Have You Got The Wrong Idea?

Gratitude. Joy. Love. Peace.

It's easy to assume that yoga is always meant to be a feel-good experience that guides us to inner bliss, to an eternally unruffled, untroubled disposition. But it's naive to think that yoga is all unicorns and rainbows.

My early yoga years were all about mastering poses - holding them for longer, going deeper, being better. I got really quite good at ascending into a delightful cloud of bliss after a vigorous practice. But then disappointingly, my zen post-yoga state would dissipate - often the minute I got home when I'd lose it because the kids were still running around well past bedtime.

Why, when I was doing so much yoga was I not the serene calm human I wished to be?

I naively thought that if I practiced long and hard enough I'd become immune to to 'negative' feelings. Finally the penny dropped: yoga is not about feeling only the sweet stuff. It's about connecting deeply to all our emotional states.

My practice nowadays is about working my psyche as much as my hamstrings. About embracing my shortcomings, foibles and failures. Embracing the light and the dark. Reviving the parts of me that have been forgotten, ignored or diminished.

In learning to be with these feelings I'm accepting my humanity. And this is leading me to greater sensitivity, kindness and humility.

How’s your practice feeling these days?