Inviting Softness

This short talk is a personal share around some of the ways I have been really rigid with myself and how it was keeping me from living in the way I wanted. If you find yourself having lots of rules around the way things should be in your life this talk will have immense benefit for you.

Transcript

Hi there,

Thanks for joining me today.

It's Anita Kaiser here and if you're not familiar with me,

I'm a nationally certified EFT practitioner,

And I'm also a living priestess.

And today I wanted to share with you two examples from my own life about where rigidity and rules got in my way.

And the first one is about my own personal yoga practice.

So I have been practicing yoga and teaching yoga for over a decade now.

I've been teaching yoga for over a decade now.

I've been practicing since I was young.

And,

Of course,

During that time,

My own personal practice has ebbed and flowed,

Right?

Sometimes I'm practicing six,

Seven days a week,

And sometimes I'm practicing two or three days a week.

And so at the beginning of this year,

I knew I wanted to get back to a more regular practice myself because it had,

My practice had taken a little hiatus.

And so in my mind,

I had these rules about if I'm going to practice yoga,

It has to be an hour long practice.

If I'm going to practice,

It has to be really serious business.

And I started to notice that that felt really heavy in my body.

And more often than not,

I found myself struggling with that resistance.

I didn't want to do it.

I didn't want to practice for an hour.

And I don't think that it was because I didn't want to practice.

It was the rigidity around it.

And as soon as I started looking at that and offering myself a different way of being,

I'd pull out my mat for 20,

30 minutes.

I'd pull out my mat and just start.

And this space of allowing myself to practice for 20 minutes,

To practice for 15 minutes,

To practice for a half an hour on the days when it felt right.

Just in allowing myself that shift in perspective,

Where I could do what felt appropriate for me on a given day,

It made the whole practice feel lighter.

And it allowed me to come to my mat more often.

I've had something similar happen in my life around meditation,

Right?

Where initially I had these rigid rules.

Meditation has to be done in a certain way.

You have to sit and there's no point just doing it for five minutes.

I need to meditate for at least a half an hour or I'm not doing it right.

And the minute I started allowing myself to meditate for five minutes,

If that's what I felt like for that day,

Or 10 minutes,

Some days is 25 minutes.

The minute I gave myself space,

Some days I danced during meditation,

Some days I tap during meditation,

Some days I sit in silence and I'm focused inward during my meditation.

And each one of those days is valuable and important.

So I wanted to share that with you today,

Just in case that offers you an additional layer of softness for yourself.

You get to choose,

And you get to choose softness for yourself.

Your meditation practice,

Your yoga practice,

Your creativity practice,

Your whatever gets to be what you need it to be.

And the minute you start feeling that pressure coming in like,

Ah,

It has to be a certain way,

Notice that.

Those are denser energies,

And they're not serving you in the same way that the freedom and flexibility serves you.

All right,

That's it for today.

I hope that's been helpful.

And I'd love to connect and hear how this resonated for you.

Thanks so much.

Have a beautiful day.

Much love.

Reviews

Love this talk, Anita. I was just discussing this with someone. My “programming” makes me feel like a workout must be intense to be effective. I know it doesn’t and I’ve been working on changing my thoughts on it. Thank you for sharing this talk. Much love 🌻

Really made me aware that I do This in my own life, with various things and could be the reason I hold myself back from committing to a solid daily practice. Whether that be movement or meditation…. Thankyou for sharing this insight (on Insight😉) much love K🙏❤️

Yes, yes, so helpful to hear that being soft with myself is so compassionate. 🤗

So true. I’m too hard on myself. Really resonated with me🙏🏽🌸

This is a lesson I have been learning myself over the last few years, with varying degrees of speed and success depending on the area of life in which I sm applying it. Always, ALWAYS worth the effort to be able to turn off that rigidity switch as needed AND not feel guilt or shame over doing so. Life is terminal - spending unnecessary time in negativity takes time away from being in joy and wonder at the beauty and marvel that is our world and the space we have to play within this world. It's a loftier sounding version of "You can either laugh about it or cry about it." I choose laughter, and laughter defies rigidity by its very nature. (Especially if it triggers the giggles or someone else's laughter. 😁)

Thank you for reminding me of this today. The next few days have the potential to be highly scheduled, with people who are very driven by that exact rigidity directing activities. This has caused me much stress in the past, trying to match it. But now, I choose self-love and to do what I can rather than trying to be equally rigid. That is the greatest gift I can give to myself as well as to them, even if they do not see it at the time. My calm and steady presence will be an anchor for them when things go awry, as Murphy's Law assures us they will. 😉

Feeling much more relaxed about the days ahead now. Thank you for sharing these thoughts with us here. I see you and the light within you. Be well. 🤲🏻❤🤲🏻

It’s exactly what I needed to hear today, thank you!