Yogi Wisdom: Change your thoughts, change your life

There are many moments in life, sometimes more than others, where we feel stuck. We feel stuck in a rut and feel like nothing good is happening and that nothing good is in our thoughts. But it is important to learn that quite often, it is the mind that decides where our attention is directed to. It is the mind that preoccupies itself with thoughts and ideas that perhaps you don’t even want. It only does this because it has been taught by you to do so.

Let’s dig a little deeper here. Why would you teach your brain to have negative and unappealing thoughts? Because how you spend your time, your energy and your days obsessing over, is what your brain thinks you should be thinking about. If you are constantly thinking about the bad things in your life first thing in the morning, not only will you attract more negative things, but your brain will actually learn that you like to start your day with these thoughts. And so, you subconsciously teach your brain to automatically give you these thoughts every morning.

The same rule goes for our actions. Do you scroll through your phone first thing every morning and think about how tired you are and how unmotivated your are to go to work? Those actions condition you to have the same thoughts and behaviors every single day.

This is where a bit of yoga comes into play. Remember, yoga is not simply the act of looking pretty and going to a studio to do poses every day. While it can be that, it is also the act of being thoughtful, meditating, and caring for the body. So how exactly does this yoga help change my thoughts and change my life, you ask?

With the process of understanding that your have thoughts and actions that need to be changed, you begin to do things that change the way you think. You can begin to push yourself up out of bed in the mornings and go for a morning walk. You can begin to go to a yoga class that you’ve been afraid to try and see how it makes you feel. You can also simply start by saying, no, I will not think about that and distract yourself with something good, and productive. You can distract yourself with cooking, baking, reading, playing with your dog or your kids. Over time, the new behavior patterns will come naturally, the thoughts you have will change from, I’m so tired to go walk my dog in the morning, to I can’t wait to go walk my dog in the morning.

When we do yoga, we begin a process that stops us from doing what is harmful to us. It does not have to be deliberately but simply we start to see that we have directed our attention, our thoughts, and our energy to something positive. We will begin to have control over our mind and how we can change our thoughts for the better. By doing this, we can change our thoughts and eventually change our lives to be more meaningful and rewarding.