Use my Neti Pot daily for 40 days

Like a lot of people I started to hear the buzz about the neti pot. I think the recent interested originated on an Oprah show. Never the less, I read a little about it online and watched a couple of videos about it on youtube and decided to give it a try. I’m really interested in preventing colds this winter. I’ve taken to washing my hands more often so I think this complements nicely. I do attend a yoga class weekly and understand that this is considered part of some yoga practices, so it fits nicely with that.

This morning, I completed my final day of the 40-day challenge! Which means I actually used the Neti Pot 41 days in a row.

So, what was this like? Well, I’m honestly not sure there is any overall improvement in my sinuses – although I haven’t come down with a virus since I’ve been irrigating daily. I think the test now will be to see what happens when I stop doing it every day, and see if I notice myself feeling more congested. If that happens, well, I’ll go back to doing it every day (or most days; I’m not sure I’ll ever feel the need to have it as a strict daily practice again).

As for watching my mind during the process (which is really the reason for doing this sort of committment, IMO), I never hit any big resistance to keeping my word about doing this every day. I expected to just dread doing it some days, but that never happened. There were a couple of days when I forgot until late in the day (once I think I even got back out of bed to do it), but that was just forgetfulness, more than, “OMG, I really don’t want to have to do this!”

There were times when I procrastinated, and was aware that I needed to go do this throughout the day. I definitely found that I felt “better” about things on days when I’d remembered or made the effort to do it first thing in the morning, or at least earlier in the day vs. later. This same thing holds true for my daily asana practice, as well. When I’ve done all my daily practices early in the day, I had a nice feeling of completion – “okay, so now I don’t have to worry about those anymore today.” Not in a tired, crabby way – just in a way that I felt accomplished, and free to move on to other things. That was probably the most interesting part of the experience for me – realizing that I feel better about myself and my activities when I’ve gotten the real priorities done early on in the day. That would be something to remember and carry forward into the future. :)

Wow. I just realized that I only have six more days to go before completing this challenge! W00t! I haven’t skipped even one day – I have completely kept to the program. I hope I haven’t just jinxed myeslf by writing this. ;)

Still haven’t skipped a day, including today. Whoo HOO! :)

One week in, and I’ve kept to my committment every day. :)

As part of yoga teacher training, our instructor suggested that each of us take on a 40-day committment. It could be anything – didn’t have to be yoga-related – just that it was something measureable that we committed to doing every day for 40 days. Immediately, this goal came to mind. I’ve been using the Neti Pot for a couple of years, but only when I’m feeling sick or congested. I’ve considered trying it daily, but haven’t ever gotten around to actually doing it. So, now I’ll be able to see what it’s like to irrigate my sinuses every day for a while. And, as this is a yogic practice, it seemed especially appropriate.

The idea, of course, is that often, when we set a goal like this for ourselves, it can become difficult to keep that committment, because our mind throws up all sorts of obstacles. So, this gives us the chance to watch what our minds are doing, and (hopefully) learn some things and work through the obstacles, too. This is the sort of discipline I’ve been working on developing in various other ways (like my daily yoga practice, for example), so it will be interesting to me to see how I do with this goal.

Even though I’ve irrigated yesterday and today, I’m going to count today as Day 1 (since when I did it yesterday, I hadn’t yet committed to it as a goal). So, just 39 more days to go. :) Which means that my 40th day will be July 20th. Should be interesting to see how this goes.