Lessons from the woo woo zone

Note: crawled on the scale and after a month of gaining and losing the same three pounds, I am finally down one new pound. Woot! That is 35 pounds total. But considering I was in san fran for five days and spokane for four, I think I did pretty good!

On to the topic of the day which is NOT my weight. Nor is it the fact that I went to the track yesterday with my daughter and her bf and I SCHOOLED them! They started out so cocky and fast and I just trotted along behind them, watching their tight 17-year-old butts leave me in the dust. Fine. Whatfreakingevah. Hare and the tortoise anyone? Cause those skinny ass girls could not keep it up and though they attempted to make up for it by alternating walking and sprinting, they finally had to stop and watch the turtle keep going and going and going. I am so going to be ready for the race for the cure! Well, if the race was held at a track, but that's another story!

No, this post is actually some lessons I learned from the woo woo zone, my new yoga classes. Now, I am a natural born skeptic. I don't cry during commercials. I have a gut feeling that most charities are out to part me from my money. For someone who has a lot of hope and wants to change the world, I really do look at stuff with a jaundiced eye, so to speak. Not to mention that I'm an evangelical Christian, albeit a fairly liberal one, so gongs and Oms are not really for me.

However.

I am loving me some yoga class. In a weird sort of way, (and I hope God gets what I am saying and won't strike me dead at my keyboard) yoga class is a little bit like a woman's bible study. At the beginning of every class the instructor gives a little speech that is strangely like a five minute devotional that you get at church meetings. It's all very positive stuff about how yoga relates to life and what we should be thinking about through class. Some of it is a little too woo woo for me. Or as my son would say, floaty. But I am loving the way yoga is teaching me to read my body, quiet my mind during exercise, and be aware of and control every movement. And I love the stretching. Since I am running and doing aerobic exercising, stretching feels way good. Plus, I think it's actually helping my running. Instead of concentrating on something else to make the time go by faster, I am focusing on my breathing and what my body feels. That makes the time go by just as good and I am more aware of the process.

Yesterday, our woo woo message was really good and can be used in any stressful situation whether physical or emotional stress. Breathe, relax, feel, watch, allow.

In yoga that means, breathe during your pose, relax what muscles you can even though others are highly engaged, do an emotional and physical scan, watch for reactions to what you are feeling and allow the emotion or physical sensations.

I guess this makes sense in real life too, during a stressful situation. Remember to breathe, mentally relax what body parts that you can, check what you are feeling, watch how you are reacting and then allow the feeling to be.

I think once you go through that process you are better equipped to deal with the situation. I'll try to remember that my next rejection. HA!