Outdoor yoga, live stream yoga, on-demand yoga, upside down yoga, seated yoga, quiet yoga, energizing yoga and all the other amazing options, are all rooted from the same place. They all help bring us closer to wholeness, to contentment, to feeling stronger, to bringing more balance, to greater awareness and so much more. It’s being open to what it has to offer and bringing it into your life.
Yoga doesn’t have to be a formal practice in a group, on a schedule, and that’s the best part! It is in your everyday, it is in your actions & reactions, it is finding a few minutes or finding 60 minutes. Don’t ever feel bad for not logging on or rolling out your mat, remind yourself that it is beyond that, the practice lives in many forms and it shapes itself each day as you need it to.
We all go through highs and lows, we can have great intentions and high motivation some days and then not on other days. In a time where you can’t live your normal life that you are used to, there needs to be room for forgiving yourself, for softness and for knowing you are doing the best you can. If there is a day where you don’t have the strength to take that next step, then do what you can to love that part of you. That is yoga, it is compassion, it is taking care of yourself.
We need to give ourselves some slack, have less judgement and be kinder, that is yoga too. So if you have a day, week, or month that you didn’t show up physically on your mat, or as much as you wanted to, I encourage you to not feel guilty but to embrace the fact that you did some other form of self care that you needed in that moment, you listened in and did the next right thing for yourself.
Yoga is breath, it is movement, it is stillness, it is contemplation, it is reflection. It is all Yoga.
By Lindsay Gordon
