How Yoga Saved My Life

In June 2019, I fell asleep in a car alongside friends, blissfully unaware that I was about to star in a very real, very unscripted action movie—minus the budget, stunt doubles, or the comforting knowledge that everyone lives at the end.

We were on the way home from a festival, that magical post-camping daze where everyone is too tired to function but too dusty to care. At some point, the driver fell asleep. So did the rest of us. Except, of course, when the car went off the road, flipped, and I took flight like a yoga-practicing ragdoll on a mission from the universe.

I was later discovered in a bush—crumpled, broken, and (somehow) alive. My body was completely wrecked, but my consciousness? Oh, it decided to do its own thing. It separated from my body, probably out of sheer disbelief. Another story, another blog, possibly titled “Things You See When You’re Floating Over Yourself Wondering What Just Happened.”

A helicopter—because in Germany, we take things seriously (and I was in critical condition)—whisked me to a hospital in a remote part of Germany. When I woke up six hours later, a nurse gently said, “You’ve had a car accident.”

Ah, yes. A car. That rings a bell.

“Your friends are okay.”

Relief. Kind of like someone handing you a life raft—only you’re still underwater.

“You’ve broken your rib, your arm, and your C2.”

Right. The spine. That little stack of bones that holds everything together. Or, in my case, barely did.

Here’s the part where things take a yogic plot twist.

Apparently, I had a slim chance of surviving—unless I had been doing yoga. Seriously. My doctors told me the flexibility in my spine, thanks to years of bending and twisting played a role in keeping my spinal column from snapping entirely. Yoga: it’s not just for inner peace or impressing your ex on Instagram. It may actually save your life.

The spinal column is more than just the body’s coat rack—it’s a crucial conduit for your nervous system and a central support structure for, well, everything. Yoga strengthens this foundation by improving flexibility, alignment, and mobility. It also teaches you the fine art of breathing through discomfort, which—let’s be honest—comes in handy both in backbends and in life-threatening situations.

It’s not to say that mastering an extreme backbend will grant you immortality. But simple movements like cat-cow or camel? They’re like WD-40 for your spine. They help keep energy flowing, reduce pain, and protect your body like an invisible suit of armor made of breath and muscle memory.

And then there’s the emotional side. Yoga has a sneaky way of making you feel calmer even when your life has flipped upside down—literally. It supports stress reduction, emotional resilience, and helps regulate the nervous system so you can respond to chaos with at least a moderate amount of grace. (Or, in my case, semi-conscious sarcasm.)

In my journey, yoga didn’t just support my physical recovery—it deepened my appreciation for the mystical, strange, and shockingly practical connection between body and spirit. Moving and breathing mindfully may be the key to resilience, longevity, and surviving being yeeted out of a flipping car.

So here’s my advice: Keep moving. Keep breathing. Do the yoga, even if you feel like a tangled headphone cord trying to stretch. Because when life throws you a curveball—or, say, launches you out of a moving vehicle—it might just be the thing that keeps you in one piece.

Hear More about my story here