College is an exciting time, and a true gift in the deepest sense. It provides an opportunity to learn new skills, and better one’s mind as well as position in life, all while meeting new people and engaging all sorts of ideas and innovation. It is a vast reservoir, an ocean to increase your capacity to take on and savor all life has to offer.
Yet with this increase in power and access to opportunities come added responsibilities and, at times, even a sense of overwhelm, fatigue, or—the most disruptive—self-doubt.
This is where the practice of yoga can be your life rope. A regular yoga and meditation routine help you masterfully navigate all the changes in pace, expectations, and challenges college life brings. It will steady you and bring you back home to the source of your power, renewing you to face each day.
We are proud to announce a NEW collaboration between AHA Yoga & Florida Gateway College! If you are a FGC student, join us for a 5-week on-line course (Live Zoom PLUS recordings) for just $25! Yes, you read that right, that is more than TWO-THIRDS off the regular course rate. We begin SOON, September 22, so call TODAY to join: 386-754-4211
Want to know more about how yoga can support you to succeed in your college experience—and the school of life itself? Read on:
Just as college is a training ground to expand your broader life, so yoga is a habit that will serve you far beyond your years in a formal school setting. College and yoga are tools that support you to expand previous limitations and cultivate your best.
Yoga philosophy often describes what we have all experienced: That sense of obstacles that build up inside, and seem to block our way. These arise as sensations of physical tightness, or an agitated mind. You might encounter an anxious self-questioning or simply not be able to put your thoughts into words. Yoga calls such limitations granthis (pronounced “GRUNT—tees”—how spot on is that?!), the difficult knots that bind us and stop us from accessing an easy flow of energy and presence. Of particular importance is the difficult burden of self-doubt.
Yoga and meditation are simple methods that help us untie these self-limiting knots. It is through concentrated yet gentle yogic efforts that these restrictions are released, allowing energy to move freely so you feel nourished as well as cleansed. As you undo knots and access your innate strengths, you experience overall growth and blossoming. You can indeed rise to your highest potentials.
Similarly, college life itself is a laboratory of curiosity and study, that empowers you to realize better work life as well as relationships. All the reasons college is so wonderful—new ideas, lots to learn, exposure to new people and possibilities, and a really full schedule and timeline to achieve measurable goals—is also what can bring those inner stumbling blocks to the forefront. As college life introduces you to knowledge and skills you need, the intensified demands and responsibilities can also mount and, at times, seem overwhelming. Yet you can use yoga to transform the pressures of college into a wonder-filled opportunity that will serve you the rest of your life.
Here are 5 Reasons that as you learn the ropes of all college and life have to offer, you need to develop a yoga routine now.
RELEASE TENSION:
Yoga is most popularly known by its stretches, called “asana.” The demands of college—especially the increased time staring at a screen and sitting studying—can really intensify tightness in the body. Asana (yoga postures) can alleviate such physical strain and restore better movement and sense of ease. It helps you strengthen and stabilize the body, clear out sluggishness and a sense of restriction, and even increases immunity and emotional resilience. Many also report improved sleep and therefore recovery from stress and exertion. All of this keeps you healthy and can even improve your academic performance.
ENHANCE FOCUS:
Yet yoga’s benefits rely primarily beyond the body. Physical practice is like a book cover: It is simply a gateway to support the mind. The turn to the subtle, inward practices yields yoga’s most amazing, lasting results. Yogic breathing is a particularly potent game-changer.
In college, the sheer number of opportunities as well as new information, situations, and deadlines can aggravate internal pressures to the point that they feel burdensome. Yoga provides you with physical and mental coping mechanism to alleviate stress and thereby soothe the racing or heavy mind.
Once basic stretches have strengthened and released the body, yogic breathwork allows you to access incredible inner riches. Though stress arises, you identify it and make it work for you rather than against you. You develop to ability to breathe through tough confrontations or workloads, so you stay calmer. As the mind calms, it regains the ability to adapt, focus, learn, and remain open to creative solutions. Your increased focus improves your overall academic achievement, while also keeping you attuned to your finest inner resource: You befriend your radiant mind. You unbind and re-orient that agitated mind, so its increased energy—rather than work against you—now serves your overall development. That refined mind of one-pointed focus supports you in all your college endeavors.
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INCREASE CONFIDENCE:
A successful college career will require lots of disciplined structure to better manage your time and keep you moving toward your goals.
Simultaneously, yoga provides you healthy internal habits that allow you to remove sluggishness as well as frenetic busyness.
As you are introduced to new ideas and demands on your time and know-how, sometimes your self-worth or overall confidence might take a beating. Even staying constantly busy, though often heralded as society’s badge of honor, is actually a signal that something is off balance on a deeper level. The uneasiness that blocks your inner knowing is the granthi or “knot of doubt.” Yoga introduces simple and sometimes surprising techniques so you remain true to what matters to you and your longer-range goals, suited to who you are on the deepest levels.
Physical and mental concentration practices build what yoga calls “agni,” the fire of transformation that burns away the things that make you question yourself in unhelpful way. Instead, you begin to discern what is essential to you and what is not yours; you return with invigorated energy as well as a clearer sense of your purpose. And, over time, the physical strength gained by yoga simply reflects that more profound foundation of inner wisdom!
IMPROVE COMMUNICATION:
College is a realm where you can untie and surpass all kinds of knots, including times you fail. You learn to get back up and be better for it, and serve others in the process.
Yoga can help you improve your ability to face challenges, including an increasingly open self-awareness, acknowledging with equal ease your own limits, shortcomings, and gifts.
College will often demand you work with others and express yourself clearly, honestly, and with eloquence; here, yoga is a great life rope.
In yoga, as you experience when you need to say ‘no’—and implement it!—you no longer take on more than is healthy. As you increase your self-awareness and affirm truthful, empowered boundaries, you then have enough energy to start again and surpass previous failures. You also grant yourself more compassion and understanding in the process. You begin to work with the breath to smooth out inner difficulties, allowing yourself to be less reactive and more thoughtful. This practice impacts your life long after your formal yoga time.
As you become more honest with yourself, you build stronger relationships with others. You take on your responsibilities with more enthusiasm, skill, and humor, and thus lessen the tendency to judge others. Just as physical practices strengthen your body, you feel the unfolding of an incredible gift of patience. With less inner strife, you affirm your own experience, making space for your emotions and concerns without attacking others. Outer communication then remains more receptive, leading to promising, more meaningful connections with all those around you. It can even help you finding your voice more easily in college writing assignments. You more readily identify your own truth, and deliver it more articulately, with tact and kindness, whether in the college classroom or beyond.
BUILD CALM & CONTENTMENT:
College life is anything but easy, and often is not smooth sailing. Yet it is also a fertile ground to experiment with being happy in the here and now, no matter the external consequences. One of the richest benefits of yoga during college life is the access it opens to your own calm mind and deep, inwardly focused contentment, what yoga calls “santosha.” This sweet acceptance and sensitive awareness remind you what a treasure college life truly is.
We usually enter college with a grand sense of vision and drive; we all desire a better life and want to lessen suffering. But as you enter the rigorous day-to-day work of college life, including stresses of grades, managing finances, busy schedules, constantly evaluating your own performance, plus the rhythms of tests and project due dates, sometimes you lose sight of the simple joys of living.
College is not just a thing to endure and get through; college is an opportunity to thrive and enjoy your life. Yoga practice keeps this truth at the forefront.
Everyone in a college community needs stretching; yet we also require more. Once again, yoga provides this life rope. Yoga is ultimately about systematic approach to both relaxation and meditation. This is how yoga helps you stay present to each and every moment, largely by encouraging you to pause, breathe, and notice what is perfect and beautiful right here and now (yes, even in the crazy year of 2020!).
College provides a marvelous time of challenging yourself, exploring and experimenting, admitting disappointments, doing your best, all while admitting mistakes and changing course. Integrating yogic practices will help you retain the ability to be introspective, so you do not get lost in the external demands. Yoga helps you ask yourself the hard, most meaningful questions, so you realize your innate value and higher purpose. Though college is a critical time and crucial experience, yoga empowers you with embodied knowing that though college is important, it does not define you; it is ultimately there for your own upliftment. You are not just earning a degree or more earning potential; you turn toward and uncover you. Approached with self knowledge, college life becomes even more meaningful. Yoga reminds you that you are the ultimate gift of highest value. Yoga keeps your vision focused on what is already perfect, right here and now, most of all you.
And this is where college life and yoga practice create a marvelous alchemy: As you develop and bring more stability and happiness into your own life, you can also be of greater service to your friends, family, and community.
Your difficult knots can indeed unwind to become your strongest life rope, your means and goal of a life well lived. The training ground of college is the perfect time and place to start your yoga practice, to excel in college and life itself. Come practice and feel for yourself:
AHA Yoga has teamed up with Student Life Services at Florida Gateway College to offer students an amazing opportunity for five weeks of a deep dive into yoga. It’s all on-line, and these gentle sessions are perfect for an absolute beginner, as well as those with experience who simply want to build more inner yogic skills. It’s just $25.00 for 5 classes (YES! That’s over SIX hours of yoga for nearly 70% off the usual course tuition!).
We meet LIVE via zoom on Tuesdays, 4 to 5:15 pm. All sessions are also available via recording, so you can practice at the time that best suits you.
Call now to save your place!
Fee payment: 386-754-4211
Zoom information will be sent to your wolves email address.
This simple course, YOGA to RELEASE TENSION & CALM THE MIND, helps you let go of stress & cultivate focus through traditional yoga. You’ll soothe the mind with breath work,
do slow stretches, & learn systematic relaxation to reduce strain & increase serenity.
All sessions are taught by AHA Yoga’s Virginia Hill, of Lake City, Florida.
Want more information? Contact FGC’s Director of Student Life, Amy Dekle, at 386-754-4317
We look forward to supporting FCG students through tried and true yogic practices!
