Yoga - It's a Practice

Yesterday was an incredible day. We had a restorative yet challenging yoga flow in the morning, I went to get a coffee and smoothie bowl and review for the exam during the lunch break, and then I had the best body high from our afternoon class of inversions. I ended the night by going to the spa and alternating between the sauna and cold plunge - an invigorating way to revitalize my body.

I absolutely loved this entire week! Janice Liou is an incredible teacher. I was completely intimidated after seeing her instagram pictures, but she is so down to earth, approachable, and truly has an incredible approach to teaching. She encourages the use of props (which I need for basically every flexibility focused pose), and she empowered me to move deeper in my practice without making me feel bad for not being flexible.

Another reason that I loved this week is because of the style of yoga we did. While it did have a lot of flexibility aspects (it is yoga after all), it seemed to be more strength focused. I felt so excited to try new poses for the first time and actually be able to do them! I was up in a headstand almost as soon as I attempted it, and I was making progress with the other inversions. As I was excelling at the inversions I began to feel more confident in my practice.

This morning I was brought back down to where I was at the beginning of the training. We had an ashtanga vinyasa session, and I realized again how far I am from where I want to be. I can hardly do any of the poses in the sequence correctly, and since there’s a vinyasa between every pose, it’s very difficult to use props and move through the sequence smoothly. I was almost in tears a few times as I began to lose confidence and slink back down to comparing myself with the rest of the class.

I once again got sucked into believing that I don’t belong here and that I’m useless at yoga. Towards the very end of the practice, however, we did one pose that I can actually do! Headstand! The teacher also gave us the extra challenge of slowly lowering our legs to 90 degrees for a hold. I didn’t think I had the core strength to do it, but I did!

While I’m still struggling this morning with my self-destructive thoughts and negativity, I’m trying to remember that it’s called yoga practice because you’re always learning. I do want to maintain the positive energy that I get from inversions, and I need to again focus on what I can do instead of what I can’t, and just keep practicing. I’m very excited for the inversion workshop with Janice this afternoon!

Janice Liou, a pose I feel confident in, and one that needs much more practice