#13 What does your home practice look like?
All answers are the correct answer
Years ago, when Jason wrote a story about home practice for Yoga Journal, it felt radical when he advised readers to simply practice the poses they love at home. His perspective was (still is) that home practice doesn’t have to be a goal-oriented or rigid or achievement-based pursuit. Instead, it can be a respite, a refuge, and a haven from the intensity of the daily grind.
For years, even with this encouragement, I still struggled with home practice. It’s almost like responding to the natural needs of my body was simply not natural at all. My guess is that years of being a compulsive rule follower, overachiever, and people-pleaser had obscured any intuitive sense of what I need from moment to moment.
I’m pretty thrilled to say that this has changed over the past few years. I think it’s a combo of motherhood and age that helped me turn the corner. Motherhood has meant that I don’t have much open-ended time and when I do, it’s in shorter bursts so I don’t feel guilty with a 15-20 minute practice. And age means that the rule-following and people-pleasing can go fuck itself. (I rarely use profanity in writing, but this just felt too true and good to edit.)
So, what’s my practice like these days? It changes daily and it fills me with delight.
It’s also often woven into the other exercise that I do. Some days it’s gentle breath and movement in the morning + a studio class in the late morning. Other days it’s Sun Salutations and then my strength-training workout with some Chaturanga, UpDog, DownDogs between sets. Today it was a long walk by the beach followed by slow set of poses to stretch my back and hips on a bench by the water.
My guest on the podcast this week is Brett Larkin. I loved getting to know her — she is super sharp and sincere — and we talked about her new book, Yoga Life, which largely gives folks permission to create a home practice that is responsive to life. On the episode, she talks through her framework for doing this and it’s great.
My question to you this week is: What’s your home practice like? I hope after reading what I wrote above you will feel safe being completely honest, because there are absolutely no wrong answers. I love hearing from you — what you need, what’s working, what’s not. And I know that we can all benefit by sharing and being real with each other.
Here’s this week’s episode for some inspiration:
My home practice has evolved significantly over the years. It started when I was just a child playing with yoga from a book called "The Children's Garden of Yoga"...I find myself now with a similar energy to that 10-year-old girl, just playing with how different movements and positions feel in my body each day. Somedays my practice is 5 minutes, somedays it is well over an hour. I never know what poses or sequences I'll do as it depends entirely on what I'm feeling in the moment. I've been practicing for well over two decades, and rolling out of bed onto my mat every day is as automatic a habit now as brushing my teeth. When I taught yoga, I had two priorities I wanted all my students to walk away from my class with. #1 BREATHE. #2 HOME PRACTICE.
No teacher can tell you how you feel in your body, or what your body craves and loves and needs. That's for you to figure out, on your own, to the rhythm of your own breath.
My home practice this morning probably looked wackadoo from the outside, but luckily, I was all by myself and able to drop the self-consciousness that often comes along with that invisible observer/critic who sticks around to keep me in line. You said there's no correct answer, but I still always feel like I'm cheating when I do things that feel good to me, that are maybe exactly what I need. And this time, I think I actually began by cheating because my home practice started with Jason's Glo class as it typically does Wednesday mornings. But in savasana after he ended class, it turned into floor dancing. Dancing has been a really therapeutic thing for me. Today I just didn't have the energy to get up and do it, but still felt called, so I just laid there and danced while lying down. Lots of flowy arms and some twitching. How's that for letting go of any prescriptions? I wasn't even holding on to sanity! Lol There was some cathartic release, processing the loss of a friend's husband yesterday. We were not close but this friend has been the definition of grace through their goodbye and I've been so moved to witness it. I'm always surprised by Jason's classes and your offerings in how they seem exactly perfect to what I specifically need. Like you two are also there standing next to the critic, more benevolent invisible observers checking in to see what you should send me next. Maybe it's just that all of us could always use more of this yoga thing no matter what's going on. It's more fun to think that we're psychically connected! Both and, I suppose.