Veena Ugargol (www.yogawithveena.com) found yoga at a time in life where she felt burnt-out, stressed, and unsure which path to take next. Four years later, she is teaching dynamic hatha classes in and around London. Veena tells how yoga changed her life.
My yoga journey began four years ago. My life circumstances around that time were hugely challenging, and among specific personal difficulties, I was struggling to cope with a work environment that left me feeling totally trapped.
Simply, I wanted to get out, but I just didn't know how or where to go.
I unintentionally exacerbated the problem by stepping up the intensity of my social life in an attempt to take my mind off work and relinquish the pent up stress.
Burning out
But burning the candle at both ends was not a strategy that worked for me and one morning after the night before, I ended up being rushed into A&E with a tachycardia - a racing heart.
Having always being such a relaxed person, I was shocked that I'd been so physically and mentally affected by what was going on in my life; and more importantly, by what was going on in my mind. It was time to face some realities and make some changes.
Gradually I began to find some new direction, and was learning to cope with my newly realised anxiety symptoms; however, it would be a year before I contemplated that yoga may just help to me.
I started practicing purely as a way to deal with the anxiety and to try and find the relaxation that it felt like I hadn't truly experienced for years. Immediately after my first hatha yoga class, I felt that 'floaty' feeling I have come to associate with yoga, and week after week, I kept going back for more.
As time went by, I noticed that physical ailments that I'd picked up over time from bad habits were beginning to ease.
Gradual healing
I'd suffered for over ten years with a recurring whiplash injury in my shoulder and no amount of physio appointments, pain killing tablets, anti-inflammatory creams had treated it successfully.
Yet with regular yoga practice, for the first time, I was managing to keep my shoulder pain under control.
Gradually, what I was learning in yoga began seeping into my everyday life. I began to gain a deeper understanding of the body I thought I already knew so well, learning to correct postural imbalances I had acquired over the years and figuring out, through self-enquiry, what my body liked and didn't like.
I started to use meditation and pranayama outside of my classes to tune out the buzz of everyday life and alleviate stress.
I'm now almost four years on since I started my first class, and every day I continue to be amazed at the positive transformations that yoga has had, and continues to have, on so many areas of my life - it almost feels like I've woken up from a long sleep.
I have regained the confidence in my abilities that I'd lost and I'm so much more open to new challenges and ideas. Yoga is so diverse and there are so many teaching styles out there, I have been lucky enough to find teachers that have been the perfect fit for me.
Towards teaching
Having felt so inspired, I decided that I really wanted to take my practice further and be able to teach to enable others to experience yoga. So last year, I quit my career as a fashion buyer and I completed the Sivananda Teaching Training Course (TTC) in Kerala.
I've been teaching dynamic hatha yoga since the beginning of this year and I love it, for so many reasons. I'm constantly learning and teaching has left me keen to broaden my yoga experience and knowledge.
As well as my own self practice, I'm practicing Ashtanga Vinyasa Mysore style with my teacher. I'm also just discovering Kundalini Yoga -I think this is going to be the next teacher training course I embark upon.
There are so many uncertainties in life, but one thing I know for sure is that yoga will always be a part of mine.
While the course we take is a result of many interactions, I truly believe yoga has been the driving force in influencing recent developments in my life. I cannot see that the positive ripples will ever stop coming.
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