I Did… But Then I Took it Back…

November 2, 2008 at 8:13 pm | In coworkers and colleagues, learning and growing, questions and conundrums, the Universe craves balance | 1 Comment

So, I did it.  I sent in my resignation letter.  It was scary to hit the “send” button, but I did it, and I was prepared to live with the decision.

Because the place where I work can often be like a high school – where rumors pop up like so many dandelions in springtime – I decided to send a copy of my letter to my coworkers who also teach yoga.  I didn’t want them to hear that Chili had stormed into the bosses’ offices and threw things and uttered vicious swears and cried, screaming “I QUIT” at the top of her voice.  I wanted them to hear it from ME exactly the way I intended it to be heard.

I wasn’t prepared for the reaction.  Three of the five people I emailed responded that same afternoon that they were more than happy to cover my classes for me and wished that I’d reconsider my decision to quit.

I thought about it for all of five minutes, then sent another email to the bosses asking them if they’d mind very much if I retracted my resignation.  If it was okay with them that quite a lot of my upcoming classes be taught by my colleagues, then I’d like very much to keep my job.  I was surprised when the big boss emailed back that he was pleased I’d be staying on and that, as long as the members were okay with the subs, whatever arrangements we came to as a department were fine with him.

I taught my Sunday class today, and everyone there understands that they likely won’t be seeing me again until after Thanksgiving.  Mr. Chili is leaving for an extended business trip to New Mexico on Wednesday, I explained, and it’s damned near impossible to find child care on Sunday mornings.  They all said they’d miss me and look forward to my return.

I’m glad that I don’t have to quit.  While I’m not pleased with the working environment at the health club (though I do love my yoga colleagues!), I really love my classes and the people who attend them.  I’m really glad I don’t have to leave them just yet.

The Universe provides.

To Whom it May Concern

October 16, 2008 at 5:55 pm | In learning and growing, observations, philosophy, questions and conundrums, the Universe craves balance | 1 Comment

I’m going to hand in my resignation at the health club tomorrow.  I’ve been thinking about letting this part of my life go for a while now, and I think it’s finally time.

I’ve been teaching at the health club for going on about 8 years now; I joined the club as a member after Beanie was born and started as an instructor about a year later.  In the course of those eight years, I’ve taught step and aqua aerobics, pre-natal fitness and weight-training, and, of course, yoga.  I’ve also made a lot of friends.

My decision to leave is one that’s been brewing for quite some time.  The idea came to me, I think, when my step class was reassigned to another instructor and was reinforced when a class that I was recruited for was also reassigned.  The instability of the environment is a big factor in my wanting to leave; the attendance at my Friday yoga class has been low over the past few months and I suspect that considerations are being made to either drop the class off the schedule or give it to another instructor.  I don’t find my supervisor to be a very stable or supportive presence in that part of my professional life, and I dislike the condescending emails that are periodically sent to the staff, scolding us for things like not parking in “designated areas” (with apologies to those who actually lived through that era, the emails feel very much like we’re being told to use the “colored” entrance).  While my work there has never been about the money, I’m not getting enough joy out of the job to make up for the fact that I’m only earning 28 dollars a week (before taxes).

My “other” life is interfering with my yoga schedule at the health club, too.  Because of professional and personal commitments (workshops, visiting relatives, Mr. Chili’s business travel), I’ve had to (and WILL have to) sub out a LOT of my classes.  That’s not going to fly with the boss for much longer, and I don’t really think it’s fair to the members, either.  I can’t give the club enough of a commitment for me to feel good about the job.  It’s best if I give my notice now.

While I’m relieved to have made the decision, I am going to be sad to go.  I really do love my classes there, especially my Sunday morning group.  We’ve laughed, we’ve grown, we’ve had a good time, and I’m going to miss a LOT of people who have practiced every week with me for the better part of a decade.

The thing is, though, that I need to balance my values against my affection for them.  I have rules in my classes, you see.  Rule number one is that you may not do anything that hurts in my class.  Challenging is good; painful is bad – unless you’re in labor, this is always true.  Rule number two is that you don’t have to look like me (or her, or him, or anyone else).  Do what you can do today and be content with that.  Rule number three is if you have a question in the middle of class, ask it in the middle of class.  Don’t worry about disrupting the energy or anything like that – I’m here to help you in any way that I can, and if that means calling me over to adjust your pose (or standing behind you to keep you from falling), then do that.  Finally, rule number four derives from the wisdom of the Ben and Jerry’s bumper sticker (which, of course, I can’t find online right now) that says “If it’s not fun, why do it?”  Yoga classes should be fun, safe, and welcoming.  Enjoy yourself.  Laugh (or cry).  Be where you are now.  It’s THIS rule that I feel I’m breaking by staying at the health club.

I’m going to compose my resignation letter and drop it by after my class tomorrow morning.  My last day at the health club will be October 31st, unless the boss finds a replacement before then (or the boss already has one lined up, which is a distinct possibility).

Moving on…

Hot Yoga

September 12, 2008 at 3:41 pm | In compassion and connection, learning and growing, philosophy, the Universe craves balance | 3 Comments

And no, I don’t mean the kind of yoga practiced in a 105° room, either.

I’m talking about me, being hopping mad about the experience a friend of mine had in a yoga class.  Go on over to Ciboulette’s site and read about what happened.  Go ahead, I’ll wait; you’ll need to read it to understand what I’m so mad about, anyway…

You back?  Okay, first of all never, and I mean NEVER, stay in a class where the instructor tells you that pain is to be expected!  EVER!!  The very FIRST thing I say at the beginning of EVERY yoga class I teach is that if it hurts, don’t do it. Challenging is good, painful is bad, and unless one is in labor, this is ALWAYS true.  Please promise me, y’all, that you’ll get up, roll up your mat, and make for the door as soon as you hear an instructor tell you that you need to work through the pain.  You NEVER work through the pain unless you’re delivering a baby.  Promise me.

Look, I have nothing against Bikram yoga in principle.  The poses themselves are very similar to yoga poses taught in other traditions (not much changes in that respect – yoga poses have been pretty much the same for the last 5,000 years) and, as long as someone is well-hydrated and not prone to heat exhaustion, I think that hot yoga is fine, if you’re into that sort of thing (personally, I don’t particularly enjoy sweating/melting, so I’m not really a fan).

What I DO take issue with are teachers who teach students not to honor their bodies or their intution.  I dislike teachers who don’t offer modifications to students, who expect students to do the pose THIS WAY, DAMMIT! without any consideration for the different levels people occupy or the different ways in which people are physically built.

It may be true that, because of someone’s bone structure, they will never be able to get into a “full” expression of a pose, and no amount of focus or dedication or practice will change someone’s bone structure, folks.  If someone (like me) has a short neck between the body and the head of one’s femur, for example, one is never going to be able to do a full split; it’s not a matter of making the muscles work in certain ways, it’s a matter of the physics of bone against bone – once the head of the femur hits the hip bone, it’s not going any further no matter HOW much yoga one practices.

I really think that responsible yoga teachers would encourage their students to work within their physical edges.  I tell my students to do what they can and ONLY what they can.  They are certainly allowed to gently nudge those edges – if you don’t go a little beyond what you always do, you’ll never really improve – but they are admonished to never, ever force themselves into poses.  It’s just not worth the risk of injury.  And for the love of Goddess; if it hurts, stop.  Let’s not fail to take into consideration the fact that you may have tweaked your shoulder lifting the baby out of the tub, or that you slipped on the stairs and have a fussy ankle now.  Those bits need to be treated gently while they heal, and your instructor should be telling you that during every single class.

Finally, a good teacher is one who will encourage you to be kind to yourself.  Don’t allow yourself to be bullied or intimidated in a class – yoga, at least as I understand it, is intended to teach us how to interact with ourselves, each other, and the world around us.  We’ve got plenty of influences telling us to compete and strive and push ourselves.  What we really need are loving, counter-balancing messages of relax and accept and flow.  You should leave your yoga class feeling joyful and renewed.  If you don’t, don’t go back; keep going to classes until you find a teacher who clicks with you – you’ll know them when you find them.

Easy Come…

September 1, 2008 at 5:25 pm | In learning and growing, practice off the mat | 2 Comments

I was supposed to start teaching a kundalini yoga class at the health club on Wednesdays.  The woman who teaches the class decided to leave the club, and the group exercise instructor approached me to ask if I’d take over the course.  Keep this in mind – she came to me.

It just so happened that the woman whose class I was going to take over – we’ll call her Jen – was in my dining room going over some of the resources she uses to teach the class.  She was excited that I was going to be taking over for her, and she wanted me to have a variety of places to go for inspiration and support.

Just as Jen was getting ready to leave, the phone rang.  I excused myself to answer a call from Gretchen, the woman who coordinates the group classes at the health club.  As Gretchen tells it, members came to her to request a different instructor.  She told me that they had hoped to have different teachers each day of the week in our time slot – so since I already teach the Friday 10:00 class, they wanted someone different in the Wednesday 10:00 slot (she said a bunch of other things, too, but that’s neither here nor there).  I told Gretchen that was fine, said good bye, and hung up.

Jen was beside herself.  She didn’t believe a word Gretchen said to me – she was under the distinct impression that the class was excited to have me take over for her, and she wondered what could possibly be the motivation to bump me from the class.

Honestly?  I was over it as soon as I got to the purpose for Gretchen’s call.  Yoga is teaching me (among other things) to practice detachment.  Did I want the class?  Yes, I did; I was looking forward to working in a new tradition and to adding another class to my practice.  Was I upset that I lost the class before I even got to teach the first one?  Not even a little.  I wasn’t attached to it, and I am not willing to give anyone – bosses in particular – power to upset me with something so small.

Holding the Space

August 8, 2008 at 8:33 pm | In compassion and connection, learning and growing, meditations, observations | 1 Comment

My Friday yoga class is the one in which I include a bit of restorative yoga.

I’ve mentioned restorative yoga before – here, specifically – and I think that it’s an important component to my teaching practice. SO many people in our society just do not know how to be still and quiet with themselves. They can’t relax, even for ten minutes.

I give my participants the opportunity to practice settling their bodies and minds at the end of each Friday class, and I tell them that it’s okay if they don’t get it this week – or next, or the week after that. I’m going to continue to provide this as a part of our practice, and I implore them to not be harsh or judgmental of themselves if they can’t quite sink into these ten short minutes; what’s important is that they try-by-not-trying (just try explaining THAT to a group of over-achieving health club members!). I’m asking them to release, to exhale, to let go of themselves for a little bit, and I make a point of being firm but gentle in what I expect them to do. I want them to know that they are safe here with me, but I also want them to focus – I think that the effort is well worth the reward.

This morning, as I do every Friday, I explained what was involved in the restorative part of the practice.  I told people to get into whatever position was most comfortable for them, let them know that there were blankets and blocks and chairs and extra mats for their use, then went around the room making sure that everyone was settled.

One gentleman, who’s been in my class many times before, was lying with his heels on the seat of a chair.  I knew that his knees were going to hurt in just a few minutes, so I had him lift his feet while I slid the chair under his calves.  Then, I went to get a blanket for him – he was only wearing shorts and a tank top, and when the A/C kicks in, it gets cold in that room.  I laid the blanket gently over his chest and arms, all while talking the class into relaxation.  Then, I noticed that my gentleman was crying.

I know what it’s like to cry in a yoga class.  I can’t really tell you what it is about certain environments or certain situations that allows for the walls to come down, and I can’t really tell you exactly WHY I sometimes feel the urge to weep in a class – there’s nothing specifically upsetting; it’s more as if a hatch gives way and allows something amorphous to come bubbling up.

I also know that it’s terrible to have specific attention drawn to you when this happens; it’s hard enough to be crying without knowing why, but to have the entire class know it makes it even worse.  Finally, I know how wonderful it feels to feel connected, quietly and unobtrusively, to someone else.  Knowing that someone knows you’re struggling without having to explain yourself or feel embarrassed is incredibly freeing and, I think, helps to work out whatever emotion is trying to escape in the first place.  A nod, the touch of a hand, a smile, or a hug are really all that’s needed for that connection to be made, but those small gestures are profoundly important.

Knowing all of this, I continued to talk in the same tone and pace to my class, but I moved to kneel over my gentleman’s head.  I put my hands gently on his temples, all while directing the class to release their toes and fingers, to let themselves either sink into the floor or float above it, while I stroked the sides of his head.  I wiped tears away.  I stayed there until he began to calm, but I left before he was quite there because I didn’t want him to calm for me; where he went with this was entirely his journey, and I didn’t want to influence it in any way.  He knew I was there, he knew he was safe, and he knew that I had no judgment; I tried to vibe as much love and warmth as I could.

I let the class stay in their pose for about 10 minutes, then guided them to be brought back in the arms of a strong, loving presence.  I wanted them to feel light and clean and safe; held and loved unconditionally, the way a parent would carry a sleeping baby.  I asked them to feel themselves being lowered gently back into their bodies.  I brought them back to a seated position, thanked them for sharing the hour with me, and invited them to come to see me with questions or concerns, then I dismissed the class.

Before he left, I went to my gentleman, bowed to him with prayer pose, then wordlessly offered a hug, which he accepted.  I don’t need to know what his emotion was about, but I do need him to know that he is loved and cared for.

I’m feeling pleased and proud that I created a safe space for him to take this trip today.

He’ll be back.

I Honor That Place In You…

August 4, 2008 at 10:48 pm | In inspiration, learning and growing, philosophy, practice off the mat | Leave a Comment

I had no idea that I did this.

A few weeks ago, while attending the Shoah fellowship, I was approached by one of my colleagues with a question. “I noticed,” he said, “that you do this a lot.” Here, he put his hands in prayer position in front of his heart. “I’ve seen you do it when you meet someone new, and I watch you do it every time someone finishes a lecture. Why do you do that?”

I hadn’t realized that I WAS doing it, but after he pointed it out to me, I acknowledged that I do. I explained to him the idea of namaste – that I believe that there’s a bit of the divine in me and a bit of the divine in everyone else, and that when I’m in that place in me and they’re in that place in them, we are the same being. The prayer pose is my way of honoring the divine in someone else; of extending to them a recognition of and appreciation for the gifts that they bring to me.

Here is a photo of me with Ernie, a survivor of Auschwitz who came to share his story with us. My roommate took the picture – I didn’t know she had her camera out – and caught me in the proverbial act. I was so profoundly moved by this man’s capacity to love and to forgive and to devote his life to telling his story that I couldn’t not honor him in the most respectful way I knew how.

Namaste, indeed.

Registration… and Resignation

June 27, 2008 at 6:56 am | In learning and growing, poses and asana, questions and conundrums | 2 Comments

First, the “registration” part:

I’m officially registered with Yoga Alliance. In the big picture, I’m not entirely sure what that gets me, exactly, except a cool sticker like the one you see here. I also know I can get decent (and cheap) liability insurance through the alliance, and it’s something fun to put on my resume and business cards, but beyond that, I’m not sure what else it’s good for.

Now, on to the “resignation” part.

I was going to try to keep this an entirely positive place – to not use this space to vent or complain – but when I thought about it, I realized that the Universe craves balance and that, sometimes, a little venting is a healthy thing. Here, then, is my current frustration which I am trying, with varying degrees of success, to resign myself to:

I taught three yoga classes yesterday for three different colleagues at my health club. It started with a class at 5:45 (which, despite the obscenity of the hour, was actually kind of fun), continued through a 9:30 a.m. class, then finished up with a 5:30 class that I’ve subbed several times before. Well, in the evening class, there was someone I’ve not yet encountered, and he frustrated the CRAP out of me.

I don’t mind working with people who are totally “into” yoga. I like their dedication and I think it’s fun to compare notes about our respective practices.

What I DON’T like, however, are people who are SO into yoga that they think they know more than the instructor – especially when they don’t.

Here’s the thing – if I’m giving a corrective cue, PLEASE assume I’m talking to YOU, especially if I keep giving the SAME corrective cue over and over.

Dude over by the windows kept putting himself in the ugliest lunges I’ve seen in a long time. I reminded everyone – over and over again – to make sure their hips were under their shoulders (“don’t hang out over your front knee”) and that their knees were BEHIND their toes. Dude kept leaning out over his knee, which was WELL forward of his toes. Exactly what he thought he was stretching, I do not know, but I do know that he was putting that knee at pretty substantial risk by leaving it out there.

Don’t even get me STARTED on his upward dog.

When I started wandering around the room, offering adjustments, he yanked himself right out of the pose we were doing, so it was pretty obvious he didn’t want my help.

It took me a while to disengage from this. Part of me – the teacher part who cares about the well-being and success of my students – wanted to get right into it with this guy and explain to him that I wasn’t just talking to hear my own voice. There are a lot of good reasons why I’m instructing the class to do these poses in this particular way. The other part of me – the yogini part who understands that I can’t walk anyone else’s path for them – wanted to honor Dude’s right to (ab)use his body in whatever way he saw fit.

I’ll tell you what, though – teacher and yogini? They can really duke it out sometimes.

Still and Quiet

June 23, 2008 at 10:05 pm | In learning and growing, observations, poses and asana, practice off the mat | Leave a Comment

I did an experiment with my Friday morning yoga class last week.

The gas crunch has inspired me to coast as often as possible. Whenever I’m on a hill (and it’s safe to do so), I engage the clutch, pull the car out of gear and let Sir Issac Newton power me along. I’m telling you this because it’s a metaphor for a big idea I’m circling around lately as a part of my yoga practice; the idea of releasing oneself to the flow and taking advantage of the energy that’s available to us all. I don’t need to power my car down hills – the Earth will do that for me (and, it turns out, just this act of coasting has increased my gas mileage by almost six miles to the gallon!). Coasting isn’t just a behavior; it’s an attitude, and I wanted to see if I could get my yoga class to step back from themselves and disengage for a few minutes.

I warned them the week before that I’d be adding a single restorative pose to the practice for the coming week. For those of you who don’t know, restorative yoga is a practice which puts practitioners into supported poses and leaves them there for long stretches of time – up to 20 minutes in some cases. The idea is to reach a state where the sympathetic nervous system – the fight or flight response – is shut down and the parasympathetic system – the relaxation and restoration responses – are turned on. The student is given an opportunity to be completely still, to relax completely into the pose, and to experience the sensations of the quiet of body and mind that ensues, with the added benefits of healing and a little bit of rest thrown in for good measure.

What I’ve learned about the population of student who frequents my class is that, for the most part, they are all profoundly uncomfortable with still and quiet. I habitually put students in savasana (the final relaxation at the end of a class) for little more than about 6 or 7 minutes, and even THAT is too much for most of them; they fidget, they sniffle, they wiggle and roll around. Has society gotten so frenetic that we’re unable to lie still for 5 minutes? It seems so.

A few weeks ago, I experienced an epiphany in a restorative yoga class, and I wanted to offer my students an opportunity to play in the quiet spaces of their own inner selves. I explained to them that, for some people, this was going to be the hardest part of the class – some of them, I said, wouldn’t be able to be still for the 10 minutes I was going to leave them in this pose, and that was okay. All I asked was that they do the best they could.

True to my expectations, in a class of 11 people, only 2 of them were able to fully engage in the practice. There was the usual sniffling and shuffling that I hear in savasana (I hear it because I sit in easy pose with my eyes closed, trying to steal a little still-and-quiet for myself, even though my classes aren’t MY practice). I was neither surprised nor disappointed – I had a pretty realistic expectation going in. All I was looking for was exposure, really, and I got it.

When I called them back to themselves and up to a seated position, I asked them to debrief. The 9 who were fidgety said that I was right – it WAS hard (well, two of them said so – the other 7 nodded agreement). The two who were able to sink into the pose echoed my praise of the practice – while they’d never done restorative yoga before, they could certainly see the value in it. Everyone agreed that it might be a good thing to include in the practice on a fairly regular (though not weekly) basis.

I’m pleased by the experiment. It’s often difficult to introduce new elements into established classes – students come to the sessions expecting certain things and can be quite resistant to anything that messes with their comfort levels. My aim as a yoga instructor, though, is to stretch my participants’ experiences so that they’re willing to at least ENTERTAIN a new idea every once in a while. I’m pretty sure they’re not ready to OM just yet, but my teaching them to coast a little more often will certainly do them some good.

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The Inner Guru

June 10, 2008 at 3:13 pm | In learning and growing, philosophy, practice off the mat | 2 Comments

A debate was raised – but never addressed – in my 200 hour yoga teacher training about how (or whether) one should seek a teacher to guide one’s path.

One of the things I loved about this training was that our trainers – I call them Cecily and David for the purposes of their privacy – were so very different in a lot of their ideas. Cecily, for example, thinks that it’s vitally important for a practitioner to find a teacher. She spoke reverently of the person who she considers her guru and whose ideals and philosophies she studies and works to emulate. David, on the other hand, believes that one can be one’s own guru and, though he didn’t actually say so, I got the impression that he thinks that devoting oneself to a single individual is a potentially dangerous thing.

I’ve got to say that I come down with David on this question. I really do think that I would find the study and devotion to one person – one way of physical practice, one way of thinking about the Universe and one’s place in it – would be too limiting. As I thought about this, I thought about why it is that David – and I – feel so strongly.

I think it has to do with one’s self-esteem, one’s willingness to experiment and play (and to be willing to change and adapt as a result of those experiments and that playfulness), and one’s belief that there are, as David so beautifully put it, many paths up the mountain. I think it’s a lot more risky to “go it alone,” and while I can understand that some people might not be ready to blaze their own trails, *I* can’t imagine signing up for only one tour guide.

During our 200 hour training, we were exposed to a vast sampling of different styles, different personalities, and different attitudes about yoga – its origins and practices and its place in one’s life. Some of these views and ideas resonated with me and some of them didn’t. I made a commitment to myself – and it’s one that I largely kept – to go into this experience with as open a mind as I could possibly manage (and, as a sometimes opinionated Yankee, I found that this was no small act of will). I took in what others had to offer and I used my heart, and my training in critical thinking, to hold up what they offered against what I already knew, thought, felt, or believed to see if it fit. If it did, I kept it; if it didn’t, I set it aside.

The learning that I did as a result of this experience is largely focused around coming to better terms with my trust of myself and my commitment to keep learning and growing. I learned that I CAN be my own guru, and that I can allow her to guide me to new and different learning challenges without forcing myself to accept something that doesn’t feel “right” just because someone else says it’s so. My hope is that I can show others that they can do that, too.

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My Philosophy. Well, at Least, Today

June 3, 2008 at 10:06 am | In learning and growing, meditations, observations, philosophy, practice off the mat | 4 Comments

I have been thinking a lot about how I practice – and teach – yoga. The thinking is vast and expansive; there isn’t just one factor that comes into play as I formulate and adjust my philosophy about this experience, and I find that every new student, every new lesson, and every new idea influences – even if just a little – the way I live my practice.

I had a private client the other day, who was brand new to the adventure of yoga, and I was trying to explain to her that there’s so much more to yoga than the effort of putting one’s body into pretzel-like poses. I wanted her to get the idea that where she is right now is perfectly okay – it doesn’t matter that she can’t get her heels on the floor in downward dog; it’s okay that she can’t reach her toes in forward fold – what matters is that she finds her best expression of these poses today, because tomorrow will be different.

I have found, through a lot of personal experience, that people (in general) take yoga WAAY too seriously. The get all stressed out about how often they practice or how deeply they can get into a pose or what other people – or their teachers – think of how they look or of how “yogic” they are. They spend tons of money on props and products and clothes so they can “fit in” and look the part.

Instructors are sometimes just as bad. They adhere, with the tenacity of a barnacle on the side of a pier, to one philosophy and one practice. They “encourage” (please read that for the euphemism that it is) their participants to do poses one way – their way – and to push themselves beyond their limits. They promote one way of thinking to the exclusion of others, and they end up limiting the experience of their participants with their own orthodoxy.

All of this – every last bit of it – is all contrary to what I think yoga is supposed to be about. Yoga, for me, anyway (and I don’t even imagine I speak for anyone else) is about finding balance in one’s self. It’s about getting the right mix of physical, emotional, and spiritual energy working in harmony in one’s life.

The physical practice of yoga is about challenging oneself gently and kindly; about finding your edges and nudging yourself up against – or through – them. It’s about encouraging (really encouraging – no euphemisms this time) yourself to find out what you can – and can’t – do. It’s about learning that sometimes you’re on and sometimes you’re off and it’s about being okay with that. It’s about gaining perspective. So you fall out of tree pose this afternoon; who cares? What higher purpose is a perfect tree pose going to serve in your life? It may well be that the lessons you take away from falling out of poses are far more valuable than those you’d get from being picture-perfect.

The emotional practice of yoga has to do with understanding your relationships – to yourself, to your family and friends, and to the world around you. Yoga has taught me more about compassion than anything else; when I learned, though my physical practice, to be compassionate with myself, I found that I was able to expand that capacity outward. I understood – truly understood – that I am a pebble in the pond; that all my actions have consequences that I may not be immediately aware of and, more importantly, that I have a great deal of control over those actions. I have choices, and I can be mindful about what kind of energy I radiate. I may not be able to choose how people treat me or what happens to me in the larger world, but I certainly have control over how I choose to respond to those things. I can react out of love, or I can react out of fear. Yoga has taught me to take the time to be still and quiet and to make those choices mindfully.

Finally, yoga helps me to locate my place in the Universe. I am able to connect to my higher self through my practice and no, I’m not talking about some voodoo channeling or astral-projection, either. I’m talking about making the very important recognition that I belong here, that I am a part of the larger picture, and that the energy I bring to this party is vitally important. I’m talking about learning to make those choices, in my physical and emotional practice, that resonate with me on a spiritual level. I’m talking about being mindfully aware of always striving for my own highest and best expression of my own self – of my own soul – and of playing a part in helping others to make that recognition, too.

That’s how I feel about yoga today. I’m completely open to the idea that I may learn something new this afternoon that changes how I think about my practice, but for right now, this feels right.

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