Readers, I don’t know about you, but when I practice yoga, I barely have a smile on my face. I get caught all the time by my teachers looking too serious in class. Now, I have never had a great ( or even good) poker face; whatever I am feeling always shows on my face, so I can’t even imagine what I look like to an instructor in Chair Pose.
Last night in class, I ran into the studio having had a long and productive day at work. It was hot, I was thirsty, and I just wanted to clear my mind. As we started to practice, I started to focus on my breathing, and we started to warm up. Now, this was a longer yoga practice than usual for me in the week. It was a 90 min class, and it was hot in the studio, so sweating was definitely in my practice. No way could I put a smile on my face.
After our Sun Salutations, we started a Vinyasa Flow with Warrior II. This is a notorious pose for me to not smile. I get into Warrior II on my right side, and like clockwork, the instructor tells me to smile, or at least to try to smile. This phrase always makes me laugh, so I guess it worked.
I went home after practice feeling rejuvenated, so I decided to do some research on smiling and yoga. I had no clue there was something called Facial Yoga. Facial Yoga relieves stress and brightens your mood. To read more about Facial Yoga, The Art of Living wrote a great blog about it. You can read about it here. So, maybe I need to smile more 🙂
Readers, do you smile while practicing yoga? Also, I’m the official blogger for the Morgan Hill Yoga Festival so check out my blog and Twitter feeds for more information!
~Namaste
Scrappy Yogi
Scrappy Yoga 