“Your presence matters”

One of the aspects I like the most about the yoga class I often attend on Wednesday evening is the teacher’s style: her dry humor, her attention to details, the fact that she gently helps or corrects us in our poses while never losing the capacity to make us smile or laugh even in the toughest series of movements. I like the way she brings us gently into the atmosphere of the yoga practice and helps us (or, at least, me) reconnect to the persons and world around us with some simple but wise words. 

One thing she has said more than once, thanking us for showing up to practice, is “Your presence matters: here in this yoga practice and in the world”.

I like how she reminds us to be gentle with ourselves; how she reminds us, or acknowledges, that with all the crazy and concerning, and sometimes downright horrible, things going on in the world, it can be hard even to show up to yoga practice. 

These words are often a good reminder, if not a soothing balm, to me. 

So for whoever might need to hear it today: “Your presence matters”!