My journey to Yoga

I practice yoga.

I practice EVERY day.  Do you wanna know why????????????????? (I added that many question marks for dramatic affect.  What do you think???)

You see, once upon a time, I did no yoga at all.  Shocker, I know.  If you know me, you know by now that I do yoga.  You are probably sick of hearing about how I do yoga.

Hey, wait.  Have you heard yet how I do yoga every day?

And, now I'm driving myself nuts... Anyhow.  Back to it.  A long time ago I did no yoga, ever.  I have been very physically active for 6 or so years, exercising every day, eating a relatively healthy diet, etc.  Fast forward to last year.  You see, I have IBS and I've been struggling with it for YEARS.  Through trial and error, and changing the diet multiple times, I figured out that diet was only a small part of the problem.  Some days I would feel absolutely fine.  I could eat anything I want. Other days, days that were busy, or I was stressed out in anyway, my gut would extend to the size of a pregnant woman 6 months along, and I would get cramps, and all that fun stuff, all the while eating the same things I ate the day before.  Yikes.  Not fun.  So, instead of focusing on changing my diet a bajillion times I decided to figure out a way to manage my stress levels better.

Enter prayer.  I prayed a lot for an answer that question-how can I manage my stress?  I honestly don't remember how long it took, but I do remember having the feeling to start yoga.  I had heard yoga was good for that kind of thing.  I started yoga in December, while continuing my normal exercise routine.  Come February I decided that I just wanted to do Yoga.  Period.  This was a huge step into the unknown for me.

6 years ago, when I started this whole exercise thing, I relied on exercise to help me achieve one thing- to get skinny. I have never had a healthy relationship with my body. I blame it on someone calling me fat when I was in kindergarten forever ago, but that is a whole other blog post in and of itself. Exercise became that crutch. I HAD to exercise 6 days a week, because it is SO easy for me to gain weight.  I HAD to lift weights, and run, and bike ride because that is what the skinny people do.  In February I had this aha moment.

Eating exactly what the skinny people told me to wasn't serving me.  Focusing on how skinny the world thinks I should be isn't healthy (still a big struggle by the way). Exercising so intensely was not good for my body (remember the chronic stress and pain I mentioned??? It works for a lot of people).  It was just adding extra stress and pain to my body.  Focusing on what the world thought about beauty and health was not healthy for me.  So, my exercise routine has made a complete 360 and I love it.  I took a whole month off and only focused on yoga.  I figured out a few things:

1. I love yoga


2. I don't have to rely on exercise to eat a healthy weight.


3. Following the fitness world does not help me be healthy.  I cleaned up my instagram account and stopped following those types of things on there.  It feels so good.


4. I love to move.  After a month, I missed running and walking, but mostly walking.  So I walk 5 days a week and if I feel like it I run.


5. It's so important to listen to my body.


6. Yoga makes me happy.


7. Yoga is teaching me how to manage my stress levels.  My IBS is not cured, but I can make my symptoms less noticable with the tools yoga has given me.


8. Breathing, breathing is so important.


9. Focusing on the present is so important.  Living in the past or only looking towards the future will not make you happy.  Trust me.  Been there done that. Still do that sometimes.


10. We are a work in progress.  Some days we take 5 steps forward just to take 5 steps back the next day.  The important thing is to brush it off and move forward again.