Top Ten Tips - a Guide to Your Health and Sanity by a Yoga Teacher

This article originally has been requested by Mimram Media, but here in a slightly modified version.

I have been a yoga teacher for more than 25 years and now involuntarily I am ready to start a new adventure, to go completely online. Being acutely aware of the lack of yoga classes available to the elderly, I have already previously decided to dedicate a big part of my new business to this marginalised group and now we have to unite again in this new virtual world.

My expertise is in using yoga and meditation to improve quality of life for older people - as a prevention or as a part of stroke recovery, mobility issues, chronic pain due to arthritis, osteoporosis, etc.

In light of the recent lockdown measures I have pivoted my business, not only to provide a regular daily online yoga schedule of support digitally but creating a gift certificate system for family members of elderly isolated people to purchase which will allow them to access guided activity sessions. It has been created for those who worry about parents or grandparents not getting enough exercise in isolation but can also help with fall prevention and breathing exercises.

For instance, a subscription to a Weekly Pass (5for4): Create your own exercise routine allows the participant to choose any class that corresponds to their needs that day, if it is the opening of the hips, working on the balance, strengthening the torso, or simply breathing exercises.

There is a whole menu of different gift options, subscriptions and packages for you to choose from, for yourself, your friends and family, your employees and your business partners. The link is at the end of this article.

For anyone affected by the turmoils of self-isolation, I offer 10 essential tips for your well-being.

For me, being in lockdown is nothing new. Except, I have chosen it myself and went into the 3-year retreat. That was 2006. And it lasted exactly 3 years, 3 months and 3 days.
Hopefully, this collective retreat is not going to extend to that period of time yet we need to strategise how to cope with many challenges we are going to face.
The definition of the retreat is to go to a quiet safe place in order to avoid a difficult situation.
So, our goal is to stay safe.
We can do it!

1) Prioritise
Freedom awaits, yet there are so many pitfalls down the road. Too much Netflix, too many beers, too little time in sunlight. Make a schedule. Know your weak points and protect yourself from yourself. If exercise is important to you, prepare a nice corner in your room or garden and treat it as delight and as an exquisitely pleasurable experience, that you can live off for the next 24 hours. Example, doing even 20 min of yoga, stretching or any gentle exercise will calm your mind while moving your body in a gentle manner.

2) Utilise
Remember the time when you went shopping for the smallest gadget you never ever used? If you still have any piece of equipment, make the use of it now. The elastic stretch band, ping pong rackets, skipping rope, hola hoop,... Otherwise, take a big dictionary and use it as a yoga block to sit on it, to hold it above your head with stretched arms or place it on the top of your head and walk around the flat or garden to create a better posture.

3) Stabilise
We need to stay as stable as possible whatever that means to each one of us individually. Grounding activities, like gardening, cooking, or creating something with your hands are a welcome tool for the stability game. If you know how to do standing poses in yoga, like Tadasana or Warrior 1 and 2, this is the right time to do it daily. Breathing methods which involve longer exhalations are very beneficial for reducing anxiety and depression.

4) Vitalise
Personally, this is one of the most important tasks for us now. We have to find ways to stay positive, agile and hopeful. Whatever it means for you, do it, use a trampoline, if you have it, go for a jog or do some inversions, backbands and forward bends in yoga. The whole family can do a camel pose together or a bridge and then all sit on the floor and extending their arms and legs, touch feet to feet, hold hands and stretch the front of your torso upwards.

5) Clarify
Living in the unknowing? Mental fog? Irritation? This mind of ours is like a computer and it needs to have a clear structure of what is downloaded and where. Be mindful what you allow into your brain. All of our behaviour is based on our thoughts and the thoughts are based on the stored information in our brain cells (very simplistic summary). Give permission only to constructive ideas and projects, do a proper spring cleaning of your consciousness. Meditate with your eyes open and do not be distracted by the noise in your head. Do not follow your thoughts, they are not yours. Think of them as passengers in a big Liverpool Street Station. Thoughts come and go.

6) Perceive
Constantly comparing how it was before the pandemic? Worrying about the future after the pandemic? Memories can be a bondage. Live in the present moment, connect with others and do a self-inquiry of what matters to you the most. Comparing the times, the places and experiences will only aggravate your stress levels. Try to avoid jumping on a rollercoaster of hope and fear. Sit with your back against the wall or sofa and feel the ground under your feet and your sitting bones. Allow the gravity to pull the bones down, but lift the fontanelle up, extending the back of the neck and slightly dropping the chin. Breathe.

7) Deduct
What can it teach us? After all, there must be something we learn out of this. Take time to acknowledge all of the good changes you noticed in society and the environment. Then focus on yourself and ask yourself about the benefits, opportunities and possibilities coming out form this global crisis. Use the power of that knowledge on work on your balance. Stay on one foot, like in the Tree Pose or simply shift weight on one foot, while standing. Recognise how you still have the balance in your body and your mind even in unstable times we live in.

8) Strengthen
Remember your deep connection to the whole humanity and draw your energy from that recognition. That virtue is already inside you and why not free it up by doing some really powerful exercises or go running if you can. Re-establish faith in your own qualities and potentials.

9) Mobilise
 Just like all the organs of your body which moves when you move, mobilise your friends and family, your colleagues and neighbours into action, to better someone's life, to improve the care for the neglected ones. Is there an area in your body that has been ignored and left alone for too long? Do your knees need to learn how not to overextend, how to protect the joints by lifting the knee cap, by making your quadriceps stronger and also more pliable? Do you have a lower back problem and finally learn how to stretch properly and how to sit on the front of the sitting bones?

10) Connect
Just like intertwined society, your work buddies, your family, your body and your mind, it is all connected. There is only so much protection we can do, but connectedness is our inherent state. Explore the boundaries, within your comfort zone. Reach out to people you usually would do, there are so many virtual channels where you can gain insights about the common places. I just finished a digital campfire gathering. There were 6 different people from all over the world. And Gustavo from Lima, Peru, told me that he loves yoga and meditation, just like I do. Keep stretching, people!

Check out my daily online schedule: https://happystance-yogatherapy.com/book-your-class