Find Your Own Balance
I was proud of myself when I got to yoga this morning. I was standing on my yoga matt and I thought “I’m so proud that I got myself here today.” I had been short changing myself all weekend with other responsibilities; work, home, family. And this morning I kept repeating to myself ”I’m going to yoga this morning.” ”I’m going to yoga this morning.” ”I’m going to yoga this morning.” Kind of like I was convincing myself. Well it worked and
I was standing on my yoga matt and then it happened.
As we started, standing on our matts, arms by our sides, chin lightly resting on our chests, then we lifted our heads and adjusted our feet so they weren’t so close together. And then the instructor said “move your feet so it is comfortable, Find your own balance.”
Pow.
There I was again crying while exercising. Yes the tears welled up. I stopped myself. But I took a moment to ask myself why is this happening AGAIN. If you don’t know I’ve started a habit of crying during exercise. So I gave myself an opportunity to figure out why did that one phrase “Find Your Own Balance” make me well up? I didn’t brush myself off. I didn’t say “oh it must be that time of the month.” I thought about it and I was truly happy that I had stopped and taken the time to give myself something. An hour of stretching. An hour of getting in touch with my body. More to come on that.
Yes people I may have turned the corner. I may just be ok with expending time and money for myself without feeling guilty. I gave an hour to myself this morning when I could have been working. I wrote a check today for 15 weeks of classes and I did it with no hesitation. Why should I hesitate? Well the thing is I always have.
I give a lot and I am learning to Find My Own Balance.
A balance of giving and giving. Yup I meant to say that. A balance of giving to those who need me and also giving to ME. There’s enough of me to go around.
There is a lot of balance going on when you are practicing yoga.
So when we were on our matts, arms by our sides, chin lightly resting on our chests, when we lifted our heads and adjust edour feet so they weren’t so close together. I had my little cry. And then I continued. I focused in on the instructors voice. And followed the moves and positions she was instructing.
Now if you’ve taken a yoga class you’ll recall there is a balance between “ah this feels good” and “OMG how am I going to get out of this pose?”
You quickly learn a lot about your body. And get very in-tune with your body. It can be discouraging but you have to accept your ability and hold the pose as you can do it today. After a few more classes you will ”Find Your Own Balance”
I found myself half way into the class (which would be about 30 minutes) thinking “is this almost over?” In most poses my legs were shaking like jelly by the time we released the pose.
I’m a 30 minute runner so I reminded myself as my legs were jiggling in Warrior Pose that “Ok Tracy you can do this, Find Your Own Balance.” And I did. I found that most poses I could do. But some poses I could not hold them for too long. Others I was awesome at.
And there were times when I was really focusing on my body and how it felt and how the poses were making me feel more flexible as the class went on.
And I’d have moments when I was in a Forward Bend pose and I was like “Hey I have nice feet.”
So I made it through again. And despite my 30 minute habit check. I’m going to keep going to yoga.
I’ve been trying to do it once a week. My objective was to stretch my muscles now that I am running. When I run I am usually under a time constraint and I Run, Shower, Go! Probably not the best practice. So I knew my odds of injury were increasing. And that is why I worked a yoga day into my exercise routine.
So I will continue to go and Find My Own Balance.
I must say at the end of the class we reduced the strenuousness of our poses and eventually found a personal resting pose and rested for a while. I was on my back with my knees up and feet on the floor. Eyes closed and it was so relaxing. At one point I thought “I think the instructor has fallen asleep.” But no she is just way better at being quiet and still for a long time.
Maybe I can work that into my new found Balance.
Do you have balance in your life?
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Comments (8)
Dixie L.
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I have thought about taking a yoga class, but never followed through with finding a beginners class….you have encouraged me to do so! Thank you!
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my tiny tank
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Dixie! You will love yoga. There are all kinds. Find one that is focused on stretching to start. I’m sure you don’t want HOT BIKRAM yoga. I found someone who has a small following and she does two classes a week at our local Karate studio. She has a little email mailing list and you can pay by the class or she sells 10 or 15 classes at a discount. It is very peaceful. I need more of the slow down and relax kind of stuff so it helps me. Don’t be fooled, it is strenuous BUT you do what you can do. If you can’t do the pose completely you do what you can. I found that many times I stopped before anyone else but then moved on once they were done. I found by not pushing myself in every pose I lasted the entire class. Keep me psoted.
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Julia
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I absolutely LOVE yoga. I started doing it seriously in July when I was about 7 month out from RNY. My sister-in-law recommended it and I’d toyed with doing DVDs at home over the past 15 years or so, but morbidly obese made that tough. I mentioned to my SIL that the weight loss I’d experienced by 7 months out (around 115-120) was really messing with my balance so she urged me to find a class. I started with a gentle class, made it three weeks before my instructor kicked me out and into the regular class. Now I’ve even experimented with her intense class. Never saw myself progressing as quickly as I did. I love it, and think it’s helped so much with dealing with the changes my body went through this first year, and in learning to love the new body (shrinkles and all…).
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my tiny tank
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Julia you are so right. Yoga makes you know your body. And you do appreciate what you can do if you take your time with a position. Thanks. Ps love see you
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Molly
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Love yoga! I started yoga about 9 years ago (I’m 5 years out) when my best friend and I read about a woman in our area who owned a yoga studio who had started a Big A@! Yoga class for plus size folks. At first I was skeptical – at 185 lbs heavier than I am now I had no idea how the bleep iwas ever going to get into anything resembling a yoga pose. But I went and my life was changed.
As a large person who had been so disconnected with my body for YEARS yoga, when done in a supportive atmosphere, was amazing at helping me reconnect and learn to listen to my body. Thoughout my weight loss it’s been an integral part of my journey.
For those who are new to yoga I say don’t hesitate! A few words of wisdom though 1) finding a yoga class/teacher/studio is a bit like finding a therapist, it takes time and you may have to try several classes. Don’t give up! Find someone with whom you feel safe. 2) don’t participate in competitive yoga (my affectionate term for studios/classes where you can just feel other students concentrating more on looking at others to see if they can get deeper into poses than they can). The whole purpose of yoga is to find the balance within yourself. So don’t be competive with others and 3) don’t be competitive with yourself! It will take time to get comfortable, to learn to breathe and if your like me, it will take time simply to get comfortable truly feeling what it’s like to inhabit your own body.
Sorry for the long post but, as you can tell, yoga is something I feel very strongly about
Thanks for the post today – it really helped me to think about how much yoga adds to my life.
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my tiny tank
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Molly I love your long post!! Let me know if you ever want to write a guest post? Maybe about yoga !? You have very good information here. Thanks
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Robin
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Love this post. I’ve always wanted to try yoga but afraid of what others would think of me. And Find your own Balance…love that phase.
Thank you for sharing.
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my tiny tank
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Robin. Don’t wait. Find a small class and try it. See Molly’s tips!
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