Sterling Heights, MI – During Salamba Sarvangasana – or supported shoulder pose – in a recent yoga class, Roberta Shaeffer looked around at her fellow yogis to see how she compared to others. It didn’t go unnoticed.
According to other yoga students Shaeffer is often caught looking around at other students’ form with a self-satisfied look on her face. She will keep looking around until she finds someone she’s doing the pose in question better than. Once she spots an inferior yogi you can see her mind think “At least I’m better than him / her.”
“I saw her looking around one day,” said fellow student Michael Kline, “and figured she was making sure she was doing the pose right. It wasn’t until she spotted me that I saw she had this little smirk on her face that clearly said ‘if you say so’ and then she returned to her own pose. I’m new to yoga and this made me feel bad.”
“I try to help Roberta with form sometimes,” said her teacher, Jim Attleboro, “but she always shrugs me off and whispers ‘I got it’ to me. Once I move on she frantically looks around to see if anyone’s looking at her. When she realizes no one’s looking at her, she’ll then keep looking until she finds someone doing it even worse and then she audibly sighs.”
Schaeffer will typically say, “Keep at it, it gets easier” after class to those she’s deemed worse at yoga than her. This comes as a surprise to the recipients as they were not aware that they were being watched.
For the poses that Schaeffer struggles with she keeps her head down and prays no one is watching her, which they’re not.
