Why Yoga?

I know my last update was a downer. I just want to acknowledge that. This post is not a downer...

I have one month left of training before I am a certified yoga instructor! Last Saturday our teacher asked us to go home and answer two questions before class the next day:

1. How does yoga affect my life?
2. What are the specific benefits I can see in myself from the practice?

Glaringly obvious to me was the fact that I actually took the time to do the assignment. What!?! Before I took the plunge into yoga, my follow through muscle was weak but its been strengthened through my practice. Here are my answers:

1. How yoga affects my life:

• Yoga stretches me to move my body in ways I normally wouldn't.
• Yoga is a reminder to, at every moment, return to my breath.
• Yoga reminds me of the preciousness that is every moment and what can be created through intention and action.
• Yoga fills me up and empties me out. It washes over me like a wave.
• Yoga is a force that has connected me to others who share my interest and continues to connect me in a meaningful way to those who are curious about it. I am already connected to those who are neither into nor curious about yoga because yoga means union.
• Yoga reminds me that in the midst of all that we create, out in the world and inside our minds, we ourselves are a creation. We are intimately connected to one another and to the rest of the world. We come from the same basic materials as everything else and will also return to these same building blocks one day. I forget this often.

2. Specific benefits to me include:

• Hot body and muscle tone!
  
• Improved decisiveness
• Sense of play
• Mental clarity
• Body awareness
• Focus
• Increased follow-through (doing homework AND writing this blog!)
• Flow of creative energy
• Better able to handle stressful situations
• I get to hang out with really interesting and flexible people :)

All these changes!

I recently came across a college entry essay I wrote about the year of high school I chose to leave Arkansas and live with my dad in California. I found 17 year-old me (talking about 14 year-old me) quite inspirational. As I'm about to finish up my teacher training and embark on an even larger journey of change - becoming a teacher - I think I needed to hear young Brennan's wisdom. Here's what she had to say about change:

"I had changed my way of life. I had changed an attitude. I was a changed woman and it wasn't all that bad. I had overcome my fears and slapped them in the face with change! I still had change left over!"

What unbridled exuberance! I'm impressed I only included two exclamation points in those five sentences. Its clear I was excited about the results of changes I had made. Its pretty cool to step back and realize what has changed in myself, during the teacher training and since junior year of High School. I don't often get the opportunity to take that step back. I guess that's just one more thing yoga has given me.

My training is coming to a close and I'm a bit scared about the change coming my way. Its scary for me to think about sharing something I love on such a big scale. Its hard for me to make changes, even when (and perhaps especially when) they're based on choices I've made to follow my heart. But, I've changed before and I'm going to keep on slapping my fears in the face and being a changed woman. Surely, other specific benefits are yet to come...

A picture of the "change left over."