by Marsha Mung
I
am not a yoga teacher. I’ve only attended about 3 yoga
classes although my gym offers yoga classes. So, why am I
writing about yoga when I know nothing about it? I am
curious – that’s my nature. And through the years, this
curiosity has helped me develop a career as a freelance
graphic designer and writer. And it is through a very weird
type of yoga (my own type, or whatever I thought was yoga at
that point in time) that helped me swim ashore when I was
teetering between drowning in the sea of depression after
giving birth to my sons.Both times, I was hit badly and constantly turned to the bottle for a solution. The bottle never will be a solution and yet, I hoped it would be.
Yoga and the soon-to-be-mother
There’s all this hype about yoga that I didn’t fully understand before – what’s all this clamor about yoga for pregnancy? What’s the big deal? You have a big belly, retch half the time, have a sudden liking for pickles and have to wear your husband’s clothing... you need yoga to help you deal with all that?
But of course, I only began tounderstand the benefits of yoga as a mother when I started going to the classes, read about them in books, magazines and websites. This amazing method can help mothers regain their physical strength and sends them into a journey of self-discovery and improvement. Instead of helping you deal with others, in yoga, everything starts from within. Therefore, to solve a problem, you have to go inside.
And inside a mother, it’s always a battle zone…and it’s tumultuous half the time. Pizza or no pizza? Sex or no sex tonight? What kind of mother will I be? Will I sprain my own child’s fingers when I try to put his/her clothes on? With the kind of bizarre thinking (and hormones) going on inside our mind and our body, mothers often have difficulty finding peace. Your doctor will tell you time and time again that although nutrition is important, finding peace, quiet and calm in yourself and in your life is just as important for an expectant mother.
Yoga for the regular mother
Considering the fact that yoga can help bring calm from calamity, it’s obviously a good choice for you to try out yoga if you’re thinking of starting an exercise program. Better yet, join a gym…which is what I did. I used to scoff at people who joined gyms and judging from the loud dance music, I remember thinking to myself… “Yikes…gym is just a sorry excuse for a disco. Instead of serving peanuts, they serve fruit mixes. Instead of alcohol, they serve bottled water. But everyone’s trying to get into a social thing in the gym. It’s a social club!”And as a mother, I don’t have the time to join a social club.
But I was wrong. As soon as I gave the 10-day free classes trial, I was hooked. No makeup, no dress-up (oh, the younger gym-goers still dress up to the nines and apply mascara for gym) and no pretense. I go to the gym and attend the yoga class to sweat – to end up looking ugly, but feeling damn good!
Mothers can open up their minds and free up their hearts after Yoga
Yoga has this tranquilizing effect on people that can hardly be explained with words. It has to be felt. It’s like you’re striking those poses, stretching those muscles and bending over backwards…and all this while, your mind is opening up and all impure thoughts are just flying out of it. Yoga can be like ‘taking out the trash’.
And this can be good for the whole family, especially the kids, as well. After a session of uninterrupted yoga, you’ll feel renewed. Even a grumpy, sleeping, tired and beaten-out mother will have more energy to spend time with the kids. Instead of feeling disgruntled and trapped, a mother can use yoga to actually find an opening, a release that helps relax, not only the body, but the mind as well.
I don’t know about you…but I am going for more classes because I have seen the benefits. Yoga can do a whole lot for the ordinary non-married, kidless people….imagine what it can do for a mother.
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Marsha Maung is a freelance
graphic designer and copy writer who works
from home. More information can be found at
http://www.marshamaung.com
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