How to reclaim your life

Rather a grand title, but what would you do with 30 more days a year?

More time with family? Time at the gym? Time reading or walking or cooking nice meals or simply getting that to do list tackled? Or time for your own yoga practice whether that be meditation or movement? 30 days is A LOT of time!

Why is this even a point of discussion?

Because for some time I have had this nagging unease with the influence my phone, and in particular social media, was having on my behavior and that of my family. Talking to some of my students over the last few days I am not alone in this.

I took a look at Screen Time on my phone today and was shocked to see I have been spending on average one hour a day on social media. I can dress it up as keeping in contact with friends, or for educational purposes for my business but the reality is the majority of my feed is full of stuff that does not contribute positively to my life or health. That's 30 days a year looking at stuff that is irrelevant and even harmful. Life is way way too precious to waste it in this way. I am feeling pretty horrified with myself.

Social media platforms are engineered for shallow engagement, for the infinite scroll, for likes, and comments and are set up to create compulsive checking. Our brains over time shift into an addictive reward system seeking the dopamine hit that comes from new content and feedback. Our validation comes from external affirmation. Our self worth becomes hung up on likes and follows. This passive, reactive behavior is externally driven, weakening our inner regulator of self-discipline and mindful attention.

My own addiction started in lock down when it co-incided with a massive change in my life (joined a gym. lost weight, started yoga teacher training etc) and I fell into the trap of recording and sharing my journey and comparing myself to others. My self worth became wrapped up in what others thought of the images and words I posted.

Fast forward five years and I have found myself all too often reaching for the phone only to find my anxiety rising, stress building and found myself getting upset and worried as I compare my business, body, ability and voice, even my life with those portrayed via the fake window of a reel or post.

It is increasingly difficult to get past the ChatGPT generated content full of insincere falsehoods and exaggerations, the AI and filtered images, the spin put on lives and businesses to generate likes and follows and yet despite being an intelligent woman I still find myself comparing myself and my world to this fake and made up ‘reality’.

I would love to do as some of my students have done and go cold turkey – turning off social media and putting down my phone. The issue of course is as a small business owner I cannot afford to employ a marketing or social media person and as we live in a modern world where so much genuine communication is via socials, it is an evil I cannot get rid of.

But I am taking steps to try and reclaim some of those 30 days a year: I am unfollowing all personal accounts on my business pages and will in time refollow on my personal account. I have unfollowed the majority of businesses that are not my studio teachers, associated businesses or those handful of accounts where I learn something professionally. I will leave my phone in my office when I get home from work. I am going to actively reach for a book like I did twenty years ago when I have a few moments, rather than my phone. (As an aside in the UK, the National Literacy Trust found only 20.5% of children (aged 5-18) now read daily in their free time, compared with much higher levels in the past - when nearly two-thirds enjoyed reading.)

What has this got to do with the studio and yoga?

The yogic and mindfulness traditions of yoga emphasizes presence, awareness, inner regulation, discipline, non reactivity, self-study and inner freedom.

By contrast a social media feed that constantly demands attention, surprise, reaction, comparison and external reward sets up the opposite pattern, reactivity, dependency on external affirmation, fragmented attention and a restless mind.

In our studio, when people enter the space with these digital age mindsets, there is a gap to bridge – how to shift from externally driven feed culture to the internally focused practice. I hear people so many times say that they are unable to relax, to quieten their mind.

And this is why yoga is so important in the modern world;

-          Yoga and mindfulness strengthen self-regulation, attention control, emotional regulation, bodily awareness and intentionality

-          A recent study documented in ‘frontiers’ found that a 12-week yoga intervention of two one-hour classes a week by university students significantly reduced perceived stress and anxiety and improved emotional wellbeing.

-          One review in the International Journal of Advanced Scientific Research states that a study of 300 students in urban India, taking a daily 30-minute yoga practice, found to have significantly increased mindfulness, reduced anxiety and more significantly reduced addiction to the internet.

-          A regular yoga practice cultivates the capacity to choose rather than react, to rest in stillness rather than in constant external stimulus, to develop inner steadiness (sthira) and ease (sukha) in the face of external agitation.

What are we doing at the studio to help you?

We request that phones are not brought into the studio – unless you are on call, phones are to be left in the lockers provided.

Teachers use their phones to check people into class and play music but never to take photos to post on social media unless permission has been granted. And in any case never simply during your class.

Social media posts will be reduced to a weekly post and a daily class schedule or time pressured news on stories.

Instead we will send a weekly newsletter to share our thoughts, teachings and news. And you can unsubscribe at any time.

We will also use our blog for the meatier posts (like this one) with a link from the newsletter so you can choose to read it or not and not have it clog up your inbox.

We will keep our notice board up to date so that you can check out our events and workshops when you attend the studio.

We will use the notifications on the app to share relevant updates.

I would love to hear your thoughts, tips and ideas on managing social media in a tech world.

Much Love

Stef x