Yoga & Traveling

Traveling is when I need yoga the most, and yet, why would I make time for boring yoga when I could be sightseeing or eating or meeting incredible people or having new experiences? Every single time I travel I think, this will be the time I actually use the yoga mat I brought or I’m going to meditate every morning or yoga will help make this vacation even better.

Here’s what I’ve found out about all those statements: they could be true. Or they don’t have to be. Your yoga practice could be looking at your beautiful plate of food before you eat it and closing your eyes and luxuriating in each bite. Your yoga practice could be wandering around the new town you’re in and using all your senses to take in where you are and what you’re feeling right then. Yoga is all about feeling your body, being here, and breathing, and you can do all of those things in many ways, especially while traveling.

Sometimes I do need to actually be on my mat, moving my body and breathing in the air. When traveling, I usually try to find some unusual ground to do this on to make the experience less of a chore and more of an adventure. I opt for the gazebo in the park instead of the stale hotel gym floor. Other times, I need to meditate to process everything I’m seeing and feeling. It’s hard to travel and inhale all these new things and not have the chance to allow space for them. Then that becomes my yoga—breathing and being still.

If you think about yoga while you’re traveling as something you have to do, let that go. It’s something you get to do, and it’s much more than downward dog on a mat. Yoga is malleable and unpredictable, and it is singularly your practice, not anyone else’s. What you need on your travels all depends on you, so listen up and say yes.

By Fae Leslie Hoffman; All Rights Reserved @2018