Today's yoga session was difficult to start. I had already woken up too late (shocker), and dreaded the faster pace that the title indicated. I nearly gave myself the day off, using yesterday's intensive yoga practice as an excuse. But if there's one thing that I like more than being lazy, it's the satisfaction of completing a task in its entirety.
A paradox, if you will. Life is full of them.
Adriene acknowledges this slower start, as she discusses the ebbs and flows of motivation and readiness to engage in a yoga practice: "some days you will spend the whole practice trying to land; other times you will drop right in." Today was definitely a landing day. I resisted even looking at my yoga mat. I worried about the other tasks I had to do. Because I had an appointment at 11:00, I deemed a 9:00 yoga practice a waste of time.
It's particularly difficult to ignore these thoughts during the first third of Adriene's videos, as her warmups are slow and steady. While I appreciate the manner in which Adriene builds the foundation of a yoga practice and makes it accessible for beginners, I still have the tendency to go "alright, let's pick up the pace," only to find myself in 3-legged dog for 2 minutes, thinking "why the hell didn't I appreciate the warmup?"
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Despite the shaking and feelings of shame that I've done yoga for six years and still count the seconds until I can collapse into child's pose, there's a certain comfort in a physically intense yoga class. I feel more energized and flexible throughout the day. My muscles thank me for working for more than two seconds. I notice the physical benefits of the practice, as I can sink deeper in high lunge, and can almost touch my heels to the mat in down dog. But the best benefit of the vinyasa practice by far is not the physical flow—it's the mental and emotional flow.
The mental flow state, according to psychologist Mihàly Csíkszentmihály, is absolute immersion in the task at hand. An almost out of body experience, someone experiencing mental flow is "completely involved in an activity for its own sake. The ego falls away. Time flies. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz. Your whole being is involved, and you're using your skills to the utmost" (Cherry). With intensely focused attention, any sense of self-consciousness dissipates. You are your motion. You are just being.
Typically the flow state is associated with activities that one enjoys: music. Dance. Art. One of the most debilitating effects of depression is that nothing sparks joy. Starting any activity is daunting. Yet once I begin, I begin to find that flow state in all activities, including those I previously hated. When I'm driving, I can just be. As I clean, I mutter a mantra to myself (om namah shivayah—I bow with respect to my inner self), and let my mind go blank.
Vinyasa yoga lends itself to that feeling of getting lost in the practice, as you let your breath guide you through seamless movements. With each breath comes each movement, guiding the practitioner through sequences that build off one another. Inhale, plank. Exhale, chaturanga. Inhale, upward facing dog, exhale down dog. Breathe.
That's not to say that there aren't moments of frustration. I certainly place judgments on myself when I grow tired from a practice that is far less vigorous than the classes at Lila Yoga, thus snapping out of my flow state. Self-consciousness is a deeply ingrained mode of thinking that takes more than a 30 minute video to break. That being said, I've noticed that after stepping off the mat, I have spent far less time spinning through a cycle of negativity, and have just started doing. Going with the flow.
Namaste.
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