FOR DECADES, ANNA GUEST-JELLEY FELT disconnected from
her body. But then, standing in a yoga class sometime in her
late 2os, she felt a glimmer of a connection when the teacher
cued her to feel what was happening with her right little toe.
“After so many years of quashing my body’s signals in favor
of following the rules of my latest diet, it had become all but
impossible for me to notice anything going on with my body,”
writes Guest-Jelley in her new book, Curvy Yoga. “But this
time, as my inner awareness woke up, I felt the uniquely
squishy, yet fi rm, sensation of the mat underneath my baby toe.
And I noticed how the inside of my toe was pressed down more
than the outside was, telling me I wasn’t fully engaging my
whole foot in the pose.”
Guest-Jelley now brings this acute awareness into every
yoga class, whether she’s practicing or teaching. It’s the same
awareness that allows her to understand the ebbs and fl ows of
her body and its weight. “The only truth of the body is that it’s
going to change,” Guest-Jelley says. “You can accept this body
you have now, and that it will change.”
Body acceptance. Body confi dence. Body positivity. There
are abundant ways to refer to the often elusive concept of feel-
ing at home in your own skin. It’s elusive because “we live in
a culture where there is enormous pressure for people to look
a certain way in order to feel OK,” explains Linda Bacon, PhD,
author of Body Respect and Health at Every Size. “At this point,
the myth of the thinner body being a healthier, happier one has
become culturally well established.”
If you are battling to accept your size, Bacon recommends
separating functionality from appearance—for example,
if you can, take a walk and notice how amazing your legs are
as a means of getting around, rather than thinking about how
fat your thighs are—and practicing yoga. “If you have a larger
body, you may not be able to get into certain poses, but you
don’t need to,” Bacon says. “There are other poses you can do.
If the yoga instructor is doing poses that are not supporting,
or adapted for, larger people in the class, the instructor is the
problem—not the bodies of the participants.”
Yoga has been shown to be an effective way to help
people appreciate and enjoy their bodies. And Guest-Jelley
has noticed more and more larger people in class over the
past decade. “More teachers are realizing that supporting
all students in their classes is a win-win for everyone,”
she says. For a more comfortable practice, try the tips from
Guest-Jelley on the following pages, which she designed to
help bigger bodies fi nd comfort in poses in the moment and,
ultimately, create acceptance by affi rming the body as it is.People with bigger bodies are discovering comfort
and empowerment in yoga studios around the globe. Use these tips
to help support yourself, or your students, on the mat.INTRO BY TASHA EICHENSEHER • SEQUENCE BY ANNA GUEST-JELLEY • PHOTOGRAPHY BY PAUL MILLERIN EVERY POSE
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