I always start my yoga classes with a pause. We come together and we have a moment to do a body scanning – breathe and ask ourselves how we feel. Notice the sensation that show up right now, the feelings and the thoughts. Because most of us arrive having been go go go since we woke up, and we never had a moment to actually feel ourselves the whole day.
We’re so used to living in our heads. The to-do lists, the replaying of conversations, the low-level hum of things we haven’t dealt with yet. And meanwhile the body is just getting on with it, carrying everything, while we’re busy thinking about what to make for dinner.
The body scan is just a way of checking back in. A kind of “hey, how are you doing?” And what people notice often surprises them. Tension in places they didn’t realise. Shallow breathing they’d been doing for hours. A heaviness in the chest, or a tightness in the belly, that makes a lot more sense once they name it.
It is a simple practice.
You’re not trying to fix anything or achieve anything. You’re just paying attention. And somehow, just noticing is often enough to start softening things.
It helps with stress and anxiety – not by making your problems disappear, but by giving your nervous system a moment to stop bracing. It helps you sleep. And maybe most importantly, it helps you understand what you actually need, instead of just pushing through on autopilot. It has this way of making you feel more like yourself again — more settled, more whole.
I’ve seen people come in frazzled and leave calm. Not because anything in their life changed in that hour, but because they came back to themselves for a bit.
That’s what I’m trying to create space for.
If any of this resonates and you’d like to come along, I’d really love to see you. It’s a gentle space – no pressure, no performance. Just you, your body, and a bit of breathing room.
