When You Stretch the Mind, Body & Soul

Deirdre Hawkins | the Space | Health & Wellness

In some yoga studios, there aren't mirrors around, but in hot yoga specifically, there are. So, I looked at it like an invitation to look at myself in the mirror for one hour while in postures. Eventually, I shifted my self-talk. And I started actually seeing the beauty of what my body and mind can do. I can do it slowly, calmly, and steadily, and those things transfer right over into my day-to-day and throughout the healing and grieving process.

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I turned to yoga to remeet my body. After years of dealing with infertility, I really spent a lot of time disliking my body because I was in this mental trap that, 'my body can't do something."

Oddly enough, on that trip in particular, we conceived! I found out I was pregnant three weeks or so afterward. We ended up losing the baby. But I (we) handled it so beautifully, and I attribute that to my new relationship with my body. It was a blessing to host a baby for just a short period of time, and it's been an even sweeter blessing to keep finding new reasons to love my body and yoga gives me that.