30 Day Yoga Challenge: Day ?-Day 26!

I've always been "that person" who is a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to academic-type stuff. The annoying one in school that would say before a test, "Oh, I'm gonna fail!" and then get something like an A+ (anything that started with a B was an abject disappointment). Unfortunately, this sheer perfectionism hasn't totally translated to things like housework; I should probably work on that...

The point is that I was really excited about the 30 Day Yoga Challenge. My thought was that surely I would do yoga every day for 30 days in a row, no problem. All of the videos are under 21 minutes, so I'll easily have time for that, right? 

Haha ha. Haha. Ha. 

Nope.

Everything was actually going swimmingly until last week. I got ridiculously sick (like, wake up in the middle of the night to nurse J and think, "Things are not right here," and then in the morning, curl up on the guest bed and beg J to sleep just 5 more minutes while shaking and in horrible pain). Happily, my doctor had an opening that morning so I was able to head in and get some powerful antibiotics (thanks modern medicine! You've been saving my butt quite a bit lately!). 

But I didn't do yoga that day.

And then I missed another day later that weekend. We went to play disc golf and all the walking just kind of wore me out.

Sunday evening, I was nursing J and had a moment of deja vou; my breathing pattern felt a lot like, well, yoga. 

It hit me that something I've been saying for the longest time is actually true. Yoga isn't just the asanas, the stretching, the burn. The most important part is the breath. 

So take heart if you've slipped up and haven't found time to hit your mat! Take 30 seconds to close your eyes if that wouldn't be hazardous and take slow, even, deep breaths. Boom! You just did yoga.