I’ve been navigating spaces differently, more consciously, these last few weeks. Well, I guess I could clarify that I’ve been thinking about navigating spaces different. Currently, I’m sitting in the same chair and at the same table that I’ve been at each morning since mid-March, drinking my tea and eating a bowl of oatmeal piled with fruit and nuts. I’m definitely one who loves and feels more grounded by morning ritual. But let’s be honest, it’s feeling a bit ‘Groundhog Day’ around here.
As a yoga teacher who primarily teaches in the mornings, the majority of my AM hours used to start by slipping quietly out of the house before my partner and dog wake in order to make time for a bit of food and tea at a coffee shop before my class. Those few quiet moments before class, observing the rest of the community as it wakes up, felt soothing to me. In the studio, the ritual of preparing the space for humans to move and breath together felt powerful. It felt valuable.
We're all processing these unprecedented circumstances in our own way. As we spend these weeks, now becoming months, at home, our external worlds have shrunk and we’re spending a whole heck of a lot more time with ourselves. So when I talk about the spaces that we're navigating, I’m talking not just about the physical space that we’re currently inhabiting, but also our corporeal space, our mental space, our emotional space.
Rather than impulsively filling or manipulating these spaces, I’m trying to observe my arising discomforts. I’m refining my listening skills. My current practice, both on and off the yoga mat, is to sit with the spaces within and around me. Can we all just give ourselves a break?
This isn’t easy or comfortable AND we can sit and move and listen through it.
xo, Beth