My 30 Day Yoga Journey.

Let me just start by saying my 30 day yoga journey actually took me about 37 days.

I’ll follow with, I am in no ways a yoga expert, taking photos of yourself doing yoga is actually quite difficult.

This is not about weight loss, a new body reveal or really looks in general - it’s about my journey committing to myself on the mat, and feeling great mentally after completing the practice.

And lastly, I did not complete my 30 day yoga journey in our yard but could not get any usable photos from inside our guest room, as I’m sure you understand. And only believe in using my own original content for posts, so cue backyard photo shoot.

So let’s dive in - I completed my first 30 day yoga journey back in May but figured a really appropriate time to share the experience would be as I’m gearing up to begin another 30 day practice. As I’m thinking about starting another 30 day journey this weekend I really started to reflect on why I wanted to and what it felt like completing the last one.

To start, I’m fitness shy. I’ve held a couple different gym memberships over the past few years, have attended a few group fitness classes at various studios (typically when invited by a blogger friend), and am not really motivated to work out at home. That was, until I found Yoga with Adriene. Adriene is a yogi who grew her at home yoga YouTube videos into an amazing brand and movement. Since I’m not the most disciplined of exercisers or yogis I was really able to find a rhythm with Adriene through her laid back style of teaching, silly jokes, and Find What Feels Good attitude. In a practice as disciplined as yoga it can be quite intimidating to jump into a flow not really knowing what you’re doing. Adriene’s style of flow gives you the freedom to figuring out what’s working for your body and your practice with literally zero judgement.

After doing various videos at home of Yoga with Adriene I felt it was time to commit to one of her 30 Day Journeys. She has recorded a few over the past few years, and if you follow YWA on a regular basis you can of course go through these practices with her in real time. BUT, if you’re like me and totally move at your own pace, her archive of videos is fantastic for picking and choosing what is right for you. I opted to try a 30 day practice mainly to see if I could actually commit to something fitness related and see it through. (Full disclosure I had attempted to do a 30 day journey twice before and not made it past day 4-5.) For this go round I decided on her practice, True - focusing on being true to yourself in both mind and body on and off your yoga mat.

Throughout my practice I had many ups and downs - some weeks I would go days in a row feeling great and then out of nowhere I would lose all momentum and skip two in a row. But you know what the great thing is? No one knows, no one is judging you, and choosing to show up is just for you. Personally, having a ‘series’ to get through helped me stay committed throughout all thirty days - if I were just doing random videos throughout that time I’m sure it would have been more equivalent to 12 days of yoga instead. Wanting to show up on mat to prove to myself I could dedicate this little bit of time in each day, week, month to myself and myself alone was what kept me coming back to complete the practice. I didn’t start the journey in a series effort to lose weight or change my body, but a main reason I enjoy yoga so much is because the time spent on the mat, while challenging, is so enjoying and meditative, that I’m always shocked to see how my body naturally tones from the practice. Low intensity fitness is definitely more my thing so if it’s the same for you I would say give YWA a try.

I’ve decided I’m eager to jump into another 30 day practice in an effort to reset and recharge my body. After a very busy two Summer months of traveling, eating out at restaurants way more than normal, and just basically being out of my routine, I want to refocus and center myself around what feels good in my life. And for me, that’s regular meditation and carving out a little piece of my day to tune out life’s distractions.

A major joy in keeping my fitness routine at home is making sure I’m as comfortable as possible while exercising. And I love Aventura Clothing for their comfortable active wear and conscious clothing practices. These jersey blend leggings are the kind you can both breathe and pose in, not the kind that squeeze you in like Spanx and make you question all your life decisions. And the Aventura Stratus Leggings I shared last year are still some of my favorites of all time!

Kody Legging c/o Aventura, Ananda Top c/o Aventura, Marren Hoodie c/o Aventura