Pregnancy is a wild experience. Your body is constantly changing and growing while a tiny human is forming inside of you. It can certainly teach you how to learn patience. Your mind is even more anxious than normal, creating hyper-extreme scenarios of what can go wrong at any moment. And sleep is difficult due to your shape-shifting body, riddled with (crazy!) abnormal dreams. Despite all this discomfort, I vowed to see the positivity in this pregnancy, my second one. It had been a long time wish of mine to have a second child, however, I accepted that it would not be a possibility. Yet life has a funny way of granting your wishes when you least expect it.

So I vowed to be present, teaching me how to learn patience.

I vowed to soak up the beauty and beam with gratitude for each internal movement felt in that growing belly. Was this what is meant by how to learn patience? I was all the while wondering what it would be like to meet this new baby. And about that process… the birth. I was so nervous. 

My past experience caused me to worry.

The birth of my first child did not go as planned. In fact it was practically traumatic. I was so scared for that time around as well. The gist of that story is that I prepared for 9 months of child birthing classes to try to have a natural birth, only to end up having an unexpected emergency C-section and the doctor bad-mouth my intended choices, while I laid numb on the operating table during the surgery… as if I wasn’t even there! It was incredibly disheartening, insulting, and the opposite of empowering. I think in retrospect, the need to have some say in the situation was really due to my fears of the unknown for what was coming with motherhood; but being insulted on top of it all was really unnecessary.

The second time around taught me how better to learn patience.

I somewhat knew what was coming. Already, I was a mom, so the transition wasn’t as stark, though it had been 10 years since my last pregnancy. With care, I approached this most recent birth, planning and hoping to deliver vaginally, yet ready to adjust the plan if the situation necessitated. About a week before my due date, because of several factors, the doctor advised me to schedule a c-section. I really liked this doctor, so I trusted her opinion, accepted the disappointment in change of plans, and began envisioning what this scheduled birth would now look like.

Isvara Pranidhana

Yoga Sutra verse 1.23 (The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali) talks about Isvara Pranidhana, or self-surrender and devotion to a higher power. The next verse goes on to explain this means not having any ego or attachment to a particular outcome because you trust in the divine, infinite consciousness.

Allowing space for presence in how to learn patience

We cannot control the things that happen to us, but we can control our reaction to those things. Releasing my need to have a certain situational outcome and accepting the change of plans with an optimistic heart allowed me to be more present in the moment I was living. It allowed me to be more clear-minded to recognize myself experiencing joy, once he was born. In other words, it taught me how to learn patience.

This mindset served me well in those first weeks after our child’s birth too. It sounds cliché but sleepless nights with an infant (the second time) are so much easier to accept, knowing how it seemed to fly by with my first. This precious little one is growing so fast. I just want to be present and grateful every moment I can; absorb every smile, coo, and tiny baby cry. Every perceived difficulty is actually an opportunity to practice my patience. This is surrendering to the moment. This is living my yoga.

My yoga practice may physically change during the time of healing and continued transition, however I am always able to come back to myself. Here are some of the grounding poses that remind me of Self-Love in Yoga.

Journal Prompt: What poses allow you healing, reflection, and peace?

Another wonderful tool for mothers is Grounding, explained in more detail in my post, Grounding Benefits to Your Overall Health.