As a newly formed enterprise, we face tremendous challenges, limited monetary and human resources, and a need to manage our internal conversation to ensure we keep motivated and blossom into what we seek to become.
Here are the ways we are in a stronger position to make our vision become a reality as daily yoga enthusiasts.
1. Discipline
Yoga requires the discipline to practice. A practitioner will not master a hand/Shoulder Stand, or bind showing up every six months. You need to show up on a consistent basis to embed the movements into your motor skills. Practice once a week and reach a certain level, three times a higher level, and finally, every day and reach true mastery.
How do these apply to our startup situation? The beautiful vision we’re chasing is a direct consequence of the activities we conduct daily. We just need the discipline to get them done.
2. Presence
Breathing brings our awareness back to the present moment and quiets our internal conversation, and barrage of thoughts. It eliminates the voice saying you can’t hold the pose, or you can’t accomplish certain binds or stands. Once you quiet the mind, you take the first step to try, and the rest of it takes care of itself. Successful mastery is a direct result of that collection of moments.
Starting a company is incredibly hard, both internally and externally. When a negative thought on the possibility of failure appears, we take a deep breath, come back to the present, and do what we need to do. Our vision is ultimately a collection of the actions we take here and now.
3. Persistence
In yoga, fall down seven times, get up eight. The little voice was quiet, we took a shot at conquering the pose, and undoubtedly we fell down. What are we going to do? Give up? You’ve got to be joking. We tried again. We fell down. Tried again. Fell down. Tried again. Until, the tenth time, boom! We stayed up. We conquered the impossible. At that very moment, a preconceived notion in our mind was destroyed. If we conquered that specific pose, then why can’t everything else be overcome?
In our company, we’ve fell down about seven times. Do you think we stayed down? Hell, no. There is absolutely no chance on planet earth we’ll stay down. The way we look at it, if we can conquer a handstand, we can conquer the world. It’s all in our mind.
4. Confidence
Where does a lack of self-esteem and low confidence level come from? From the negative internal conversation telling us we’re not good enough, worrying what others think, and limiting our belief systems. Well, if yoga quiets the mind, then that internal conversation is silenced. Once the mind is mute, the world is yours. How is confidence present at CONZÚL? We are doing the things others won’t because our mind is present, and as a result we are confident in our abilities. We’re not worried about rejection, failure, and an appearance on Shark Tank so others will validate us.
5. No Pain, No Gain
Some yoga poses hurt. There’s no question. But, you practice, and your body builds up the tolerance until you no longer feel the pain. Pretty simple. We are constantly juggling seven different things, filtering copious amount of information, and staying up late at night. It hurts sometimes, but we get better every day. Both, through building our tolerance to manage uncertainty and the mental pain accompanied with constant learning.
6. Mission Focused
Last, but certainly not least, Yoga teaches us to become one with our environment and let the universe, for lack of a better word, express itself through us. We are all part of a combined whole. Since our actions matter and have consequences, our company decided that business is an expression of ourselves and a tool for the betterment of society. As a result, our financial outcomes are aligned with non-profit organizations focused on helping make college preparatory education accessible for kids from difficult economic backgrounds.
Albert Einstein once defined genius as the ability to explain a complex matter simply. We’re no Einstein’s, but hopefully, you can take away some key points on applying Yoga lessons into building successful outcomes in any environment and walk of life. We’ve reached levels we never thought possible, both personally and professionally, as a direct result of finding the time to incorporate the yoga practice in our lives.
From: Yoganonymous