Steven Chan

Yoga 24 hours a day

For someone with such stiff muscles as I have, being exposed to Yoga was really an accident! In high school I had to practice Japanese Kendo for 3 years. During that time I represented my high school in several competitions, winning medals and moving up in the ranks, slowly this experience cultivated in me a love for sports and competition.

In order to look manly and have a muscular body I joined a fitness club where I would go after my job as a social worker. It wasn’t until I started practicing Yoga that I realized that during all the workouts and weight training that I have done in the past I had ignored my mental and physical health (only paying attention to my outside appearance). When I first started practicing Yoga it was very hard for me, my body kept suffering small and big injuries. After some time, I had to slow down and ask myself some questions: “why was I getting hurt so much? How could I stop getting hurt? What was I doing wrong?” After a period of self-awareness I realized that my muscles were stiff because of my rigid personality. The practice of Yoga was putting my body in pain because my attitude made my muscles not flexible at all. When I finally started to slowly let go on my personality, start relaxing, my body also started to let go and slowly became more and more flexible. At the beginning, it was hard for me to understand the depth of what was happening to me.

I share with my classmates the basic concepts of Yoga, currently I’m focusing in the practice of Anusara. Yoga practice is not reduced just to one hour or one hour and a half per day of exercises, Yoga practice is a lifestyle. If we only use the time in class to look in to ourselves, then the other 20 something hours of the day are wasted. We should incorporate Yoga into our everyday life, pay attention to our body and mind though out the day and not go back to our bad habits right after the class is finished. Let’s experience Yoga at every moment of our life.

Finally I would like to thank my family for their support during my journey through Yoga, also the Yoga teachers that I’ve had though my life: Amanda, Shirlyn, Sharon, Ada… I’m thankful for all your guidance and friendship during my life.