How yoga can elevate your career (whatever your career may be)

Practising yoga brings greater strength, vitality, flexibility and contentment, but did you know it can also help you find and thrive in your ideal career?

Sound strange?

It all comes down to the way in which practicing yoga builds neurobiological connections throughout your body. Put simply, you can feel more of your body, more of the time.

The more we are connected to our bodily sensations, the more information we have to truly make decisions that are linked to our deepest needs and callings.

Body based decision making, in particular, the body compass method developed by Dr Martha Beck, helps align us with our integrity and what we most deeply want. It bypasses the messages we are taught by society and cuts straight to what we need and want in order to live a life full of meaning, purpose and clarity.

So how does this relate to your career?

We all want jobs or businesses that are meaningful and energising. To be excited to get to work when our day starts.

If you are tired and achy going to work but fine on the weekends or when you leave the office, your body is telling you something important… and it will make you listen, sooner or later!

Having meaning and energy at work comes from being aligned to our deepest self and we can only find that through connecting to our bodies (thank you, yoga!).

Here’s a simplified way of putting it into practice

Feel your feet on the floor, feel your body from your toes to the tip of your head.

Think about the decision you need to make (e.g. should I put this application in?)

Feel your body’s response.

Does your chest feel constricted? It’s likely the answer is no.

Does your chest and breathing feel more open? The answer is likely to be yes.

If your chest and breathing is open and then constricts, the answer is likely that you want to proceed with an action but your mind has jumped in with fear thoughts (e.g. it won’t work, you aren’t good enough, who do you think you are, and so on).

The body doesn’t lie. 

What is yours telling you about your current work or where you want to be? We'd love you to let us know if this has prompted any ideas for change in the comments below.

Dr Lara Corr is an internationally trained life coach and researcher with a PhD in how work affects our mental wellbeing.  She is also the woman behind Set Me Free Coaching in which she helps professionals discover and live with conscious ambition.  To find out more about Lara and Set Me Free Coaching visit setmefree.coach