Take up Space, Own Your Life
I have had the privilege of teaching many yoga classes and in my teachings I have noticed a common thread amongst those practicing; the fear of taking up space, whether that fear is taking up space with the breath or taking up space with the physical body the fear is noticeable. I have noticed people are more likely to hold or restrict their breath than they are to engage in a full deep inhale and a full sigh of an exhale. I have noticed people barely taking up any space on their mat, constricting their bodies and themselves into a small space not representative of the divine being they truly are. I have noticed people drawing their shoulders towards their ears and compressing the back of their neck as a way of making the self smaller and taking up less space. How we carry ourselves on our mats translates into how we carry ourselves throughout our lives. Our discomfort with taking up space in our yoga practice is indicative of our comfort level of taking up space in all other facets of our lives.
There are many different ways we make ourselves small, we may be committing to a job, relationship, or familial role that no longer (or maybe never) serves us. We may be quieting our voice and in doing so we are making our thoughts and contributions small; we are not allowing our voice, opinion, or thoughts to take up space. We may strive to people please and say ‘yes’ to everything which limits our ability to truly be ourselves and limits our ability to let our ideas take up space. We may fill our schedules too full so we are too busy to be in the present and again deny ourselves the basic human right of taking up space.
In taking up space we own who we are, we honour and acknowledge our bodies, and we are more capable of holding space for ourselves and others. We can only hold space for ourselves when we are comfortable taking up space. We are only able to truly be ourselves when we are comfortable enough to be seen for all that we are and all that we are not. When we have comfort in taking up space we allow ourselves to be who we truly are in all facets of our lives and in doing so we truly get to experience life.
Taking up space is difficult for many different reasons, typically avoiding taking up space is a learned patterned behaviour developed in childhood. This pattern may have developed from a variety of experiences and manifests as a feeling of discomfort in taking up space and being noticed. We may feel we do not deserve the right to take up space (again this was learned/patterned into us during childhood), we may have a fear of being seen as a result of an incident we experienced as a child or early in our life. We may have never been told how wonderful, how incredible, how divine we are which may have caused us to believe it is better to be small than be who we are. Maybe we watched our parents or other influential loved ones compress themselves into the beliefs society placed upon them. There are many reasons we may not feel safe taking up space, and whatever the reason may be I honour it and my heart goes out to you. The first step in taking up space is acknowledging why it is difficult, scary or uncomfortable to do so.
Take your healing one day at a time, some days it will feel as though you are moving backwards and that is ok. Be where you are, you will get where you need to go, but you need to be where you are first. Learn to trust yourself, learn to listen to yourself and ease yourself gently into taking up space. If taking up space feels unattainable sit and imagine (just for a few moments) what taking up space would be like, maybe each day sitting for a little longer with this feeling. Maybe you begin to notice your breath and the space your breath occupies in your body. Maybe you commit to taking three deep full inhales followed by three deep full sighs. Maybe you journal about your needs, your goals, your thoughts, your ambitions. Maybe you share these things with a close friend or colleague. Maybe you take up all of the space on your yoga mat when you practice, maybe you truly sprawl out during shavasana. Whatever you do let it be true to you and done with love. We are all at different places in our healing, we are all here to do different healing, so much as you can allow your healing to be what it needs to be. Hold yourself with love and ease.
Remember taking up space in a loving way is an inherent right as a living being. Own your space in a loving way and you will increase your capacity to hold yourself and all others in a caring and compassionate way.
In honouring our truth we take up space, in honouring our words, our thoughts, our bodies we take up space.
Take up space sweet friends, you deserve it.
