Should You Shrink Your World To Stay Sane?

When the World Feels Too Heavy

You’ve probably noticed how easy it is to get lost in doomscrolling. One story after another, one headline more devastating than the last. Before you know it, your shoulders are tense, your breath is shallow, and your faith in humanity feels smaller than it did five minutes ago.

Some people will tell you to shut it all out. Make your world smaller. Don’t let the heaviness in. And while I understand that advice, here’s the problem: when we make our world too small, we stop seeing. We stop connecting. We lose the very compassion that makes our practice real.

Yoga doesn’t ask us to live blindfolded. Yoga asks us to live awake.

The Justification Trap

Maybe you’ve even said to yourself, “It’s always been this way.” Or, “I can’t really make a difference.” Or, “My peace is more important than all that chaos.”

But there are dangers in this kind of thinking. When you choose to shrink your world into a bubble, you may feel safe for a while, but slowly your empathy begins to fade. You stop feeling the pulse of humanity. You risk confusing comfort for peace. And peace without awareness is not peace at all, it is avoidance.

Your yoga practice has been preparing you not to hide, but to meet life directly.

Staying Informed Without Rigidity

There’s another danger when you make your world too small: you only let in the voices that sound like your own. You start believing your side is the only side, your truth is the only truth. That might feel comforting, but it makes you rigid. And rigidity is the opposite of yoga.

Yoga is about balance, openness, and flexibility. If you only feed your mind news or opinions that match what you already think, you’re not practicing Satya. Truth isn’t just what feels good or what lines up neatly with your beliefs. Truth is bigger, and sometimes it challenges us.

Staying informed doesn’t mean believing everything you hear. It means listening with awareness, checking your sources, and being willing to learn from perspectives that aren’t your own. This is what keeps you spacious instead of small.

How Others Have Done It Before Us

Think about Gandhi, Mother Teresa, and Martin Luther King Jr. They lived in times of deep violence and division. They had every reason to shut down, but they didn’t. They found a way to stay grounded and still face what was in front of them.

• Gandhi anchored himself in prayer, silence, and fasting. These daily disciplines gave him strength to walk into the storm without being swept away.

• Mother Teresa worked among the poorest of the poor. She didn’t pretend suffering wasn’t there. She looked it in the eye every day, but she carried faith that each person was sacred. That belief kept her open instead of numb.

• Martin Luther King Jr. faced constant threats and hate. His roots were in his community and his spiritual life. He took the hits, but he never let them stop his purpose.

They faced a big, painful world not by hiding from it, but by building an even bigger strength within themselves.

But What About Me?

You might be thinking, “Yeah, but that was them. They were activists, saints, leaders. My life is nothing like theirs. I’m just trying to get through my day without collapsing.”

I hear that. And you’re right—your life is different. You don’t have to be leading a movement or running into a war zone to apply this wisdom. But the principle is the same. When life feels overwhelming, you don’t protect yourself by hiding from it. You protect yourself by making your inner world stronger.

For you, that might mean limiting the doomscrolling, but not disconnecting entirely. It might mean being informed enough to vote, to speak up, to show compassion to a neighbor. It might mean teaching your kids how to breathe instead of panic, or being the calm presence in a tense workplace.

No, you don’t need to be an activist. But you do need to be awake. Because yoga isn’t about escaping the world. It’s about building the strength to live in it fully, with clarity and compassion

What This Means for Your Practice

This is where your yoga gets real. The poses are important. The breath is important. But what matters most is what those practices build inside you.

When you sit in meditation, when you focus on your breath, when you learn to notice without reacting, you’re training for this. You’re training for the moment when the world feels too heavy. Instead of shrinking, you can step back just enough to gather yourself, then step forward again with clarity.

The Yamas and Niyamas give us a map.

• Ahimsa reminds us to protect our own nervous system.

• Satya calls us to look at truth, not turn away.

• Svadhyaya keeps us watching ourselves, so we know when to pause and when to step up.

• Ishvara Pranidhana reminds us that we are not in charge of fixing it all, only in charge of doing our part with devotion.

Walking the Middle Path

I don’t want you to drown in headlines. But I also don’t want you to close your eyes to the world. The middle path is where yoga lives.

Check in with the news, but do it intentionally. Limit the endless scroll. Seek out perspectives that challenge you. Then come back to your mat. Feel your breath. Ground your feet. Remember why you practice.

The temptation to shrink your world is real. I get it. Some days it feels easier to turn it all off, numb out, and stay in your little bubble. But that isn’t peace, it’s avoidance.

Your yoga has been preparing you for more than that. Every time you root down into your feet, every time you breathe through a hard pose, every time you steady your mind, you’re training to meet life as it is.

You don’t have to know every headline, and you don’t have to march in every protest. But you also don’t get to close your eyes completely. The middle path is yours to walk. Stay informed, but stay grounded. Stay open, but stay strong.

This is what it means to live yoga for real — not just on the mat, but in the world we share.

Root down, open up, and walk forward.

Always with love,

Vikky

Vikky Santana, ERYT-500

Yoga Teacher | Trainer | Retreat Leader

www.vikkysantana.com

@vikkysantana.yogatraining