January. The First Month.
Make it a month of firsts and switch up your yoga and self-care routines
In the last couple of weeks, I’ve given you ideas for how to assess your year of flows and flops, how to conduct an end-of-tear review, how to use an annual planner for quarterly organizing, use writing prompts to ask yourself important questions, provided details on how to participate in a FREE meditation event or The Offline Club’s 24-Hour Digital Detox Challenge… Basically different processes for achieving your 2025 goals, like so:
But is goal-setting even yogic?
The practice of yoga is partly rooted in the concept of non-attachment to the fruits of diligent action so it would seem antithetical to work toward an aim since goal-setting is all about achieving a desired result and YOGA IS ABOUT PROCESS.
In Light on Yoga, BKS Iyengar states that our Sadhana (practice) is the twinning of Abhyasa (“effort of long duration, without interruption, performed with devotion which creates a firm foundation”) and Vairagya (detachment from outcome, absence of worldly desires.)
The process — long, repetitive, steadfast, unconcerned with material gain — is the entire point.
January invites us back into the process
If process is the point, then January can be the time to focus once again on the steps rather than the outcome. Return to a beginner’s mindset. Julie Dohrman, one of our favorite yoga teachers, says that whenever she gets overwhelmed or things start to feel complicated, she asks herself:
How’s my breathing?
How’s my foundation?
Julie goes back to basics. We should, too.
Let’s become curious about our habits and perhaps refine what we already know, or rethink one of our patterns. Or try a completely different approach to something familiar — a yoga pose, a relationship, a work strategy, the way we take in the world — and see if it yields new insight.
After the jump: four ideas for switching up your yoga and self-care routines…
BEGIN AGAIN IN THE NEW YEAR
Want to become more of a self-starter in your yoga practice? Then join Maison Mysore for a 5-day Intro to Mysore workshop where you’ll learn Ashtanga’s primary series, the count and names of postures, as well as tailored variations. January 9th-13th, 2024. 8h-9h15. More details here.
Maybe you’d like to start (or restart) a journaling practice? Tanya Lynch’s first Journal with Ease session of 2025 will be an online (Zoom) guided therapeutic writing practice. January 9th, 2024. 13h GMT.
How to Start and Keep a Journal: tips from writers, artists, and a social worker that might make the practice less daunting (NYT, gift article)
Would you like to take your practice of Vedic Meditation to greater depths? Our teacher Tanya Dyhin is offering a Learn to Round workshop that will add a gentle asana sequence and pranayama to your existing 20-minute meditation. January 14th, 2024. 14h-16h30. Contact Tanya for more info or to reserve.
Studio Rituel’s new location in the 6th arrondissement has a beautiful Austrian sauna that can be booked for 90-minute sessions. The most delicious part? Slathering yourself in Red Flower products before and after… 42€/session.