A Gentle Yoga Flow for Reve-en-vert

‘As a species we’re capable of remarkable acts of compassion and forgiveness. Extending kind-heartedness to strangers, going the extra mile for those we love. Too often though we don’t extend this empathy to ourselves, acting always as our own worst critics and forgetting to attend to ourselves. In order to start turning this compassion inwards, we need to make space for self-care, making sure we are able to check-in, relax, breathe.

We live in world obsessed with goals and measurable outcomes. It’s like we’ve been hoodwinked into this never-ending competition. With other people, but mostly with ourselves.

Too often, modern yoga gets caught up in this and is taught as if it’s a work out, just another way to chase the illusion of the perfect self. But the whole point of the practice is that it’s not exercise, it’s a celebration of who you are, as you are.

The Slow Food movement changed how we eat. The Slow Yoga movement can change how we move. It can change how we live, guiding us always back into the present. Because moving slowly isn’t easier than moving fast, it’s harder. It requires greater concentration, total focus.

Imagine how it might feel to practice if you were on the moon? Imagine the attention you’d pay to everything; the skilful placing of your foot and the focused smile, the conscious effort to embrace new possibilities, new ways of being.

Don’t be put off by this, embrace it. Notice how your mind will initially resist this kind of studied deliberation but smile at the thought with recognition and respect and then come back to your breath and notice how it very slowly guides your body into the next shape.

When you move slowly, you get away with nothing; your body reveals itself to you as it is. And this basis of an honest conversation with yourself, the only kind worth having.’

An extract from Naomi’s book.

Naomi’s ZOOM timetable is:

Monday 12.30pm

Tuesday 8pm

Thursday 8am (new time)

Friday 12.30pm

Sunday 8pm