Happy Valentine’s Day!
I hope everyone finds a way to celebrate love today, whether with a special someone or your friends or just for yourself.
In fact, giving yourself some love–or as we say in yoga, Ahimsa–on this day might be the most important part. We cannot open our hearts to others if we don’t take care of ourselves first. I mean we can, but we are more likely to get hurt or burn out in the process.
It’s the whole oxygen mask on an airplane message, right? “Please secure your own mask before helping others.” It won’t do your child any good if you pass out while you’re trying to put their oxygen mask on because you didn’t put yours on first.
Same thing with opening our hearts and spreading love. We need to give ourselves some love first to make sure that when we open our hearts, we don’t get hurt.
“Heart opening” is a term you often hear in yoga class. “Heart opening” is yoga-code for backward bending. We call it heart opening because we want the bend to come into the upper back rather than the lower back taking the whole thing.
Our lower back is already in a bit of a natural backbend already called our lumbar curve. Our lumbar curve and the oppositely curved thoracic curve and the similarly curved cervical curve are important to the functionality of our spine. Curves help us to bear weight and absorb shock.
However, if we backbend without giving much consciousness to what we are doing, we have the potential to let the whole bend go into our lower back causing our lower back vertebrae to get crunchy and create the potential for pain, both acute and chronic, and injury. If instead we direct the backbend towards our upper back and try to get a nice even bend throughout our whole spine–as much as possible as the lower back will still do more just given its natural curve–then our whole spine stays more happy and we don’t get hurt.
There are four important things to remember on our mats so that we can open our hearts without getting hurt.
First, we need to be strong in our core. Having an engaged core as we move into heart opening poses ensures that our lower back is supported.
Second, we need to make the space for the heart opening to happen. Making length in our spine ensures that there is space between the vertebrae for the motion of the backbend. Movement doesn’t happen in the bones, it happens in the space between them. If our spine is all crunched together and we try to move into a backbend, bone rubs on bone and that is a recipe for injury and pain.
Third, we need to make sure that our hips and our shoulders, our two biggest, most complicated joints both of which are directly connected to our spine, are open. Stretching our hips and our shoulders, especially the fronts of both, before we move into any major backward bending, is really important to reduce unnecessary pressure on our lower or upper back.
Lastly, balance comes into play, and this one might not be as obvious, but it is important. Not just balance like standing on one foot or standing on your head, but balance in the back bend itself, letting the bend move towards the upper back as much as possible. And also balance after the backbend, making sure that we counterpose and take a few forward folds after a big heart opening class.
Now, all this applies off our mats too, which is one of the things I love most about yoga.
In order to spread love to others, to show Ahimsa, loving-kindness, to the world, to help other people, we first have to be strong in the core of who we are. When we are strong in ourselves and know ourselves well, deep down inside, when someone needs help, we can see how we can help them in a way that makes sure we don’t get hurt doing so.
If we want to spread love and help others, we have to make the space in our lives to do so.
We also have to be flexible because when we give of ourselves to help others, we often need to adjust our lives a bit and fit their needs or schedule, sometimes bending over backward for someone if you will.
And lastly, of course, there needs to be that balance, remembering that even as we help and spread love and really open our hearts, we still need to return inward to ourselves and give ourselves that same love too.
So today, as you open your hearts and spread love, be strong in your core, make space, be flexible and find that balance and love yourself too.
If you want to give yourself some yoga or lomilomi love today, I’ve got Valentine’s Specials going on through the end of the month. I also still have my February #spreadlovewithgin referral bonuses going too, so check those out also.
On this day and every day, I love you all! Happy Valentine’s Day!
With love, aloha, and namaste,
Gin
