Yoga is the song of the body - (Vanda Scaravelli)
Updated: Sep 16
If your body is not happy, you're not listening.
If you want to feel better in your body, you need to be able to understand the practical functional reasons your body doesn't feel good. Then you might be able to do something about it.
Often, if our bodies complain whilst we are just doing something, because we are busy 'doing', we ignore the signals and simply put up with the consequences of our actions later on when we've stopped. We even expect this to happen, and sometimes treat our aches and pains as a badge of honour that proves we managed to do the thing that we had decided to do. Or if it's an old injury, we assign the pain to the event that caused it, rather than the fact that we aggravated the old injury whilst we were busy 'doing'.
And if we keep ignoring the signals the body will try its best to protect itself.... A joint under threat will stiffen with tension in an attempt to restrict the movement that could damage it. Your spine will lock into whatever shape it has to hold to make it safe for the rest of you to be upright, and it will get tired and sore wherever you hang off it for support when you relax..
Ignoring the body blocks the outcome you are looking for
The ironic thing is that ignoring the body to fulfill the agenda of our identity, however well intentioned, leaves the identity experiencing itself, life and reality, through the lens of this complaining body that we have been ignoring as we misuse it.
Simply learning to explore how your body feels AS you do things, can change your life.
Originally inspired by the work of Vanda Scaravelli, my yoga has taught me that although this might be a common experience, it's not inherently 'true'.
I've understood directly that my experience of myself is entirely dictated by the way I relate to life itself. The only way to engage with life is through our bodies, and our experience depends entirely on how we use it.
Changing the way you do things so that your body is happier, changes your life!
"Yoga is the song of the body - you just need to listen"
"When you practice this way you become happier and more intelligent"
Vanda Scaravelli
"But this is just the way my body works"
Changing anything you do habitually is notoriously difficult. Because we only 'know' what we already do, and any attempt to 'control' the body can only last as long as you think about it. And 'thinking; about the body to move it is by definition unnatural, so whatever you learn to do to your body cannot be adopted as natural.
But if, instead of making the body surrender to the voice of the mind, you can learn to surrender the mind to the voice of the Body, all of a sudden 'new' ways of moving and breathing simply become new experiences of yourself that the mind can learn from.
Yoga is ....
You just need to start listening. And if you listen quietly but attentively to the body's signals whilst trying out familiar movements in experimentally new ways, the body will immediately tell YOU when you stumble on a better way of doing things... It will feel 'right', and both you and your body will be happy about the outcome... That's when you understand what 'Yoga' means.
Whilst doing this, mind has unified itself with body, and both aspects of you benefit. The practice opens the mind to a broader intelligence and softens the rigidity of the identity construct, so that consciousness can receive new experiences of itself.
Experiencing can ONLY be done through this precious body that has been gifted to us for this very purpose, and when the body is given the right conditions, it can let go of apparently permanent complications with a single cycle of the breath, and return to its natural state, along with the mind that is experiencing it.
This uniting of body, mind and soul is what I believe the practice of 'Yoga' means. Anything else is destined to keep the wheels grinding in the way they always do, with the inevitable results that you might expect from continuing to do exactly the same things in exactly the same way with exactly the same issues arising.
" Through dedicated practice the Yogi can escape the endless wheel of Kharma "
The Hatha Yoga Pradipika
If you want some guidance from someone that has been on this journey for the last 35 years or so, this is what I'm here to do.
Book your free 15min online consultation here.
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