Leah Nylander Yoga

Listen to your body, but don't let fear of discomfort make every decision for you...

I was with my chiropractor Jack Messer from North Beach Chiropractic who, as well as being a very good chiropractor, is also rather philosophical. We got talking about getting older and how easily we put up walls then slip into protection mode.

“My shoulder doesn’t like that.”
“My knee will hurt when I do that.”
“I probably shouldn’t push it.”

If we spend our whole lives avoiding anything that might feel uncomfortable, we can gradually become less capable of doing the things we actually want to do. And Jack said something that really stuck with me....Choose your hard!

Because there’s the hard of doing the work now, strengthening, moving, challenging yourself, finding your edge and occasionally getting uncomfortable.

Or there’s the hard of losing strength, mobility and confidence because we stopped asking our bodies to do the things. Neither path is necessarily easy, so choose your hard.

And of course, there are times when our bodies are very clearly telling us to pull back. Pain is information, and discomfort deserves to be acknowledged, not ignored or pushed through. It’s about learning the difference between something that genuinely doesn’t feel right and something that simply feels challenging or unfamiliar. Because sometimes, the thing we need isn’t more protection, it’s a little more confidence to explore what our body can still do.

I think that can be one thing we learn as we get older, realising that ageing well isn’t about never feeling discomfort. It’s about knowing when to listen, when to back off and when to say,

“Okay, this feels challenging… but I’m curious to see what I can do.”

Thanks for the nugget, Jack

I’m stealing this one. 😉

Leah

HOM Yoga this week

* 7pm Monday Yin (Cover)
* 6am Wednesday Hatha
* 10am Saturday Yin + Oils (Cover)

We'd love to have you join us.

Leah

Book: www.homyogastudio.com.au

MOVE WELL | AGE WELL | LIVE WELL

Join me this week for yoga classes designed to support mobility, strength, balance, calm and overall wellbeing.

MONDAY
10am Over 55s
Gibson Park Community Centre
Gibson Avenue, Padbury

WEDNESDAY
6pm Hatha
Flinders Park Community Centre
Broadbeach Blvd, Hillarys

THURSDAY
9:45am Gentle Yoga
Gibson Park Community Centre
Gibson Avenue, Padbury

SUNDAY
9:30am Yin + Meditation
Bloom Yoga Room
6/56 Creaney Drive, Kingsley

Whether you’re here to move, slow down, feel stronger, reconnect with your body, or simply take some time for yourself, there’s a place for you here.

Come as you are. I look forward to welcoming you to the mat.

Leah ✨

Bookings: www.leahnylanderyoga.com.au

Twisting Peacock Cover
5:40pm
Thursdays

Whilst the formidable is on Safari I will be covering his 5:40pm Hatha class .

Any of my Yogi friends that live in the Osborne Park area, I'd love to see you there.

I'm looking forward to meeting some new faces too.

Leah

Bookings https://www.twistingpeacockyoga.com.au/book-online

We usually come to yoga for the body, however it’s the other stuff that sneaks up on us. But sometimes we just need to sit with things.

Most of us come to yoga because we’ve heard it’s good for us. We want to be more flexible. A little stronger. Improve our balance. Move better. And this is the truth. Yoga does all that, but there’s more to the story.

The longer you practise, the more you start to notice something else happening. You might leave class feeling calmer than when you arrived. You might start noticing how you respond to things. You might discover that you actually quite like sitting quietly with yourself.

Or sometimes, something you’ve been holding onto for a very long time starts to surface. And sometimes you may go away feeling worse than when you came. That’s part of the practice too.

Students tell me things like: “I don’t really know what’s changed, but I feel different.” Or, “I’ve done all this breathwork and talk therapy, but I still felt blocked. Then I came back to yoga and suddenly I could feel the tears starting to release.”

That doesn’t mean yoga has magically fixed anything. It hasn’t, and there should never be a suggestion that it does. But I do think there’s something powerful about learning to sit with the uncomfortable stuff. The frustration. The sadness. The uncertainty. The feelings we’d really rather not feel.

Yoga gives us an opportunity to notice what’s happening without immediately trying to change it. Over time, we learn that we can feel something without it consuming us. We learn that feelings move, that we can stay with ourselves through the hard bits, and that we don’t need to rush in and fix everything. Some things simply can’t be fixed.

Yoga is a slow drip, a lifelong practice. It’s not a quick fix or something you master and tick off your list. It’s a little more awareness here, a little more understanding there.

And if we keep showing up, eventually we start to experience what those eight limbs of yoga are really pointing towards. The poses are just one part of it.
The real practice is what happens when we take what we learn from the mat and start living it.

The poses are just the doorway.

Leah

HOM Yoga this week

* 6am Wednesday Hatha

Come join us, and walk out of HOM feeling a little more grounded, awake, and connected.

It's be great to see you!

Leah

Book: www.homyogastudio.com.au

The secret to successful yoga sequencing, is knowing when to abandon the sequence.

I get asked from time to time how I put my yoga classes together, and how long it takes me to sequence a class. The honest answer is that after teaching for many years, a lot of it has become intuitive.

I don’t need to constantly check my notes or my watch to know where we are in a class. I have a feel for how long something needs, when we need to move on and when we need to slow things down. But it wasn’t always like that.

When we first start teaching, we’re often very disciplined about writing everything down. Every pose, every transition, every minute. And we should be.

We need the framework, we need to practise the sequence and make sure it actually works. But then someone walks into your class who you weren’t expecting. Or the energy in the room is completely different from what you anticipated, or you realise something needs more time. And suddenly that sequence you spent hours putting together doesn’t quite fit anymore. That’s where intelligent teaching steps in.

For me, the framework of a class is pretty simple.

✨Arrival
✨Connection
✨Exploration
✨Movement
✨Integration
✨Stillness
✨Return

Everything I bring to class sits within those pillars. Whatever class I am teaching, works within that framework without needing every minute to be predetermined.

So yes, have a plan, have a framework and know where you’re going.

But give yourself permission to change direction when you get there.

And perhaps one of the biggest gifts we can give ourselves as teachers is to keep learning, little bit by little bit. You don't need to know everything and no one ever will. What do I need to know right now is something I always ask myself when planning.

Over time, you build your own little box of goodies to draw from when you need it.
And eventually, you realise you don’t have to remember everything. You just need to trust that you know enough to respond to the room in front of you.

Leah 💌

SUNDAY Morning Yin Yoga

Yin + Meditation
9:30am
Bloom Yoga Room
6/56 Creaney Drive
Kingsley

All props provided and bookings are made at www.leahnylanderyoga.com.au

I look forward to welcoming you to this lush yoga and mindfulness experience.

Your nervous system will thank you for it.

Leah 😴

Twisting Peacock Cover
5:40pm
Thursdays

Whilst the formidable is on Safari I will be covering his 5:40pm Hatha class for the next 5 weeks.

Any of my Yogi friends that live in the Osborne Park area, I'd love to see you there.

I'm looking forward to meeting some new faces too.

Leah

Bookings https://www.twistingpeacockyoga.com.au/book-online