Deepening Your Yoga Practice: Insights for Mindful Living
In the yoga space it pays to be really bold and open. Not magical thinking, but willing to be open to new possibilities.
Yoga was born in India, where philosophy was never practiced for philosophy’s sake. The mindful embodiment, deep enquiry and opportunities that your practice offers, promise something tangible and real.
While the physical practice chips away at physical restrictions creating more space and availability, cultivating strength and vitality, that is not all this practice is good for. The exploration of postures can be accompanied by a loosening of attitudes and restrictive ways of thinking.
We become really attentive to what arises, the “stuff” that isn’t of the here and now. When you notice this “stuff”, there’s nothing you need to do, you don’t need to get overly involved, judge yourself or your thoughts. But having an awareness of those habits and tendencies that keep us tethered is the bastion of a mindful yoga practice.
There’s no need to beat yourself up for trying to remember that bread recipe while in downward dog, or puzzling over last week’s encounter with a dog on the pavement while marking out your sun salutations. But the guide brings you back to what’s undeniable, here and now: your body, your breath, your supports... Only then can new ways of thinking become possible, new approaches to old situations. Awareness itself has the loosening effect.
In a cultural landscape where the body sits over here and the mind lives over there, the idea that both ride together on this path, can remain just that: a cool idea. It takes guts to slow down and do philosophy with the body.
The courage to attend to our tendencies, to question our attitudes, our postures and our role in our relationships, this is not simply “headstuff”.
It is a training of the body-mind towards greater liberation. A gradual and delightful path that you travel in good company.
Amber Scott
Teaches MindFul Yoga class on Friday mornings at the Anderida Practice - YOGA CLASSES