Inside Yoga 65 (14/1/2013)

Well, I have to be honest and say that the festive season’s burn out, fatigue and ensuing laziness has got the better of me! Hence the absence of a new chapter of Inside Yoga for weeks, more than that, since late-November! My apologies. My new year’s resolution was to start with a new blogs, and so much more, only to be grounded by a winter cold and then a PC crash (my brand new computer hit the deck last week with its own version of viruses).

I now feel like I am emerging from this and will get back into action. Yet what has happened is typical for this time of year and something I have mentioned in previous blogs during another winter past. Some of us start the year with an intention to do so much more. For health clubs this is often the busiest time of the year, with recruitment up – all those new year resolutions. But many still find it hard to motivate and energise, and this is hardly surprising when it is still the depth of winter – cold, wet and dark. This is when the rest of nature is hibernating, and us humans appear to know otherwise. We want to be extra active as soon as Big Ben strikes midnight on New Year’s Eve but our body is saying that is not ready.  No wonder it feels hard, but the modern world still rolls on relentlessly and we do need to keep up. Jobs to go to, kids have to get to school and so on.

That is why in yoga we adapt, and adjust to the climate and our own state of health. A constant and regular practice is something that doesn’t mean we have to do the same amount every day and week regardless of season and personal health. We can do a slower practice and gentler one if this will help energise ourself enough to operate in the daily world; or perhaps we need a more physical approach to get going – to crank the engines up and then enter the outside world.

Look at yourself and be honest about what is happening right now and move on from there, instead of blindly pushing foward ignoring signals of not only nature, but from your own body, mind and heart. That is a healthy approach to practice.

And with that I am off to work…. more to follow