Yin Yoga Lessons: Learning to Stay

Yin Yoga Lessons: Learning to Stay
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[00:00:00] Today on the Yen Yoga podcast, we are going to talk about the lost art of being able to stay. That’s what we’re gonna talk about today. And why is this even important? Why does it matter if we have trouble culturally as individuals and as a society with staying? And what does this have to do with yin yoga?

Well, I would argue that yin yoga helps to teach us how to stay. And we’re gonna talk about that and all of the benefits and some of the troubles that happen when we’re unable to stay, whether it’s as individuals or as a culture. So stay tuned for more on that.

Welcome back. If you’re not, if you’re new around here, welcome. For those of you that are familiars, welcome back to a Yen Yoga [00:01:00] Podcast. Uh, today, we’re gonna talk about stay. How do we stay? What do we, what does Nikki even mean by this? We’re gonna get into all that in just a few moments, but before we do, I wanted to give a couple of shout-outs.

Um, one to Sally Cooper and to Tony Van Dyke. Four, contributing to the show. And if you’re like, “What is she talking about? ” In, uh, the episode notes of every single episode, there’s a link that says, “Wanna support my work.” If you click that, it takes you right to PayPal, and then you can, you know, ., Keep me in matcha and microphones. So that’s just one way that you can show support for the pod if you’ve been benefiting from the podcast. And if you are like, “Mm, nope, don’t, don’t wanna do that or don’t have the funds for that. ” Well, here’s some other ways you could help out the show.

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So if you [00:03:00] don’t mind doing any of , that would be amazing. The other thing to remind you about, dear listener, is that I have the soul of a mermaid with the mouth of a sailor, so if you have small people around, headphones would be a good plan. Take a moment to pause and grab those now. And then for those of you on YouTube, I am still yet, once again, in the wiggly spot.

So my apologies. If you see the camera move a little bit, it’s because the table I’m on, is wiggly. And I have tried actually to kind of turn the table and rejig it and do all the things, but as soon as I rest my arm on it, the camera moves. So, and I have cats, so that could happen too. So my apologies.

I’m not trying to give you emotion sickness. It’s just the way things are right now. All right, let’s get into today’s episode. I have some notes so that I do not lose track of the points that I wanted to make. So if you [00:04:00] see my eyes kind of moving around from looking at the camera, for those of you on YouTube to looking down, it’s because I’m checking my notes to make sure that I don’t miss anything.

All right, let’s get into it. So the working title for this at least is Yin Yoga Lessons: Learning to Stay. So I don’t know about you, and some of you may have a very conscious, um, yearning for this. And for some of you, it might just feel that something’s off, but you don’t know what it is depending on what generation you are.

So lately, I have been more and more craving an analog life. Now, don’t get me wrong. I don’t wanna go back to, um, you know, not having podcasts or not having music at my disposal. , But I am feeling like I spend way too much time on technology and I’ve been really trying to take some [00:05:00] baby steps to get back to the life that I was more familiar with.

So as a mid-Gen Xer, so Gen X, for those of you who don’t know, they’re the generation that everyone forgets about. Everyone complains either about boomers or millennials, and then we’re just right smack in between, we get forgotten about, which is fine, I guess, if all people are doing is complaining, and I’m right smack in the middle of that.

And so I can clearly remember my childhood without tech. Yeah, we had a TV, for sure, and it was color. I’m not, , not that old. And then I think also when I was a kid is when things like beta and VHS finally started coming out, and so the ability to, , rent movies and watch them at home, like I remember that in my lifetime.

My mother refused to get a VHS or a beta machine, , because she said if she did, my sister and I would do nothing but sit plugged in in front of the TV. And we even had very strict guidelines around television. We were allowed to watch [00:06:00] TV, but we were limited to, I think it was, like, 30 minutes a day, which meant on the weekdays.

And then on the weekends, we, we had a little longer where, like, we could watch cartoons or watch a movie or something. And so that meant that if our favorite show during the week was an hour long, we had to, take a 30 minutes from a different day of the week and add it to the day that our show was on so that we could watch for an hour.

And, , as a kid, I thought my mom was crazy and she wasn’t, like, doing what all the other moms did and they didn’t care about screen time, blah, blah. But actually, now I’m very grateful that she did that because it meant that we did other things, like played games and read books and went outside. So I can clearly remember my childhood without a lot of tech.

This whole tech talk will make sense in a moment. I even remember being in junior high when we got our first Macintosh computer, because that’s what they were called back then. [00:07:00] They were called Apple. They were Macintosh, and it was like a little desktop, and it was in the public area of the junior high so that any of us could use it.

Although hardly anyone did, because hardly anyone knew how to. Most of us still had typing class in school. So why I’m giving you this little talk about my childhood isn’t because I’m wanting you to get to know me more. It’s because I have a frame of reference for what life was like before we all forgot how to stay.

Now, depending on when you were born and how old you are, you may have had even less screen time than me, or you may have had much more. You might be of the generation where, streaming and DVDs even were, like, super common streaming stuff, all of the music was digital, et cetera, et cetera. And so your frame of reference for technology and what [00:08:00] effect it has had on us culturally as humans might be quite different than mine.

But here’s the thing. Have you ever noticed how quickly you reach for your phone when nothing’s happening? Whether you’re … By the way, me too. Something I’m also trying to remedy. Um, whether you’re standing in line somewhere, you’re maybe early at a coffee shop or a restaurant waiting for someone and you pick it up, you’re sitting down even for a moment, you know, you’re at the beginning, you’re at the doctor’s wherever you are, right?

You’re sitting on the toilet, that’s a big one. Do you know what we used to do back in the olden days before we had smartphones when we sat on the toilet? We used to, like, read shampoo bottles and toothpaste bottles. I know. Crazy, but true So there’s this automatic impulse to fill the space,

to check on something, to [00:09:00] scroll, to distract. And over time, this becomes so normalized that we don’t even know we’re doing it. I would say more often than not now, when I’m walking down the street, there are people … It used to be something that everyone kind of scoffed at if someone was walking down the street staring at their phone, and it was like, “Oh my God, how rude.

Put your phone away, you’re walking into people. ” I would say in my city now, 90% of the time, that’s the case. 90% of the people that I look at when I’m just out walking around are staring at their phone, and they’re not kind of pulling off to the side to, like, quickly check something or reply to a text and then putting it back in their pocket and continuing.

They’re literally walking down the sidewalk, staring at the phone. Huge safety concern. That’s maybe for another time. Even when people are with their baby and they’re doing their outside walk, or they’re walking their dog, they’re walking their dog and they’re on their phone the whole time. It’s like, w- why have this [00:10:00] little being in your life if you’re not even gonna interact with it?

Anyways, ran for another time. But over time, we just stopped noticing that we were doing it, and it just sort of slipped in and became a habit. And we’re not even conscious half the time of when we reach for our phone. And by the way, this is completely by design. This isn’t some crazy conspiracy theory, by the way.

This is out there in many documentaries that,, whether it be social media apps or whatever, they’re rewarding us with dopamine hits for staring at our phone. , If you feel sometimes like you’re addicted to your phone, you likely are. And, uh, it’s not really your fault, although there’s things we can do about it, of course.

So we just know that now stillness can feel uncomfortable. Just being in the present moment without distracting ourselves, without [00:11:00] filling the void with our phone, that can feel uncomfortable. And this is one of the things that can make yin yoga for some folks so confronting. Not because the shapes we’re making with our body are extreme, but because we’re being asked to stay.

So that’s what we’re gonna explore in this episode. What does it actually mean to stay, and why is it so hard for us right now? What I mean by staying. It’s not about pushing through or endurance or overriding our pain or discomfort. It’s much more simple, much more subtle. What I mean by staying when our, when we’re in our Yin practice is staying with sensation without immediately reacting,

staying present when nothing much is [00:12:00] happening, staying with restlessness, staying with subtle anxiety, staying in our bodies.

Staying is about learning to be with our experience, without immediately trying to change it.

And as I mentioned, we’ve lost the ability to stay. And the truth is, it’s not that we’re totally bad at this, we do have this ability as humans, but we have been trained out of it. So as I mentioned, I’m a middle Gen Xer, and I can clearly remember my childhood without tech, so we were forced to play outside, read books, play board games.

And as kids, we were not air quotes, entertained [00:13:00] if we said that to our parents that we were bored. If we said that we were bored, to most parents that were raising Gen X kids, we would get something like, “I’ll give you bored, or,, go play outside,” when we were bored. I remember my mom, when I told her once I was bored, she said, “That is ridiculous.

You have a whole outside world out there. You have a whole bunch of toys and you have a very clever mind. Go entertain yourself.” And so that’s what we did. We had to stay with our boredom. We had to get creative. We had to use our imagination and play.

And now we’ve lost that. When you are bored, you also become really observant of the world around you. So I spend a lot of time outside as a little kid whenever it was weather permitted. And, you know, if I was staring at a device, I might have missed things like the magic of butterflies and ladybugs [00:14:00] and the different shapes that clouds make, all of those things because I would have been staring at a screen.

I would have lost the ability to look at the small moments because when we’re waiting, we check our phone. We’re watching something and we scroll at the same time. I know I’m not the only one who’s done that. Even when I’m watching a movie with my partner now, I have to resist the urge to pick up my phone and Google, “What other movies was that actor in?

Right? It’s ridiculous. I never would have done that before.

When our, when we’re eating, most of us can’t even eat without some sort of noise coming in, whether it be podcast, video, , music, something, or not even present when we’re eating.

We’ve created a world where there’s almost no gap left unfilled. Platforms like TikTok [00:15:00] or Instagram, of course, are designed to keep our attention moving. Something new, always something next, next, next. Scroll, scroll, scroll. And just to wave my Gen X flag a little harder, it reminds me of some of the lyrics from Nirvana’s song, Smells Like Teen Spirit.

Here we are now, entertain us. I feel stupid and contagious. Here we are now. Entertain us.

So when that stimulation disappears, it can feel now like something is missing re- or really uncomfortable.

And this has consequences. What happens when we can’t stay in our body? We miss the signals, early signals that tension builds quietly. We miss the little moments where there’s, um, discomfort, tightness, soreness that could lead [00:16:00] to eventual pain and injury, and we don’t see them or feel them because we aren’t paying attention.

Emotionally, we avoid discomfort, and so it just lingers and hovers in the background. Mentally, our attention becomes fragmented and we lose the ability to stay focused on one thing. And if we can’t stay with the small things, it becomes really difficult to stay with the bigger things.

Boredom. Let’s talk about boredom. The threshold that we avoid, like it’s a disease. One of the first things that we might encounter when we start to learn to stay is boredom, or what we call boredom, but is actually often just the absence of stimulation. Nothing’s grabbing your attention, and suddenly you’re left with yourself.

And we’ve been trained to s- [00:17:00] now to escape that moment. Here’s the thing that we often miss.

Boredom creates space, and space is where something new can emerge.

Creativity, insight, new connections, imagination, daydreams, innovation.

There’s often a stretch where nothing much is happening, and if we interrupt that too quickly, we never reach for what’s underneath.

And this is why yin yoga can be the antidote to this and so powerful, because, not because it’s doing more, but because it’s doing less.

Longer holds, fewer transitions, less stimulation. [00:18:00] A yin yoga practice isn’t about a fast or creative flow or a pump and playlist. It’s much more quiet, much more spacious. And in that space, everything that we’ve been avoiding starts to show up, which is what makes yin so challenging, the urge to move, the mental chatter, the boredom.

But in our yin practice, instead of fixing it, we stay.

In our yin shapes, this might look like noticing the moment that you wanna come out. And instead of reacting immediately when time comes up, you stay for one more breath, or you move very slowly, almost like you’re in slow motion.[00:19:00]

In a yin shape, this might look like, noticing the moment you wanna come out of a pose, and perhaps pausing to ask yourself why. Now, of course, if you’re in pain, you should come out of a pose. Why do you wanna come out? Do you need to come out? Do you need to lessen the degree that you’re in the pose, perhaps, or is it just that there’s that something that you can’t put your finger on, that feeling of not being entertained, of being bored, of being still, of being quiet.

We can also practice this that when time is up, instead of reacting immediately, we stay for one more breath.

In our yin practice, we can notice boredom, and instead of labeling it as a problem, we can get curious.[00:20:00]

We can notice our restlessness or anxiety or the mind that never wants to shut up, and we can let it be there.

Over time, slowly, something begins to shift.

With time and practice, learning to stay feels like less effort, like less holding on, like more allowing and more settling. We might even begin to start to crave that feeling because it is more like our true nature than how most of us live every day when we’re always plugged in and we’re never taking still quiet time.

Ah, and then there’s the rebound, which is what my teacher Paul calls it. I call it the resonance or the linger of the pose. And [00:21:00] this is the part of yin yoga practice that often gets overlooked, but might be one of the clearest places where we actually learn to stay, is in that rebound or in that resonance.

So after we’ve come out of that pose, there’s that time where nothing is being asked of our body, no effort, no stretch, no doing, and yet this is often where people struggle the most, that urge to move, to adjust, to do something. You’ll see it in class.

Students come out of the pose and almost immediately they move, they fidget, they check out, or they try to immediately go to the other side if it’s uh, asymmetrical pose. They leave the rebound or the resonance before they’ve even arrived in it.

But the rebound is not just rest. [00:22:00] Yes, we’re gonna rest and allow our body to feel more like it’s familiar self again before we move on. But the coming out of the shape and into the rebound actually invites us to move out of the shape in slow motion, noticing each little sensation in the transition.

Sometimes I say to my students, “Come out of this shape so slowly that it’s like you’re afraid to get caught

moving.” It’s a moment of integration where sensation is reorganizing or something subtle is happening, and the only thing being asked of us is to stay. if the pose is where we meet sensation, the rebound is where we learn to stay. And for many [00:23:00] people, the stillness and the staying is actually much harder. This is often where the boredom shows up the most clearly, nothing to focus on, nothing to fix.

And instead of escaping that, we learn to stay. Over time, something shifts and this resonance time between poses doesn’t feel empty, it actually starts to feel full, subtle sensation, pulsing, softening, noticing not only the difference from when you first came out of the shape until when you’re in that rest time, but also over the course of a minute or so, how does that rest time itself ebb and flow and shift and change from the first breath to the last breath?

Subtle sensation, pulsing, softening, and this is [00:24:00] where the practice quietly aligns with Taoism, not as an idea, but as an experience. Nothing being forced, nothing being directed, and yet something is happening.

This rebound or resonance time teaches us that we don’t always have to do something for something to be happening, that even in these still quiet moments, if we can learn to stay and be present, there’s a multitude of things happening.

And this is what happens when we’re practicing, right? When we’re on the yoga mat. But hopefully, for most of us, our practice doesn’t just stay on the yoga mat. It doesn’t just stay in the practice. Over time, we start to notice that you could perhaps stay in a conversation a little longer without rushing to interrupt.[00:25:00]

We start notice we don’t need to fix everything, that we can just observe it. We become more patient in lineups at the bank or the coffee shop or the grocery store. We learn that we can actually resist the urge to look at our phone. Doesn’t mean the urge won’t be there, but we can go, “Huh, I’m feeling very bored in this moment, in this lineup, or wherever you are, and I’m feeling the pull to look at my

phone.” It starts to teach us off of the mat how we can sit with uncertainty and with discomfort, and how we can become a little less reactive and a little more present. I’m gonna read you a little guided reflection that might inspire you, something you could use with your students. So if you were driving, just know that you can come back to this. If you are somewhere where you could, even if you’re out [00:26:00] walking, if you can pull over and sit on a bench for a few minutes or the ground, or if you’re at home cleaning the house, maybe you could take a little pause, guided reflection here for you.

So I wanna just pause here for a moment and shift from something we’re thinking about to something we can actually feel.

If it feels okay, you could either soften your gaze onto a still spot, or depending where you are, you could close your eyes. Obviously, not if you’re driving or walking.

And just begin by noticing your body as it is right now, without needing to change anything, no need to adjust, just noticing what’s here.

Maybe there’s a sensation that stands out to you clearly, or maybe there’s very little sensation. [00:27:00] Maybe there’s restlessness and that urge to move, noticing the impulse to leave.

See if you can become aware of this. At what point does your mind start to drift?

At what point does your body want to shift or fidget? Just notice it.

If there is a sensation in your body that’s present, see if you can stay with it for a few breaths without labeling it or needing to change it or correct it. Just let it be exactly what it is.[00:28:00]

And if there isn’t much happening, you could notice that too. The mind might call this boredom, or it might just start looking for something more interesting. But can you stay even here

in the simplicity of nothing much happening, and notice actually that there’s Probably a lot happening. There’s a lot of richness in every little moment.

Maybe you learn to stay with restlessness or anxiety if there’s a feeling of being restless or a low level feeling of unease. See if you can stay with that as well. Not diving into it, but also not pushing it away. Just letting it be [00:29:00] present.

And then softening the effort. Notice if the staying starts to feel like a job or a chore or like effort. If it does, see if you can soften that too. Staying doesn’t have to be rigid or holding. It might feel more like curious or allowing or settling.

And underneath all of this, there’s the simple experience of being in your body, breathing, sensing, existing.[00:30:00]

And then from here, receive one more breath.

And when you’re ready, if your eyes were closed, you can gently open your eyes. Or if your eyes were half open and gazing at a still spot, you can slowly begin to bring the world back in with you.

There’s a little meditation that I have done for years with my students. And I will, um, include that in the blog post that accompanies this episode, a little, uh, guided audio if you wanna check that out on these ordinary Of course, you could take a bunch of inspiration from what I just did as well.

So to start to wrap this up, we have been trained due to our technology [00:31:00] to leave our experience, to distract, to move on, to fill the space.

And yet,

yin yoga offers us something very different, an opportunity to stay. Not perfectly, not forever, but maybe just one or two breaths longer than what we’re used to. And as we can learn this in our yin practice, we can also, hopefully then, take this out into the world with us

when we’re not on our yoga mats.

Okay, my friends. I hope that you found – some of this helpful, some food for thought, maybe it’s just some inspiration of how you might, as a teacher, bring this concept of learning to stay [00:32:00] into your class, either as an overt theme or just in subtle little cues that you sprinkle in throughout practice.

And if you like me have difficulty staying when you’re not practicing yoga, that’s also something we can explore. I know for myself, as I mentioned, being a mid-Gen Xer, that I’ve been looking into my life and trying to slowly bring in aspects of my life before all this technology.

I’m a craving for a more analog life. For example, I’ve never even owned as an adult a record player but lately, I’ve been craving getting a record player and records, even though I’ve never owned one before.

Rather than listening to it on my technology, I’ve been craving the sort of imperfections [00:33:00] that vinyl can give. And there’s many other ways that I am exploring this pull back to a more analog life. I hope that you found this podcast helpful, either just some food for thought or maybe some teaching tips and themes that you can use in your practice.

And until we meet again, bye for now.