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Has your yoga teacher ever offered an intention at the beginning of the class?

If yes, did it makes sense? Did you remember it throughout the class?

What was your takeaway?

I’ve been curious about intentions ever since I came back from a 9-day intensive Teacher Training in Bali in March 2020.

Each day the teachers would invite us to have a particular focus for the practice and on one of the days, our focus was “dosage”.

How much do you need?

Typically this invitation is normally related to a more down-levelled practice in reference to speed, breath, or intensity. Anything that would guide you to being more conscious of your needs at that moment. But it’s not exclusive to down levelling, it’s more about meeting yourself at the point that is most aligned, in terms of your energy, strength, mobility, etc.

Focusing on Dosage, and aligning with your needs, starts to create a deep sense of inner satisfaction.

Something we quite often reach into the world for rather than going within.

What a wonderful way to amplify the relationship with yourself, being able to provide so much satisfaction internally that we no longer need to reach out into the world for evidence that we are enough as we are.

On the days when our mental health is more challenging, we have the opportunity to return to the mat to raise our awareness of what we need and design a practice that’s in alignment with this.

It could be the same practice you have done for many years, but due to the intention, you may approach the practice with a very different mindset which can transform the energy and experience of the poses to create the level of inner satisfaction you are seeking.

Staying dogmatic in our practice is bland and controlling. And like anything it may create satisfaction for a while but as we age and our bodies change, our commitments vary, and our outlook changes we therefore need to be changing our attitudes toward our yoga practices too.

What is an Intention? (in a yoga class)

Typically it refers to a specific focus, which could be mental, emotional or spiritual. 

Something a student would like to cultivate during class.

It is set at the beginning of the class, either by the teacher or a student (for themselves) and can be as simple or complex as is desired.

This can aid a student to create a mindful connection to the body and their inner world and even guide us towards a desired state of being.  Allowing us to stay focused and present during the practice.

Biggest challenges that can come up when practising dosage

Dosage can bring a lot of our core beliefs to the surface challenging the status quo.

• Do you deserve it? The break or change of practice.
• Giving meaning to the practice if there is a down-levelling element.
• Your feeling antenna has been turned off, you don’t know how to feel. 

When we work with the intention dosage, we have an opportunity to question if we are in the driver’s seat of our life.

Wondering if we are capable of creating our own happiness and joy from within?

It would not be unusual to not know what kind of dosage you need if for most of your adult life you never considered you had a choice.

And the moment we ask ourselves what we want and how much we need to feel aligned with our truer self, we are often confronted with beliefs and stories that will try to block this.

Taking the time to notice what we need challenges our beliefs, that we are not deserving and worthy of this offering and that can resonate in the form of internal statements. (some we are conscious of and some not)

• I don’t deserve it
• I’ll do it next time
• No one else is doing it
• I need to be better
• I need to be in control to stay safe
• I’m ashamed of my body
• My body is disgusting 
• I’m not allowed to decide for myself 
• I’m punished if I care for myself first
• I never learnt how to have boundaries 
• I’ve never had a choice before, so why now
• I don’t know what I want
• If I feel it’s too much
• I’m too much
• Disconnecting kept me safe 
• Don’t show your venerability

So many variations of the same thing “not good enough, not worthy”

It’s the job of the beliefs to resist or challenge change.  But if we continue to invest in our beliefs we are not able to experience choice.

What else could we experience if we decided we were enough?

If we stood outside of the beliefs we might start to experience our yoga practice and life as different. 

Different like magical, blame-free, joyful, happier, grateful, more motivated, fearless and abundant.

As if you are fully present in your life and life itself is occurring all around you in the most magical way. Miracles happen every day, because your eyes are open to them happening and you see life differently.

You don’t have to go to India or Bali to experience “bliss”.

It allows us to fully commit to our part, being responsible for our imperfections.  Not fixing them but allowing them space to be welcomed and loved.  Seeing the challenges as lessons rather than hindrances.  

The beliefs you are not enough are not on repeat throughout the day, your body feels more aligned and freed up and you have more capacity to honour yourself with compassion.

Yes the beliefs are still around but rather than living from lack or fear you are operating from a place of abundance and self-belief that you are worthy of creating satisfaction, joy and peace from within.

What happens in the body when we feel internal satisfaction?

Reduced stress

Balanced mood

Sleeping Better

Reduces the risk of chronic disease

Improved Cognitive Function

How to stay satisfied? 

What kinds of things do we need to have in place to stay motivated outside of our beliefs?

• Meditation 
• Yoga Practice
• Gratitude Practice
• Regular connection to Nature
• Trust you are always supported
• Faith
• Time alone
• Time to reflect
• Promise to self
• A reason for being here, your “why”
• Commitment to yourself

There is more than enough data out there stating if we want to stay well mentally and spiritually, we need to continue working on ourselves, alongside all the other wellness modalities.

The rewards out weight the effort, and starting is the hardest part. 

Starting with a simple intention on your yoga mat like dosage gives us the opportunity to question what we need on a much deep level if we want to. We have a choice to go in deep one day and then the other, notice on a more surface level what our needs are. 

We are abundant with choice.  From there are have more opportunities to create without being restricted by the boundaries of our belief systems.