Practice, practice, practice.

What is it that I do every day? I started making a list because I’m frustrated. It’s summertime, and frankly, I have less time to do yoga now than I did when I just thought I was busy with preschool and other school year activities. I have these little people around me 10.5 more hours than I did in May. Back to my list! Everyday, I eat (multiple times), sleep (a little), drink coffee, drink water, play outside, repeat, and that’s about it. I’m sure there are more things but this seems to be what I focus on and I got a little bored thinking about how much I don’t get done.

A few of us have been talking at the studio about how we have to sneak out of the house to make it to a 6 am class. I have a kid who can hear a pin drop in the morning, a dog who thinks breakfast starts the minute my feet slide out of bed, and if you’re awake, they should be too. So in order to get to a 6 am class, I have to put my clothes basically outside the night before, tiptoe through the house, and leave through the backdoor carefully closing it while balancing a water bottle, a mat, keys, and my purse in the semi-dark. We can make adjustments to practice; they’re just not easy.

But here’s why I’m frustrated. I feel like I’m losing any momentum I gained in the spring. One day I can jump into plank and the next class I can barely hold plank. My body keeps betraying me when I don’t practice. My poor body. It takes a lot of abuse. However, if I look on the positive side, I find that the beauty of practice is that it’s daily and it’s repetitious and I’m never where I was the day before—for good or for bad. This morning, my sweet husband took the boys to the park. In order to really capitalize, I spent 45 minutes mindlessly scrolling blogs and instagram and then decided, I should probably get some yoga in. I did some sun A’s, some sun B’s and tried to practice hip openers so I could do crow. Y’all, I just spent 25 minutes at my house trying over and over to get into crow. I (finally) decided to stop, google it, and in my youtube googling of how to get into crow, I stumbled across a beginner’s guide to yoga. I don’t really need the instruction, but I really need the practice. So instead of getting into a pose that I know I should be able to get into, I practiced the basics. I wasn’t at the clean studio with great teachers and nice students, instead I was surrounded by stuffed animals and an old dog bone. There wasn’t inspiring music, but there was the consistent roar of a leaf blower. And, there were 30 minutes of practice. Not perfect, not even really that enjoyable, but I took advantage of an uninterrupted (HALLELUJAH!) chance to practice the basics so that eventually, in the fall, or when my kids are like 20, I can get better at the rest.

Maybe you’re feeling the same way—and to that I say, “solidarity, sister.” Let’s just practice separately together. Or maybe your kids are grown and you want to tell me to shut up, that I’ll miss the busyness. And to that I say, “Do you want to babysit?” (Just kidding.) To that I say, “I’m a little bit jealous, but you’re probably right; I’ll just take my minutes where I can squeeze them in.” This summer, I think practice will mean balance and flexibility in my life. A little less wasting time. Hmmm. Who knew that yoga could solve so many of my worst habits? (Well, probably somebody did. That’s why they’ve been doing it for a thousand years or so.)