Recently I've been pondering the difference between practising carefully and practising with care.
Personally I don’t wholeheartedly subscribe to the notion of ‘practising carefully’ - it suggests that there’s something to be afraid of, that the body is fragile and needs protecting - whereas for most of us, the body is in fact incredibly robust and capable of remarkable adaptation to the demands that we place upon it.
Of course there’s a time and a place for being careful when working with the body - but as long as we approach our practice intelligently, I don’t necessarily believe that our yoga practice needs to be ‘careful’.
Because if we’re always trying to ‘be careful’ it will start to inculcate a sense of fear when our practice should be something that empowers us, something that gives us greater confidence in the body and what it’s capable of - something that we enjoy.
On the other hand, ‘practising with care’ suggests an attending attitude to the body - cultivating the ability to tune into and listen to the body's feedback, and the skill to adapt our approach to practice accordingly so that it truly serves us.
We can look to yoga philosophy for inspiration and guidance, in particular to the gunas (three constituent properties of nature): rajas (expansion), tamas (heaviness, inertia) and sattva (balance). Each of these constituent properties will exert an influence on us to varying degrees in each moment…sometimes we feel exuberant and energised, at times tired, and at times calm, centred and grounded.
When we apply this understanding to our practice, it means that sometimes we’ll want to dial up the level of challenge in our practice, to test and expand our preconceived boundaries, whilst at other times we’ll want to ease back a little - to use our practice for restoration and balance.
There's no one way to practice and no right or wrong way to do so either - it will be different for each of us and it will also be different every time we take to our mat for practice. The key is to listen to the body's signals so that we can really meet the practice where we’re at in each moment. In this way our practice can feel truly nourishing and empowering rather than something that depletes us.
So be bold in your practice and be confident in your body - enjoy your yoga and let it be something that really nourishes and empowers you. But above all practice with care…be attentive to sensation and to what the body really needs in each moment. And adapt your approach accordingly, without judgement and without any preconceived notions of what practice ‘should’ look like - for me this the is mark of a truly ‘advanced’ practice.