3 Ways to Take Time for You and Ascend.
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We all do it — preach peace and love and love and light, but meticulously berate ourselves whenever we have to skip a Yoga class because we can barely stand we’re so tired, or have one too many tequila cocktails at happy hour.
We chant in our morning Yoga class, followed promptly by an hour-long scroll through an Instagram account of someone who makes us feel crappy just for being ourselves, endlessly comparing our lives to a standard that consciously we know does not exist but subconsciously we desire more than our own sanity.
We hold ourselves to an impossible standard — that of perfection, and either expect very little of those around us or expect so much that we push them away. These rigid perceptions of our own identities and those of others are suffocating us. It’s difficult to breathe when we aren’t given the space to make mistakes, sleep in, or altogether be a human.
And it’s time to release the grip, and stop standing on others in hopes that we will ascend. Here’s how:
1. Unfollow, unfollow, unfollow. Repeat.
There is a lot of subversive rhetoric in the spiritual coaching world, on social media, that essentially depict white/able-bodied/thin women as a selling tactic, portraying them as the gold standard of spirituality.
We all know the ones: skinny, blonde, white women doing Yoga on $100 yoga mats, on beaches of Bali and Hawaii. Their accounts that we scroll through for hours, in somewhat of a self-loathing binge. The ones that make us question how they are able to even make money (you never see posts of them working) and always seem to be #vanlife travelling across Europe.
The accounts that make us wonder why we do not have the Yoga mat or money for a plane ticket to Indonesia, or that one photographer friend who always seems to be in exactly the right place at the right time to snap the perfect Instagram-worthy photo of us.
We internalize: what is wrong with us? What sponsored items should we buy in order to get closer to having this life? What courses should we take to be like them? What do they read/eat/watch/study that keeps them living this life?
So we buy the book, enroll in the course, take out the mortgage.
And we never know what landed them in this level of privilege that was completely beyond their control, or what goes on in their lives when they’re having a bad day.
Basically all the off-camera stuff they don’t choose to portray on Instagram.
But we follow anyway, watch their videos religiously, and our heart quickens whenever they post a long and descriptive caption, in eager anticipation of how we can learn to be a little more like them, even though, for many women who do not have thin/able-bodied/white privilege, it’s impossible.
No matter how many courses or Yoga mats are bought, the privilege of these Instagrammers is not something you can buy.
It’s subversive. It’s violent. It’s exhausting. To consistently subject oneself to an impossible standard for many women, to which they still hold themselves.
So delete all the feeds that make you feel like crap, the ones that have you up all night wondering how you can lose 10 lb to look as good in that outfit, or hating that you didn’t drink enough green juice, to make your skin look that glowy.
As for Facebook: what articles and accounts do you see most often? How accessible are those self-help tips for your life? Is there an overarching theme of perfection and never-a-bad-day and healing is all love and light?
If so, unfollow. Block them if you have to. Watch yourself feel better, money-back guaranteed.
2. Drop the perfection.
As a personal side note, I have had the opportunity to train in Kundalini Yoga, which encourages morning practices (sadhana) that are often around or longer than two hours every day, complete with a 4 am wake-up routine accompanied by an ice-cold shower.
For a while, I adhered to this daily practice, and I felt incredible. But I became meticulous about needing to adhere to this practice every day. I put my sleep schedule, social life, and mental health second, and started to feel like crap.
I practiced, regardless of how tired or busy I was at my full-time job and enrollment in University.
Soon, I was burnt out, exhausted, and in need of a long nap.
I write this because it’s common for modern spiritual, working women to prioritize perfection and hold themselves to rigid daily standards, accompanied with whole-scale self-loathing when they don’t follow through with it.
Similar to how many of us think our diet is ruined if we eat a bite of cake, it actually more often than not discourages the continuation of our spiritual practice because the standard of perfection hasn’t been reached.
And newsflash: it never will.
No matter how much we try harder next time or just try again, we’re embodying the definition of insanity, and driving ourselves mad.
So aim for consistency over perfection. Five minutes of meditation during your morning commute is great. Sometimes no movement at all will happen in a day other than getting to work and back. Sometimes you’ll want an evening Yin Yoga class. Sometimes you’ll want a two-hour morning sadhana. Sometimes you’ll just lie on your Yoga mat and breathe for a few minutes.
Sometimes you will just want a slice of chocolate cake, and a long lie-in, and feel free to just enjoy the hell out of both!
If you are a mother, your exercise can be chasing your kids around, trying to put a fresh pair of underwear on them.
If you are feeling depressed that day, your meditation can just be listening to music.
There is a difference between being complacent and being self-accepting. Allowing yourself breathing room in the structure of your spiritual practice will actually encourage you to practice longer on other days, because it will be out of true desire met with a bit of discipline, rather than discipline met with a lot of force.
If you find yourself falling into a pattern of more off-days than on-days, take stock of the structure in your life and whether it is supporting you well enough.
Where do you need to invest in support? What needs to shift? What needs to go?
It should be 80:20 as a rule, which shouldn’t be extremely difficult to uphold.
Aim for discipline, not perfection, and when it is very hard, seek support. Obviously there will be times in our lives when spiritual practice is more strained because we are busy. But that business and burnout should be temporary, in service of greater, long-term freedom and prioritizing rest.
Sometimes we are burnt out for longer periods of time, just making ends meet. This is where we have to creatively seek support and admit though we can do it on our own, we shouldn’t have to.
3. Lessen your screen time.
This is easier said than done, especially if you spend the normal working day on a computer.
But harm-reduction — the universally unsexiest, but in my opinion, best, approach — is important here too.
We have chosen to incarnate — if you believe so — in these bodies on Earth, at this time, for a reason. Know that nothing’s a coincidence and nothing is random. So there will be deep healing available for you within a fully modern, working life.
The key is to look at where you are straying too far into the tech world, and see where you can cut any excess time.
Lessen your after-work Netflix binges, or if you’re feeling brave, stop them completely for a week. Write in journals instead of in a Word document, or transcribe your writing in a Voice Note app on your phone.
Seek support from an online web designer if you are feeling burnt out as an online entrepreneur and hate the tech stuff, or delegate someone else to design your website.
Have more in-person meetings as much as possible. Leave your phone behind when you go out for dinner. Definitely leave it alone whenever you’re eating, as well as an hour before sleeping and waking.
Say No! No is a complete sentence, which is something that we often forget when we’re trying to save the world and heal ourselves all in one day.
If you are asked to take on a new online project, and feel that you have to, or feel guilty saying No, here is a gentle reminder:
Your work in the world will be 1000000 times more potent if you first take time for You.
This includes: offline, coloring, dancing, journaling, walking in nature, playing with animals, eating and cooking nourishing food, intimacy with your partner, lounging in bed, feeling your feet on the earth, exploring the movement section of YouTube.
If you are taking on too much, learn to say No so that you can truly be of higher service to yourself and your work in the world.
And as a closing point:
You are infinitely worthy even if all you did today was lie on the couch.
Your beauty and spirituality are not to be measured against a privileged standard that is designed to sell products.
Your radiance will bring the world to its knees.
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Lauren Jade is a Love Coach for modern beings seeking more mystical lives. She is a true believer that freedom can be found deeply within the modern working world, and she wants to bring sacred partnership back to modern life. In her healing and writing, Lauren engages with archetypes of the wild woman, the witch and the queen, to evoke deep resonance of freedom, passion, sovereignty, elegance and creativity within the psyche. She lives by the ocean in Connecticut where she writes, heals and mentors via her online coaching company and community, The Jade Sanctuary.
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