Circle of Life? NOT.

Over and over I have heard life moves in cycles. That in everything there is high and low, commitment and leniency, push and pull. What I am realizing, though, is that the underlying lessons are constant, and just the way in which they are brought into our lives varies in cycles.

My physical yoga practice has waned lately. I went from a 6-day-a-weeker to a once-to-twice-a-weeker in the past month or so. It hasn't been a priority like it was earlier (and like I am sure it will be again). It isn't that I tired of it, just that other things have been taking center stage in my life so yoga has been placed on the back burner.

Or has it? The lesson of yoga is patience, acceptance, detachment. And maybe the reason I haven't felt the familiar urge to get to a class is because these lessons have appeared in my life in other forms as of late. 

I am in the process of buying a house. Due to many items out of my control, it has been touch and go for 6 weeks now. One day I think I am closing and the next I am digging up a birth certificate (or P&L statement, or copies of deposited checks, or DNA sample, etc). Over and over this has happened. After a break down 2 days ago, I have finally gotten to the point that it is either detach from the emotion involved or get physically sick. I can no longer afford to be invested in the outcome. It is what it is, and my health is more important.

Besides detachment, the other yoga lesson this has tested me on is faith. Faith that I am exactly where I am supposed to be. I am a control freak and need to know things, like, where I will be living a week from now. I have Alex's daycare/school to take care of, my own work deadlines to plan moving around, getting a renter into my current house, etc. Living day to day is very difficult to a planner such as myself, but I am slowly learning I have to have Faith that things are unfolding how they will. That when my attention is not focused on tomorrow I can give more today. I need to release my grip on the future (easier said than done, but better at it now than a few weeks ago!).

Today I am having an exam covering everything I have been studying for the past month and a half. I showed up for a 7a flight (much needed vacation!) only to have it cancelled. I now have 10 more hours to chill in a cheap faux leather seat with locked arm rests that prevent stretching out. Looking around when the cancellation announcement was made, I realized how far I have come in my yoga lessons, even without physical practice. 

So instead of feeling guilty (like I did) for letting something "slack", recognize that if you still have more to learn on the lesson, it will find you. Might be in a different form, but it is still there. You just have to be willing to do a little homework.

Can't Forget To.......Look! A Pretty Bird!

If you're anything like me, then you have so much going on that sometimes "unimportant" thoughts have to take a back seat to something more immediate and pressing. The perfect example is my laundry. I am a horrible laundry person. I put the clothes in the washer and then I remember about them at the most inopportune times - such as sitting at a restaurant far from home, in the middle of a yoga class, or during a work meeting. The thought comes into my mind ("don't forget to switch the clothes to the dryer!") and then it goes out just as softly as it came. And there is no predicting when it will reappear (usually NOT when I am at home and able to actually accomplish the task).

I have found a system in the past year or so that has a lot of promise. So far, it has been better than setting timers and text alerts on my phone (which I still do, but don't need to rely as heavily on them now). I thought I would share it with you, just in case you have a similar issue.

So how do I remind myself of these little thoughts? I project them onto something I will see in the future directly before the task has to be accomplished. I know, it sounds strange, but hear me out.

This morning I needed to stop at CVS on the way home from yoga. The thought came into my head as I was laying on my mat before class began. I had been meaning to get to CVS for 3 days now but kept forgetting, so it was really important I remembered. Therefore, I turned to my technique. I pictured my drive home from yoga. At 12 Mile Rd there is a huge church I pass, so I mentally stamped the thought "go to CVS" onto it in my mind. I then continued on my drive and on the corner where I would usually go straight to go home but where I needed to turn to go to CVS, I again concentrated on that intersection while mantra-ing "turn and go to CVS". I did this over and over for about a minute or two. Then cleared my head and began to meditate, eventually moving into an amazing morning hot vinyasa class. By then, any thought of CVS had long since left my mind.

I get out of class and into my car and begin to drive home, the CVS thought still hidden. I drive a few miles and I see the church - boom! Into my head comes the thought "go to CVS". I just smile in wonder at how well it worked and start to go on a mental tangent on how cool that just was, letting the CVS thought slip out of my head again.

A mile later, I am at the intersection. My blinker goes on automatically. I think it is strange and then I remember "turn and go to CVS". My subconscious was a little quicker than my thinking brain, but it still worked regardless. I pulled into CVS - mission accomplished.

I use this pretty often lately and it works great. For instance, if I need to bring a few things I am likely to forget with me somewhere I will picture the door handle in my house and attach the thought "there should be 3 things in your hand" or something. Should be short and quick so it easily can be remembered. With the laundry, it will often be when I see my kitchen sink, since that is right next to the stairs to the basement. The reason I believe it works better than an external reminder, is that you are only going to trigger the thought when you are imminently close to where you need to be to do the task, so there isn't much time to forget again. For example, if I set a reminder on my phone to make Alex's lunch and I happen to be outside or in the middle of something when it goes off, I just shut it off and continue what I was doing - ultimately forgetting again. But if I picture making Alex's lunch when I see the fridge, I will already be right there in the kitchen and can quickly do it.

Now it isn't foolproof - I have often found myself driving towards a store just to forget in route and drive right past. But it is pretty amazing how well it works overall. If you need help remembering the little tasks, give it a try. Why not? Worst case, it doesn't work for you. Best case, it does :)

Invisible Reality

I think the hardest thing for people to accept about a yoga lifestyle is that most of the concepts they cannot see with their own eyes. We currently live in probably the most skeptical timeframe ever. Faith is at an all time low. Everything needs to be proven to every individual before they entertain the thought that it is real. Even then, many shrug it off as a coincidence or a trick. I am not judging, as I have been just as guilty as the rest of them on more than one occasion. Think about it - before the wireless Internet existed if someone told you information could be sent hundred of thousands of miles in microseconds through the air and arrive at the other end in tact, would you have believed them? Of course not. That's crazy talk. Information has had the ability to travel through the air since the Earth was born, but it wasn't until someone built devices that could both send and accept that information that we could see for ourselves this concept of something invisible traveling through air was, in fact, "real".

Luckily, I get reminders that some of the most powerful "real" things are invisible. In yoga, we believe in energy. Not the "I'm pooped, I have no energy" type of energy. Moreso the "energy as a tangible thing" type of energy. We talk about directing our energy inward towards a tight hip or outwards towards world peace. We send our energy places by just focusing on the receiver.  

I know, many of you are thinking I'm about to get all new-age on you. I don't mean to. But last week I realized just how much other peoples' energy affects me. I taught the same class twice last week - once to 12 people and then the next day to 37 people. The first class was good, but the second class was electric! Having so many bodies moving and breathing and generating energy, it became a palpable thing in the room. I could feel my own endorphins running wild, and walked out of the room with the same euphoric feeling as having just participated in (instead of taught) an intense yoga class. 

Thinking about it, my favorite classes to participate in are the packed ones. I complain (like everyone else) about being crammed into a sweaty smelly room so close to my neighbor that their sweat often flings onto me. But those are the classes I get the deepest workout. I keep my eyes closed through most of my practice so it isn't that I am watching the others in the room. That isn't why I have a better practice with a more crowded class. But I can feel the energy they are creating and using it to get deeper. Something in my body actually receives the energy they are generating. 

And if I can actually receive it, if it makes a noticeable difference in me, why is it so far-fetched that others could receive it? That if I really focus on someone who is sick, that my energy might not actually make it to them and give them strength? As a society, do we believe that human energy outside of our bodies doesn't exist at all? Or just that we can't direct it with our will? Or that it exists but there is nothing on the receiving end so it just floats up to space? I am just curious why everyone dismisses the idea of human-generated energy  (no matter if it is generated by the body or the mind as thoughts) as capable of making changes to the world around them. Just because it isn't a hammer we can see and touch, doesn't make its impact any less "real". What would need to happen for people to believe that their energy can actually change the world around them?

Just curious.

Thank You, NY Times!

Yoga has taken some pretty hard hits in the press lately. Last month The New York Times published an article entitled How Yoga Can Wreck Your Body. Now today I opened my email to their newest hatchet job Yoga and Sex Scandals: No Surprise Here.

The yoga community has been rising up against these articles, ruffling their feathers, preparing to fight. But honestly, I think that is the wrong reaction. I am thrilled! Last year, my yoga RSS feeds hibernated for months at a time. 2012 has woken them up with story after story of this glorious practice.

I don't agree with the content of the above stories, but I love that they exist for a few reasons.

First, to the mainstream world, yoga has had this clouded mystical mystery surrounding it. Articles like above bring to light that yogi's are, in fact, human. They make mistakes. They, too, get drunk when given too much power, much like members of our political system. It makes yoga more accessible, that you can be flawed and still practice.

Second, yoga has been touted as a "cure all." The only articles you saw before were ones where miracles have happened. How yoga has swooped into someone's life and now they have the perfect life. They are off of their diabetes medication, they are able to walk again, they became one with the universe. But much like a 3am infomercial, when something is made to sound too good to be true, people often believe it is. Over and over yoga articles keep pushing the positives down everyone's throat, to the point they stop listening. But throwing in some humbleness, showing some cracks in the yoga armor? Well now it's a whole different story. People may start to feel less of the hard sell and more like they are getting real facts all around. Yoga may pique the interest of a whole new audience, those who started listening again ("Wait, yoga makes sex better? I need to try this for myself!").

Lastly, I think the fact The New York Times feels yoga can sell magazines is huge. Sort of like when a celebrity starts to grace the cover of tabloids it is a sign they have made it. The New York Times would not spend this much precious space if no one was interested in yoga. So to me, them publishing multiple stories in two months is a great sign that yoga is crossing over into the mainstream.

Personally, I have seen the many benefits of yoga and how amazing it can be. But if you're not open to it, it has zero benefits. Yoga is about balance, and these "negative" stories are just balancing the pot a bit so maybe more people will get inquisitive to give it a try themselves. And if that's the case, I say go for it!