As reading week comes to a close, I have started sleeping poorly and stressing myself out over what is to come in the next few months (assignments, interviews, etc.). So, after a particularly short night of sleep, I decided that this morning was the perfect opportunity to try out some yoga to both wake myself up and calm myself down. I wanted to leave this yoga session feeling relaxed yet energized and ready for the day. I visited the “Do Yoga With Me” website hoping to find a beginner hatha yoga video that would fit my needs for the day. While on the site, I found a video called “After Work Revitalizer 2”. The website describes the video, led by an instructor named Rachel Scott, as being fun and lively, with a focus on the neck, spine, and hips. While I wasn’t sure that this video was exactly what I was looking for, I decided to give it a shot because of the description, and because it was around 20 minutes.
I am so glad that I gave this video a chance! It turned out to be exactly what I needed. Upon completing my yoga session, I feel calm and in control. While following the video, I finally had that “aha” moment I have been waiting for, where the point of doing yoga finally started to make sense. I believe that this was my most successful yoga session for a multitude of reasons:
I focused solely on myself and the yoga that I was doing. When documenting my yoga sessions for my learning project in the past, I couldn’t seem to just “let go.” As much as I tried to focus on just being in the moment, I was constantly pausing the videos that I was doing to check and see if my laptop was still filming, whether the camera was pointed exactly where it needed to be, and whether I looked ridiculous. Today, I just let all of that go. I made sure prior to starting filming that my laptop was set up exactly the way it needed to be in order to include my full body, and then just didn’t care after that. I knew that even if not all of the footage turned out blog worthy, I would still at least find something to work with. As for worrying about whether I looked ridiculous? I just decided that I don’t care! I am not a yoga instructor or someone who has been practicing for years, so it’s natural that I wont look exactly like the instructors in the video. I am learning to accept and embrace that. By just letting myself focus on the yoga, I found that I felt calmer and was able to benefit from it more than usual.
I am getting stronger. Even though this is only my third post since starting yoga, I have been starting to practice more often without documenting it. Since finding the Flexibility and Range of Motion video that I reviewed in my last post, I have been making a point of doing the 9 minute video every day. As a result, I am starting to feel more flexible and finding it easier to hold more challenging poses for long periods of time. It helps that all of the videos that I have used incorporate some variation of a sun salutation, so I have been able to practice the same basic poses multiple times.
The video itself is amazing. I know that I have liked every video I have written about so far, but this one is excellent! The instructor, Rachel Scott, is energetic and moves through the poses at the perfect pace. I loved the poses used because they are a mixture of fast, high energy sequences, and slow, relaxing ones. I did find many of the poses very challenging, but they were not impossible. Whenever a pose did seem especially challenging, it was usually followed by an easier, slower one. I left my session feeling decompressed and energized for the day.
I used the savasana pose to end off my session. After my last few sessions of yoga, I have found myself feeling like something is missing. The videos would just abruptly finish and that would be the end of my session. The video that I used today made me realize that what my yoga sessions have been lacking so far is the savasana pose! The savasana pose, or corpse pose, comes at the end of a yoga session. During savasana, you basically just lay on your back on the floor with your arms and legs relaxed and your eyes closed. While it is definitely a simple pose, it has so many benefits, as stated in this article. Savasana has always been my favourite part of yoga, because it allows your whole body to relax, and makes you feel incredible. Even if the videos that I find in the future do not include the pose, I plan to start doing it at the end of every yoga session no matter what.
Overall, this morning’s session of yoga has left me feeling revitalized and excited to continue my learning project! For the first time since starting, I can confidently say that I am looking forward to my next yoga session and making more progress.
Have you ever started learning a new hobby and skill and had that “aha” moment where it all finally starts to feel worth it?