I remember taking one of my first yoga classes way back when and the teacher had us focus on the transition between the poses. It was life changing.

It completely took emphasis off of “arriving” or “completing” a pose and had more to do with the “getting there” or the “leaving there.”

It made me look at the transitions of my day. Pre-pandemic, I mostly taught in offices so I used to drive to teach and I always tried to use that time as a meaningful transition.

I would park my car before a class, gather the props we’d be needing and walk into whatever building I was teaching in at the time. I’d often move tables and chairs, play soft music and have short conversations/check-ins before class. It felt like a nice shift between folks’ workdays and their time for yoga. After class as the students would roll up their mats, put away their props, maybe help me put back some chairs and I always thought that was a nice transition back to the workday as well.

Nowadays I find it trickier to be intentional with transitions as I’m mostly on Zoom and working from home. The walk into/out of the room I use as my studio is a short walk away from my home life. My setup/tear down involves lights/sound and uploading recordings and my only real transition is between a door being closed or being open.

This is the same as the physical practice sometimes, too. Transitioning from virabhadrasana II/warrior two into trikonasana/triangle pose might seem like a very obvious shift between two poses. LOTS of space between them.

But lying prone/face down and lifting for bhujangasana/cobra pose might not feel like a huge shift for some of us.

The time between your inhale/exhale might also not seem like much transition.

There’s still space to be found. There’s still time between. Time for one experience to slowly (or very quickly) become another experience.

And it’s in that space, those pauses, that morphing, where the magic happens.

I’m more present in my classes when I create some internal distance between what’s outside that door and who’s inside my screen. When I consciously close the door behind me and leave work behind, I’m more present in my home life.

It’s in the transitions where one version of ourselves becomes another. Who you were in tadasana/mountain pose is someone totally different than who you are in vrksasana/tree pose.

And right now, this version of you? It’s just a transition between what you were and who you will be.

Make sure to open that door consciously.