Conversations on Rest
I recently had the opportunity to talk to my very good friend, long time yoga practitioner and inspirational teacher, Madina Tanekeyeva. Madina specialises in emotional release yoga, you can find out more about her workshops and offerings on her website: Madinayoga.com.
We chatted about a favourite topic of mine, REST. What does it mean to rest, how do you find rest and how it all relates to self care. Enjoy!
Question 1:
Kelsey: What does it mean to you to rest? How do you practice resting?
Madina:
Rest is about doing or not doing something with a sole purpose of relaxing and recharging. True rest is when I am least cognitively engaged.
I have to be very careful with making sure that I don’t turn even calming things like meditation or restorative yoga into something purposeful. Because I can use meditation for emotion processing, manifesting or gaining clarity. Or I can use a restorative pose to stretch something out or target a specific muscle to release. This is where I feel my rest turns into something else because there is an agenda and an expectation for an outcome.
For me rest is about sitting / lying down without any result in mind. It’s when I meditate without using any techniques, visualisations etc. I simply try to relax, be easy and open. Not stimulated in any way.
Question 2:
Kelsey: There is so much talk about self care these days online and in social media. How do you practice self care and what does the idea mean to you? How do you encourage others to practice it themselves?
Madina:
Self-care for me is about being in tune with myself.
It’s about noticing tiredness and honouring that with rest.
It’s when I become honest with myself about a relationship that drains me and then decide to see that person less until I can become clearer about my boundaries.
It is when something bothers me for days and I finally decide to carve some time for that emotion and really get to the root cause of it. Self-care is not something fluffy and cosy.
For me it is about being aware and disciplined about dealing with whatever is in the way of my happy fulfilled living.
Question 3:
Kelsey: How would you equate self love/acceptance and self care, do you need one to practice the other, how are they related?
Madina:
To me self-care is about manipura chakra (abdominal) - the centre of self worth, action and discipline. While self-love and acceptance is about anahata (heart) - the centre of our relationship with ourselves.
These two are definitely related but one has got to do with a deliberate action, while the other is about our beliefs and values. Self-love and acceptance is about discovering our own truth: in regards to our purpose, worth and definition of success.
When we know what is true to us, then we learn to love who we are without having to perfect, compete and prove anything to anyone.