Perhaps you’ve noticed that I’ve been MIA for the past 6 weeks or so… Or perhaps you didn’t notice, which is OK too. 😛
As I’ve mentioned in previous letters, I’m constantly doing this waltz of being way too busy and taking on way too much, and then slamming on the brakes to get my breath. February was one of those months where everything caught up with me, and something had to give (beside my mental and physical health), so it I let go of the newsletters for a few weeks.
And you want to hear something SUPER ironic? One of the things that made me “oh so busy!!” was a trip to the Dominican Republic wherein I laid on a lounge chair for 5 days straight and did the following: Read 3 books, drank several fruity cocktails, ate lots of seafood, walked along the beach, went to bed at 8PM and slept until 6AM almost every day, and generally did not much of anything at all.
And boy was that weird.
We arrived in the DR on Monday night, and by Wednesday I was getting the itch. Should I go on an excursion? Should I go to the gym? Shouldn’t I be doing SOMETHING?? Shouldn’t I be milking this experience for all it’s worth??
And then I gave myself permission to just sit on my butt, bask in the sun and warm weather, and just read, drink, eat, and swim to my heart’s content. No judgment. Just relax. Oh. And chat with the septuagenarian Canadians who were encamped in the neighboring cabanas.
Not being “productive” for 5 days was challenging mentally (or maybe I mean culturally??), but oh so necessary. Us human beings, much like machines, need periodic reboots to keep functioning well and to clear out all the random bits and bytes that are clogging up our junk.
I recently listened to Dr. Andrew Huberman’s AMA (Ask Me Anything) podcast episode, and he answered a question about how to increase motivation. The number 1 thing we can do is to get quality sleep (if you need any tips on how to get QUALITY sleep, please reach out to me – we just covered this in my health coaching class). The second thing he mentioned was Non Sleep Deep Rest (NSDR). To the yogis in the audience, this is essentially yoga nidra! NSDR or yoga nidra is a type of mediation where your attention is systematically led through your body, leading to a deep state of relaxation.
Dr. Huberman referenced two Danish studies that show that doing yoga nidra for as little as 10 minutes a day can dramatically increase your dopamine reservoirs (dopamine is closely tied to motivation). There is also data showing NSDR can help recover lost sleep, as well as increase cognitive ability and performance in cognitive tasks!
And now, I’m circling back around to my point. By RESTING, we can actually be MORE PRODUCTIVE with LESS EFFORT. Whoa.
If you’re curious about NSDR, here is a 10-minute practice from Dr. Huberman. And here is a 10-minute recording of a yoga nidra from yours truly.
Happy Resting!
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Tag: wellbeing
On The Importance of Opposites
I recently started a 5-month certification program, called Yoga for The Mind. I’m doing the course with my teacher, Dr. Betsy Rippentrop (Heartland Yoga Studio in Iowa City, Iowa), so I can learn how to use yoga to improve mental health.
The class is ALL about the importance of the mind/body connection. And the more I learn about this topic, the more frustrated I am by the term “mind/body connection” because THERE IS NO SEPARATION BETWEEN THE MIND AND BODY. They are the SAME thing. It’s like talking about the “connection” of the front and back side of a coin.
But, while they are ONE, they are also DUAL. Much like how we as humans are Me but also We.
And so this concept of balance, tension of opposites, grounding down and lengthening up keeps coming up.
In Thursday’s class we talked about the Masculine and Feminine sides of the body. Energetically, the right side of the body is more masculine – more focused on doing, being disciplined, achieving, other-soothing (so interesting!!). The left side of the body is more feminine – more receptive, nurturing, trusting, self-soothing.
It’s interesting to note, “What side of the body do I have more issues?”
In neurosomatic therapy, we often observe that people have more injuries, more pain, more tension on one side versus the other. One explanation could be that one side of the body is longer than the other (a lower limb length inequality), resulting in a sacrum that’s tilted, which can cause imbalances in muscles, fascia, nerves. Another explanation could be the existence of a pelvic obliquity, where one ilium (hip bone) is flared in while the other is flared out – again causing imbalances in the form of a spiral that travels all throughout the body, often leading to one-sided pain.
But (or maybe AND), could another explanation be, that there is an imbalance in energies in the body – one side is more dominant, and we need to focus awareness on developing qualities of the opposite side?
Whether we are talking about structure (bones/tissue/fluids) or subtle energies, the solution seems to be the same – WORK WITH THE OPPOSITES.
If one side of your torso is compressed – stretch it! If you always turn your head to the left to look at your left monitor, put your email on your right monitor, so you start looking to the right more! If you are always going, going, doing, doing, thinking, thinking. TAKE A BREAK. Get out of your Head and into your Body. Spend some time doing restorative yoga. Use the urge to grab your phone and look at Facebook as a reminder to settle your energy into your pelvis and take some smooth, slow, breaths.
Many of us were raised in a culture that values Action, Achievement, Hard Work (it’s the American Way!), so we really need to work on instilling the more feminine qualities of intuition, cooperation, sensuality. Interesting side note – it is WAY more common with my clients to have more pain on the right side of their bodies!
One of my favorite yoga poses to offset the Drive of Daily Life is Constructive Rest. I guide you through the practice here. Please remember to Check In with your heart, mind, body before and after the practice, so you can prove to your Ego that it was time well spent. 🙂