I don’t do yoga for fitness.
Fitness is not what inspires me to get out of bed in the morning. Fitness is not my why. It’s necessary and can be a secondary gain and not why I do yoga
To know why is what creates the how. When your why is big enough the how will come.
My yoga practice first thing in the morning is my self awareness ritual. As I come into the darkness of the morning and light my candle, the room lights up and so do I. There is quite all around me and the only calling I have is to be still. To learn something new about myself, to develop and be, my Self. To take this quiet time in and get excited about my day ahead.
My why is to make a difference, so I start with me, every day.
To feel what is alive in me and to bring this out into my day.
I don’t want to spend my days tired, I don’t want to waste another day doing for everybody and not being able to receive the love that is available to me. I want to be open, trusting and filled with the experience, feeling and the knowing that I am worthy, loveable and enough. That’s what my time in the morning gives me.
Recently I have begun to work with the 10 core traits as discussed by Sharon Pearson in her book “ Ultimate You”
These 10 core traits are intrinsic, they are apart of who we are. We are born with these traits.
Curiosity, warmth, self expression, love, playfulness. optimism, spontaneity, risk, resilience and Uniqueness.
Through our tribes and our conditioning as we grow, we can become detached from all or some of these traits and begin to live in our external world rather than living from core or self, from our authenticity or true essential nature.
This is in-fact the ultimate benefit of yoga as stated in Patanjali’s yoga Sutra’s. Chapter 1 Sutra 3.
1:3 The seer (Observer) is established in it’s ( his /her/ other) true nature
Through this conditioning our boundaries become too soft or too hard. We loose touch with our needs as we attempt to be someone everyone will love by putting on masks or identities and being the person we think everyone wants us to be. I know from experience that eventually this tactic backfires and we create so much suffering in our own lives. We become lost, stuck and can fall into looping patterns of procrastination, overthinking, perfectionism, overwhelm, anxiety….. the list goes on, maybe even hopelessness.
Ouch
This is the difference I want to make. I see, hear, feel and know that when we bring our learning to the mat, perceptions and life begin to change for the best.
As I am integrating these traits into my morning practice I am setting an intention to work with my chosen trait. To experience how this trait lives in me.
This has been incredibly powerful
I wanted to share my experience of warmth with you.
Warmth for self.
As I came to my mat to experience warmth for self, straight away I felt kindness and compassion for myself. For me, warts and all. As I began my movement practice, simple asana connected with the breath, and my mind focused on Warmth for myself, I was immediately taken to the tension in my body. As I allowed this tension to soften and fall away I felt an inner quality I had never really brought consciousness too before.
I knew this was warmth.
It felt like an energy that was growing within me, flowing through my blood as it radiated from my heart centre. I simply took great joy in the sensation within me and gladly connected the idea of warmth with it.
Warmth is now alive in me.
I can language how it feels and delight in knowing that I am connected and aware of this energy within. As I show up each day I become more and more familiar with this experience of warmth.
How does this now translate off the mat and out into my life?
I am more connected with my boundaries. I can feel in my body what I can and can’t tolerate. There doesn’t seem to be as much doubt and confusion within, my body lets me know loud and clear when a boundary is being pushed, poked or prodded.
I realised this through an experience I had just a few days ago.
We are currently in lockdown. Everybody is feeling these lockdowns in different ways and I fully respect this and have been doing my best to stay above the line in my thinking, to see the learning and the opportunities that are available to me. There are some very real knock-on effects from a lockdown and I am certainly feeling them so this is a constant vigilance that I am keeping.
I met a school mum as I rocked out for the daily dinner shop and outing. Our talk immediately had a covid focus. Straight away she began with conspiracy theories and very much below the line attitude.
I’m down with conspiracy theory. People are free to think what they like in my world and I find the difference of opinion intriguing .
I didn’t receive the same congeniality from her.
Suddenly I started to kind of discombobulate from the inside. My body was thriowing out alarm signals. I knew in that moment I couldn’t listen to this for another moment.
How was I going to stop this and get on with my day?
As I stood there my mind went blank and my voice began to flow. The warmth I had been cultivating for myself on the mat was present. In a very natural and matter of fact way I said “ This conversation is really fucking with my head right now. I came to do my shopping so I’m going to go get on with this.”
Micro truth in action!!!!!
This Mum was apologetic and kind and simply stood back and we each went our separate ways.
I was astounded at how natural this warmth felt. Usually I would be thinking “OMG, how am I going to get out of this? What if I upset her ? I don’t want to upset any one……” Warmth managed to totally bypassed the mind stuff and this natural trait simply did the work.
WOW
Through all of the learning that is available to us in this information era, It’s great to take the info that really strikes a cord with you onto the mat. Explore what this feels like in your body, what meaning you give it and integrate this into your very being. These 10 core traits give us something tangible to begin to awaken and experience our authenticity and truth. The morning ritual of movement, breath and meditation is a must for personal growth. Take what learning is in your mind and spread this throughout your whole being. Become the observer. Give your Self the time everyday, to bring your Self to life and experience your inner infinite wisdom and peace.
As these words came out of my mouth I felt authentic and real. There was no mask, no identity, just a simple boundary that was heard and respected. I feel so grounded and anchored in this truth, and trust this warmth implicitly.
Thank you school mum for this beautiful opportunity to feel warmth in action and to have this amazing experience.
You Rock.
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