Patience.

Patience - that sounds nice I thought while reading an article many years ago where Madonna described becoming a mother for the first time. She expressed how her daughter had given her patience. I went on to day-dream about maybe, one day, my beautiful daughter arriving and handing me the carefully wrapped gift of patience. I was very young and naive at the time - obviously. 😂

My daughter is now eight and the present of patience that she insists on giving me EVERY single day is delivered in many different ways. Thrown, tossed, catapulted but it is never presented neatly in a pretty bow and handed over with ease and calm like I had conjured up in my head all those years ago.

For me, patience is a virtue that I have to tend to on a regular basis or life gets messy and distressed. The best place to cultivate my patience is on my yoga mat. That 200cm by 60cm is not just a bit of blue recycled rubber it is my sanctuary and my teacher. It’s where I go for answers when I have questions and comfort when I have dis-ease.

One of the biggest “aha” moments I have had on my yoga mat and as a mother is noticing how we all tend to rush. We are always going some where. The next part of the day is always more important than the moment we are in.

I remember the slow dawning of the realisation that my main job as a mother had become telling Nell to hurry up and to move her from A to B. I remember becoming deeply aware of this in the swimming pool changing room when I realised it wasn’t just me with this compulsion to hurry things along but it was all of us - all the mothers. I stopped in my tracks and watched as the patience slowly drained from the room. I want you to know I wasn’t judging the women in that hot, sticky, changing room. I wanted to get out of there as fast as they did but my yoga practice has opened my eyes to that churning in my stomach that feeling of “Come on! Let’s move onto the next thing!” And rather than let that impatience lead the way I have learned to step back and give the moment a chance with less struggle and cajoling from yours truly.

I face impatience on my yoga mat all the time. Sometimes whilst having to hold a certain pose when I just want to skip it and get to the end of my practice to get on with my day. Or when having to take the time to move thoughtfully and slowly to reap the benefits of my vinyasa rather than just ploughing through it. Strength and flexibility are gained mentally as well as physically with a yoga practice. I get to grow and tend to my patience on and in the safety of my beautiful, blue, yoga mat with no audience, no witnesses and no judges.

I practice so when I’m out there in the real world I have a fighting chance to at least try and do the right thing.

Patience is a virtue. Patience is a practice. Patience is a quality that can change our lives significantly if we take the time to invite it in. So I’m here, on my yoga mat ready to welcome the power of patience into my day once more. After all, it’s Wednesday and that means swimming lesson! 😂

Namaste.

Laura x