Perfect self-care is not working for me these days. Actually, I've always seemed to take better care of others than myself.
A lot of Self-Care ideas are preached to us that cost time and money and planning, downtime, motivation, discipline and self worth, In all my life of struggling with Self-Care, YOGA is the thing that requires the least amount of time and effort and gives the most profound feel good results.
It feels easy enough to be consistent because there is no preparation needed, and no recovery time.
I'm the oldest and heaviest I have ever been, and yet I feel the best I have felt.
I am going through the most challenging days of my life as my sweet Mom, my life line and best friend in the world, is journeying to the end of life with a painful and incurable cancer. I know I would have been swallowed up in a debilitating depression months ago if it wasn't for my simple Yoga practice.
There are abundant treasures waiting to reveal themselves to your body, mind and spirit if you will devote time to your Yoga practice.
Your body cannot carry all the life experiences it is subjected to.
Your mind needs space to quiet and refresh.
Your spirit is vying for your attention.
Yoga gives you the time and space, in a compassionate way at your pace, to process all the things your physical body, your nervous system, immune system, mind and emotions are trying desperately to process.
If you're an avid exerciser, good for you! You still need time to mindfully breathe and have a Yoga Teacher's carefully trained eye watch you stretch. If you go to counselling, good for you! You still need time to let the mind rest fully, while you focus your attention on your breath and soothing your body.
I'm saying this to you as an overweight person who just cannot master the whole self care of do all the right things...
I'm saying this to you as someone who struggles to keep a routine and consistency and who used to carry around a lot of pain in her weary body...
I'm saying this you as a Yoga Teacher who has seen men, women, children and elderly of all different body sizes, struggling with their minds and bodies, terribly nervous to start, crying through their first class (or their hundredth)…
We are all reaping the benefits and bliss of Yoga.
Regardless of your shape, size, or struggles, we are more alike than different.
Our circumstances and perspectives are different.
Our capacity to love and be loved,
To experience joy and pain,
To give and to receive,
To sense and be our true essence beyond it all,
is where we are one.
None of us is a rare super hero, nor a helpless victim. We are each capable of tuning in and feeling better. Yoga is the simplest gateway to guide us there.
All Yoga asks is for you to show up. Can you commit to a 1 hour class per week? (there is huge benefit to attending an in person class that I'll get to in another blog). You don't have to lose x amount of pounds, or buy the yoga clothes, or wait until you can touch your toes, or until your life is perfectly organized, or insert any of your excuses here. Yoga is ready for you now, as you are. Each time you come to your mat is a different experience.
In your yoga practice, you will greet the present moment and yourself with loving curiosity, and the mingling of that becomes how you begin to experience life.
All while in a body that is:
stronger,
more flexible,
feeling lighter and smoother with lubricated joints,
calmer,
feeling brighter with feel good hormones circulating,
enjoying better digestion and rest with your parasympathetic nervous system functioning well,
and balanced because you know how to move functionally to age well.
You will love Yoga because a simple 1 hour per week will make a profound difference in your body and mind and spirit.