Months before my breakup, I wrote in my diary: I feel like my body is preparing for a long winter ahead. When I look back at these words that have appeared on the page, I see it as confirmation that each of us has a knowing voice within our bodies—especially if we are willing to listen.
My ex and I ended things in early December of that year, and throughout the following winter and spring I found myself regularly practicing stretches and twists on my yoga mat. I instinctively came back to the long breath of yin yoga week after week after week. Every Sunday night, even on nights when the streets of Denver were covered in snow, I rolled out my mat and attended a vin-yin yoga class that was my source of comfort no matter how heavy my heart felt.
After the relationship ended, I found it incredibly difficult to reclaim the city where we both lived. There were many things I loved about the time we shared, and I really missed aspects of my relationship with my ex. He had been my best friend.
In the months before my ex and I broke up, I found myself feeling extremely lost amid the changes — after being fired from a job, having my career take a turn and past traumas being healed in therapy. We both wanted things to stay the same, yet we all changed. I now know that, like any pattern or dynamic in a relationship, ours was co-created. But at that moment, I had internalized the feeling and fear that I was somehow not enough.
When the relationship ended that winter, I was as heartbroken as I was confused, overwhelmed with even more self-doubt and insecurity.
How Yin Yoga helped me overcome heartbreak
Although I had been teaching yoga for over six months and practicing for over ten years at the time, I was a relative newcomer to yin.
What I appreciated about this more restorative form of yoga was that I could just show up and settle into different inward forward folds. By providing a place where I can just be, yin yoga helped me through the waves of sadness I was feeling.
It wasn’t until the spring after our breakup that I finally understood how those weekly yin classes had supported me. I signed up for a weekend-long yin yoga training and learned that yin yoga is based on the principles of Traditional Chinese Medicine by stretching the connective tissue along the meridians, or energy lines connected to various organs. Each meridian has a different function and connection to the elements, seasons and emotions.
In yin yoga we find our own personal ‘edge’ of sensation along these meridians in a stretch that may be slightly uncomfortable, but where we can remain in silence for a while, often with the help of yoga props such as blocks, blankets and pillows.
During that weekend I explored, discussed and experienced yin postures such as shoelace, cat’s tail and bridge in a different way. I began to understand how they can facilitate an aspect of letting go, using the breath as a vehicle to sink into the pieces.
I also learned that when we feel pain in a pose, there are options. We can change the angle of our arm or leg. We can add a block or bolster. Or we can change the position completely and choose to leave behind what isn’t working for our body at that moment.
As I practiced the art of listening to my body, supporting myself and becoming curious about my experiences, I was able to not only feel the stored tension, but also release it. Finally it made sense why I had turned to yin yoga despite my heartbreak. It helped me take a break from the mental analysis so that I could feel the anger, longing, and pain deep in my body and cry the tears I would have otherwise had to hold back.
With therapy, support from friends, and finding space to be quiet with myself, I slowly realized that I didn’t need rescue or recovery. What I needed was to come back to myself and my body.
How Yin continues to support me
When times are tough, it can be annoyingly common to hear the phrase “feel your feelings.” What that means is not always so clear.
There are not always enough resources or space to feel grief, especially in situations that are sometimes considered minor or ambiguous, such as the loss of a love, being fired from your job, or moving a close friend. Without adequate tools to deal with our emotions, our default response may be to suppress or attempt to resolve our complicated and non-linear feelings in a logical and external way – inevitably carrying our wounds into our next relationship, workspace or friendship. Yin yoga gave me a safe space to feel and be held as I processed my grief.
In the time I spent healing this heartbreak, my practice of yin yoga gave me the space to explore the depths and crevices of what happens when previously held constants in life disappear, by learning to truly feel in my body.
My yoga practice continues to teach me how my hips, hamstrings, and shoulders can vary drastically from one side of my body to the next – just as my emotions, wants, and needs can vary. This kind of awareness, with time and seriousness, slowly brought about a greater calmness in experiencing the impermanence inherent in life. At the same time there was an acceptance of something beautiful that did not last.
For me, healing my broken heart didn’t mean fixing it. It meant coming back to myself more emotionally resilient than ever.
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