As a teacher and practitioner of yoga, I try to model that each of us is always learning and teaching those around us.
There are no experts.
When we begin to accept that we are all learners on different parts of the same path, it opens us up to be more accepting of others, and ourselves.
The only thing we can truly be experts in is our own experience. No one, not a single other person, can better understand, relate to, or speak to your experience.
Personal Development Junkie.
I like to call myself a personal development junkie. I read all the books, sign up for all the webinars, and constantly seek the knowledge and advice from other “experts” in the mindfulness sphere.
And I find SO much value in this learning! If you’re not growing, you’re dying.
Personal development, your yoga practice, or any other journey you take on to grow as a person is just that, a journey. There is no end. You don’t read enough books or watch enough webinars one day, and then realize, “Wow! I am now personally developed!”
It’s a continual, mindful practice of trying, testing, changing, stretching, and challenging to become more and more of your true, highest self.
But none of these teachers, speakers, or writers have been in your shoes (or, in yogi terms, on your mat).
Challenge Your Assumptions.
Seeking new ideas is only one part of the journey. Another part is making a conscious choice for what actually resonates with and serves you. Your body, mind, background, career, socio-economic status, race, religion, and so many other factors play into what will actually serve you in your experience.
But again, you are making a CHOICE for what serves you. You might read something in this article that totally resonates. And you might read something else that you 100% disagree with.
Great! Either way, you’ve learned something new about yourself.
Allow me, though, to challenge your assumptions.
Assumptions are what happens when you believe something will work out one way because it has before. What would happen in your life if you stopped assuming? What opportunities could present themselves instead, if you chose to try instead of assume?
What is something you want, whether related to the yoga limbs or not, that you assume you can’t do, so you never even try? It could be literally anything.
By challenging your own assumptions, learning new perspectives, and simply trying where you most believe you’re going to fail, you find what works for you.
Whether you’re practicing with what foods work best for your body, or what yoga style resonates with you, or how to bring more self-love into your every day, this is my best advice:
Take what works, leave the rest, and deviate as necessary. You are the expert in your own experience.
By Jordan Page
Jordan Page is a traveling nomad who takes her love of yoga with her everywhere she goes. She also believes you can learn a lot about someone from their Hogwarts House. After completing yoga teacher training in 2017, she and her husband converted a school bus into their tiny home in which they now live and travel in full-time. She has taught in multiple states around the U.S. and in 2019 she completed her professional coach training through iPEC and earned her CPC. Through yoga and coaching, she works to empower and inspire women to own the life of their choosing through conscious, purposeful intention. She is purposefully living, while not taking things too seriously.
NOTE: This post is part of a collaborative media series organized and curated by Omstars and the Yoga & Body Image Coalition intended as a deep dive into yoga & body image.
