My First Yoga Class: Breathe In… Or Was It Out?

Apparently, Yoga Is Not as Easy as It Looks!

Like I told you guys, I am going to start focusing a little more on my physical well-being. I had promised my daughter that I would attend a yoga class, so today, I finally kept my promise.

I come from the land of yoga, but when and where I grew up, yoga was mostly something I had heard about. Other people did it. I didn’t.

After moving here, I was always too busy to focus on myself—or at least that’s what I kept telling myself.

So, today, I walked into my very first yoga class with absolutely no idea what to expect. Heck, I didn't have a yoga mat.

Anyways, it turns out, I was the only newbie in the room. Everyone else seemed to know exactly what they were doing. And there is a whole lot more to yoga than what meets the eye.

The instructions came at me too quickly and there were just way too many things to remember at once. My brain simply couldn’t process half of them.

And then there was the breathing.

Apparently, I was supposed to inhale when everyone else was inhaling and exhale when everyone else was exhaling. Somehow, I managed to do the exact opposite.

But you know what?

I stayed for the entire class.

And that, my friends, was my win for the day.

And honestly, I found myself paying more attention to the beautiful Indian classical music playing in the background than to the instructor.

Also, during that one whole hour, my brain was so busy trying to figure out which way my arms, legs, body and breathing were supposed to go that I completely forgot about everything else—the worries, the endless thoughts, the things waiting to be done.

Maybe that’s the whole point of yoga.

Not necessarily to bend yourself into impossible shapes, but to quiet the noise in your head for a little while.

Maybe I stumbled upon my own version of meditation!

So, today's takeaway,

I may not have done the poses correctly.

I may have breathed at all the wrong times.

But I showed up.

And sometimes, showing up is the first step toward taking care of yourself.

Have you ever tried something completely new where everyone else seemed to know what they were doing? Did you stick with it—or quietly make your escape?

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