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Most of us live our lives in fear of falling, either physically or metaphorically.

We play it safe and take no risks because the possibility of falling is scarier to us than staying in the same place. But what happens when staying where you are becomes your greatest fear? When the cost of staying stuck is greater than the risk of falling?

Well, you learn how to fall.

At Yogi Flight School, we teach people how to stand on their hands, and one of the most important things that we work with our students on is learning how to fall safely.

A lot is happening in our bodies when we flip them upside down, and training our bodies to know what to do if we begin to fall takes some pressure off of our conscious thought process and alleviates a level of fear.

We practice moving our bodies purposely out of alignment so that we can gain the muscle memory that shifts our balance and landing points to the best option for recovery. During this process, we begin to gain trust in our body’s instincts and a knowing that our body will keep us safe.

We learn that it’s okay to fall.

When we translate this concept of learning how to (figuratively) fall in our everyday life, the practice looks different, but the lesson and the result stay the same.

Learning how to fall in life is a preparation of the mind more than the body. Falling or failing at something that we want to achieve is disheartening. Failing at something and experiencing a related loss can be devastating.

We’ve all heard stories of people who put their life’s savings, blood, sweat, and tears into something, only to have it not work out and lose everything. These are the stories that keep us small. Our fear of having a similar experience keeps many of us from even daring to dream.

If we can train our minds to land softly out of turmoil similarly to how we train our bodies to bail out of a handstand, we can begin to look past the point of fear—and that is the only place that we will find success.

When you trust that you are stronger than your circumstances, it becomes okay to fall and okay to fail, because you no longer see them as falls or failures. You’ve grown to accept and appreciate them as lessons to learn from.

So, keep falling and one day you will fly.