I Give Up: I Can’t Complete the 200 Days of Yoga Challenge!
Yoga Challenge
(c)Melanie Parish, 2013
I didn’t succeed at my 200 day challenge. I just couldn’t complete the number of classes I would need to make up to do it. I took my son to New Mexico for spring break, I couldn’t find a yoga studio, I got asked to work in California, and I realized I was just not going to complete my 200 days of yoga challenge.
It was a disappointment to realize I wasn’t going to make 200 yoga classes in 200 days. It was a challenge I liked. In the back of my head, I had hoped I could continue and could actually do 365 classes in 365 days. I wanted to know what a year of yoga would do for my body. How would I be different. I was fascinated by the idea that I would do yoga every day and I could see the impact it would have on my life. But I never scaled back my travel or other activities. I wanted it all.
I realized I am more diverse than just yoga. I want a rich and full life and I want to travel. I am not willing to give up travel to do yoga. So here I am, trying to find a standard and doing mostly daily yoga.
I have been trying to figure out my “new normal.” If I don’t do yoga every day, then how much yoga do I do? I also love the benefits of going almost every day. I like how daily yoga impacts my life. It is a practice and I like practicing yoga almost every day. I really struggled over this and it felt like a real journey for me to figure it out. In my life, I haven’t been good at regular exercise. I don’t wake up and think “exercise sounds good” because mostly it doesn’t. I would rather read a book on the couch. So I had some fear that if I didn’t do yoga every day, then I might just stop going altogether. I wanted a goal and a structure so that I could be at choice about how much yoga I would do.
I also like staying home in bed every now and then and snuggling my family. One evening, I didn’t go to yoga so I could have a friend over for tea. I have been playing with the idea that I can have an hour a day (plus travel time) to spend on “me time” not to just fill with work. And sometimes an hour of sitting and talking with a friend fills my soul in a way that yoga can’t.
At yoga, I find that the thing I miss most if I don’t go 7 times a week is shavasana. I feel the need to get a work-out while I am at yoga and I feel a little less permission to rest in shavasana if I’m not there every day. But then my yoga becomes more productive. This thought is the one that is circling around my head daily. I haven’t figured all this out yet. This month, I have been taking days off. But in May, another 30 day challenge is being offered. I have signed up and am looking forward to 30 days of yoga. I have to say, I am loving this yoga journey.
**My initial 21 day yoga challenge turned into a 200 day yoga challenge – share the journey with me starting here
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