We’re halfway through January (already!) and those New Year’s resolutions have probably started to wane by now, whether it was to lose weight, give up alcohol or do the whole ‘Veganuary’ thing.
But I feel that this year, what with it now being year three of a global pandemic, we are well within our rights to skip the resolutions.
Me feeling is that it’s enough to resolve to get through the year, and whatever it decides to throw at us.
The good thing is that if you’re reading this blog, you’ve made it this far. Through the fearful but sunny spring and summer of 2020, through the false hope of Christmas 2020, the dark days of January 2021, the uncertainty, vaccines, two-metre distancing, mask-wearing and probably, Covid itself.
But, it has left most of us with scars of some sort.
How Yoga Teaches us to take the Rough with the Smooth
The thing is, we all know that life isn’t a bed of roses. None of us really expect to be happy all the time, but it’s still hard when we face suffering and uncertainty - as BKS Iyengar observes accurately in his book Light on Life, “Most people want to take joy without suffering.’
Iyengar says, “I will take both.”
When we commit to a yoga practice we’re committing to to both pleasure and pain.
For example, in the yoga class that I taught this morning we focused on the feet and the hands. We worked them hard, spreading the feet, sitting on the heels (agony), asking tough things of our hands and feet. But with this effort came the pleasure of connecting hands, arms, shoulders and upper back. The pleasure of feeling the body come together in a pose.
Why We Commit to Yoga Again - and Again - and Again
Let’s come back to that word: resolution. When broken down into its component parts it is; a means of solving a problem or dealing with a difficult situation AGAIN. This is very similar to committing to a yoga practice.
I decided to commit to a yoga practice seven years ago as a yoga teacher trainee. At the beginning it was easy to stick to it as I had to a) know all the yoga poses off by heart b) get confident enough to teach them and c) had the support of my co-trainees on the same journey.
Seven years later my yoga practice is still something I have to re-commit to every day. The incentives have changed. Without an assessment looming the practice is for my own benefit and to inform my teaching. And there are days when I don’t get on to the mat. But I know that if I do, it will shift my perspective and allow me to face the day with a little more equanimity.
Why Isn’t Yoga a New Year’s Resolution?
Yoga is the best New Year’s resolution that isn’t a New Year’s resolution, because it’s an All Year Round resolution. And now I’ve said ‘resolution’ too many times and it sounds weird.
And because our yoga practice gives us all those ‘re-’ things that are healthy for body and mind.
Yoga teachers us resilience. Because we practice the poses we find hard, we pick ourselves up after falling over, we try again and again.
Yoga teaches us respect. Because we start to appreciate our bodies for the things they can do, not the things they can’t.
Yoga teaches us to relax. And not in a shallow way, but the deep relaxation of savasana, when we sink down through the layers of consciousness.
So in order to re-commit to your practice, whether it’s a daily one, a three times a week one, or your commitment to a weekly class, why not come up with your own ‘re’ word that motivates you to get on the mat?
And then we can resolve to make 2022 the year that we all practice yoga together.