The Magic of the Morning Ritual

The Magic of the Morning Ritual

For years, science has backed the idea of a morning ritual. Neural pathways are the most malleable in these early hours of the morning. Creating a routine to prepare your mindset and body to support your day provides a well of resilience for the twists and turns of life. The ritual can change over time, be it meditation, movement, or breathwork. It’s the time of day that stays the same. The practice is about showing up for yourself. 

We also see evidence in current cultures across the world, of a morning practice being passed down from the ancients. The mystics of India called this time of day, just before dawn, the Brahama Muhurta. They say it’s the most sacred time to align the inner cosmos with the outer. 

For example, Ayurveda’s recommendation for easing depression is to walk outside and get sun in your eyes first thing in the morning. Science has confirmed that this helps reset the circadian rhythm with the biological clock and supports the vitality of several health-related topics, including a good night’s sleep. 

So, there are plenty of reasons why a morning ritual is a great way to start the day. Perhaps the bigger question is…how? 

Neuroscience continues to provide valuable information on building new, healthy habits and dissolving the less desirable ones. For starters, we don’t need to rely on sheer willpower. Atomic Habits author James Clear quotes Greek poet Archilochus: 

“You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.”

This means if you aren’t meeting your goals for a morning routine, don’t take it personally. The key to success in building a ritual is to troubleshoot your systems, not your willpower. 

Clear says there are four essential elements to setting up a process that makes new routines achievable.  

Building New, Healthy Habits

  1. Make it Obvious: For a new habit to be successful, create a time and space for your ritual. Set your alarm. Add a block of time to your calendar and prepare your space by laying out clothes ahead of time, your tea cup, journal, or yoga mat.
  2. Make it Attractive: Add something you know you’ll enjoy to your ritual.  Perhaps your favorite music plays in the background during your yoga practice. Or learn about some of your favorite topics while hydrating with your morning tonic or smoothie.
  3. Make it Easy: If a guided meditation is part of your morning routine, pick one ahead of time and have it ready to go on your device. One recommendation is to have two duration options available. If you are short on time, you can still accomplish the shorter routine at the time you set aside. Build the muscle of showing up at the time and date you have set aside for yourself, even if it’s a shorter practice.
  4. Make it Satisfying: Hopefully, after following through for a week of your ritual, endorphins will begin to flow and confidence will build. You can always try habit-stacking and let your morning coffee or breakfast be the reward for completing your ritual practice every day.

Breaking Unwanted Habits

If you have habits you want to release, ask yourself the opposite of the questions above: 

How do I make this habit less attractive? 

How do I make it more difficult to engage in this behavior? 

If you are building your Morning Ritual with Gaia, we recommend using our Playlist feature. Create as many Playlists as you like for specific days of the week or for certain durations.  

Most importantly, go easy on yourself. The Morning Ritual that suits your lifestyle may change over time, and creating new routines can also be fun. Just as the Willow tree bends in the wind, allow yourself the flexibility to adjust what works for you as lifestyle changes arise. Ultimately, your unique ritual is meant for you, to grow your sense of self-love and increase your love of life!  



The Glass Ceiling of Yoga: Body Positivity

The Glass Ceiling of Yoga: Body Positivity

The picture of a serene and beautiful yoga community that is celebrated by the media actually disguises a disturbing layer of normalized and ubiquitous body type discrimination. However, by unveiling a previously “invisible” glass ceiling over the Western yoga community, students, teachers, and administrators can find ways to effortlessly mold body-positive practice spaces for current, new, and future yoga practitioners.

Gender vs Body Type

I’ve encountered a lot of glass ceilings in my life. Honestly, when you’re black, queer, and born with female genitalia, you encounter them constantly and I’ve grown to expect situations wherein boundaries and limitations are the norm. However, there’s a glass ceiling that limits our Western yoga community to a troubling degree and it’s something I never expected to encounter. I mean, when “glass ceilings” are typically identified in Western society, they are almost invariably related to gender.

Ironically, the yoga community doesn’t really suffer from a gender glass ceiling, at least not one that negatively effects women.

Even though women weren’t taught asana until the 20th century, the vast majority of Western yoga teachers and students are female. And while discrimination against male yoga students and teachers is probably more common than any of us could imagine, it’s still not the most expansive and divisive glass ceiling in the yoga community.

No, the real ceiling within our community is based entirely upon physical presentation and, specifically, body type.

This ceiling is clear as day to those of us who have atypical yoga practitioner bodies. Instead of being slender, white and heaped with physical ability, there’s a growing wave of yoga teachers and students who are plump, multiethnic and powering through life with a wide range of disabilities. However, those of us who challenge the white washed yoga teacher stereotype face a very different practice landscape than our colleagues. For example, it’s inappropriately common to hear a story about a yoga student being shamed out of a yoga studio, based upon comments made by discriminatory yoga teachers and students.

In some communities, it’s nearly impossible for atypical yoga teachers to find teaching opportunities. And even when teaching opportunities are available, they are not on par with options for more traditionally bodied teachers. This problem is well documented within small communities of “different” yoga teachers, but it’s essentially invisible to those who don’t see themselves as “different”. And, what’s worse, there are way too many practitioners and teachers who don’t see this kind of discrimination as a problem. Thus, an “invisible” glass ceiling has domed over our community, and only those who have been discriminated and oppressed are fully aware of its existence.

What Does This “Glass Ceiling” Actually Look Like?

Here’s the thing, no one in the yoga community is ever going to openly bad mouth someone who looks different from the traditional idea of a practitioner. Ok, let me back up. I’m sure it happens. But being openly mean to people is not condoned in our yoga community. It’s a pretty big no-no, actually. Therefore, I wouldn’t be surprised if someone reading this article right now is truly shocked by the idea that discrimination exists in a community which oozes the kind of saccharine sweetness that can only be honed by decades of marketing and product advertising. Unfortunately, the prettiest bandages can hide the ugliest wounds.

And beneath the surface of our saccharine sweet, mass media approved industry is a festering wound characterized by offensive language, discriminatory hiring practices and a bunch of other negativity that gets swept under the rug.

Admittedly, it’s not fun to acknowledge discrimination. In most cases, it feels very embarrassing, and many people would prefer to pretend as though they are not part of the problem. But anyone who turns a blind eye to this problem is also a key contributor to its existence. But how does this problem actually manifest and what does it look like? Let me paint a clearer picture for you.

Imagine you’re a curvy person who has finally decided to face your fear of practicing yoga in a group setting. Perhaps you’ve practiced yoga online with free videos, and you’re finally feeling confident enough in your understanding of asana to venture out of your living room and into a communally supportive environment under the watchful gaze of a knowledgeable instructor.

With a yoga mat under your arm and an emotionally swollen heart on your sleeve, you proudly stride into your local yoga studio.

When you approach the reception desk to check-in for class, the teacher (who looks, as expected, like a human Barbie doll) gives you a curt visual once-over. “Is this your first class?” Yoga Teacher Barbie chirps nonchalantly. While your knee jerk reaction may be defensive, you calm yourself down mentally. You remind yourself that she’s not trying to be offensive, and that she’s merely trying to take the proverbial temperature of a student she’s never met before. You smile and shake your head. “Nope, but I’m excited to take your class!” you say. Barbie smirks. “Well, this class is pretty intense,” she says.

You stare at her blankly. You’re wondering why she’s decided to tell you that the class is intense. Is it because she thinks you can’t handle the class? All of a sudden, you’re second guessing yourself and hiding sweaty palms. Why did you think you were strong enough to attend live classes? By the time you’ve rolled out your mat and gotten settled with props, the tissue thin confidence you brought into the studio has been shredded beyond repair by the self-doubt you’d managed to keep at bay prior to arrival.

During the class, you notice for the first time that your expressions of various yoga poses look a little different than other people in the class. Maybe your balance is a little less sharp, or you use props and modifications at times when other students seem to be able to go without. While that acknowledgement makes you a little self-conscious, it pales in comparison to the shame you feel at having your movements constantly corrected by Yoga Teacher Barbie.

Because, yes – Barbie has also noticed that your movements look a little different. And she’s decided to make your differences an opportunity for a teaching exercise by constantly correcting your alignment and offering more physical adjustments than you could have ever wanted. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter if she’s offering more or less advice to anyone else in the room – in fact, it’s entirely possible that she offers this level of adjustment to every student. But your confidence has been shattered.

The emotionally swollen heart you proudly wore on your sleeve is now openly bleeding.

In the best case scenario, you somehow find the strength to believe in yourself again. In the worst case, you vow to never darken the doorstep of another yoga class for fear of ever feeling this way again.

The thing is, if you’re reading this right now, you’ve probably worn the moccasins of either Yoga Teacher Barbie or our Curvy Protagonist. Maybe both. And the weird thing is, I’ve heard this exact same story told by people who are not necessarily “curvy” or “different” in some other way.

In fact, it’s startlingly common for people who look just like Yoga Teacher Barbie to still feel discrimination at the hands of their instructors.

I could be wrong, but I think this is all the result of the fact that we live in a staunchly body negative society.

Body negativity is endorsed by the mass media – let’s face it, that’s how they get us to buy things. We make purchases because we find ourselves wanting or lacking in one way or another. Unfortunately, in addition to the mass media, body negativity has also fully permeated the yoga community. In fact, many teachers believe their discrimination isn’t discrimination at all – they see it as a kind dose of realism to students who don’t meet their personal standards of yoga perfection. Because that’s really all discrimination is – it’s the state of our judgment when we encounter people, places, and things which jibe with our personal definitions of perfection.

It’s sad to see this happen in a community which has the potential to include every single human being on the planet. Frankly, it’s not absurd to imagine a world where everyone practices a style or hybrid blend of yoga. However, that reality will never come to fruition if we don’t resolve the body negativity and discrimination problem. How do we do that? Well, fight fire with fire.

If body negativity is the disease, then body positivity must be the antidote.

The Antidote: Body Positivity

Body positivity is frequently confused concept. It’s pretty confused even within the body positivity community. You could get a different definition depending on the person you ask, the day of the week, etc. Some people think body positivity is solely tied up in body size acceptance, and others might even go so far as to equate it with fat acceptance and fat positivity. While fat positive movements have their rightful place of importance in the evolution of our society, I don’t believe they are synonymous with body positivity. Another popular way of describing body positivity is by equating it with constant self-pep talks. You know, a pattern of methods to remind yourself that “I’m Great! I’m Beautiful! I’m worthy of breathing oxygen in front of other humans without feeling suicidal!” While pep talks are rad and I fully endorse them, I don’t think they speak to the core of body positivity.

You see, body positivity assumes your constant perfection. It assumes that you’re always beautiful. That you’re always worthwhile. That you’re always capable. That you’re always strong.

In a truly body positive world, these statements are not up for debate – instead, they are seen as impenetrable fact. The only perspective up for debate is that of each individual – are you willing to accept your own perfection? Especially when the mass media tells you that those statements are definitely not true. Body positivity is the confidence to accept your constant perfection and beauty, no matter the proverbial weather. And, most importantly, to accept the constant perfection and beauty of those around you, even if they look and act different from yourself.

When we implement body positivity in our yoga studios and spaces, we create environments where students across an infinite spectrum of differences all feel as though they are equal to one another. This type of attitude is absolutely critical in order to see the yoga community grow beyond the one dimensional image offered by the media. Body positivity doesn’t mean teachers aren’t free to offer alignment tips and adjustments to their students without fear of offending someone. But it does mean that every word, every gesture, and every moment is an opportunity to be encouraging. To make someone feel welcome. To actively avoid discouragement.

Eventually, this kind of environment will lead to the end of classes where certain students are viewed as superior to their fellow students. Good riddance, as far as I’m concerned. This is a glass ceiling that desperately needs to be shattered.

We must all take responsibility for the role we play in a yoga culture which is thoroughly embedded in discrimination and negativity.

We need more than a few people who are proud of their bodies. We need a legion of yoga teachers, administrators and advanced practitioners who truly walk the walk of the eight-limbed path, and who will stop at nothing to spread the practice to every soul across the planet.

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