As one starts to practice yoga it is easy to get carried away. We either want to master the yoga poses that our neighbour is good at – or just want to blend in with the rest of the class. If you are a yoga teacher, it is natural to feel the pressure of standing as an example, to be able to do everything with ease and elegance.
The truth is even for an experienced yoga instructor, certain yoga poses can be hard. There will be poses that you handle elegantly, and then there will be poses that you can’t handle that well.
Yoga is not about dreaming of something different from what reality presents us. It is about letting yourself go and accepting you the way you are. Don’t push yourself to perfection. Practice mindfulness, perfection will follow.
To make this process easier, there is a little something that I did, which helped me.
- Connect with your breath
Breathing is life itself. Yet it’s surprising how less we connect with it. When was the last time you were truly curious about your own breath?
“Breath is the bridge which connects life to consciousness, which unites your body to your thoughts.” – Thich Nhat Hanh
There are two types of breathing – unconscious breathing and conscious breathing. As the name suggests, unconscious breathing is the normal involuntary state of breathing, something that we hardly notice. Whereas, conscious deep breathing is controlled by the cerebral cortex. It engages your brain more effectively and has the power to alter even your emotions.
Inhale deeply. Exhale fully and deeply. Welcome to living.
- Learn your body positions
You don’t have to be a yoga expert to notice the position of your body. Take a conscious effort to notice your body postures as you do your daily chores; learn and perfect them as time goes.
So, next time when you are walking home from your work or while having dinner with your friends, take a moment to analyse what’s going on with the positions of your body.
If you are putting more weight to one side of the body, make a conscious effort to regain the position of balance. If you notice putting that extra unnecessary tension on your jaw, hands or shoulders, take a deep breath and free yourself from it.
There are many other ways yoga can reflect your life in a much better and balanced way.
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Love.