Monkey Mind

Have you ever had your thoughts run so insanely in your mind that they take you to a far off distorted world? I've been struggling with that for the past month now, all come to realize it's stemmed from not taking care of myself and honoring my own yoga and meditation practice. Yoga takes me out of the mind chatter and into my body, tuning out unrealistic expectations and stories created in my mind. It's so easy to get caught up in life, or make excuses as to why you can't carve out time in your schedule for something that is good for your physical and mental body, but I assure you that it is important and much needed.

Last night I took a yoga class with my dear friend Erin Ward and it wasn't until my moving meditation begun that I realized I was dealing with Monkey Mind. As someone who is naturally an over thinker, over analyzer and over achiever, it's easy for me to to fall into patterns of hyper critical thoughts. What helps me deal with all that is a consistent yoga and meditation practice and when I go weeks without it, I fall back into all those patterns. Yesterdays practice brought up a lot of emotions for me, a lot of which I was holding in and not vocalizing, so to be able to put my thoughts into words and discuss them with Erin afterwards was immensely needed and appreciated. 

Do you deal with monkey mind? And if so, how do you deal with it? What are some of your  methods for self-care?