Have you ever tried to study to meditate however the considered sitting nonetheless to meditate made you so squirmy you threw in your meditation cushion throughout the room? For many, quieting the thoughts feels extra like a chore than a second of peace. And that may be a barrier to growing an everyday meditation follow.
I’ve been a yoga instructor for greater than a decade. I could be flexible and twisty, feeling snug in superior courses. But the second meditation was launched, I began to squirm and my wandering thoughts simply bounced round like a pinball.
What if Traditional Meditation Techniques Don’t Work For You?
In my instructor coaching, we meditated and discovered easy methods to lead meditations – primary breath meditations, physique scan meditations, completely different focus meditations, and tons of different meditation methods. But, it was not clicking for me. I satisfied myself that I couldn’t sit nonetheless, and I actually couldn’t get my thoughts to nonetheless.
Even if I can’t do a selected pose myself, it’s no drawback as a result of I nonetheless have the talent to information my college students into that pose. But for me, not having the ability to meditate felt completely different. So I didn’t introduce it into my courses as a result of I didn’t really feel snug speaking to my college students about stilling the physique and quieting the thoughts once I couldn’t.
As my yoga follow and educating grew to become extra superior I’d all the time really feel that I used to be missing for not being “a meditator.” And no quantity of meditation suggestions or meditation methods have been serving to.
Eventually, I found the bridge I wanted to lastly settle into an everyday meditation follow. It was Yin yoga. Yin yoga is a type of yoga the place you maintain a posture for an prolonged time frame … like full minutes of time, not simply 5 – 10 breaths. Have you already tuned out considering it’s not for you? Hear me out.
Yin yoga can provide a gateway to mindfulness meditation for these of us who discover conventional approaches difficult. Let’s speak about how Yin yoga helped me begin meditating and may have the option that can assist you unlock the meditative state you didn’t assume you could possibly attain.
Enter Yin Yoga
In increasing my data of yoga, I attempted completely different class kinds. Being a stream yoga lover, a gradual follow the place I would solely do 6-8 poses seemed like my worst nightmare. But it turned out to be simply the alternative – Yin was precisely what I wanted to easily focus and really feel calmer.
Yin is a passive follow that as Bernie Clark writes within the Complete Guide to Yin Yoga, “physiologically … targets the deeper connective tissues.”
It is a cool follow, which means that you shouldn’t go into it with a warmed up physique and it’ll not be a cardio follow that heats you up. The follow’s “intention is to safely, moderately stress our joints to promote the health of the tissues in and around our joints—not to overly lengthen these tissues” (Yoga Journal April 2023).
And sure, physiologically it did all that, however I additionally discovered a option to enter a meditative state.
Practicing Yin has many similarities to meditation, beginning with sitting in “stillness.”
Think of Childs pose. Have you ever taken a category and also you begin in Childs pose? Especially when it’s your first form on the yoga mat as you first widen your knees and ease your sit bones in direction of your heels you may need to wiggle to handle the bodily sensations of the pose. It doesn’t begin out feeling restful however after a couple of deep breaths your physique begins to settle in and your rest response comes on-line.
Then, you may discover that you just’re in a position to now get your head all the way down to the ground. You could discover your arms can inch ahead somewhat extra. Your breath begins to even out. Your thoughts may even start to give attention to the sound of your breath versus some other ideas your individual thoughts introduced into the room.
Congratulations – you could have simply achieved Yin yoga.
How Yin Yoga is Like a Meditation Session
While I used to be specializing in my breath, entering into every Yin pose, and permitting my physique to proceed to regulate I used to be in “the moment.” I wasn’t enthusiastic about an e mail I had to answer when class was achieved. Or enthusiastic about what I ought to have stated within the assembly 5 days in the past.
I used to be linked to my physique and my breath and – little did I do know – I used to be participating in a meditation follow – even when it wasn’t the best way we historically consider sitting meditation.
I used to be having a continued dialog with myself seeing if the discomfort of relative stillness I felt was my autopilot mind simply wanting to maintain shifting on to one thing else, or my physique saying that it had to get out of the form. My thoughts was totally immersed with curiosity on the precise second I used to be in.
My “doing” mentality was glad as a result of I used to be “doing” yoga. The “being” mentality of meditation – of being within the current second – was additionally glad.
A New Perspective on Mindfulness Meditation
It took me awhile of constant follow with Yin to appreciate that what I used to be doing was meditation. I used to be mindfully within the current second. It enabled me to get out of my very own approach and notice that there is no such thing as a proper or flawed option to meditate.
Eventually, I used that very same set of expertise from my Yin follow to start to take a seat in what you’d usually consider as a meditation follow (sit loosely cross-legged, eyes closed). I’ve a cushion and I pop on an app’s guided meditation for five or 10 minutes.
Some days I’m in it, in a position to keep centered with few distractions, and different days my thoughts wanders. But I can sit with the stillness and provide myself light reminders frequently to information my thoughts in direction of that too, even when it’s a fleeting second.
So if meditation is in your 2025 checklist of intentions and also you bristle on the concept of having the ability to sit nonetheless for even a minute, strive Yin yoga.
Have you ever tried Yin earlier than? What was your expertise? Drop us a word beneath. –Tam
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Tam Turse, M.A., RYT-500 is the Editor at FBG. When she isn’t enhancing, writing, or working a 9-5 advertising and marketing job, she might be educating a yoga class or coaching for her subsequent marathon. You can discover her on IG @tamturse .