Little did I know when I sat down to my first yoga class, I was about to start on a path that would teach me lessons affecting every other part of my life as well
I remember sitting there, waiting for the instructor to begin my first yoga class. I wasn’t sure what to expect, was apprehensive about whether or not I’d be able to physically complete the poses — called asanas — and wondered if my body could handle it.
Now, almost twenty years later, I realize my concerns were for nothing. In fact, yoga teaches you how to feel discomfort, walk into situations where you don’t know what you’re doing and how to move your way through life with greater ease. This is what I’ve learned.
All Bodies Are Beautiful
Have you ever taken an Ashtanga class? I don’t mean ashtanga-based, but the real deal hard core ashtanga series.
It’s non-stop movement from asana to asana, and each pose requires lots of jumping, lifting, extreme balance and strength.
As you make your way through this grueling class, you find yourself marveling at how the bodies in the room move. You stop judging, noticing extra flesh or worrying what other people think and instead start to find extra space in your joints and marvel at the strength in your muscles. When you walk out, you will literally feel a greater confidence in the way you feel, stand and are.
Sometimes You Fall On Your Ass
Everyone looks ridiculous at some point while in yoga class, and chances are, you’ll end up falling many, many times. Try tree pose, crow pose or peacock, all of which ask you to balance precariously on some body part or another. In the same way, you’ll make mistakes at work, yell needlessly at your partner and forget to pay your health insurance bill.
Photo by Lululemon
It’s going to happens sometimes, maybe often, and the sooner you get used to it, learn how to laugh through it, the happier you’ll be.
You Can’t Do Everything
Fifteen years of practice, and I still cannot do a full back bend from standing. I’ve tried, I’ve done preparatory stretches to make my back more limber. I’ve tried abdominal strengthening postures to develop the necessary strength. Yet it still hasn’t happened for me.
I know one day I will eventually do it, but even so, there will be another pose, something else I won’t be able to complete. Yoga always presents you with another challenge.
You Achieve Your Goals Faster When You Don’t Force Things
We live in a world where we’re supposed to struggle and constantly move forward, but sometimes it’s better to just let your mind and body rest.
Try a seated forward bending pose. You sit legs straight in front of you and reach gently toward your toes until you feel the stretch. Now, if you attempt to make your body move more deeply into the pose by pushing and straining, you’re more likely to hurt yourself or get discouraged than reach past your ankles.
Instead, just sit in one place and breath for a slow count of twenty. I promise, by the time you reach your final number, you will be reaching more deeply than when you began. Often, farther than you thought you could go.
Consistent Practice Is More Important Than the End Goal
You’ve probably noticed I refer to yoga as a practice.
Photo by Axel Buhrmann
That’s because it’s meant to be something you do every day. Same applies to your life. Are you frustrated with your boss? Do you wish you didn’t watch so much TV at night? Would you like to take a dance class, but don’t know when, where or how?
Do just a bit today and again tomorrow, and you’ll find the effects cumulative. Over time, you stand a little taller, breath a little deeper and perhaps face the rest of your life with more confidence. You realize you have no where in particular to go, you’re already exactly where you are and need to be.
COMMUNITY CONNECTION:
Share with us the lessons and benefits you’ve found in your yoga practice. Or if you don’t yet have one and would like to, search for the perfect yoga retreat or begin a vipassana meditation practice. In the meantime, here’s some great advice from Christine Garvin to help you survive the holidays with a little extra calm.
About the Author
More By This Author
- Six Reasons It Sucks To Be A Parent (4 comments)
- Uberboober Vs Formula Funbag: Choose Your Weapon (40 comments)
- How Do You Measure Yourself? (11 comments)
Related Posts
21 Comments... join the discussion!
-
-
It most definitely helps with toning. Actually, I haven’t found anything that yoga doesn’t help with. Toning. Mental health. Pregnancy. Helps you sleep. Saves the environment. You hear me.
Yeah, we yoga-folk do tend to go on and on, don’t we?
↵ -
I love this! Started doing yoga regularly about 2 years ago, and I’ve totally learned a lot of the same lessons. Not to muscle or force, and to breathe through life’s challenges (“in the midst of a challenging moment, what can you let go of?”). Makes me feel like a total hippie. Aw well…
↵ -
Hippie shmippie. These days, yoga is punk rock anyway.
But I agree, when I started yoga, the way people talked sort of freaked me out. It felt so airy fairy. Now I find myself talking in the same way, but it feels totally normal.
Either way, I figure if you walk away from it having learned something or feel stronger, happier or more settled, it´s all good.
↵ -
I can totally relate to this! I’ve been practicing with the Jivamukti school for several years. I love their emphasis on the whole practice of yoga. There are actually 8 yogas, only one of which is the physical asana poses practice. The others have to do with mediation, non-violence in your life, learning to control your breath, letting go of the external, etc. It has definately made me more in tune with the natural world around me, and more at peace with myself. Great article!
↵ -
Thanks for mentioned the different types of yoga focus. I didn´t talk about it at all in this post, but the truth is, yoga does very much focus on things other than body position. I studied Sivananda for a few years, and when I began, I was surprised to find we started our day with long hikes in the woods and stopped after lunch to do karma yoga. Basically, we stopped to wash dishes, clean up, garden and basically help people out with whatever needed to be done.
↵ -
Well said!
I’ve been doing Bikram yoga for 7 years (minus a 1.5 year break twice for pregnancy and childbirth) and could say the same things. I’ve learned it’s better to try to do a pose properly, step by step, and if I only get to step 2 on that particular day I hang out there rather than try to push through.
And I rely on my yoga for good ideas. If I’m stuck somewhere, before class I think 1 last time about the problem I want to solve then I focus on the yoga. Every single time, an idea or answer or part of an answer will appear during class. Magic
↵ -
It does feel like magic, doesn´t it. Even after years of yoga, I still sometimes (often maybe?) forget that I should stop thinking about things so much and just try the yoga way.
A question for you: I know Bikram is strong so probably would be a bit much for pregnancy, but I don´t know enough about it to say one way or another. Is it recommended you take a break? Did you consider trying another kind for the pregnancy or preferred to stick with one type of practice?
I continued with gentle hatha throughout my entire pregnancy. It literally made the pregnancy easier. Days I didn´t practice, I felt all the pregnancy symptoms. Days I did, I felt great.
I think it also helped with L&D. Talk about being able to breath through anything.
↵ -
Ah yoga IS such a metaphor for life, isn’t it? Some things it seems we will never do, but we have to keep trying (and eventually, we will do them). And yes, the Ashtanga classes will kick your booty, but man, do you feel good afterward!
All of this is true for meditation, too, which I have just recently reclaimed.
↵ -
Most definitely! I´m partial to Ashtanga and tend toward Ashtanga based hatha classes. It hasn´t always been easy to find the real Ashtanga series while traveling. But that website I mention in the post has been a life saver. It´s definitely more fun with a class, but I like trying the asanas – especially in the later series – just to see if I can do them.
Meditation? Is not quite as easy for me. My mind is a monkey on a chain.
↵ -
Bikram yoga is certainly intense, but many women can definitely continue their practice throughout pregnancy, some up to the point of delivery. It depends on the individual. Bikram doesn’t recommend that women start when they’re pregnant, though.
Great post! I have practiced different kinds of yoga since I was a teenager, but tend to fall in and out of it — hectic life, ridiculous class expense, feeling stuck in a home routine, general life moods. Recently, I’ve been doing a little blend of Yoga and Pilates that I like, but your post has inspired me to try a true Ashtanga class. Thanks!
↵ -
Oh, but there are, of course, pregnancy modifications.
↵ -
Yes, Simone. Good point. Even for the gentle hatha there were pregnancy modifications and some poses you stop doing altogether, like mid-section twists.
↵ -
Great article! My favorite thing about yoga is that I get to take a bit of time to just let the burden of the day disappear –1.5 hours of being purely in the moment & not concerned with anything other than being present in my own body.
↵ -
Thanks, Sarah. And I totally agree. This is also why I like to find a class wherever I am. I do much of my practice alone, which is necessary when traveling or when busy, but I tend to be able to let go and just be in the practice when I’m with a group.
↵ -
In my book, the greatest yoga lesson is proper breathing. It’s amazing how something so simple and basic can fix so much.
↵ -
Love the article, Leigh, and I’d like to add one lesson learned, if you don’t mind:
Imbibe each moment as fully as possible.
I refer of course to the deep, focused breathing associated with yoga–but this rule applies, as your article asserts, to life more broadly.
One week ago I lost one of my closest friends, the woman who introduced me to yoga. She was a yogi in the truest sense: not only did she know and execute the asanas with unwavering poise, but her outlook on life was finely yogic. She cherished living in every moment, breathed it deep, and exuded her bliss. It is only now, after her sudden and untimely death, that I fully understand what she was getting at when she would tell me, “Just breathe. Think only about what you are doing in this moment. And above all, just breathe.”
↵ -
Eric,
I’m very sorry to hear about your loss and appreciate that you’ve shared it. In many ways, it’s when we face these challenges in life, we learn exactly how well we’ve learned our lessons from yoga.
What you say here is very important, As Neha says above, the most important of all things yoga, When I first wrote this article, I did include “Breathing Can Get You Through Anything.” I’m not entirely sure why I didn’t keep it.
You explained it perfectly, and I thank you for adding to the five lessons I have here. Wishing you a long, full easy breath.
↵ -
Yes! Yoga is so wonderful and I wish more people would take advantage of it. Sometimes the most radical thing you can do is lay on a mat and feel whatever you’re feeling.
If you are interested in meditation but have issues focusing, you could always try listening to a dharma teacher. Tara Brach is based out of my hometown and I love her podcasts. They are full on insight and have helped me deepen my practice.
↵ -
YOGA, the true spirit of the philosophy is the life line leading one to more satisfied way of life and more fulfilling too. I can say this after 10 years of teaching yoga philosophy at masters level and after accomplishing successfully myself a course for three months in yoga from a three decades old institution in the field. Today i am actively practicing yoga since last five months and I find a sea change in my total equilibrium and outlook towards life.
↵ -
Great topic! I wish they’d implement lessons/training in yoga (or something similar) in the public school systems around the world. Kids grow up today lacking focus — mostly due to deliberate distractions, etc.
With regards to breathing, I think it’s such an important topic. In general, we just don’t breathe correctly.For taking control of your mind and reprogramming “it” to improve “you”, I’d recommend DynaMIND by the amazing husband-wife team of Jonathan Kramer & Janet MacDonald. It’s basically a refinement of the Silva Method and when you’re finished with the 3 day hands-on workshop (going to alpha level, learning: dream control to solve problems, getting rid of bad habits, improved intuition, how to wake up without an alarm clock, amazing memory techniques, and tons more), you’ll, literally, have greater control of that amazing instrument in your head.
When you think about it, the mind is like a muscle. The more you exercise it, the better control you have over its manifestations.Suffice to say, these 2 instructors have very strong minds. Have a peek at the remarkable reviews from over the past 25 years or so. I was in awe of some of the new skills peeps learned in said workshop. The key is to PRACTISE “going to level” where you’re able control your mind and reprogram it — to accomplish anything.
Visit them here: http://www.scienceofhappiness.com
Tell them Pat Maxwell said hello.
↵
