My foray into yoga has been a struggle. As a beginner, I assumed yoga required two things: flexibility and the ability to quiet your mind. Unfortunately, I've never been particularly good at either.

I blame the sit-and-reach test. Remember those elementary and middle school fitness tests? I could handle the pull-ups. But the sit-and-reach? That was always my downfall. While other kids stretched several inches beyond their toes, I could barely brush the tops of mine. That one test regularly kept me from achieving the highest level of physical fitness recognition.

Decades later, I still struggle to touch my toes. And while my flexibility hasn't improved dramatically, something else has. I've slowly started learning how to quiet the constant restlessness in my mind.

It started almost by accident. One day, I decided to try a restorative yoga class. When I walked into the studio, I quickly realized I was one of the youngest people in the room. I panicked for a moment, wondering if I'd accidentally wandered into a class I wasn't supposed to attend. But no one said anything, so I quietly rolled out my mat in the corner.

Then Debbie started teaching. Debbie has a wonderful sense of humor, and something about the way she explains breathing, movement, and being present just clicked for me. For the first time, I wasn't worried about whether I could reach my toes or hold a pose perfectly. I was simply there.

Now, every week, I join this group of mostly older yogis, and it's become one of my favorite parts of the week. So when Debbie announced that a drummer from Africa would be joining us for a special class, I knew I couldn't miss it.

His name was Masankho Banda, a storyteller, musician, and cultural educator from Malawi. As luck would have it, I arrived early enough to set up my mat right beside him.

From the moment he began playing, the energy in the room shifted. There was something powerful about hearing the steady beat of the drum fill a space I had come to associate with quiet breathing and gentle movement.

Masankho didn't need to explain the music. He let the rhythms do the storytelling. I felt goosebumps. Here we were, in a yoga studio in Charlotte, North Carolina, experiencing a beautiful intersection of movement, music, and cultures.

And then, of course, there was the yoga. I still struggled through Warrior III and my arms grew tired as we held Peaceful Warrior for longer than I would have liked. Apparently, live drumming doesn't magically improve flexibility or balance.

But something about the music changed the experience. The rhythms seemed to rise and fall with our movements, sometimes building in intensity, sometimes retreating into something softer. The steady pulse of the drum became a foundation for the entire practice.

Rather than concentrating on how much longer I needed to hold a pose, I found myself listening. And being present came a little more naturally. At the end of class, we settled into Savasana, the final resting pose. Masankho began to sing. He sang in both English and Chichewa, one of the languages spoken in Malawi. The song spoke of great rivers around the world—the Amazon, the Nile, and the Missouri.

Rivers that carry life, connect places, and shape the landscapes through which they flow. Then the words turned inward, describing ourselves as rivers, full of life, and the idea of being loved by the river in return.

I lay there listening, thinking about the rivers I'd encountered in my own travels and the unexpected connections between places that can seem so far apart. Before we left, Masankho taught us how to say thank you in Chichewa. And just like that, our ordinary weekly yoga class came to an end.

I rolled up my mat, gathered my things, and headed out into Charlotte. I hadn't boarded a plane. I hadn't crossed a border. I'd barely traveled beyond my usual weekly routine. But for an hour, a little piece of Malawi had found its way into my corner of North Carolina.