quarta-feira, 4 de março de 2015

10 things I learned doing 30 days of Yoga



  1. Breathing is the core business and I’m bad at business.
With this adventure I found out I was breathing wrong. Truth be told I found out I might been bad at breathing all my life. I think swimming practice was the only time I actually forced myself to breathe properly… and even then, I struggled.

During the #30daysofyoga challenge I often found myself holding my breath and I had to constantly remind myself to breathe. 10 days into the practice it got better but it still helped that Adriene reminded me sometimes.

  1. Savasanaaaa and I’m asleep.

Savasana or the Corpse Pose is one of the most important poses in Yoga - it’s the first step to focus and the last step to relaxation.

Because sometimes I didn’t have too much time to just stay in Savasana at the end of the practice I started doing that in bed before sleep.

I think you can guess what happened a couple of times: I actually fell asleep in that position.
  1. Balance is the key and I have no clue where’s the key.

My balance is crap, this is no news to me. But doing this yoga challenge I got frustrated several times because I kept losing my balance. I blame my crooked escoliosic backbones.
  1. “Be still” never worked for my parents.
Next to breathing correctly standing still - just standing still - was the biggest challenge. I am so easily distracted that it was actually very hard to focus on my breath and nothing else.
  1. It is a proper exercise.

Hell yeah, planking and all. You’ll feel it. Your muscles will feel it - that soreness all over is there the next day. But if you yoga through it it will go away after some time.
  1. It does help.

You do feel more relaxed afterwards. For me it helped to forgive my selfishness: taking that time just for me. It helped me with my balance. It really makes you more aware of where you stand and I do believe it builds your confidence.

  1. Making time is the hardest thing.
It is. There will always be buses to catch, dishes to wash, laundry to do. You have your work, you are tired, you have soooo much to do. Yes, I know. But just make the time. Force yourself to make time for it. It’s hard, but if there’s a will there’s a way.

  1. You have to be more stubborn than lazy.

You have to be strong and stubborn. Yes, stubborn. I had to be stubborn with myself in order to make it until the end. I’ve also committed to post one pic per day on Instagram, as a way to add the responsibility of “pleasing the followers” or “proving the ones who didn’t believe it wrong” - the sense of obligation might not sound appealing but it comes in your advantage, trust me.

  1. It helps if you have a funny teacher (Adriene is funny).

Sometimes you are really tired and not feeling it. It’s okay. Sometimes you are frustrated because you can’t do it perfectly, you leg doesn’t reach that high, your balance is crap. And you resent the practice, you resent yourself because you suck at it. In these times it helps a lot if you have a funny mentor. I found myself cracking up in the middle of a pose because of something Adriene said. Thank you, Adriene.
  1. You really have to “find what feels good”.

The good thing about this challenge is that it is not strict. you can move, you can laugh you can roll your eyes. The important things is that you feel good doing it and feel better after you’ve done it. I know I did.


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Nota: este post está em inglês porque calhou, fiz o desafio em inglês e comecei a escrever em inglês. Para quem quiser, o desafio é este: http://yogawithadriene.com/30days/

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