Part 3 Click here for part 2
Read about yoga and resilience in this post that Yogashala guest teacher Marcella Dean contributed to our blog. You can find her regularly on Sunday mornings at Yogashala, teaching from her deeply rooted love for yoga.
Sincere yoga practice
bears fruits with time. I am now a much more balanced, compassionate and easy going person than I was 16 years ago. Some of this comes naturally with age and maturity. The ability to center, find stillness and wisdom within is very much the result of many years of dedicated yoga practice. How have these qualities enhanced my capacity to recover with ease from difficulties?
When our daughter was first diagnosed with severe depression, anxiety and obsessive compulsive disorder I was initially in denial. I thought that it must be a mistake. There was no way she suffered from so many things without us noticing anything. Yes, she had increasingly been hiding in her room, but isn’t that a normal teenage thing? Her grades were good until the end when she finally stopped hiding the truth from us.
Therapy, medication and one year residential treatment followed. There where times when my heart almost broke. But there were also times when I could glimpse a pinprick of light at the end of the tunnel. Throughout this time I kept going back to my yoga mat and meditation cushion where I found the grace to let go of wanting to control. And wanting to change the situation, as I was able to let go of feeling guilty for somehow having failed as a parent. On my my yoga mat and meditation cushion I found the blessings that still were in my life.
We still have work ahead of us. Our daughter is not considered completely well, but she is thankfully doing much better. One thing is certain: I don’t know how I would have handled this very challenging time without my practice. I am eternally grateful to all my teachers that passed on their wisdom based on ancient yoga traditions.
Namaste.