3 Gentle Ways to Meet Yourself with Kindness

We began our September series with three ideas each week to get back to your yoga mat by first getting grounded. Last week, we worked on confidence and trusting ourselves on the mat. This week, let's focus on meeting ourselves there with kindness.

First, a little check-in…

• How often have you been able to get back to your home yoga practice this month? Even one single pose counts!
  
• Have you found a quiet, comfortable place to roll out your yoga mat? Does that space feel like a sanctuary?
  
• How does your practice make you feel?

  

Consider this: every time you step onto your mat, you are offering yourself a little kindness. Each practice is a small gift. Remember, your home practice is your sacred time for soul-care—possibly one of the nicest things you can do for yourself. Self-kindness is a choice.

Here are three things you can do to offer yourself a little kindness: one yoga pose, one fun practice, and one thoughtful ritual.  Each is a little gift to yourself.

And as you step onto your mat this week, place your hands over your heart, one on top of the other. Close your eyes and connect with your heart energy. Just sit silently for just a moment, feeling your heartbeat. It's a beautiful way to come back to yourself in the present moment, as you move into practice.

1. Open your heart with Heart-Melting Pose (Anahatasana) 


For your one pose this week, try this beautiful heart-opening pose.  I just love the name — Anahatasana, Heart-Melting Pose.  It’s a way to active your heart chakra.  This pose is a gentle shoulder opener and backbend, which helps to counteract the rounding forward many of us find ourselves doing all too often in our daily lives. It’s ideal to release tension in your upper and middle back and creates a lovely heart-opening stretch in your chest. And it might feel very restful to connect with the earth by placing your forehead on the mat between your arms.
Come down to your hands and knees. Keep your hips over your knees, and walk your hands forward, allowing your head and chest to release towards the ground. 
Keep your arms engaged and your elbows lifted. 
Breathe slowly and evenly, for 5-10 breaths, as your spine releases into this gentle extension. 
To release, walk your hands back under your shoulders and notice the sensations in your spine and shoulders. 

 

2. Let go with the Letting Go Breath

Letting go and releasing things that no longer serve you positively can be really powerful.  It’s one of the kindest things you can do for yourself.  I truly believe that letting go is freedom.  Start by releasing any tensions you carry in your body, the worries and concerns you carry in your mind.  The Letting Go Breath can help — and can also help you feel more peaceful and balanced.  It’s quick and easy to do.  
As you sit on your mat, take a deep inhale through your nose, and let it all out through your mouth, like a great big sigh.  Do this three times, with a nice pause in between each one.  
Notice how your body feels as you do this practice.  Feel your shoulders relaxing down, your whole body releasing any tensions it might be holding on to.  
You can also let go of any worries or concerns or troubling emotions you might be feeling these days… just let them go for these few precious moments of soul-care.   
You CAN let go.  As as you let go and release all these tensions, you become more peaceful.

 
3. Reconnect with your higher self through the power of incense.  

Burning incense can add depth, meaning and connection to your home practice.  It will enable you to create a peaceful, inspiring and positively charged atmosphere in your home sanctuary and in your practice.  And lighting a stick of incense is like making a little offering to yourself and to your highest potential.  
This week, I invite you to light some incense and to immerse yourself in the ceremonial aspect of it.  If you’ve burned incense before, this time see it with new eyes and real curiosity.  Experience it fully, revel in the sensorial richness.  
Feel the sensation of your incense stick in your hands, the texture, the weight.  
Hear the crackling sound as you strike a wooden match to light your incense, watching it sparkle slightly when touched by the flame. 
Gently fan the flame to soften it into a smoulder.  
Notice the scent of your incense, all the different fragrant notes.
Watch the beautiful bluish filaments of swirling smoke as it rises up, connecting with something higher, like an offering to yourself and to your highest potential. 
Give yourself the gift of all-natural, plant-based incense.  After all, you will be breathing in the sacred smoke and I’m sure you’d rather breath in plant essence than synthetics and chemicals.

One last TIP…Cultivate gratitude. Gratitude puts everything into perspective, helps us to stay grounded in the present, and to focus on what is real and what is truly important. Take a minute or two at the beginning or end of your practice session to list in your mind or write in your journal the people, the experiences, the lessons, the things you are grateful for in that moment. And be sure to express gratitude to yourself for showing up to practice.  

MORE RESOURCES
Yoga to Unlock the Power of Your Heart Chakra
30 Easy Ways to Practice Self-Kindness  
How to Get Out of Your Head and Into Your Heart