What Will Happen If We Do Yoga Every Day for 30 Days

The insights are much more far-reaching than expected

January 2017 was the first year I did the 30-day yoga journey with a Youtuber called Yoga with Adrienne. In fact, it was the first time I did yoga. I was in a very bad place then, but a combination of things have changed my life, including doing yoga at home when I almost couldn’t leave my bed.

Ever since then, I showed up on the mat every new year. Sometimes I couldn’t go through 30 days consecutively, sometimes I had to do three videos in a day to catch up, but nevertheless, I turned up year after year.

For 1 January 2022, there was no exception and some of you have followed me on my Instagram and laughed at my stupid boomerangs. I finished the journey before February came, and god…

I think I just got a little wiser.

Have I lost weight

This is usually the first thing people asked me. Combined with dry January, meal boxes and drinking 1.2 litres of water a day, I have lost a total of 7 kg.

That’s a lot and I suspect most of it should be credited to the diet and the no-drinking. But I wouldn’t underestimate yoga, it’s quite a light exercise but it has given me more than just weight loss.

I turned into a monkey during these 30 days

After doing the workout in the morning, throughout the day I kept stretching randomly, rolling on the floor, dancing around, burying my head in my knees. It’s like my body is sustaining the momentum of moving around.

And this is powerful because, during the darkest days of my life, I could sit in my bed and watch Netflix all day. I avoided eating or drinking because I didn’t want to leave the bed to even just go to the loo. Coming from that place, to now where I am embracing my child-like spirit, is a miracle.

Yoga helped me to reconnect with my body.

The ripple effect of exercising consistently includes building stronger muscles, putting more focus on a healthy lifestyle and the next big thing I want to tell you about.

Find what feels good

Find what feels good is Yoga with Adrienne’s tagline. She repeatedly tells us in the videos not to focus on how we look in the posture, but how we feel. Don’t shy away from yoga because we are inflexible, don’t force the shoulder stand if it hurts.

It’s not about achievement or even progress, it’s about how we feel at the present moment.

And that’s very true. We are programmed to achieve more and more in everything we do. Many of my achievements were downgraded as a milestone so that I’d immediately jump to the next bigger thing.

When we graduate from school, we have one day to celebrate all the hard work we’ve put in, because all the other days are about finding a job and working on our next goal. Same with work promotion, getting married or even recovering from an operation.

We always need to get better.

This exhausts everyone.

But now is technically all we have. The only time that’s existing is the present moment. And yoga is one of the few things that can ground us back to this reality.

Making small changes, choosing the healthier option and celebrating small wins, were what got me out of my rut slowly and sustainably. Step by step, I felt less horrible, I felt better than eventually I finally felt good.

This is why yoga is not about acing that 30-day journey or doing the crazy poses, but about choosing to be present in the now.

Tender, love and care

My favourite thing during Yoga with Adrienne’s video is the foot massage. A small anecdote, but I used to force myself to wear smaller shoes because of some crazy Chinese stigmatism against women with big feet.

So my feet were battered, there were bruises and blisters everywhere, and at one point, I had corn on the sole of my feet and they hurt so much.

In one video we were asked to massage our feet with tenderness and compassion, this changed how I view my feet. They were nothing but tools before, for walking, but now, I love my feet.

It might sound like an excuse to justify a pedicure, but considering my history of hurting them so much, treating my feet well help me to be grateful about what I have and how to treat ourselves and everything we own with respect and gratitude.

Yoga really slows down time, allows us to focus on our body and love ourselves again.

Watch this essay in video form and subscribe to my youtube channel here:

Am I fangirling Yoga with Adrienne? I definitely like her, but I’m more fangirling about exercising every day.

Some of us might prefer doing high-intensity exercises a few times a week, and that’s fine too, of course. But for me, the mental health impact of moving every day is huge, it literally got me out of my mental health issues.

Low impact, moderated exercise help me to reconnect with my body every day. It helps me to become more aware of what I do to myself, what I put in my stomach and what feels good.

So yes, I have lost quite a bit of weight, but the truly great thing is about self-love. Not in an indulgent way, not an excuse for shopping and whatnot, but a truly appreciative way.

After the 30-day journey, I have continued to exercise every day (well, almost!). Follow my journey on my Instagram, and share your daily exercising journey with me! We can keep each other accountable.

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