Yoga for Your Life

by Nina

Past and Present by Marie Lossky
(@Marie.Lossky on Instagram)

As we move through life, we experience so many changes! Physical changes. Mental changes. Emotional changes. Some of these changes are temporary. For example, temporary physical changes include injuries, illnesses, pregnancy, and so on. Temporary mental changes can include a change in your life circumstances that cause you to think differently about yourself, such as maybe you realize you need to change careers or let go of some life plan you once had for yourself, or you may have an insight about society or the world at large that causes you to change your political views. And temporary emotional changes can include such things as the stress of changing jobs, moving to a new city, or getting a divorce, or even a short-lived bout of anxiety or depression. 
Other changes can be permanent. Age-related or disease-related physical changes can mean having to give up certain activities forever. For example, a friend who had a shoulder replacement had to give up playing tennis, something he really loved, forever. Another friend with osteopenia had to change the way she practiced yoga and give up certain poses entirely, such as Headstand. A permanent mental change might be an epiphany that changes your entire approach to life, either from taking a course, reading a life-changing book, or even talking with someone, and this might mean making permanent changes in your life. Permanent emotional changes can include such things as the death someone very close to you, experiencing a traumatic event, or developing an emotional illness (such as depression), all of which will alter your life in profound ways. 
None of these things are reasons to stop practicing yoga! In fact, practiced with the right attitude, yoga can actually help you cope with these changes, and in some cases can help you resolve some of your difficulties. 
Today I’m thinking there are two basic ways yoga can help you with your life changes: 1) Help you to adapt to the changes both physically and emotionally, and 2) Help you to accept the changes. Because we’ve already written about these ways of using yoga throughout the years (and in tiny chunks), I thought today I’m give an overview of how I see them fitting together into one big “Yoga for Your Life” approach.
Adapting to Changes 
For physical changes, you need to change both your attitude and the way you practice yoga.

1. Using a Yogic Approach to Practice. Using a yogic approach toward practicing includes practicing with a combination of active engagement and acceptance (see Yoga for Healthy Aging: Our Philosophy and Our Tools). It also includes letting go of your attachment to how you used to be able to practice (see Goodbye, Lotus Pose, Aparigraha and Emotional Agility and Attachment to Our Ideas About Who We Are).
2. Modifications and Props. The ability to modify poses, either by using props or by changing up the pose, will allow everyone to find some way to practice that works with their new reality. See 7 Reasons Why You Should Love Yoga Props for basic information about props. See our individual pose descriptions on our blog (search on the pose names) for versions of poses that almost everyone can do.
3. Staying Safe. Simple, common-sense guidelines will help you stay safe as you deal with your physical challenges. See 9 Tips for Being a Good Yoga Student, What Your Yoga Teacher Really Wants to Know, and Friday Q&A: Finding a Safe Yoga Class.

For emotional changes, you can use your practice to help with difficult emotions. For information on the emotional effects of poses, see Yoga and Your Emotions. 

1. Anxiety. You can use breath practices and poses to reduce anxiety. See 10 Ways to Soothe Anxiety with Yoga and Anxiety, Yoga, and Your Front Body.
2. Depression. You can use backbends and moving with your breath to help manage depression. See Practicing Yoga for Depression: An Overview.
3. Anger. You can use your practice to cool down from the heat of anger. See The Importance of Cooling Your Anger and Anger Management, Philosophy, and Science. (I plan to write more about anger in the future.)  
4. Grief. You can use yoga to support yourself through the grieving process. See The Way Home: Yoga for Grief. (I plan to write more about grief in the future.) 

Accepting Changes 
Finding a way to accept changes and losses—both mentally and emotionally—is as important as learning to adapt to your new reality. And yoga can help with this in so many ways! 

1. Stress Management. For all changes that cause stress and emotional problems, such as depression and anxiety, that are caused by or exacerbated by stress, you can use any of stress management techniques that work for you. See Stress Management for When You're Stressed.  
2. Equanimity Practices. To cultivate a general feeling of balance that will help you navigate through difficulties without getting set off or losing your composure, you can use various meditation techniques and pranayama, as well as other techniques. See 7 Ways to Cultivate Equanimity with Yoga.
3. Yoga Philosophy. Studying yoga philosophy provides you with an alternative way of thinking about your life, enabling you to be more content with what you have and what you don’t have and to become more comfortable with change. We particularly recommend learning about this concepts: Non-attachment (see Gandhi and the Bhagavad Gita), Contentment (see Enough, Practicing with Pain, and Yoga and the Pursuit of Happiness), and non-holding (Transforming Unhelpful Core Beliefs and Aparigraha (Nonhoarding) and Healthy Aging as well as the ones listed above under using a yogic approach to practice).

If you think I’ve left anything important out of this, please let me know. 
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