Becoming a ninja
This summer I was turned onto Yogi Flight School by my dear cousin. She participates regularly and saw that I was looking to become more flexible and work on my balance through light workouts. I had lost the weight by adjusting my balance both emotionally and nutritionally and wanted to move again to support my body and maintain the work I had done. And #LivingWithMS means that I most definitely benefit from a stronger core and ability and knowledge of how to balance myself.
If you’ve been reading my blog, let’s remember, it isn’t about working out hard anymore. It’s about doing short, meaningful movements that strengthen my mind, body and spirit at the same time.
Yoga seemed perfect. I, however, doubted my abilities because it always seems so hard and like I am too big, my body is too heavy, and I wasn’t built to be able to move that way. All excuses.
The trainer, the program, the classes. It’s more than Yoga, it is applying this mindset and thought process in our daily lives and making it part of who we are.
Again, another opportunity to add to my current version or adjust to a better version of myself.
I dove into a free 5 days of online sessions where the instructor showed you how to warm up and perform arm balances. In 5 days I learned the lunge, the crow and the flying pigeon and felt comfortable. Who knew! I was shocked and had a blast.
It turns out it’s all about the proper warm-up. If your body is prepared for the movements and has been warmed up properly the movements actually happen easily. I was so impressed with how attending these classes and seeing the success made me feel. I felt like I was actually flying!
The program calls us Ninjas because we are learning, growing and soaring in life by becoming more focused and stable.
I love to practice. I love to attend live online sessions and join in and see others doing the same thing. I love the Facebook community built up around this and I love that I have access to all of the sessions and library if I miss a session.
What this program has actually taught me:
Number one is confidence in myself. The instructor emails us during the week and gives us prep talks and asks us questions that all actually relate to our everyday lives and can be applied in multiple ways, not just yoga.
One theme for example was commitment. It wasn’t just about committing to practicing the moves, it was of course part of it but it went deeper than that.
“It’s the fact that I can be committed to my limitations. I had a reason why everything was impossible for me and I was committed to staying stuck and to being a martyr.”
It’s about opening our minds and realizing that commitment is a choice, and we typically are choosing to commit to the wrong things.
The instructor shares in her emails her story. Her connection with these words and how she shifted her life and understanding of these words and then applied them to everything she did including Yoga.
She explains that it’s about feeling capable. Feeling like a badass. Having control over one’s body. That’s commitment!
She then poses questions that make you think and reflect:
Ask yourself now, without judgment - in your life “What am I committed to?”
Are you committed to being authentic and free?
All of the above are segments from her emails, the program talks about commitment a lot. It’s because to get on your hands, and arms and balance your entire self there takes you committing to break through your fears and doing the work.
She often refers to the OH SHIT moment and you don’t get it until you get it, it’s that place that you get to, right when you think you are going to fail, going to fall. Embracing that Oh SHIT moment actually shows us that because of the practice, the warm-up and the proper instruction your body knows what to do and is powerful enough to hold you through that OH SHIT moment.
I have applied it several times not only in my yoga moves but in life!
I am blessed that I have the opportunity to learn from these instructors. I challenge myself daily and I choose to commit to practicing, pushing myself to and through the OH SHIT moments in everything I do.
Living with MS and knowing that this will benefit me, not just now but in years to come. I am committed to continuing to do the moves. Even if I can’t do the handstands or struggle with the grasshopper. I commit to continue trying. Practicing and feeling the way it makes me feel each and every time.
In group, we call it #NinjaInTheWild when we pull off our yoga moves out in public. I have challenged myself to do the crow move on top of all the mountain tops I reach.
It takes all I have to get to the tops of these mountains now and then it takes a few moments of steady focus to pull off these moves. To show that I can still steady my body and get it to do what I want it to do brings a smile to my face every time. Sometimes it is definitely hard, and sometimes it doesn’t happen or happen for long but I will never stop trying.
