When the Mat Turned Into a Mirror

Update: 10/26/25

I don't know what yoga taught me. I didn't become a graceful, unbothered and unshaken queen of the world. I am not even sure if it changed me that much. 

Growth is a weird thing. I used to think I changed so much, but I am the same person I was six months ago, before I started practicing yoga consistently. So, maybe the lesson here is that you are not supposed to go through a life changing transformation that entirely shifts your worldviews and values, how you act and behave and what you say around people. Maybe just a little bit. I know it changes how you talk to yourself, alone, at night, with nothing but silence wrapping your body in the darkness of 1am. 

Somehow yoga is the best thing in my life, yet now that I am trying to write down why, I have no way to express what I feel. My title says "When the Math Turned Into a Mirror" and it's an AI-generated title I put here exactly five months ago that no longer feels true. And now I am sitting down on the softest sofa and wondering: seriously, what has yoga taught me? 

Surely I can say I am more flexible and definitely stronger, I actually look more toned and I have a better body-awareness, but what is that feeling in my core? I am strugggling so much to express it. 

Sometimes I fear the person I have become. It feels like I have no truths anymore, nothing is definite in my life anymore. At least I am learning how to stop blaming myself so much. It is one of the worst struggles: "Oh how much I could have been, but how little I am". Except for I am not even remotely close to being little. Funny, I am learning from yoga how to unlearn bad-mouthing myself. How to show compassion towards my own self. The self that carries me through all of this beautiful life. I am learning how to not be sad over not being perfect. And it's just another layer to the same problem. If I blame myself, how do I stop blaming myself again and again for not practicing self-compassion? The thought is so heavy it hurts the exact spot in between my eyebrows. So, then I take a breath. Close off one nostril then breathe in for a few seconds. Hold. Close of the nostril and open the other one, breathe out. Alternate in between. REPEAT. Breathe in and out. Hold. Breathe in. Hold. Breathe out. Hold. The power of life, yes it is. Your breath takes you everywhere in this world, you move with your breath and when you finally let go off this body, your breath lets you go. Stillness. No I can't sit still, I am constantly overstimulated and still sad about the past. No, I won't badmouth my own self for not being able to let go off people. 

I have no clue what yoga taught me. I think I am slightly more confused about this life now more than ever. 

5/25/25

First time I did yoga was freshman year, every Tuesday and Thursday at 8 AM in my university gym. After each 30-minute class my spine felt stronger, my posture taller, but my mind? Unmoved. It was stretching with nicer music, nothing more.

Fast-forward to junior year, exactly two years later. I met the ocean for the first time. I got up at 6 AM to watch the sunrise over the Atlantic, a soft reminder that I was alone in a beautiful place, away from home and humming with longing. I rolled out my mat on the sand, started my vinyasa flow, and suddenly every thought dropped away. All that existed was the shake in my legs, the breeze against my frozen skin, the sun warming my bones. The waves sounded like a distant dream. That vinyasa was the moment I fell in love with yoga, because it hushed the noise in my head and told me I could breathe right through it.

For the past two months I’ve been consistent. No, I haven’t become the strongest human on earth or achingly flexible. Outwardly I look the same. Yet something is different.

Each trikonasana now feels like grounding. At first my side body screams, then I realize it isn’t pain, it’s space. My arm reaches for the sky, my chest lifts me, my legs steady me. My body might look unchanged, but with every pose I line up a bit more cleanly with the world. The noise fades because I can breathe through the shakes, because I feel expansive in every direction (thank you, Down Dog app).

One morning I wake up and my core is solid, those chaturangas that once flattened me now glide. It’s gratifying, but not instant; I trained for this. The very next week everything falls apart: balance shot, arms jelly, legs useless. So what? I’m sad for a minute, then I get it. That small practice I do before work, the best part of my day, is the day now. Yoga was never about raw strength or perfect form; it was always about making my mind stronger. And it’s working.

Am I suddenly wise? Not even close. But yoga keeps teaching me:

• You fall down; you get up.

• The hardest poses soften when you breathe instead of chase.

• Listening to your body matters more than forcing it into shapes.

Yoga is the most beautiful thing that’s happened to me, and you won’t believe it until you try. I still have bad days, still get angry, still cry, still miss ex-people. Yoga doesn’t fix everything; it invites me to surrender what my body’s been clutching. One day all of it will fold into a larger story.

Most of all, yoga teaches acceptance. I’m not wise today or tomorrow, but I’m getting there. I’m learning to temper anger, to feel every inch of skin when the breeze touches it, to savor my time and energy. I started just letting things go, I finally heard my own pleas to leave toxic spaces. You can’t force growth by begging someone else to grow. So I leave that behind and turn inward, breathing with the part of me that’s been waiting patiently to stretch.

And that - every rise, every wobble, every breath - is the journey.