A couple of mornings ago, I was doing my yoga practice, one that has been part of my life for over 25 years. I realized it now felt like I was doing it for the first time. About a month ago, I reached into the back seat of my car to pick up a box of avocados. Holding the box to my chest, I began to walk away. By the second step, I felt a very different kind of pain in my left thigh.

I have to tell you a very quick story about my left leg. Around a dozen years ago, I got a dangerous infection, requiring three surgeries and a skin graft. It was an incredible ordeal. I am thrilled to have my leg and it has worked really well for me, but it’s been kind of compromised. When you tamper with the body’s alignment, a cumulative kind of damage happens. A life time of running fueled the imbalance and the box of avocados lit a very short fuse and there went the leg.

I just want to say a little about pain, but that is definitely not what’s on my mind. During that initial go around with the infection, I experienced levels of pain I don’t want to try and explain to you, because I cannot. There is no vocabulary for that kind of intensity. It is like this secret that you can’t possibly share. It is a riveting reminder of our being alone in the world. There are just some things that only belong to each of us and no other.

I am big into my routines. Man, when I lock on to something, it is pretty much a life time commitment. My mornings have pretty much been a Groundhogs Day regimen for decades. I roll out of bed in the dark, grab the phone and set the timer for 25 minutes. I sit on my cushion, facing a very simple altar with a long story. I get a cup of coffee and waste at least 45 minutes online. It’s then around a 30 minute yoga practice, followed by a run for around the same amount of time. It has been my normal for years. It’s been something I just do.

After The Avocado Incident, I was bedridden, a tortoise on his back. The pain was reminiscent of what I tried to forget from the horror show of years before, that’s how intense it has been this time around. One of the many lessons from that earlier time is that pain is the way into the mess and unfortunately, it is the way out. You have to let the body heal itself by minimizing the stress you put it through, like when you see an animal licking and licking an injury. It’s a bad idea to hurry the healing.

When you achieve a certain threshold of recovery, the time comes to be proactive and that’s another part of this entire equation that truly sucks, especially if you are doing it correctly. Correctly means to me that you want to get back to where you were before the injury and you want to work to prevent it from happening again.

The bar for me involves being able to fluidly go through my yoga workout, the same one I’ve always been doing, now incorporating some preventive measures to avoid this leg drama ever again. It likely means my running days are over, replaced by the incredibly boring, stationary bike. I confess to having gotten one and it really isn’t that bad. My body craves the heart workout after decades of running and I’ve been pleasantly surprised how good I felt after carefully stepping off the bike. The fact that a headset now wraps my whole body in my favorite music while I’m peddling is a magical mind medicine.

When you actually start rehabbing on your own, I guess it depends on what would you’d consider to be normal, in terms of where you want to get to. I am kind of screwed, because of a regimen that has been part of my personal identity for many, many years. I am not sure which has been more of a barometer for my overall health, yoga or running. Based on the nature of my injury and the history of my legs, I have a feeling that running is likely gone. However, I want to do yoga until I die. I occasionally want to be able to still fantasize about having the grace of ballet in assuming and holding my postures.

You would think my morning Zen sit would be the easiest return, but I have known it would be last, because the cushion is waiting for me to stop moving. It will be like my spiritual reward for busting my ass to get back in shape. If I bumped into the Buddha, he’d hopefully say this healing time is my meditation and not to worry about it.

I had been easing back into my yoga practice for several days. On that morning, I had a flash of how incredibly intimate this whole thing has been for me and it ain’t over by a long shot. Every morning, I begin a conversation with my body to see what I can expect for the day. When my leg hurts a bit too much in yoga, I sit down and gently rub my leg, closing my eyes and vibing a healing energy through touch. In this process, I am continually being reacquainted with myself as I slowly reinhabit the once familiar.