The day is so grey it’s felt like dusk all morning. If it wasn’t for the lawnmower noise from the neighbour’s property, my brain would be saying it’s time to get ready for bed.

So to wake myself up, I did my morning routine (yesterday was the first time I’d done the 15 minutes in two weeks. Two weeks! Holidays threw me out, and then I was out of the habit – back now) and went straight into Sadie Nardini’s 30 Min Morning Wake Up Yoga Flow, which I’ve done a few times before. You can find the video here.

I do enjoy Sadie’s workouts, but lately, I’ve really noticed how much she talks. She talks and talks and sometimes that’s great, but I find it frustrating when she says “Here we’ll take five breaths while we blah blah blah blah (30 seconds worth) … Ok now for the five breaths.” I’ve done 10 already. For me, this really interrupts the whole flow of the routine. Some poses we’re in for longer while things are explained and some poses are done quickly. I need to learn it off by heart so I don’t have to rely on the video.

With the idea of finding something with a better flow, I went searching and came across Dagmar Spremberg from Soft Music & Yoga – YogaYak. From just watching parts of it quickly (didn’t have time to do another routine!) it looks like a peaceful yet energetic yoga routine with just the right amount of talking and a constant, calming flow. Being on a beach with melodic music at the start and end also makes it appealing.

It’s a little longer than Sadie’s but that’s because you lie quietly at the end listening to the music. Ok! I think I may have found my new favourite yoga workout. Can’t wait to try it. There are others in the YogaYak series as well, including Hatha and Vinyasa routines. You could start with the beginners series and move through the routines. Here is the YogaYak website where they have plenty of options. As per usual, I have no affiliation with any of the links I post, just putting them out there for us all.

While searching their site, I found 11 hours of Tibetan bowl sounds for meditation purposes. What a resource! You could paint to this, or write, or read. It’s great for people with tinnitus because we focus on the ringing in our ears when there’s silence, and before too long that becomes overwhelming. This is ‘music’ without being a distraction. I might even start writing more (long-form stuff) thanks to this. I had no idea these videos were out there. Maybe you’d prefer to listen to the ocean? Or listen to birds in a garden? (I found one bird highly repetitive and irritating, so this is not the background noise for me!)

Using two tabs on my computer, I was able to play the Tibetan bowls with the ocean sounds at the same time. That’s also a lovely combination. I could write all day with that softly in the background. Hearing all these sounds makes me realise how much time I spend in silence. Not good. So … Yahoo! What a find!

• Physically Fit: 30 Min Morning Yoga with Sadie
• Mentally Fit: Finding the new sound recordings and yoga routine; meeting Pastora
• Nutritionally Fit: A non-fasting day today but I’ll be good
• Minimalism: Finally wearing the trench coat I hauled from storage at mum’s. Will I love it?

Wishing you a wonderful day.