One of my yoga teachers, Jennifer Steed, explains yoga as “changing your life in one breath.” It is that simple. One deep breath can change how we feel in a moment. Have you ever noticed how sometimes your body involuntarily takes in a deep breath? Often, on the exhale of this deep breath, a lot of held tension is released from the shoulders. With that release of tension can come a little more openness, lightness, or joy.
I thought it would be fun today to offer an actual example of how yoga can change how you feel in less than 3 minutes. Yoga Outreach offered this short YouTube video this morning as an inspiration for those of us doing the Reach Out Challenge, and I’d like to share it with you. Do you have 2 minutes and 36 seconds to spare? If so, try this very simple video and see how you feel before and after.
The clip is from Amy Weintraub, author of Yoga for Depression: A Compassionate Guide to Relieve Suffering Through Yoga. I ordered this book yesterday, as well as Overcoming Trauma through Yoga, and I look forward to learning more about using yoga as a tool for easing depression. Research evidence indicates that yoga can help people who are suffering from depression. I hope that if you try the video, you will experience this directly for yourself. But yoga can do more than transform a momentary feeling into another momentary feeling.
Last night, I did Melina Meza’s Yin Yoga for Winter practice again. You may recall, this was my Get Out of Jail Free card, and believe me, after an active, fun, and exhausting week, I was tempted to use it; but instead, I set up the computer at minutes before midnight, tuned in to My Yoga Online, and did my practice. I did it for the kids… just kidding. I did it for all of you who are sponsoring me, and for the whole range of students who come to Yoga Outreach classes. But I digress…
One of the things Melina says in the class is that it is natural to become a little depressed in the winter time, due to the reduced sunlight and to the natural rhythm of slowing down. It is a harmonious response to the slowing of the season and life moving into slumber mode for the winter. What she also says—which is very interesting to contemplate—is that we don’t actually have to try to change this feeling. We don’t need to feel good all the time. What a concept! Learning to accept slight depression or discomfort is true freedom. Yoga can help with this learning, as we hang out in a pose and learn to be with all the sensations, without clinging or aversion. The skill of staying with what is can develop on the mat, and spread into other parts of our lives.
Personally, I feel much more comfortable on the up side of life’s cycles and of my daily and monthly rhythm. But learning to hang out in the slowed down, lower side of the cycle can bring a perverse sense of quiet elation. For me, the key has been learning to trust that if I slow down, and let myself hang out there, I will naturally move into the up cycle again a little while later. The fear is that I will be stuck in the low cycle forever. But I’ve learned this is not so. And gradually, I am learning to accept the slow side, and give myself permission to be there without anxiety.
Thanks to my friends and family who have pledged 50 cents or a dollar or even two dollars a day for the 30-day Reach Out Challenge. The total pledges is now at $285 dollars! Almost at my goal of $300. If you haven’t done so and would like to sponsor me to raise money for Yoga Outreach, you can use the online donation link. Or phone me at 604.251.6337 or send an email to kyrempel [at] gmail [dot] com. Thanks!