How Hollister Thomas rocked a yoga practice (and I didn’t)

Hollister Thomas has been doing yoga every morning for the past 2 years. I have not.

A quick background, lest you think she’s a trophy wife whiling away her days between mani pedis and book club brunches:

She homeschools 3 kids
And homeschools her hubby who works from home, when he’s not jetting off for events
Which means she’s frequently abandoned to run everything alone
She’s a photographer
Oh, and this, she works up to 30 hours a week

Hollister has a few things going on.

Unbeknownst to each other, a couple of years ago we both made commitments to do yoga daily. In fact, we both do yoga in the mornings when we wake up.

So we had eerily similar intentions. With enough other commitments to make a minimalist swoon.

Hollister has a near-perfect two-year track record of doing yoga daily. I have a near-perfect two-year track record of thinking I’m going to do yoga daily . . . but not.

I’ve succeeded and then failed at this enough times to know a master when I see one.

What is her secret, you ask?

It’s so simple we can name her method after a country-music dance: The Two Step.

She made a real commitment
She made it super easy not to fail

Let’s break that down:

You make a real commitment

We both made a commitment. And we both succeeded for a time. In fact, here’s me bragging about when my yoga practice finally locked in . . . ironically just before it fell apart again.

When you make a real commitment you set up your environment to do the work for you.

You have the yoga mat ready to go.

You schedule the timeframe into your day.

You lock it into something you already do. (Waking up, in this case.)

You clear the decks of all other commitments.

You start right away.

What I failed to remember is Step Two . . .

You make it super easy not to fail

This is Hollister’s secret sauce!

Guess what her minimum commitment is?

20 minutes? 15 minutes? 10 minutes?

Nooooooooo . . . it’s one freaking minute.

One minute.

You can do anything for one or two minutes.

When I first started I aimed for a 15- to 20-minute morning practice. I even gave myself a 5-minute minimum. But promptly forgot about that once I locked in my 15-minute morning practice.

So I glided along morning after morning after morning with my yoga . . . until one morning — it happens, gasp — I didn’t have the time.

You miss once and then missing again doesn’t seem so catastrophic.

Then suddenly you’re me now, left with wispy memories of a better time.

Imagine how glorious you feel on the day you simply can’t do yoga — you don’t have it in you — there’s too much going on — you definitely don’t have the time — sheesh gawd it won’t really matter if you skip it this morning — but you squeeze in one minute anyway . . .

Because it’s so easy. Super easy in fact.

And you made a commitment.

And what’s one minute anyway?

That’s how Hollister rocked the hell out of her morning yoga practice. And I didn’t.

For you —

Evan Griffith
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