Yoga: Effective Key in Women's Empowerment

Female empowerment. What does it mean? To me, it is the ability to enjoy the right to control our own lives. We have the finances and the ability to improve our wellbeing. We weren’t always allowed this choice in our life so it’s important we embrace it today. Even though we’ve come a long way, there is still something within us that doesn’t take what is available to us. If you do yoga now, you may find that it helps you find that inner power. 

Becoming Community Oriented

Around the world, women are doing yoga. There are many different kinds of yoga that can be done so it suits all types and capabilities of women. Generations passed with women not having the same kind of community with one another. With the likes of yoga classes, women are coming together. We are strong as individuals but much stronger as a tribe. As we go through our own journeys in any given yoga class, we energetically support the other women in the room. As we come together in this way, we are freer and more supported to feel safety in exploring empowerment within.

Getting on the Mat for Yourself

Just committing yourself to get on your mat shows a lot of empowerment and self-love. Women tend to do things for other people all the time. While that is our strength, it’s also important to care for yourself. It’s important for your kids, peers, partner, and friends to understand that you matter to yourself. You inspire others with your dedication to self. That sends a strong message that you care about yourself. Honoring the act of just getting on your mat is huge so give yourself a pat on the back for loving yourself the way you do.

Yoga Builds Self-Confidence

Yoga is a gentle, simple way to build your self-confidence. As you use your body to do challenging poses, you see that you are more capable than you realize. That boost in your self-confidence and worth can really enable empowerment. It will help you to stop second-guessing your great ideas. It may seem like getting your heels down on the floor when doing Downward Facing Dog just shows flexibility but it’s so much more.

Not only do you nurture your body and create flexibility, you also become the strongest version of yourself. When you’re good to yourself in this way, you gain greater insight into your capabilities. 

Warrior Poses Make You Feel Powerful

The feeling you have when you go into a warrior pose is unmistakeable strength. You feel like a warrior goddess within the pose. They are demanding poses that ask you to stand firmly and create a steady foundation for yourself. When you can stand in any of these poses with your heart open and arms strongly pointing out, you feel strong and capable. The more you dig into the pose, the stronger you’ll feel. It will make you feel like you can take on the world.

Getting Upside Down

Firstly, holding a handstand or a headstand takes a lot of practice and effort. Once you master inversions, you’ll feel extremely physically capable. This will transcend into the rest of your life. You also have the opportunity to see things in a different way because the brain can’t figure things out in it’s normal way. You gain clarity and experience a greater calmness. We fear the unknown that is part of our survival make-up. We experience it in life and it makes us want to cower. When you don’t cower but engage in the fear of going upside down, you may just feel inspired to try new things in other parts of your world. As you begin to master things on and off the mat like this, you will easily feel more empowered towards whatever challenges come your way.

Going Back to Your Roots

In a pose like Crow Pose, you may go back to feeling like a kid. It is a challenging strength-based balance pose that takes all your concentration. At the same time, it’s sort of carefree and keep you close to the ground. You can extend yourself more than you might in a handstand pose because there isn’t far to fall. It might remind you of what it was like learning to ride a bike with training wheels.

Going back to childish roots can help you to remember the child you once were. Often, we don’t feel confident and empowered because we have lost the feeling of who we really are. We feel lost which leads to insecurity. You will find yourself laughing out loud as you tumble over while learning Crow Pose. When you begin to successfully balance in the pose, you have overcome the fear that was perhaps stopping you in the first place.

With the breathing and meditation involved in any given yoga practice, you will dig deeply into yourself. You may find that there is a beautiful woman in there that you haven’t allowed to shine. It’s time to stop letting other peoples voices dictate who you can be. With yoga, you have the opportunity to listen to your inner voice. She is strong and much more capable than you think!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Meera Watts is a yoga teacher, entrepreneur and mom. Her writing on yoga and holistic health has appeared in Elephant Journal, CureJoy, FunTimesGuide, OMtimes and others. She’s also the founder and owner of SiddhiYoga.com, a yoga teacher training school based in Singapore. Siddhi Yoga runs intensive, residential trainings in India (Rishikesh, Goa and Dharamshala), Indonesia (Bali)

Here are her social handles: Youtube,  Instagram,  Pinterest,  Twitter,  LinkedIn,  Facebook  

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