Achieving Balance

Recently I started going to hot yoga classes. I thought it would help my posture and flexibility, and apparently, I just really like to torture myself. During class the other day, my instructor said something which got me thinking (dont' ask me how I had enough energy left to think, breathing during class is hard enough). He talked about the importance of changing sides when we do our poses such as the still pose. We can become unbalanced with bad posture, if our body is trained to always go to one side only.

What I immediately thought about is how true that is with our minds and the way we do things in general. We get ourselves in the habit of always responding to situations in the same way with the same mindset and viewpoint, and therefore achieving the same result. Now this may be ok, if you are achieving the results you are after, but if you aren't, this becomes a problem. Doing the same thing, in the same way and expecting different results, isn't that what they call insanity?

The other problem is that you become closed minded and unable to look at things from another angle. I think the saying "Use it or lose it" applies with our bodies and our minds. The sooner we can open our minds to look at things from different perspectives, the sooner we can begin to create new and better results. Another saying comes to mind here "You can't teach an old dog new tricks". The older we get, the more closed minded and set in our ways we tend to be, but it doesn't have to be that way.


Watch, listen, and learn from others around you, especially those who may be experiencing similar challenges in their lives. How do they work through it? What are their thought processes? Will what is working for them possibly work for you, or does it give you any new ideas, or a new perspective? Try asking for advice from some of your friends, they may offer an angle that you hadn't thought of. Just be open to thinking in different ways then you are used to. Improve the posture and flexibility of your mind. Be open to look at situations from all sides and angles, and begin to regain the balance in your life.