Acceptance - a key element of our yoga practice
Men's health month and Remembrance Sunday
Acceptance
One of the key lessons of yoga is Acceptance. It can also be one of the trickiest ! Our mind has a tendency to resist change. We often want things to stay the same. But life doesn’t work that way. Change is inevitable. The way we approach these inevitable changes can be made easier with our yoga practice. Through our yoga we recognise where we are at any particular moment in time, and learn to adapt our practice to suit that moment.
This is an area which I have found particularly challenging, in particular in coping with changes that feel unfair or unjust, and I know I’m not alone here. So it’s worth reminding ourselves that acceptance doesn’t mean being passive. When we become aware of change that doesn’t feel right, and if there is something that we can do we don’t need to accept it ! This is why I use this platform to encourage people to fight for their rights, particularly when it comes to their health care. I suspect that the vast majority of societal changes that have happened to improve things have been because people haven’t been accepting.
This was our theme in class last week, and we will continue to weave it into classes over the next few weeks. Here’s a lovely article which explores this theme further.
The serenity prayer, which I know you’ve heard before, sums this up.
The Serenity Prayer
“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
the courage to change the things I can,
and the wisdom to know the difference”
Men’s Health Awareness Month - Movember
If you’ve wondered why the men in your life are suddenly sprouting hair from their upper lip, it could be because it’s Movember - men’s health awareness month. The majority of people attending my classes and reading these emails are women, so it’s women’s wellness that I tend to focus on. But I’ve realised that in doing so I’m bringing in an element of “gender bias”, so to correct that I want to raise awareness of men’s health issues too.
According to reports, men have a tendency to ignore symptoms, or be unaware of the kind of health issues that they should be aware of. 1 in 8 men will develop prostate cancer. That’s a pretty huge number. I don’t understand why there isn’t a screening programme. Digital rectal examinations are pretty easy to do, followed by a PSA test, and I’m sure that a routine screening programme for men from the age of 45 would detect a lot of cases early enough so that early treatment could begin. Sir Chris Hoy didn’t have any symptoms at all, and is now campaigning for a screening programme. Conversely my dad had (what I now know to be) several key symptoms, but the GP sent him for physio for his back pain, resulting in a very late diagnosis (and yes, this was a particularly big lesson in acceptance for me). So it’s good to hear that awareness has risen significantly in the last few weeks, so that hopefully men will get to see their GP if they have symptoms or are at a higher risk.
We went to see John Bishop at the Floral Pavilion last weekend, and he was talking about his own mental wellbeing and how he’s struggled over recent years. He found that testosterone was what he needed, and this has made a big difference - his wife’s gynaecologist prescribed it, once he’d sorted out her HRT !
So it’s good to know that men are talking about their health and wellbeing, and comedians are very well placed to reach a big audience, so please share anything that may be of relevance here with the men in your life.
"But you realise you can't outrun this, this is within you and this is just the first step of the process of acceptance." Sir Chris Hoy
Men are still very outnumbered in my classes, but are very welcome to join us ! That said, there are a total of six men starting Yoga for Healthy Lower Backs in December, which is a new record !
And last but certainly not least on the subject of men’s health, my brother had his kidney stone removed at last, which after a couple of months of pain is a huge relief !
Yoga retreat at The Little Fox
We had a lovely afternoon at The Little Fox. The setting was just right, the room warm and cosy. Everyone was delighted by the afternoon tea, with delicious cakes and plenty of tea and coffee. The scones were warm out of the oven, with clotted cream and strawberry jam. There was carrot cake, a lemon tart, eclairs, flapjacks and a chocolatey treat - they were all divine ! We will go back again, so watch this space for details.
Remembrance Sunday
I always find Remembrance Sunday so poignant - its difficult to contemplate the enormity of all that we are remembering. So I will say no more, except to remind you that there are no classes on the 14th Nov - we are off to Bruges, with a view to visiting the WW1 battlefields and memorials. Two of John’s great uncles died near Ypres, and their names are on the memorial at Vlamertinge. Both underage when they signed up.
Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them; that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like. – Lao Tzu
Until next time
With love
Kate xx