Monday, June 02, 2008

Injuries as Blessings

What if your injury was a blessing? What if you no longer saw it as an inconvenience? Something to be tolerated until you could “return” to your “normal” life and “normal” practice. If you have been practicing long enough, you probably have encountered an injury and you have probably also encountered the frustration and irritation that often accompanies an injury. What if injuries were blessings? What if they were gifts from the universe to help you focus on a specific area? Stop focusing on a specific area? Or to learn something new about your body or mind? In hindsight, can you glean any gems from past injuries? I have spoken at length on this blog about my hamstring injury that challenged me for almost thirteen years! I can list a dozen benefits from that issue. I also had a neck injury (I straightened the curve in my neck doing inversions incorrectly) that took three years to fix. One of my best gems from that period of time was really taking a fascination to inversions and how to teach them well.

Your yoga practice is about where you are right now, balancing you whether that balance is physical, mental, emotional. When you have an injury your practice is around supporting the issue, helping it heal or release or restructure, whatever is appropriate. When you no longer see an injury as an irritation, a whole new world opens up!

9 comments:

SAS said...

Laura - this is an interesting concept and well written. What a pleasure to read it, as well as digest the thought. It comes at a good time for me. THANK YOU!

SAS said...

I just read this again -- I have to say this is just incredible - the ideas you propose for pondering AND the comments about "your yoga practice being about where you are right now .."!! Wow!!

@MuseLaura said...

You are so welcome!

Unknown said...

What a great perspective! THANKS for the insights, and thanks for sharing!!!! I've been reading in conjunction with my practice, recently, and I'd like to share a book with you that might offer you some new insights. It’s called Harmonic Wealth and it’s all about finding harmony in your life in all areas - financial, relational, mental, physical, and spiritual. It has some really good tips about how to engage all five pillars (or areas) of your life, and to learn more about how they complement each other. Rather than dealing with each issue individually, maybe take a look at the bigger picture.
Here’s the link to that book I recommend: harmonicwealth.com/read
a James Ray Fan

@MuseLaura said...

Thanks for the suggestion!

@MuseLaura said...

Ah, yes! I just looked up the book. It is all about manifesting by a person from The Secret. I love also books by Abraham-Hicks and Wayne Dyer around manifesting. It was was I was hinting about in the post. Everything happens for a reason...happy manifesting!

Nadine Fawell said...

What a great post! I always need reminding of this. Always. Sigh.

Unknown said...

NP, Laura. Happy manifesting to you, too!
Namaste.

Connie said...

What a fabulous post. For the past two months I have been dealing with a hamstring injury that has transformed and made me reexamine my Yoga practice entirely. It is incredible how tightly one can hold onto just a simple set of poses. Kind of silly. But now, two months into my injury I realize what a blessing it is. A complete blessing. It has taught me more about my body--then my entire years of practice has ever done. It has taught me more about my Yoga, then the years of practice have done also!

I love your blog..absolutely love it..and have added this one and your other blogs to my side bar on my blog.

Peace & Love.