Find the things to love about the pose that you hate.
Oh God, not that pose! Bob hates standing hand to big toe pose. Sure it is a good pose to help with balance and it stretches the hamstrings and helps to open your hips. But Bob almost always falls down. And when he does not fall down he wobbles all over the place. He starts to dance all over the mat.
Bob is so embarrassed and discouraged. He has never been able to keep his balance through out all four parts of the pose. Sometimes he can keep his balance on one side but on the other side he has no balance at all.
There several techniques that Bob can use to work with this pose and make it a loving part of his practice.
- Fake it until you make it
- Consider the benefits
- Just do it!
- Approach it with gratitude
- Laugh at yourself
The first of these techniques is to fake it until you make it. You may have heard about this technique in other areas of your life and it also applies to your yoga practice.
Fake it until you make it
The key to this technique is to find something about the pose that you like. Sure the pose is difficult and challenging but there must be something about that you like.
Find the bright spot within the pose itself. Find the part of the pose that works well for you and focus on that aspect.
Use your body language, your breath and your internal dialog and start the process of finding the few aspects of the pose that you are okay with.
Change your internal dialog to “I love a challenge” rather than “Not that one again”. Make it a positive challenge rather than a negative fear. The positive approach will make the pose a little more tolerable.
While Bob is looking for the bright spot in Utthita Hasta Padangustasana that he can appreciate he can also look at how the pose is affecting his body.
Consider the benefits of the pose
So the pose is physically challenging. Have a look at how else the pose is helping you and your body. You may hate the pose because it is exposing tensions or emotions that have been long buried. The pose is helping to remove the negative stuff from your body and you are not enjoying it. It may not be a comfortable process but you will be better for it.
One of the good things about this detoxifying process that it will eventually become less extreme and you will grow to enjoy the pose because you feel better when you do it.
Now that you have found something in the pose to love and realize that it is helping you to detoxify maybe it is time to consider a shoe manufacturers advice to “Just Do It” anyway and get on with the pose.
Just do it!
It is like eating your vegetables when you were a kid at home. You knew they were good for you even though you didn’t like them. Later in life you realized that vegetables are good for you and you eat them all on your own now.
Your body is like that kid you were at home struggling to eat your vegetables. Just do it anyway and you will realize later that, just like your vegetables, the pose is not that bad after all and you might even start to like it.
Just like there were somethings on your dinner plate that you liked and somethings that you hated you did have a plate with food on it. Be grateful that you had regular and good meals growing up and do the same with your yoga practice.
Approach it with Gratitude
Some poses are easy. Some poses are challenging and some poses are so difficult that you hate them. Be grateful that you have the opportunity to practice yoga. You have a good teacher and a great studio to practice in. You, your body and your mind are benefiting from the yoga practice.
Work through the pose that you hate and move on to the next. The difficult poses make you appreciate the easier ones even more. Without the variety of poses and the different levels of challenge, your yoga practice would becoming boring and uninteresting.
Learn to appreciate the different levels of challenge that your yoga practice brings to you and lighten up.
Laugh at yourself
Why are you stressing out about one or two poses. You are doing yoga to relax and get rid of stress. Get a grip on yourself and relax and enjoy your practice. You need to realize that you do not need to be perfect at each and every pose. No one else expects you to be perfect.
So maybe you are little awkward in a pose. Maybe you fall down. Maybe you look like a scarecrow.
Bob has learned to laugh at his attempts at the Utthita Hasta Padangustasana and he realizes that his attempts at it will pay off eventually.
I suck at Utthita Hasta Padangustasana
I have been practicing this pose for many years. There are times when my balance is good and I can do the pose with grace and poise.
There are other times that I am wobbling all over the place. I cannot keep my balance. There is no warning from day to day which way the pose is going to go. Will I be able to hold the pose and be steady during the four parts or will I be falling down all over the place.
I have learned to accept this uncertainty as part of my practice. I have realized that accepting where I am at with this pose is an important part of my yoga practice. “Just Do It” and move on.
There are many aspects of the pose that I can be proud about. My hips and hamstrings are open and flexible enough that I can do the pose with good alignment. I can take satisfaction in that aspect of the pose while I continue to struggle with the balance part of the pose.
Summary
There is no need to be perfect in every pose. Yoga is a journey that never ends. The pose you currently hate today will become over time your Best Friend Forever. You will learn to love the challenge that it brings and over time you learn to embrace it and appreciate the benefits that this pose brings to you and your body despite its challenges.
And then you will be ready to move on to a new and more challenging pose. Maybe you will hate the new pose, but if you apply some of these points it will eventually join the ranks of your most loved and respected poses.
Next Steps
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