Weberling leads. She attends bluegrass festivals all over the country, in Minnesota, New York and Austin, where up to 100 people show up for a good stretch. Even though she’s got a big banner hanging up at her camp displaying her website, www.festivalyoga.com, she says it’s been hard to garner much interest in the pre-festival sessions in Winfield. Still, she’s happy to cater to the smaller crowd and intersperses her poses with reminders about breath.
She tells everyone to breathe deeply, then force all the air out of their lungs.
“Squeeze out the toxins,” she says, “squeeze out the beer, squeeze out the wine…”
The group erupts into giggles.
She moves on to the feet.
“We do a lot of walking in Winfield,” she says as everyone points their toes and rotates their ankles. “You can’t baby your feet enough.”
Throughout the session, Weberling encourages her yogis to open their hearts and pay attention to their bodies. She says striking a perfect pose is not the point.
“Yoga is not about the pose,” she says. “It’s about connecting with what’s going on in your body.”
Weberling takes the class into a standing squat pose to work on opening the hips while strengthening the legs. As the seconds pass, with everyone standing still as trees, focusing on their breathing and attempting to ignore the mounting tension in their thighs, she reflects on the moment.
“Sometimes bluegrass festivals are about endurance…” she says to more chuckles. “Enduring…It’s only Monday.”
The hour passes quickly…and quietly. The only sounds are the continued tinkling of the cottonwood trees and a distant voice singing “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”. Weberling ends the session with everyone on their backs, breathing deeply and melting into a relaxed state.
As the class folds up their mats and begins to disperse a few remark on the things they liked about the session. For some it was the balancing work in tree pose. For others, the meditative state achieved worked wonders.
Weberling’s yoga class is “one of the best things to do” at the festival, according to fellow camper Heidi McClure of Monument, Colo.
For Dan Duggin of Sedro-Wooley, Wa. ? who’s attending the WVF for the 20th time since 1980 ? it’s a chance to keep up with his yoga practice.
“I feel better,” said Duggin. “I actually work for a woman who teaches yoga. I’m not real consistent, but I sure feel good when I do go.”
Weberling is a certified yoga instructor who studied at the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health in Lennox, Ma. She says Kripalu is a special style that incorporates body, mind and spirit and can help people in their every day lives.
“It’s a yoga that’s like meditation in motion,” she says. “By tuning into your own body you can better know yourself.”
Weberling will hosted a yoga session Tuesday and will host one more Wednesday starting at 10 a.m.
