Cats have much to teach us. They are natural yogis.

Cats have much to teach us. They are natural yogis. If we behave like cats we may feel more agile at a ripe age, and sleep better, too!





This Flow and Restore Yoga class tonight was very allowing. We could follow the suggested asanas, but also interpret our next move according to what our body needed. It was fine to modify, linger in a pose, or break from it altogether to do something different, or rest. At the end, we tuned in to our body to receive the messages from this experience.





Although I bumped up against some of my limitations that didn't used to be there, I also pushed it a bit to try to free those injury areas that chronically feel "stuck". Breathwork was also helpful. Any time we feel anxious or stressed, we can choose to slow down and breathe to calm ourselves before carrying on.

I first started doing yoga over 40 years ago, in High School, with my Mom. It led me to learn to meditate and do yoga on my own, as I did for years, dropping and picking it up again, getting busy or sitting too much at the computer when I should be down on the mat.

In the last few years, I have been inconsistent with yoga, only practicing at home sporadically. I have seldom danced or gone hiking since I left California, so my body gets less movement than I was accustomed to. In the bitter cold and high heat and humidity here, I am more sedentary than I was in California's dry warm hills and cool Redwood canyons. Even though I do massage, and a lot of it on some days, I also sit at the computer for long hours as I have been doing for several days now.
So the point of doing classes is to get back into a daily practice at home, and take classes here and there for guidance and motivation.





Images: Here is me as a cat, when I arrived at class, when I was able to relax and hold stretches, and after class, finding nourishment.


(MOL~!)