Relationships aren’t easy. Throw in adult life, some kids, careers, a mortgage and relationships get even harder. It’s not our fault, the world we live in is nonstop. You can stay connected to work 24/7 with phones and emails. There are 25 after school sports and your kids need to do them all. There’s late nights, early mornings, and even late-early night-mornings, whatever they are. But there is hope!
If we start to take the things we learn in yoga and meditation and start applying them into our lives, we can see just how all-encompassing these practices are. Yoga and meditation can improve your relationships and here’s why!
Communication
We live in an era of communications and yet we barely talk to each other anymore. Relationships need real interaction. Our souls need it. In our practice, we learn to listen to our bodies, to pause and reflect and to give our soul exactly what it needs each day. Our conversations with loved ones need this too. Yoga and meditation puts us in a calm frame of mind, where we can listen to each other. We can observe instead of react. We can reflect instead of judge. If we can enter communications with a calm mind and an accepting heart, we will find the trials sand tribulations of conversations much easier to deal with.
Presence
When you enter a yoga class, you give yourself to it. You have made a commitment to yourself and you have shown up for yourself. When we meditate we try our hardest to stay in the moment. Our minds can wander and that is normal, but we bring them back. We focus on where we are and what we are doing in that moment, because it matters. Only this matters in this moment. That is the statement we need to give to each other in our relationships. Show up. Be present. Put the phone down. There is so much kindness and love in the art of just being with someone and making space for them. How loved do we feel when someone gives us their full attention? Our relationships deserve this.
Acceptance
The greatest gift you can give yourself is the gift of letting yourself just be. In yoga and meditation, we talk a lot about acceptance. We accept the poses we can and cannot do. We accept ourselves for who we are and we accept each other in the class. How great is it, to then give, that same gift of acceptance to a particular person in your life? Life is full of ups and downs, and yoga and meditation teach us, not to run away, but to face these uncomfortable times, sit with them and accept them.
Love!
All relationships need love, whether it is with your partner or your co-workers. You don’t need to be in love but love needs to be there, and it starts with you. Our practice teaches us we have to love ourselves first. There is no room for judgement and hate. In yoga, when you love your body, it loves you right back. We bend and stretch and sometimes think we might break, but the compassion and kindness we show ourselves, keeps us going. Of course, our relationships need our love too. We need to go in with a loving heart and a compassionate spirit. Love teaches us to look for the good, and not jump to the negative immediately.
Yoga and meditation gives us the tools to have an amazing relationship with our self. These tools don’t stay on the mat. We take them with us, into our lives and into our relationships. We can use yoga and meditation to be our best selves and to have strong and loving relationships with each other. Use your tools.
Namaste.