How can we use what we learn, experiment or do on a yoga mat?
Yoga can teach you a lot about yourself and about others. The yoga poses are meant to open or close currents of energy in your body and mind that will be directed differently and will make you realize things about you and your thinking patterns. It can really be a life changing experience. When doing a yoga class, you learn a lot about your muscles, your body and the way your brain reacts according to the different poses that are suggested to you. Each pose has been designed for you to experience a different feeling or sensation that most of the time you can translate into everyday situation. how can we use what we learn, experiment or do on a yoga mat? The very first teaching that you receive when doing a posture is to feel grounded. Everything starts from here. If you do not have your two feet or all fours firmly grounded the rest of the posture will not follow and most of all if you want to perform balance postures the grounding and the focusing is even more important. In everyday life, it is exactly the same. You need grounding to be able to perform. Grounding can be your family, your friends, your job, your health, anything or anyone who gives you a structure on which to count in order to be able to stand straight on your two feet, or hands or hips. On another perspective what you learn from an inversion posture is huge: To lift up your feet in the air and see the world from a different angle. First you think: I will never be able to do that, it will never happen to me, I am so scared Then you try: You try placing your hand and lift your hips closer and closer to the wall and all of a sudden you realize that you can lift one leg almost automatically and then you become more curious and try lifting your second leg. Maybe at this point you will need the teacher’s help to lift both legs and in no time you will find yourself feet against the wall head over heels! You will probably have mixed feelings at that point: I am scared and I am happy But then when you get out of the inversion and place your feet on the ground, you will be so proud of yourself that you did it that you will have forgotten the scary part!! How does that translate into real life, off the mat situations: This will make you understand that in real life perhaps you will think that you are not fit for a job, or a task. It will teach you that at least you need to try, you need to experiment, be curious, be daring, you need to let go of all your fears and also be trusting the people that are here to help and support you. Do not be scared and it will happen, you are the one who makes things happen, no one else!!! Once you realize that you just did something you had never imagined you would ever do even in your wildest dreams then the world is yours! You open the door to endless possibilities. Never think that you are not fit, that the other is better than you, that you are not enough.