#Yoga

I unlock my phone and turn on the camera. I switch it to selfie mode. I place it on the floor, propped up against the wall. I roll out my yoga mat and I pose for a picture. I upload it to Instagram. #Yoga. I turn on my iPad and play ‘Yoga with Adriene’. I think “Okay, let’s see what all the hype is about”. But after 2 minutes in, I’m thinking “How? How? How am I supposed to do that? What do you mean keep breathing? What is supposed to be happening right now?” I exit out of YouTube and walk to the kitchen for a snack. “Why the hell do people do yoga?”

Yoga caught my attention about 3 years ago. I came across it on Instagram and thought “maybe this can get me to do a split” – something I always wanted to learn how to do ever since I was exposed to gymnastics as a kid. I figured, if I could practice yoga consistently, I can become more flexible. The key though, is to do it consistently. That was something that took a while to get to. I would dabble the first year and get frustrated when it felt like there wasn’t any progress. But I was stunting my own growth by wanting to do it for all the wrong reasons. Being able to do a split, stand on my head, or wrap my leg around my neck, were not strong enough reasons why I would want to stay committed. But after finding a consistent flow, I soon realized the real benefits of yoga. Now, whenever anyone tells me about any of their ailments; physical, emotional, or mental, I tell them they should do yoga. I’m so persistent with it that I’m practically begging. ‘Please. Only ten minutes a day, 2 days a week. Don’t even call it yoga. You can call it stretching. Little by little becomes a lot. Ten minutes will turn into twenty and you’ll notice your well-being improve tremendously over time.’ Because there’s nothing I love more than to be able to help people improve the quality of their life.

Recovery

Tension in your muscles and pain in your body, are indications of stored stress that need to be released. Both physical interactions and emotional events cause this sort of energy build up. Stretching and breathing deeply, helps to release it out of your body. There’s no way to avoid stress entirely, in life and in sports, but the key is to learn how to manage it. A session of yoga after a workout, a game, or a long day of work, helps you to recover faster. It doesn’t matter if you were lifting weights, running for an hour, or storing stress in your neck and shoulders, there’s a yoga pose and flow that targets every inch of your body. It helps to relieve the tightness that you feel and reduces the soreness that may come after a physical activity. You cannot avoid the pain and the discomfort, but if you want to get through it you need to lean into it. Yoga helps you do that. It’s not about being able to do what the person in the video is doing, it’s about finding what works for you and personalizing your flow to meet your own needs.

Peace of Mind

A scattered mind is a lost mind, and it’s necessary that you bring it back home. And the present moment is the only moment where you truly reside. When we are worrying about so many things that have either happened in the past or expect to happen in the future, it’s as if fragments of our thoughts are traveling in outer space, causing anxiety. Yoga helps you to bring those fragments back home and makes your mind whole again. It’s how you center your mind with your body, creating a calm and collected state of mind. It does so by teaching you how to breathe effectively; slow, deep and through your nose. Breathing is used as the vehicle that drives you out of those scattered thoughts and into quietness. By focusing on your breath, you pull your focus away from everything else. It’s a way to achieve mindfulness, slow down time and bring you to the present moment. When you’re in this state of mind, you are able to think clearly, improve your focus and make better decisions. It’s why I make sure to get a session in before something big like a job interview, a first date or a tough conversation with someone. Because my mind can race if I give it a track to run on. And it won’t stop until my head hits my pillow. But yoga has taught me how to manage the running thoughts; to think through them instead of allowing them to run through me. When I find myself struggling in a particular yoga pose, it’s because I haven’t let go yet. I haven’t surrendered to the present moment. My mind is elsewhere. And the more I practice gaining control over my mind on the mat, the more it becomes second nature off of it.

If I could bottle up the feeling that is earned after a session of yoga, I would give it out for free. The lightness that you feel, the clarity of your mind and the sense of peace that comes over you is something that I wish for everyone. But unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way. The benefits cannot be achieved without putting in the work. The good thing though, is that it doesn’t matter how old you are or your current flexibility, yoga is for everyone. It only seems intimidating, because we are so quick to compare our level one with someone else’s level ten. All you need to do is start where you are. I’m still unable to do a split, but I’ve learned so much about myself, that the journey has been much more valuable than any destination I ever had in mind.