Yoga!
I have always enjoyed moving, doing something interesting and creative with my body, trying to improve it. Besides that I love cooking and especially baking. By baking I mean muffins, cupcakes, tea-cakes, celebratory cakes, breads, cookies, cheesecakes, brownies, etc. Last year this was my escape from over-thinking my life-situation, money troubles, anxiety, missing my family and so-on. Let's put it simply - I wasn't at my happiest place last year. So I baked, ate, baked more, ate more and gained weight. It was hard for me to accept that I'm now 5 or even 10 kg more than what I have ever been and I got even more depressed. The depressed me is not fun to be around. At all!
I have history in dancing (modern and classic ballet) and in athletics but one extremely stupid injury stopped my dreams for actual carrier in the sports field. So last year, when I finally managed to put myself together, for the first time in my life, I faced the real and urgent need to loose weight. Fast!
Off course I cut all of the baked goods, I reduced my portions and left the mid-meals snacks but that wasn't enough. I needed a sport or an exercise program that will keep my interest for long enough, will be challenging but won't be to hard on my almost destroyed knees. I started with aerobics. It was easy on the knees, it had different levels of intensity so there was place for improvement over time and ... it was boring.
So I decided to spice the things up with pilates, what apparently was the hip activity around the world this days. At this point I wasn't even considering doing yoga, I always assumed that it is not my field of expression - too humble, too serene, too quite and finding-your-inner-centre kind of activity. Besides that I was satisfied with the results of my aerobics+pilates routine - I was loosing weight, I was growing stronger. It was nice. And then the summer came, I went back home and it was too hot to jump up-and-down for 30 minutes as my aerobics required. What is more - the pilates part of my work-out wasn't challenging me any more and I failed to find a new one. I had to find something new that will help me keep the good results that I already had and it will help me go to the next level.
And this is when I friend suggested yoga.
After a day-long You-Tube search of "Yoga for Beginners", "Doing Yoga for the first time", "Your first Yoga Lesson", "Yoga 101" and so on I decided that I'll give it a try. Best Decision I Could've Made! It took me awhile to find the right routine for me, to determine exactly how long I can do Yoga before I start to shake and my bones start to hurt. Just like with everything else - it takes time and adjustment until you reach the point of knowing what, why and how you're doing something. I was struggling with the basics at the beginning and I was feeling like some kind of fraud, saying that I do yoga but I can't even do a proper Downward Dog. Worst feeling! But I also felt that I'm actually improving, I was challenged, I was excited, I was eagor to get better, to be able to do more and more difficult poses. And then everything, and I really mean everything, felt perfect and just right for me when I found Tara Stiles. Ever since I found the You-Tube channel my yoga routine consists of nothing but different mixtures of her videos. This is not a "Go-Buy-Her-Books" kind of post, it is "This-Is-What-Fits-Me" kind of post and I'm completely bias in her favour simply because everything I want from yoga, all the reasons why I do yoga (besides weight-loss) are covered by her. Plus, she knits hats. How cool is this?!
For the past half a year, or more, yoga has been a huge part of my life. I've been doing yoga at home, at the summer house, at the open field (what a great place to have a yoga routine - at the open field where all you can do is stare at the mountains and enjoy your tree pose), at the beach, while at vacation, at the pool ( that was kind of challenging), at the side of the road, while on a road-trip, at the university library, at the green area outside the university library, everywhere. Really - everywhere!
So, here are some snap-shot of today, while doing yoga at home. Gosh, it's harder and a lot more slippery without my yoga mat (lost somewhere around the house while we were moving from one bedroom to another).
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| Dancer Pose |
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| Tree pose |
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| Bikram Tree pose |
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| Up-ward Dog pose |
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| Down-ward Dog pose |
You can't get lost if you don't know where you're going...
