“I was never very happy or confident in myself and had always struggled with being healthy overall. I’ve spent money on all these workouts and supplements over the years and nothing ever really stuck until I started doing yoga consistently. Once we hit the 40 Days to Personal Revolution (Baptiste Yoga program) and began doing yoga every single day, it was easy. I couldn’t believe it. It just, came. The only time I can really get up in the morning is when I plan to practice at 6am. For me, yoga provides me so much fuel – it’s the fuel that I’ve been desperately looking for.
This whole process of ‘going in’ and figuring out what I’m made of has been really scary, though. But, at the same time, I’m here, I completed our teacher training program, and it all scared the living sh*t out of me, but I am standing here – TALL in my skin. At training one of the weekends people were watching me ball my eyes out, but I was still up there. THIS is me.
Before, I was very…I’d hate to use the word ‘blah’ but that’s what it was. I still played soccer, the group I was in would always go out and drink. I didn’t take care of my body how I knew I should. I’d go out with them, and just wanted to fit in.
I was living at home after college, and totally ran away from things that were happening in my family. I’m ashamed to admit that, but I didn’t want to be around it, and it still makes me feel guilty that I left my mom. I ran from a lot, and I was truly on my own during my first year in Binghamton, NY. It was really hard, and I was by myself and living by myself. I didn’t have a roommate or a lot of friends, and I’ve always had a dog growing up, so I scrounged in my bank account for the five hundred dollars it was going to be for a lab breeder to get my own.
I picked Sunnie up when she was eight weeks old, and that was it. She’s been my buddy ever since, and I’ve had her for almost four years now. Yoga has given me the tools to find stillness and peace in uncomfortable situations, and Sonnie is my partner that I share it all with.
I’ve never been more excited for my journey through life. The future is going to be SO GOOD. And that’s my mindset- it’s totally shifted. I’m good; I’m great; I’m beautiful; I’m confident. I’m all these things and it’s yoga that has created this transformation. This, here, is what the universe had led me to. It’s true now more than ever for me, almost a year after teacher training ended.
The hardest practices for me are when we have to hold poses because it’s just as mental as it is physical. My mind races; doubt creeps in. It’s the hardest in those moments when I think I can’t do it anymore and I think there’s no possible way IN HELL I can do this…. ‘All. Is. Well’. And I stay. The toughest lesson I’ve learned on my mat is, to stay in the thick of something when you feel doubt crashing in around you and all you want to do is run.
When I was in college, I was sexually assaulted after a night of drinking. A guy forced himself on me when I was drunk. A year ago, I’d never be able to type that, and saying it out loud? Yeah, right. “I’m so dumb, how could you let that happen? You are not valuable. You are not worth fighting for. You are not worth being put first.” These are the lies that ran my life for a very long time. I didn’t put value on my mental and physical health because I truly believed them. To this day, I still struggle with these lies.
My breakthrough certainly wasn’t this miraculous moment of shining light that came to me in a meditation. It was messy, it was excruciatingly painful because I had to come face-to-face with it. Things fall apart; WE come apart so that better things can fall together. Yoga has made it possible to put the pieces back together, piece by piece. Because of yoga, I know my worth, and I can confidently and powerfully, live. I have NEVER felt so powerful in my life. And I let go of the hold those lies have over me a little bit every day.”
Follow Brittany’s story on Instagram: @brttny.bnntt
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THE SELF STORIES 