Having Fun is Essential for Living Well

How do you have fun?

What brings you joy?

What do you love doing?

For me I think it's people really, hanging out with people that I love. Hanging out, doing stuff. I love being outside, I love my garden, I've got two cats, you might have seen them in some of the videos, especially Monty, the yoga cat. Yeah. I just try and jam pack my day with fun actually. I love doing yoga, that's pretty fun.It makes me feel great in my body.

What about you, Kristina? What makes you have fun? What do you like to do?

You know what? I think everything that I do is fun. So I love yoga, obviously. I love spending time with my kids, I love spending time with people I love, I love taking nurturing time reading books, I love going walking in nature, I love walking up hills. I love being with people, I love being by myself, I love meditating.

I love learning things, I love constantly looking at what is the next thing that I can do.

Like there's no limit, so where am I going next?

Together we've really turned the dial up on fun in our lives. Haven't we?

It wasn't always like that.

No.

And in fact, I'm not sure how you feel about your life, you might be sitting there thinking, oh, it's all right for those two. Yeah, nothings gone bad for those two-

All they do is have fun.

Yeah. Like nothing bad's ever happened to us.

We've never been depressed or sad or lonely.

Yeah nah that’s happened plenty of times.

We’ve been full of grief.

Or in pain.

We’ve been lost and lonely and heartbroken.

I think for a period ... actually, and I might have mentioned this in an earlier thankful Thursday that I started my journey in earnest when I was about 21, because I was in so much pain. I really believed that I was completely flawed and it took me about 10 years to pull myself out of that. So I was alive but I was miserable.

I really believe that yoga has been the cornerstone of my transformation.

I've done a heck of a lot of other stuff, but the constant has been every morning, I meditate and every day, I do yoga. For that whole period of transformation.

I think that yoga provided that same kind of inspiration for me in a different way. Because I used to be this head, this thinking person really from about here in my neck up and the rest of me ... you too Audrie?

Yeah.

For me I was just a body carrying this head around. In my family you were valued if you could think new thoughts or you could remember stuff or you were articulate and you could say things and talk about things. And so I really felt that it was my thinking mind that was the most important part of me. And I actually didn't look after my body very well. I ate poorly and thought diets or even throwing up would be a good idea!!!

Yeah. And I was detached from my body too, I was completely out of my body and had to get back in to it.

And I think maybe that's why the practice of yoga has been so attractive to both of us is that it's a practice of embodying your experience and really getting in tune with this physical vessel that we have, which is referred to as the temple, the container for your life force and your experience and your interpretation of life. So why not have a good body!

And a good relationship with it.

I've always known that I was going to do yoga. A little bit of my thinking mind already knew that when I first went to my first class, at a local high school. I went along to the class. And my brain didn't really have very much idea about yoga because I didn't even know where my body was in space. Was my leg straight out behind me? Was it to the left? I had to look. I was so out of touch with my body.

But through that, and I think if you read anything about me, I say that I loved it from the first practice that I did. All of a sudden, I was in my body and it wasn't one of those times when, I could fail at this. With yoga, there is no failure.

No.

Whatever you're doing-it's perfect.

It’s perfect for you right then in the way you're doing it.

What a joy, what fun.

I know. What fun!

There are so many gifts that have come from the yoga practice and when you think about like, so the yoga's way more than the asana and that's the movements. But the outcome is living in more joy. Right?

Living in more love, living in more peace and your mind being completely clear of all the rubbish that it might have collected along the way. And here, if you were anything like I was, I collected a lot of rubbish.

Like on my journey, I remember a teacher saying once, when you gossip about someone else, then that's not okay and all of that stuff. And I had this little aha moment, this shows you a little bit about who I was at that time in my life, I was like, well, if we're not gossiping about people, what am I going to talk about?

But if you are gossiping about people, you're not in a high vibration,

You're being mean.

You're not having a good time and it's such small conversation, right?

So just eliminating little things like that, all of a sudden, the vibration starts to raise. Yeah?

That's right, leaving the past behind and we're in the moment having fun.

Moving our bodies.

Living well.

And loving this moment because heck it's the last moment that we are having, that's exactly like this in the next a hundred years of our life, right?

Exactly. And in some of the terrible grief filled times of my life, there's people very close to me who aren't having any more moments at all.

My sister stopped having any more days in her life when she was 44.

And if you want to spend your days with joy, you have to think, well actually, I'm going to do something that's a bit more purposeful. And something that's going to bring joy to other people and have fun with other people because I might not wake up tomorrow.

The only reason you need to be celebrating is the fact that you woke up and you are breathing right now. Right?

We take life for granted and we get addicted to feeling a certain way. We've taught ourselves to be addicted to feeling great through the practices that we teach in our courses. There's a whole lot of great tips and hints and tricks. But most people aren't taught to be addicted to feeling great.

If you look at modern consumer media they want you to feel terrible because they want you to be buying that pair of shoes. Then you think, oh, I look great because I've got these pair of shoes and then that lasts for about three seconds and then you go back to not feeling great anymore.

So… look for things to be thankful for …

Being grateful for every moment.

And the more grateful you are, the better you feel about your life.

So having a gratitude practice of being thankful every day for the little things and the big, the natural things of maybe the sunshine or the clouds and the rain. Being thankful for people in your life, for animals in your life, for having a tap that has water in it, a loo that flushes.

To have this technology so that we can record this, share it with you. You can read it any old time you like. You can watch our video on your laptop or your computer or your phone or your iPad or whatever. All that technology is, well, that's really recent.

That's a real miracle, right?

We just take so much for granted. And then we get caught up in this habitual thinking about what's not right, what's not good, all of these things.

And the practice of yoga  is about fully experiencing life and fully embodying every moment of life. Right?

Because life isn't a dress rehearsal.

That's right. This is it babe!

Having fun is an attractive energy, celebration is an attractive energy. The more you praise and celebrate your life, the more you have to praise and celebrate.

Well that's right, the more you're thankful for your life, the more you have to be thankful for.

What are a hundred things that you can be joyful about in your life?

Like, I love singing, I love dancing, I love yoga, I love being playful and doing handstands, all kinds of different things.

I love dancing because the way you get more energy and life into your body is by moving it.

Do yoga. Just roll the mat out and say I'm just going to do five minutes. And then you'll always be surprised that that five minutes will turn into 45. Even if it's just sitting and breathing, because breathing changes your state.

I always notice after my yoga practice

1.  I felt more energized and alive in my body.

2. I noticed that my eyes looked more alive, my face looked more alive. I actually looked more beautiful after a yoga practice than before the yoga practice.

So even if you're feeling tired, just do it  and have fun doing it.

So what

S worked for us…

Do yoga. Have fun. Dance around the room. Sing.

Move your body. Be thankful.

So it's raising that vibrational energy around you so you're attracting more things into your life. More fun.

Yes. Yes.

What are the things in your life that bring you joy? Well, maybe you would like to ask yourself that question too? Write down 100 things that you're grateful for or bring you joy.

And then can you do them all.

Wouldn't that be great.

Share them with us.

And have a bucket list of things that you want to do.

Be yourself, be authentically you, doing your things and be joyful.

So…

Go forth.

Have fun. Be joyful. Be thankful and have a great week. And we look forward to being in touch with you again soon.

Namaste.

Audrie and Kristina xx