...I'm not flexible enough...

"I'm not flexible enough to do yoga". I hear this a lot. My response: would you go to French lessons if you could already speak the language?

All you actually need to do to start yoga is to turn up physically and mentally. You can borrow a mat to start with, or get an inexpensive one from the local supermarket. Everything else will come with time, patience and perseverance.

Yoga can bring physical and mental flexibility and strength with regular practice. Everyone's practice is different. Personally, I find some of the introductory postures very challenging. On the other hand I find some more advanced postures are easier to practice, but that might just be me!

Recently, I had a brand new student who went straight into a posture I've been working with for several years. Everyone's body is different, so there's no reason to assume that because you can't touch your toes, for example, that other postures won't be accessible to you.

Yoga is more that just physical movement anyway. Postures (or asanas) are an important part of the practice. However, just as important is working with your breath and noticing/ questioning what's happening in your body. Are you maybe getting deeper into a posture than before? If not, what is preventing this?

As we all become more skilled with the practice and understand our limits, we can start to use our experience to find different ways into the postures. This self-inquiry and openness to new experiences can lead us to practicing postures we might only have imagined doing. Sometimes we just have to start, even if we're not flexible in the beginning.

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