Rambling Yogi

Tag: mindfulness

  • Getting things done

    Getting things done

    It’s hard to believe that it’s been over 5 years since I last wrote a post for my blog. Since my last post I’ve changed jobs, had a baby, lost touch with my yoga practice / reconnected with my practice and written 27 draft posts.

    For one reason or another I just haven’t been able to bring myself to complete a post and publish it. So I thought for my first post in a very long time it would be fitting to explore why we put things off.

    Sure all of us can put things off from time to time and sometimes prioritising things to make the best use of your time is the best thing to do. But chronic procrastination is a different beast! In my life right now I feel like I’m the queen of unnecessarily postponing things, even thought I know I’ll be worse off for not doing them . But I’m not alone – it’s a very common habit with recent studies finding that 20 per cent of adults are chronic procrastinators.

    Despite what you might think, procrastination isn’t a sign of laziness. In fact it’s more about emotion regulation than time management.

    So why do we do it? It relates to emotional self-regulation, that is it’s a way of coping with challenging emotions and negatives mood brought on by certain tasks. So in short we procrastinate to avoid feelings like boredom, anxiety, insecurity, frustration, resentment and self-doubt. The nature of the aversion depends on the task, here are some examples:

    • Hating the task – it’s really tedious, difficult, boring or stressful
    • A lack of confidence or self esteem – the fear of failure or being a perfectionist
    • Being easily distracted – just can’t stay focused on the task
    • Feeling overwhelmed – the job feels too big or unachievable
    • Hitting a creatively blocked – can’t solve the problem or feeling uninspired

    It’s important to take some time to try understand why you are putting something off so that you can take actions that will best support you to get the important things done.

    Here are some things you can consider to help things along

    • Attach a reward to getting the task done. This is essentially the Premack principle – a less desired behaviour can be reinforced by the opportunity to engage in a more desired behaviour.
    • Focus on just the next action. At the start of a task can you consider what the next action would be. Ask yourself, what’s the next action I would take if I were going to do it. Maybe it’s writing the heading at the top of a document or it’s the separating of washing or opening an email. Don’t wait to be in the mood to do a task, let your motivation be built on your action.
    • Set yourself up in a distraction free environment. This might mean just putting your phone in another room or turning off notifications while you are trying to focus.
    • Enlist Help. Find someone to keep you accountable. Tell someone that you won’t do X until you’ve done Y or that you want to do X by a certain date.
    • Build your skill set. If you’re lacking confidence in a particular area are there any courses you can take, people that you can learn from, opportunities to practice and get feedback. No one is an expert at anything straight away, so try to support yourself to crawl before you walk. And if you find yourself stalling out of fear try and tell yourself the mantra “progress not perfection”.
    • Look after yourself. It’s really hard to get anything done if you’re feeling exhausted or your anxiety is through the roof. Take a look at how you are living – are you getting enough sleep? are you eating well? do you get regular exercise or send time outdoors? do you meditate or find time to decompress without technology? If you read this list and its overwhelming thinking about all the things that aren’t what they should be then try starting with sleep. That is unless of course you have a tiny human that’s in control of your sleep right now, then maybe it’s getting out for a walk with bub once a day.
    • Practice self compassion. There’s so much to be gained from being compassionate with yourself, particularly when mistakes are made or things don’t turn out the way you had hoped. Finding kindness and understanding for yourself can do a lot to help improve motivation and personal growth. Things that can help build self compassion include guided meditations on self compassion, practising daily gratitude where a least one thing you are grateful for each day relates to yourself and if you catch yourself being critical try flipping that thinking on its head by replacing it with something kind and positive. Of course it’s not easy to just change the way you speak to yourself but like any new habit if you start small and gradually build it up, that small change could build into a lift changing new perspective.

    Before writing this post I’d assumed that procrastination was all about motivation and time management. I’d never considered that it would be more about trying to avoid unwanted emotions. But once I knew what it was all about it made a lot more sense to me; I’ve never been very good at sitting with unpleasant emotions and am a big seeker of ways to avoid.

    So in light of what I’ve learnt writing this post I’m going to put it out there that I will write at least 1 post a month. Here’s to getting things done!

    With love and kindness

    xx

    p.s if there’s any particular topics you’d like to me explore and write about please do reach out and let me know

    The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time to plant a tree is now.

    Chinese Proverb
  • Old habits die hard

    Old habits die hard

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    What happens when you fail; when you regress back into an old habit that you’re trying to kick. Do you give up, wave the white flag and tell yourself you didn’t really care that much anyway or do you dust yourself off, reassess and get back in the game.

    Let’s face it we all fail at things from time to time. We’re not perfect nor should aspire to be. We’re absolutely not meant to get everything on the first go and yet most of us are pretty hard on ourselves. What happens when we don’t meet our self imposed, often unrealistic expectations?

    Perhaps you beat up on yourself and begin running through past events, telling yourself you should have this and why didn’t you just do that. Or perhaps you begin to feel really defeated, like all you ever do is let yourself down. Maybe you even put on the I don’t give a shit mask and then make yourself really busy so you don’t have to confront how you feel. Or maybe, just maybe you respond to your failure with kindness, you tell yourself that it’s okay and you re-evaluate the situation.

    In the past I’ve been a big fan of the I don’t give a shit mask and getting real busy but over time I’m really starting to appreciate the lessons that come with things not working out on the first go. I’ve found that in working on my ability to stop, accept failure and identify opportunities for growth my whole capacity for living has expanded.

    So when I set myself a goal to not buy any new clothing for a whole year and on the 24th of January walked into a little boutique and bought myself a hat I was at first pretty disappointed with myself. Not even one full month in and I just couldn’t stop myself.  I thought about just never speaking about it and pretending it never happened and I thought about just completely giving up…I’d failed challenge over. But then I stopped myself and began to try and better understand why I hadn’t been able to stop myself.

    When I was in the store there was a little voice of reason that asked what the hell are you doing besides the fact that you don’t need any more hats you’re actually not supposed to be doing this! But then my old mate piped up – the voice that hates to say no and can justify anything – and simply said if you like the hat get the hat, you only live once.

    The first thing I recognised was that clearly I don’t like to tell myself no, I don’t like to feel like I can’t have things. This way of thinking can be both useful and problematic. It means that I take a lot of risks and I get a lot of what I want in life but in this situation it meant that I had no self control. I began to question myself further, so I can’t say no but why do I feel like I need the hat in the first place? Why do I always want so much material stuff?

    I believe the answer lies in the fact that I was completely ignorant to how much I really owned. I always wanted more because I had no real concept of excess in my wardrobe. Just the other day a girlfriend was talking to me about a beautiful dress that I own and I realised that I had totally forgotten that it even existed. It sits in a dress bag at the end of my wardrobe saved for a special occasion and it had completely left my mind.

    With this realisation I decided that in order to stop buying things and live more simply I had to take stock of what I already had and more importantly let go of some of the excess. I knew I needed a little help in this department and so it was time to get myself a copy of the Life changing magic of Tidying up by Marie Kondo. I’d been told before that I needed this book. In the past I would often go to clean out my wardrobe and just end up reorganising things, never really getting rid of anything. In order to have some sort of lasting change I needed more from myself than a little reorganisation.

    So has this one little book made much of a difference? It most certainly has. It’s reframed the way I look at the stuff I keep, given me some perspective on how much I have and more importantly made me assess how much I want to have. To feel like I don’t need more, that is a luxury unlike any other. I honestly couldn’t recommend this book more highly and I’d like to share some of my favourite little quotes from this magical little book.

    • “Visible mess helps distract us from the real disorder.”
    •  “Relieving yourself of the burden of excess is the quickest and most effective way to put your things in order.”
    • “The best way to choose what to keep and what to throw away is to take each item in one’s hand and ask: “Does this spark joy?” If it does, keep it. If not, dispose of it.”
    • “To truly cherish the things that are important to you, you must first discard those that have outlived their purpose. To get rid of what you no longer need is neither wasteful nor shameful. Can you truthfully say that you treasure something buried so deeply in a closet or drawer that you have forgotten its existence? If things had feelings, they would certainly not be happy. Free them from the prison to which you have relegated them. Help them leave that deserted isle to which you have exiled them. Let them go, with gratitude. Not only you, but your things as well, will feel clear and refreshed when you are done tidying.”
    • “The question of what you want to own is actually the question of how you want to live your life. Attachment to the past and fears concerning the future not only govern the way you select the things you own but also represent the criteria by which you make choices in every aspect of your life, including your relationships with people and your job.”
    • “The act of folding is far more than making clothes compact for storage. It is an act of caring, an expression of love and appreciation for the way these clothes support your lifestyle.”
    •  “From the moment you start tidying, you will be compelled to reset your life. As a result, your life will start to change. That’s why the task of putting your house in order should be done quickly. It allows you to confront the issues that are really important. Tidying is just a tool, not the final destination. The true goal should be to establish the lifestyle you want most once your house has been put in order.”

     

    With a fresh perspective, a few garbage bags for the salvos and more knowledge on tidying up than I had ever considered possible, I embark again on my challenge to not purchase any additional clothing for the rest of year.

     

     

  • A whole new year

    A whole new year

    Without letting go there can be no new space. Without space there can be no change. Without change there can be no growth.

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    People often set new years resolutions in the hope of achieving some sort of self improvement. Whether it be a health goal, a financial goal or perhaps just an all round I’m going to sort my shit out goal, it all comes back to the desire to make some part of your life better.

    In concept it’s a great idea; pick something out that you’re not happy with and make it a goal to change it. So why do new years resolutions almost never last more than a couple of weeks or if you’re lucky maybe a couple of months.

    I think firstly when people set out to make changes they don’t invest much time exploring and trying to understanding why they actually want to change, what the change would mean to them and what has been blocking them from making it happen in the past. So when they begin to set the change in motion it’s really only a surface change which looks good on the outside but fails to break into the deeper, more hidden aspects of their soul; the only place where real change and growth come from.

    The other thing is that when people refrain from habitual behaviour it often brings up uncomfortable feelings. It may stir up sense of anxiety or uncertainty. It may show them parts of themselves that they were trying to avoid. It may even leave them questioning who they are without their old habitual patterns. It is these feelings that often drive people back to their old known ways; there’s a certain safety in that place.

    With all of this in mind my challenge for myself this year is to stop one habitual behaviour with the intention to see what I can learn about myself in the space that is created. For me I knew straight away what I wanted to try and stop. I want to not buy any new clothing for the next 12 months. It may not sound like a bit of a weird challenge but for me I think it’s perfect.

    Firstly it will most certainly be a major challenge for me. Many years ago a boyfriend challenged me to not purchase any new clothing for a week and to my horror I only lasted 4 days before I bought something without even thinking. It’s been a habit I’ve had for so many years now that I really can’t wait to see what comes up for me when I’m just dying to purchase something; to see what I have perhaps been trying to escape for years.

    Secondly I think that it will be a good chance for me to recalibrate and take stock of all that I already have and begin to realise that what I have is enough.  I’m super excited for the element of simplicity that I hope this challenge brings to my life and I welcome the uncomfortable as a special kind of magic.

    Here’s a fabulous new year filled with new goals, new focus, new adventure and lots of magic.

    xx

     

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  • Lessons of 2015

    Lessons of 2015

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    With great challenges come great lessons. While this year has been one the most heart breaking and challenging periods in my life thus far I can honestly say that I have also never felt more alive, capable and on purpose.

    I want to share my big lessons from this year in the hope that they enrich your life in some way.

     

    1. Let go of all the ways you thought life would unfold. Letting go of the plans and expectations you hold for your future is extremely liberating and allows you in live in flow with the universe. I realised the more I agonised over the loss of the future I had always dreamed of the harder life was to stomach. I had never even imagined a life where my dad wouldn’t be around to simply talk to and one day walk me down the aisle. Letting go isn’t a simple little choice you just make one day and then you’re done. It takes self awareness and consistent choice. When you begin to let go and allow things to just be as they are you’ll be blown away by the possibility that stands before you. Sometimes things better than your wildest dreams can just show up but you have to be open to the possibility that you don’t always know where life is taking you. You can fight that and try and control things or you can dance through the journey…the choice is always yours.
    2. Don’t fight with hard emotions. When you’re sad and you go into overdrive trying to shake it off and make yourself happy again you can wind up doing more harm than good. I never really realised until this year how much I truly loathed feeling sad. We’re all probably guilty of trying to numb or suppress undesirable emotions from time to time but doing it repeatedly not only means that you’re living an inauthentic life but it also dulls down all the good stuff. You can’t selectively numb emotions. When you let yourself experience sadness and pain the happiness and joy in your life also intensify. Allowing yourself to really sit with and feel your emotions grows your ability to experience the full spectrum of human emotions.
    3. Don’t get addicted to emotions. This is a follow on from my last point, while you should always let yourself feel what you need to, you also want to have enough self awareness to discern when you’re dropping a little too deep into an emotion or spending a little too much time there. I talk about this mainly in relation to pain and sadness but know that excessive emotion of any kind can be damaging to your body. It’s important to honour how you feel but you don’t want it to consume your life. Know the people, places and things that bring joy to your life, that make you laugh, balance and ground you, restore your calm and heal your heart.
    4. Don’t compare the beginning of your journey to some else’s middle. When I first lost my dad I’d often to talk to people who had been through a major loss and I’d find myself getting jealous of how well they were doing. There were times where I got insanely frustrated and felt like it wasn’t fair that I had to go through all of this, why couldn’t I just get back to good. It wasn’t until I got comfortable with pain and sadness that I began to realise how much I had to learn. Don’t cop out on the lessons in the challenges. As much as possible try and live in your own life and embrace your precious journey.
    5. Slow Down! Time will pass regardless of what you choose to do with it so don’t be in such a rush to get everything done yesterday. You never know when your time is up so be micro ambitious. Care more about short term goals and the everyday things. The only time you have to be alive is in each moment so live for your moments and enjoy each breath. And if you find that you’re living for future goals and wishing away your days I hope you find the courage to make some changes and take back your life.
    6. Know your worth. When I started telling myself “I am enough” each day I was amazed by all the things that came up. I was able to really clearly see all the areas that I didn’t believe I was enough and that awareness began to create a shift in my thinking. The stories I’d been subconsciously telling myself about my shortcomings we’re getting replaced with this new story that I am enough. All the crazy expectations that I pushed on myself in a bid to reach some dreamed up ideal fell away.  I began to believe that I don’t need more in order to be my best self…I was already there. I can’t even begin to tell you how much easier life got.
    7. Get help when you need it and don’t be too proud to accept it when it’s offered. I’ve never been overly brilliant at asking for help or accepting help when it’s offered but I’m so glad that all of that has changed. I knew this year that old habits and ways of coping were just not going to cut it. Accepting and asking for help from family and friends made me feeling so supported and really reassured me that I was going to be okay.  Getting professional help made me feel a bit sick at first but it was truly one of the best things I’ve ever done. There were sessions where I felt like I was making heaps of progress and then there were sessions that felt a bit pointless but it’s all contributed to bringing me into an amazing space.
    8. Make it happen; sort it out. All those things you’ve been putting off – the hard conversations, the mess and clutter, the mile long to do list – just do them. Previously I’ve been a pretty big fan of sticking my head in the sand when things have felt a little too difficult, unpleasant or overwhelming. All the things that I knew I should deal with would buzz around in the back of my brain creating a mild anxiety that I could usually balance out with a bit of yoga and meditation. But when I lost my dad I realised that I just didn’t have the capacity to carry the mild anxiety that lingered in the back of mind and I started to learn to deal with things. It didn’t just happen over night but like learning any new skill bit by bit I got better and better at dealing with things when they came up. I slowly stopped letting things run out for weeks and started taking action.  It feels absolutely brilliant to live in such a bold way.

     

    Take the time to figure out what your challenges have to tell you about yourself and find the lessons hiding in your experiences. You hold the answer to all of your questions you simply have to look within.

     

    Love and Blessings

     

    xx

     

     

     

  • Learning to Live

    Learning to Live

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    When my dad first passed away a number of people who had lost loved ones told me that you never really get over your loss. At the time it felt like I was being told that I was never going to be okay again, that somehow I was now broken beyond repair and I truly hated hearing it. Over the past few months I’ve been pushing myself to maintain my usual routine, believing that if I just kept pushing through I would somehow come out the other side. But the real truth is there is no other side to grief, it’s not finite, it’s not a linear path or a journey to a light at the end of a tunnel. It changes with you and it comes in and out like waves rolling onto the shore. After much soul searching I can finally say that I’m okay with that. I’m okay with no specific end to my grief and I’m comfortable with my pain.

     

    It’s been a long journey to get to that point.  I went through what seemed like a really good period where I felt almost weirdly together and at peace with everything. Looking back now I’d say it was a pretty heavy case of denial. Then the reality of how much I had lost started to set in. I found myself reduced to a crying mess day after day and I began to get really frustrated. I could cope with bits of sadness here and there but being upset every single day really started to take its toll.

     

    Desperate to find some reprieve from the constant crying and sadness I  began to hunt for a fix. I decided that I must be out of balance and so I went to my list of self care activities. I went through all the possibilities in my head: maybe I need to practice more yoga or run more or just get more sleep or perhaps regular massages are the answer…everyone loves a good massage. Now while self care is extremely important to good health it really doesn’t work if you’re using it to try and numb unwanted emotions. You see the problem with numbing is that you can’t selectively numb emotions. Just like yin and yang all of our emotions are interconnected and you can’t numb sadness without numbing happiness just like you can’t really appreciate light unless you have known darkness.

     

    At this point I hadn’t recognised just how much I was trying to avoid my pain. I confided in a good friend that I’d been crying and feeling down every day and that I didn’t know what to do to pull myself out of it. I was desperate for some sort of advice on how to make it stop. What I got instead was raw heartfelt honesty, he told me that I’d just been through one of the most significant and testing periods in my life to date and I can’t expect to just bounce back out of it and think I’ll cope. His words cut me to my core, I was immediately reduced to tears and could hardly breathe. This was the first moment that I realised just how badly I wanted to bounce back and return to something familiar.  At the time I felt so defeated and a big part of me wanted to argue that I could bounce back I just needed to do A, B and C. But instead of getting defensive and at least talking about how I felt, I did what many before me have done and internalised my feelings. I took the argument inside my head.

     

    Still desperate and believing that I could find a way out of my pain I began to go through all the things I was doing in my life that were perhaps too much for me. The list I came up with was pretty much everything and that sent me into a total tail spin. The thought of having to pull back from everything in order to be okay made me feel stressed and anxious. Note to self – Internal problem solving while overwhelmed is not the best idea. So I then found myself in a sad, crying, stressed and anxious mess and it was time to see my psychologist.

     

    At this point I’d been seeing my psychologist for a little over two months and I’d never let myself cry in front of her. And yes I know that it’s crazy to not let yourself cry in front of someone who’s there to help you work through your pain but I’m working on the whole vulnerability thing. In contrast to pervious sessions, this session I was a blubbering mess. I told her how I felt like I’d come such a long way; I’d made peace with all the painful circumstances surrounding my dad’s death, I’d let go of my fixation on better understanding his cause of death and I even felt untroubled by this death being under investigation and yet despite all of this I felt like I’d reached an all time low.

     

    With tears running down my face I went on to tell her my idea about needing to pulling from pretty much everything. The next few things she told me really shifted the way I was seeing things. Firstly she pointed out that part of the reason that I was feeling so frustrated was because I’d been through a good phase and this down phase felt like a step backwards. Because it felt like a step backwards I was then looking for a fix it in order to get back to good again. Secondly she spoke about the necessary role that tears and sadness play in healing. And thirdly she also told me that I didn’t need to stop doing things just because I was feeling down but if I did decide to scale back anything that I’m doing I should change the language that I’m using. She said that saying I “need” to do this because I’m not okay was making me feel like I had no choice in the matter. Instead I could rephrase to I am “choosing” to do this to give myself time and space. It was such a simple rephrase but it lifted a huge weight off my shoulders.

     

    I walked away from that session with a new sense of calm. Over the next few days I still found myself randomly crying every day but I wasn’t as troubled by my sadness. Then another bit awesome wisdom came in the form of a YouTube clip by Marisa Peer called You can be enough.  In this clip Marisa instructs her audience to set two reminders in their phones one for every morning and one for every evening. The reminder is to tell yourself “I am enough”. She also suggested to write it on a mirror that you see each day to really drive the message home. I decided to give it a go for a week and I was amazed by the things that began to happen. The biggest thing that came from it was letting go of many of the unfair expectations I put on myself. Letting go of some of the expectations I held for myself meant that I began to feel a lot more comfortable in my own skin and I was able to really accept where I was in my grief journey.

     

    I can now see that all the time and energy that I put into fighting with my pain was actually time and energy put into my own suffering. Pain and grief are unavoidable parts of life that hold enormous potential for growth and learning. The same cannot be said for suffering. We make ourselves suffer when we wish for a reality other than our own.

     

    Self acceptance has been huge in getting comfortable with pain. Showing up for myself and truly embracing who I am right now and how I feel in each moment has allowed me to detach from this idea of needing to be okay. What the hell does okay even mean anyway! We’re never in a fixed state where everything comes together perfectly and stays that way. Things are constantly coming together then falling apart, it’s the nature of life.

     

    With my new found self acceptance I found myself able to make decisions that really honour what I need from myself right now. I stopped forcing myself to push through things and I was able to discern what was making my life harder than it needed to be.

     

    The one thing that stood out to me was my Chinese medicine course. When my dad first passed away I was in my first trimester of my course. I was determined to not fall in a heap and pushed myself really hard to get all of my assignments done to a high standard and in on time and I did well in all of my exams. This current trimester has been a very different experience. I would sit at home listening to lectures on the physiology of the heart and lungs and relate every last bit back to what was going on with my dad. After a few weeks of continually relating most class content to my dad I became emotionally exhausted and began to disengage with the content to protect myself. I went from being a student that got great marks to being a student that was just scraping through. Acknowledging that I wasn’t doing that course justice, that I couldn’t expect anything more from myself and that I needed some time out to heal wasn’t easy. But as soon as I made the choice I felt a huge weight lift off my shoulders and I knew I had made the right decision.

     

    We often get so caught up in chasing these long term goals we set for ourselves – finishing a degree, saving for a house, working towards a promotion – that we don’t pay attention to how we’re actually experiencing life on a daily basis. I don’t know where this great urgency comes from that makes us feel like we must be in a certain place by a certain age but there’s a huge amount of harm in the hurry.

     

    While I would give anything to have my dad back I can truly say that I’m grateful for just how much I’ve learnt and become aware of over the past few months. I consider his passing my wake up call. A reminder that you never really know how long you’ve got so don’t get so caught up in the pursuit of long term goals that you forget that you’re only really living right now, don’t try and avoid hard feelings they hold invaluable lessons for you and most importantly know that you are always enough, so make sure that you turn up for yourself, back yourself and know that whatever life bring to you….

    You got this

    With love and blessings
    xxx
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  • Finding freedom

    Finding freedom

    I’ve been home from my yoga teacher training for a little over two months now and I’d like to take the chance to talk about the struggles I’ve faced since coming home. Talking about tough times isn’t something I’m comfortable with, but I’ve come to recognise how very important it is. I’ve found that there’s a certain freedom and strength in vulnerability that I never imagined existed.

    I’d always thought that being strong meant putting on a brave face and holding things together when times got tough. It’s how I was brought up and it’s how I have lived most of my life. It wasn’t until I went to my yoga teacher training that I was exposed to the idea that maybe being strong is actually about dropping the mask and being vulnerable. It takes a great deal of courage to own your story and tell your truth.

    Being around such a loving, supportive and open group of people I found it surprisingly easy to drop the mask and be real. For the first time in my life I was openly talking about all the ugly parts of my life without any fear. I didn’t feel uncomfortable telling the whole truth, talking about the things that brought shame, the things that have really hurt and the problems I’ve come up against time and time again. Talking so openly and honestly allowed me to detach from a lot of the emotions that I had connected to certain experiences. I began to heal from things that I didn’t even realise had wounded me. I was able to let go of so much and experienced a freedom I’ve never known before.

    I still remember one afternoon after lunch I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and I actually had to stop and stare at myself properly to really take in what I was seeing. In all my life I have never before seen myself look so well and truly happy.

    My amazing teacher Alicia had warned us all that the real yoga starts when you go home. It’s easy to practice yoga and let go of negative behaviours when you’re in such a special bubble, coming home and bring it into real life now that’s the challenge. In fact it’s bloody hard! You’re continually challenged by the environment, people and situations.

    I was initially very nervous about coming home, my job is high stress and big hours, I burn out regularly from taking on too much and my dad who is in remission for a battle with lung cancer has taken to occasionally smoking making my home life a pretty hostile place it be. Nervous is probably an understatement. I was kind of dreading coming home!

    I tried to plan how I would make things work when I got home, I made little rules for myself like no more eating lunch at my desk and working overtime all the time, slowing down and making sure I have a few nights a week just for me and keeping up calming rituals like dry brushing, mindful eating and meditation.

    On my first day back at work one of my colleague said to me “how’s the real world treating you…a little too real?” She could not have been more spot on! The real world was definitely a little too real. I spent the first week crying myself to sleep and waking up wishing I was back in Bali. I’d broken every one of my rules at least once. So much of my life, if not all of my life felt like it didn’t fit anymore.

    Change was the spice of my life. A significant relationship had ended, my boss had left while I was away (essentially doubling my workload) and I had been through a major personal change. For the first few weeks I kept telling myself it’s reverse culture shock, just breathe through it, you’ll be ok, change isn’t easy. I tried to keep up my meditation and asana practice and I kept coming back to the philosophy that had seen me through tough times before. There were times when my efforts worked and things would be okay but mainly things were not okay. I was overwhelmed by my life and starting to slip into a pretty depressed space.

    Then the old Clare came back out to bat; the one who believes that being strong means pulling it together. And the self talk started, what is wrong with you, you have so much to be grateful for, stop being an emotional crazy! I decided in my divine wisdom that what I needed was to start teaching. Yes Clare, take on more when you’re already not coping with life.

    I was putting on my everything is fine, I’m happy little yogi mask each day and each night I’d fall to pieces. The week after I taught my first classes I had lunch with a friend and when he asked me how my week had been I just burst into tears, I couldn’t even talk about it, I wasn’t even happy that I’d just organised and taught two of my own classes. I was exhausted and drowning in my own mess. I’d taken on so much in a bid to make things better and keep moving towards what I wanted that I couldn’t even breathe anymore. That lunch was one of a few turning points; I was in such a mess that I just couldn’t pretend to be okay anymore. I spoke honestly about how miserable I’d been feeling and I walked away feeling like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders. There was no great advice given in that conversation, I just felt like I had a compassionate ear that really heard me. He held the mirror up for me, provided a circuit breaker and allowed me to stop and really look at myself honestly.

    Things started to feel a little better from there but I was still very all over the place with everything. I knew that I didn’t want to be in my full time job anymore, but even the thought of leaving made me feel guilty. With my boss gone there was now more dependence on me than ever. Just thinking about the hole I will leave and the strain it will put on my already overworked colleagues was making me feel sick and stressed.

    Then another conversation came. While chatting to a close girlfriend she asked how all my yoga stuff was going, for a moment I wanted to give her my usual it’s great lie. But instead I stopped took a few breathes and made a decision to be real, responding with not so great. From those three words I went on to talk about everything: moving on from the break up, worrying too much about leaving my job, putting myself first, burning out and the courage it takes to turn your life on its head. The honesty in that conversation unburdened me from a lot of the worries I’d been carrying around.

    From there I went back to my notes from teacher training with a new resolve to turn things around. While going through notes and reflecting on the journey I had been on being home it became very apparent just how significant opening up and being vulnerable had been. I went back to a TED talk that we had watched at Teacher Training from Brene Brown on vulnerability. Everything started to click even more, the key to finding the freedom I had known at Teacher Training was in the behaviour I had changed as soon as I go home. As soon as I got home I put the walls up again and attached a sense of shame to my struggles.

    Shame is a nasty pasty! It has this way of making you feel like you can’t share because of the negative judgement you will face. When we hide parts of ourselves in shame from those that would listen with compassion we create a disconnection. And I tell you now, from what I’ve read and my own personal experience it is so beyond important for people to have a sense of connection with other people. Sharing and being vulnerable creates connection between people which then leads to a sense of love and belonging.

    Things have turned around a lot since that realisation, there’s been no great change in my actual situation, my life is what it is but I feel like I could climb Everest! People have been telling me that I’m glowing. Through embracing and sharing who I am and where I’m at, I’ve found a strength and freedom that still blows my mind a little. Vulnerability is something that I’m still not completely comfortable with and I know there will be times that I fall back into old habits but I accept that I am imperfect and I love myself wholeheartedly.

    It is my hope that through speaking honestly in this post and in many more to come I can inspire others to also speak their truth, owns their story and to not attach shame to any part of their lives. I’d like to send a bit of extra love out to anyone struggling with anything at the moment, my heart goes out to you, keep going beautiful souls.

    Love, Blessings & Kindness

    Namaste

    xx
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