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Posts Tagged "21 Day yoga"
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...
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I breathe, I rest, I lie face up on my mat with my head toward the mirror. I feel my shoulder blades under me opening up my chest. I stretch my feet just outside the sides of my mat. I place my heels just over the ridge that is my mat onto the floor. I let my feet fall outward. My palms face up. Ready to receive, I think. My head tilts back slightly. I breathe deep into my belly. When I do the first deep breath on my mat, sometimes there is a breath so deep it is like it finds an extra pocket in my lungs and more air goes in at the end. Not every breath is like that but when it happens there is a sweet release. My favorite breath starts with a really good exhale. Sometimes I realize I don’t really finish breathing out before it is time to breathe in again. I lie in shavasana trying to keep my mind clear, focusing on my breath. As thoughts come, sometimes I try to clear them, sometimes I watch and release them, sometimes I work too hard trying to turn them off. As I become more fit, my mind is more and more active. I am having more and more challenges as my mind tries to get work done during my yoga practice. In the beginning, this was almost a non-issue. I was really working on the postures and breathing and I didn’t have all those racing thoughts. Now I actually need strategies for my emerging thoughts. I have tried breathing and holding a thought like “clear” or “present’ in my mind with each breath. The other night during a discussion about meditation, a guy I had just met told me to notice my thoughts and release them so I have been trying that, although I have to admit, I may lack some discernment by implementing new methods into my yoga practice just because I talked to a guy...
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I think I just committed to 200 days of yoga. As I wrote the title, it seemed right. I missed my 100 yoga classes in 100 days but I realized that if I extended the time, I could catch up. I am still down 8 classes, but I can make up those classes and still meet the 200 days of yoga goal. I had to really think about why I am doing this yoga challenge. For a while I wondered if I am being obsessive in my daily commitment. I found it incredibly challenging to be with failing to make my 100 day goal. Often in my life, not making a goal would make me quit and wander off–losing the benefit of what I was doing. In this case, I was more interested in digging deep, to keep going, and to try to meet a future goal. When the people at the studio found out I was doing a 100 day challenge, I noticed a little touch of ego. It got me attention and that worried me. I don’t want my daily practice to be about feeding my ego. I want it to be about the practice–me, my mat, and my breath. I have wondered if I could trust myself to let go of my daily routine because I am not sure I trust myself to make good decisions about exercise if I don’t have strong boundaries. I didn’t like setting a goal that was about me not being good enough to do it without a daily commitment. It seemed to be coming from fear instead of abundance. I have been really paying attention to why I love daily yoga so much. There is something I get if I go daily that I wouldn’t get if I went 3 or 4 times a week. It is rest. When I am there daily, it is impossible for me to work out hard every day. I get tired. My feet hurt. I get sore. Going...
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It has become clear to me that I am not going to make my goal of 100 yoga classes in 100 days. The end of the 100 days is about 10 days away and I am down 9 classes. It was an optimistic goal. I was on track until I went on a trip. Then I got caught in the polar vortex for an extra 4 nights in Orlando. I have counted so many times to see if I could make it. It is theoretically possible, but not in a way that feels sane or reasonable in my busy life. I am noticing my attachment and I am allowing failure intentionally–watching it happen–because it feels like the right thing to do. I don’t have regret, although I still wish it was different. It is a disappointed dream for me personally as I will be 7-9 classes short of my goal. Now I need a new goal. I have realized I have the possibility of continuing on and resetting the goal for 125 classes in 125 days or 150 classes in 150 days. It would give me time to double up some classes on the weekends. I notice my attachment to this structure of lots of classes and how it makes me feel a little bit special. Maybe I should let it go and just allow myself to be “normal”. Someone who goes to yoga sometimes. I know I have other travel happening soon. I wonder if I will just get behind again–maybe life will “happen” again and again. I worry about my commitment level. I don’t have a great track record with exercise. The daily commitment really has worked for me because there is no opportunity for excuses. I go daily. The goal of daily yoga has served my body, my mind, and my spirit. I don’t like that I don’t trust myself to “do” yoga without a big picture goal. Or maybe that goal is just helping me do what doesn’t...
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In the last few weeks I have lost count and I don’t seem to be able to keep track of how many days I have been doing my yoga challenge. With the business of December, I don’t have any bandwidth for the information. I try to count–I admit it, sometimes during Shavasana, but I can’t really hold onto the thought. Somewhere between 50 and 70 it just stopped mattering. I am just showing up every day as a practice. It feels a little like free-falling and maybe a little crazy. Yoga is definitely a part of my daily practice. I can’t imagine not having it. I had been “banking” some classes–my goal has been to complete 100 classes in 100 days–and I will be out of town for 6 nights in early January. I had 2 classes “banked” when we had an ice storm and the studio was closed for a day and I missed a class. Then I missed a class the next day because I got there without my yoga top and had to leave. I couldn’t picture doing hot yoga in my sweater. I actually had tears as I drove home. I love yoga and in that moment it felt like a loss. I wonder about being too attached to my yoga practice, but I figure it is early days. I am happy I have found exercise that I love, and happy I like the studio and have a place to practice that gives me joy. And it does. It is a lovely place. I need to start counting the days. I will need to pay attention in order to make my 100 classes– or I will need to do some yoga while I am at Disneyworld. I am planning to take my mat. I think that practicing some yoga on my own would make it more my own. If I count that practice toward my 100 days of yoga, my goal will be easier. Maybe easier is perfect for me...
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