Fabric-related balance

Recently my mother told me something that my sister had told her about yoga and balance. So this post comes to you possibly distorted by chinese whispers, but even with the distortion, it makes sense to me.

Apparently, the reason why balance, and specifically learning to balance while standing on only one leg, is so important in yoga is because it teaches you the inner strength to remain balanced even when life itself leaves you (metaphorically) standing on only one leg. I don't practice yoga, but since my mother told me about this I have been practicing standing on one leg. When my husband walked into the room and saw me making like a stork yesterday he asked what on earth I was doing. I explained the theory to him and now he's begun practising balancing on one leg too. When you're unsure what life may throw at you, the ability to stand one leg seems to be a good skill to be practised in.

Yes, it's disturbing to have to try and master inner balance on a maroon carpet, but I feel that if it can be achieved on this basis then I might just be one step closer to mastering, as my little boy would say, 'super-human mega strength'*.

Anyway, perhaps you came here to find sewing-related ramblings. I was trying to think of some tenuous link that I could pull at to make this seem like a legitimate post for what is meant to be a blog centring around sewing. But I couldn't find one. Until I had what seemed to me to be a Eureka! moment: I could try to stand on one leg, while holding some fabric in one hand and taking a photo of myself doing this using the other hand - I thought this to be a fabric-related challenge that might just make us all happy and make this blog feel thoroughly on target with its focus! And for the challenge to have been satisfactorily met, I decided that both myself and the fabric must be completely in focus. Above are some out-takes. There were a great many because it was a fiercely tricky feat that I'd set myself, so success was not immediately forthcoming. Eventually I realised that I was so involved in thinking about the fabric or the camera angle, that consequently I was wobbling all over the place. The moment I focused only on staying upright, my foot firmly rooted to the maroon atrocity beneath, my mission was accomplished.

I'm unsure what metaphor one can take from this to apply to real life...but you might like to know that the fabric featured in these shots is a Liberty Kingly needlecord purchased from ebay last year. It might one day become a skirt, but for now it has been returned safely to its drawer.

Wishing you a lovely weekend,
Florence

* Thus far this is a level of strength that my little boy has only attributed to his grandfather...but there's little harm in having high aspirations.