14/06/2024
Thoughts on Yoga
TAKING THE PRESSURE OFF
I donāt know how you feel, but as a yoga practitioner and teacher,
Lately Iāve felt the pressure.
The pressure to always remain young, to be flexible, to never become ill, the pressure of perfection.
And itās come at a time (71 yrs old), when my choices to aspire to those ideas of perfection have been taken away by time.
What a gift this has been!
Because, unwittingly, I too have taken part in this constant sales pitch, believing that yoga would maintain these false truths, younger, flexible, in fact healthy forever.
They are misleading ideas, they make yoga inaccessible to some, and they allow you to feel failure when you donāt achieve.
Do I want to feel like my practise is over now I have imperfection challenges, or do I want to embrace the practise for what it is really about and what it can teach us.
Fortunately the challenges of aging bring us back to the real reason we practise, and we can let go of the false identification with ourselves, we can stop striving for perfection, we can breathe out.
Take the pressure off, such a gift! And then how useful our imperfections become.
Lately Iāve felt the pressure,
But only because my 30 year practise and time have allowed me to stand back and observe.
Lately Iāve felt the pressure,
And with joy in my heart, Iāve let go of it.
