Fourth Form of Madness

I’m back fresh from a yoga retreat. When I say fresh, read exhausted. I always forget how hard these things are. Lots of sitting with issues, processing of different energies, learning from others and acknowledging the wisdom within. Yet I keep going back!

I’ve always found being with groups of people difficult, which I find hilarious as I study sociology (do double major degree the other part is philosophy). I struggle with feeling comfortable and at ease. It was only fairly recently I realized that this discomfort was due to my habit of always being what other people want. When I am in a group I struggle with being what people want of me because there are so many conflicting demands and I didn’t think just being me was good enough. This has been a most helpful insight and I have consciously started working with this when in groups of people, which I seem to have actively sought out more of lately, like a moth to the flame!

At the retreat, I felt myself settle back into my breath and relax into my core. I listened openly to their stories without a need to agree or even reply back right away or a feeling that I am not adequate in comparison with them. I was just there and open and just enjoyed them for themselves which I think has been able to manifest from a newly found ability to accept myself on all levels within and just be with myself.

I only rediscovered recently that I love being by myself. I mean I have had plenty of time to be by myself in the past but it was always spent in the intention that this was just passing/killing time in between moving onto the next activity or time with someone. I even realised that I had been using meditation, the pinnacle of time alone, as an activity to do to get me somewhere instead of an activity of just being. However, before this yoga retreat I have just been on, I went on another yoga/philosophy retreat to Bali (yes I know it makes me sound like a serial retreater but I don’t go to that many it’s just how it worked out this time). At the Bali retreat I was really able to address this aspect of myself and make peace with it and fall in love with it. I made friends with loneliness and found out it truly was an illusion.