Life is a Practice
I have this post it note by where I meditate.
It says: "In Amy I trust." It's a reminder to myself that I know what is best- that my gut is right, that trusting my intuition is where it's at. I need the daily reminder. It's all too easy to forget. As we navigate this new time in the world, I keep hearing two things from people: 1). This is both an amazing and exciting time. 2). This is a stressful and chaotic time. It feels to me like the world "opened up" again and we went full throttle. We planned and planned and planned. We went back to business as usual. Then we looked at the calendar, and our weekends in the summer were suddenly full. We barely have time to breathe as we run from thing to thing to thing. Back to "Busy"-ness as usual. I, for one, am not having it. I swore to myself in the pandemic that I would NOT take the time for granted. That I would take the things I loved about the last year and a half and weave them into my life. That I would slow down and stop hustling so damn much. I'm still learning. I got sucked back into the hustle game and after a few weeks of it, took pause.
What does Amy really want?
Amy wants time with her husband and her dog. Amy wants to enjoy the lake this summer. Amy wants to have slow mornings and days where she can make sourdough bread. Amy doesn't want to teach 15 classes a week. In order to do those things, I have to set boundaries. I have to practice saying no. I have to let go of the old ways of being and cramming so much into a day and slow my roll a bit. I could beat myself up about all the ways I haven't done those things, and here's where I got to instead:
All of life is practice. Just like yoga.
The more we practice something, the better we get at it, the more habitual it becomes, the less hard it feels. We practice things all day long whether we know it or not. Eating. Drinking. Social Media time. Exercise. Sleep. These are all things we practice! What does your practice of those things look like? Is it serving you? Where could changing the practice or adopting a new practice be more beneficial for you? Start to look at your life as little practices and notice what you see. Observe what is working, and what isn't working. And then, put the tools in. We all got into a lot of practices over the past year and a half. Some of those were wonderful- some not so much. I got into the practice of drinking a glass of wine every night recently. I was getting very good at it. It, however, was not serving me or my body. So, I chose a different practice. Instead of wine at night, now I practice drinking some homemade kombucha. I am in the practice of meditating every morning. This means, I also have to practice going to bed at a decent hour so I'm less likely to hit snooze. When I remember that life is a practice, I can ease up on myself. I can remember I'm human- and then- I can listen to the inner voice that's speaking to me and make choices from that space.
Where do you need to remember that life is a practice so you, too, can ease up and listen to your inner voice?
Yoga is a great place to practice living life- moment to moment. When we get on our mats, we have the chance, the opportunity, to listen, to let our inner voices guide us, and to take the wonderful lessons we've learned with us- and to say no to the things we no longer need. So if you're feeling the wonderfulness and the chaos- look at what might need to shift for you so you can move through this transition time with more ease.