A Year of Yoga in Lockdown

Well, it’s official. We’ve suffered through a year of this s***show.

Sorry if that’s too aggressive an opening to a blogpost on a yoga website, but this year has been strange and I think we should acknowledge that. Of course, we need to remain adaptable. This year has definitely made me acutely aware of how little control we have over our lives. Learning to let go and release attachment is a good thing. But I think it’s important to remember that this year has been tough, and you’re not failing if you’ve been sitting in a perpetual state of cabin-fever.

The one year anniversary of lockdown in Ireland has invited me to reflect on what has been a strange, but not entirely bad year. I was lucky to have a lot of lovely family meals, the sun shone (in the first lockdown), and I became addicted to sea-swimming. Teaching six or so classes a week online was incredibly rewarding – it was such a privilege to be able to continue working from home, but also to be able to bring some calm into my students’ days. The feedback was really uplifting…it made me feel helpful, in some capacity.

Something I have been thinking about recently is the pressure we put on ourselves to do certain things, like exercise or meditate or eat ‘better’. We can all relate to that feeling on a Sunday night, or when you go to bed, that tomorrow you will do better. Tomorrow you will finally be the person who never skips a yoga practice, who always meditates, always journals. I recently thought that I was struggling with a lack of dedication in my yoga practice. I felt guilty for not doing yoga or meditating every morning. But my practice is dedicated in its own way. I land on my mat a few times a week, when I need clarity, when I feel agitated, or when I simply want to move. I am not a bad yogi, or a fake teacher, for having an irregular asana practice.

Perhaps I shouldn’t admit that, as a yoga teacher. But it’s so common to think that a practice like yoga is only valuable if it is regular, that it’s only dedicated if you do it daily. But yoga happens off the mat too, it is in your interactions, it is in how you show up for people.

During the first lockdown, my body might have felt stronger because I was teaching more, but I practiced less for myself. Sea swims became my yoga practice. I went almost every day from the end of February until I moved to Sweden in August. I didn’t go because of any external pressure that made me feel like I should swim. I went because I wanted to, because I needed to. The sea is a little further away from me now, but I still go every Saturday morning with our newly formed ‘Hop & Shock’ community. The sea has given me the headspace that I used to rely on my mat for. And for a while that made me feel guilty, like I was a bad yogi. I am slowly realising that this is not the case.

When I let go of the guilt of not being the kind of yogi who falls out of bed onto her mat every morning, I remember that this is a healthy way to practice. My practice happens organically, without pressure, the way that I need it to. Long story short, cut yourself some slack if you didn’t write a book during lockdown.