3 Surprising Ways Yoga Helped Me on My Ski Weekend -Part 1

We just returned from a short and sweet trip to Banff with a day of skiing at Sunshine (with no sunshine to be had.)

Here's a collage for you:

The weekend was both magnificent and filled with growth opportunities - which is the best kind of travel, don’t you think?

As I contemplated the learnings and takeaways from the trip, I noticed that yoga played a big part (even though I only did my daily sun salutations and nothing out of the ordinary). 

The thing I love about the style of yoga I do (Body Awake Yoga® or BAY) is that it promises to improve one’s life both on and off the mat. This promise was very evident on our trip and so, of course, I have to share it with you!

I’ll break it up into 3 posts so that you don’t get overwhelmed. Today’s surprising way that yoga helped me on my ski weekend is this: 

BAY helps you approach life’s occurrences with “Grand Neutrality”

Grand neutrality means that you’re so connected with your personal power and your divine nature that you truly feel that you’re “big enough” to hold it all. Things don’t upset you as much (or at all) when you’re aligned with grand neutrality because you know for sure that everything is happening to help you grow and expand and to connect you with even more of the vastness of the Universe. In essence, you know that even if something is uncomfortable or unpleasant, it’s all good (or will be soon). 

There were two moments on our ski trip when this grand neutrality was helpful. 

Moment #1

I was in the hotel bathroom on the first morning when I heard a commotion outside. I could tell that something had spilled and it sounded like it was the blueberry smoothie I had prepared the day before. The 1 Litre Jar of blueberry smoothie. 

Rather than rushing out to take control of the situation (older version of me), I let my family deal with it. I made sure that when I emerged, I was in a state of grand neutrality rather than letting anything trigger me or be reactive. 

It turned out that when my son, Oakley, had gone to shake the glass jar to mix up the very thick beverage, the bottom just fell off, along with the large quantity of dark purple smoothie. 

It went all over the carpet, the walls, the sheets and duvet covers, the ski clothing that was laid out (including my white snow pants) and more. Using the white hotel towels and facecloths, my family had cleaned up most of it (to the extent that was possible, anyway). 

The towels were a bit worse for wear but the carpet looked surprisingly good and we stripped the beds and threw everything in the bathtub so that housekeeping could whisk it all away. 

It crossed my mind that I could be upset that the smoothie was wasted, but instead, I chose grand neutrality. It didn’t really matter. I also could have been annoyed about my snow pants, but grand neutrality seemed like a better choice. They could be washed once we got home. We left about 45 minutes later than we had planned, but again, grand neutrality helped me know that it was perfect timing. 

Thanks to the ability to see the bigger picture that I’ve been cultivating on the mat with BAY, the incident was more humorous than anything else. 

Moment #2

The bigger challenge/growth opportunity came when we got to the hill. It was snowing big wet snowflakes on the drive to Sunshine and the precipitation continued on our way up the gondola. Although Sunshine is known for spectacular views, we couldn’t even see any mountains (or out the gondola windows, for that matter). 

Unphased, we rode up the chairlift, into the low-hanging clouds. As soon as we started skiing down, though, a whole bunch of things happened at once. 

I couldn’t see anything, thanks to the white-out conditions. Even through my pink-tinged goggles, the light was completely flat. 

On top of that, I was on my second day of a new kind of contact lenses that were wreaking havoc with my depth perception. 

On top of that, I was wearing new-to-me gear. The skis were longer than anything else I’d ever worn and they were extremely heavy, which made my knee howl with pain. 

On top of that, my boots were painfully squeezing my calves and the outer edges of my feet felt like they were getting bruised with every turn. 

On top of that, there were floaters in my vision that I had thought were getting better thanks to all the supplements I’ve been taking but they all turned up in the white-out and I felt so frustrated and discouraged. 

The only thing left to do on this first run of the day was to cry. As I made my way down the wet snowy/icy slope, I let all the feelings surface and loved each one in turn. 

“Part of me that feels discouraged, I love you,” I thought.

“Part of me that feels angry, I love you too.” 

On and on I went with all the parts that were showing up. It took the rest of the ride down to get through them all.

As I’ve noticed before with this loving-all-the-parts approach, it wasn’t too long before I felt better. 

An older version of me would have dwelled on the issues and replayed them over and over, but thanks to the yoga I’ve been practicing, I was able to use my mind in a different way and pour some love in instead. The grand neutrality in this case wasn’t as graceful as with the spilled smoothie but I got there much more swiftly than I would have in the past. 

Ultimately, my devotion to yoga helped me suffer less on the ski hill. I never would have imagined that was even possible, but I know for sure that the time I’ve been spending on the mat ripples out into the rest of my life and improves things in ways I didn’t know were possible.

Pretty amazing, right? Yoga is so much more than I anticipated and I’m so grateful for having discovered Body Awake Yoga®. 

A Gift For You

Of course, I can’t keep it to myself. I would love for you to discover grand neutrality and the other benefits of yoga in your own life and so I’ve created the opportunity for you to give it a try.

I have a library of dozens and dozens of classes that I’ve been teaching for the last year and a half and I also add three new classes every month. As a gift to you, if you’re interested, you can access the “Yoga for Divine Alignment” library for a month at no cost.

Want to experience the benefits of yoga this month? Click here for all the details and to register.

I’ll be back next week with Part 2 of this mini-series to share how yoga helped me later on in the day when I needed to make an important decision.  

May you have a week where you get to experience the wonder of grand neutrality for yourself. 

I’m sending many blessings your way. 

With vast love and upleveled courage,

Christina

>Creator of Courageous Self-Care

>So refreshed after a weekend away - even though the hotel sheets were the noisiest I’ve ever experienced and I woke up every time someone turned over

>So grateful not even a drop of this morning’s smoothie was spilled

PS - I’ll be doing a live via Zoom yoga class this Friday morning, Feb 9 at 9am Mountain. Get free access to the class when you register for the trial of Yoga for Divine Alignment.  (Or watch the replay at your own convenience. It will be added to the yoga library within 24 hours.)

If you’re ever in Banff, I must encourage you to go to the vegetarian/vegan restaurant called Nourish. 

The veggie burger I had there après ski was a show stopper. I’m considering driving back to Banff just for this burger in the near future. It’s called the Boss Bear Burger and it was everything you could hope for in a veggie burger. The gluten-free bun was as good as they get. You must go! The World Famous Nachos were also excellent. 

See the full menu and the awesome vibe here: https://www.nourishbistro.com/

The last morning of our ski weekend, we spent some time at a great little cafe called Wild Flour. We had the best time (little birds flew in and out of the door to feast on all the delicious crumbs!) and loved it when this song showed up to enhance the experience even more. 

Crazy by Gnarls Barkley made sure that we bobbed our heads at the table along to the sweet beat. It lent an air of good times and celebration to a wonderful, relaxed Sunday morning. 

Listen to Crazy on iTunes

Listen to Crazy on Spotify