The first time I ever tried yoga I hated it. I was a swimmer and was used to the push and grind of more, more, more. What was this quiet exercise? I felt bored and thought it was pointless because to me, at the time, it was "stretching." I felt much more comfortable with hard cardio, push-ups, weights, and pure adrenaline rushes. I was seeking that high and I couldn't get with the program.
But as I deepened my spiritual practice and meditated I decided to give yoga a try again.
Last winter I was in need of some healing. I wasn't eating. I wasn't sleeping. I was emotionally wounded and my body was suffering. My soul wasn't comfortable being in my body. Frankly, I was disappearing.
I needed a change and that was when I made the first investment I've ever made on myself EVER. I committed to a membership of yoga.
My goal for the practice was not to conquer the poses but to understand breath. I went through the practice and would contort my body in ways it wasn't used to. I sweated in the heat (I chose hot vinyasa) and my whole being was pushed to limits it wasn't used to. My muscles were strained, I felt like I couldn't breathe, and I was attempting to move my body into a picturesque image. In every second my body would want to give in but I breathed. I inhaled and I exhaled. Inhale. Exhale. Breathe.
This became my practice. The practice of being uncomfortable, expanding my movement, and breathing through the pain. In the inhale, I gathered energy and in the exhale I released the tension. The breath is our life force. I saw myself improving in yoga and started carrying this practice over into other areas of my life. I used the quote, "getting comfortable with the uncomfortable" as my mantra. The conflict of not accepting difficulties weakened. I instead, opened up my energy to it. I began to heal and surrendered myself to the experience. Just like yoga, life threw at me experiences that made me want to collapse but I released the need to control. I accepted it and "got comfortable with the uncomfortable."
All this healing started because I Chose Me.