December 20, 2023

Yesterday I had the opportunity to speak with the magnificent Ann (@the.reprogrammed.parent) about yoga nidra over on her IG 🫶

I got a little nervous right before I did it, despite having led countless yoga nidras in the past few years and sat/attended/practiced even more. Despite having studied yoga semi-consistently since 2018. Despite the fact that I teach yoga regularly, and have for a few years. Despite all my knowledge and studies. I got nervous.

I had to look up and write down the four stages of brain waves: alpha, beta, theta, delta. And double check that I knew what the words Nidra and Sankalpa mean in Sanskrit.

Nidra is sleep.
Sankalpa is intention.

I want to be concise and write about yoga nidra but that’s not what I do, or what I’ve ever done.

I’ll write about what talking about yoga nidra actually made me think and feel:

-I remembered that it’s normal to feel unprepared, even when you know a lot.

-I remembered that we all feel imposter syndrome.

-I remembered the days when I didn’t know anything about nidra or rest or the absolute necessity of ‘being’ more and ‘doing’ less.

And I remembered that we all need reminders (including me!) that rest is one of the most important and productive things that we can do.

So there’s your holiday cheer of the day: Go take a nap. Or put on a yoga nidra. Or get ready like you were going to do yoga nidra but really just lay around in cozy clothes.

This life gets to look like we want it to, but (who woulda thought?) we get a whole lot more done when we REST.