In The News (Namaste Y'all Interview)

Namaste Y'all Interview 

Why I do what I do.......

Origin Magazine Articles By Me: Confessions of An Imperfectly Perfect Yogini

 Confessions Of An Imperfectly Perfect Yogini

Confessions Article: Anxiety

Rebirth and Renewel: Sa Ta Na Ma

My blog has been neglected, but this is my personal space and it misses me, or rather, I miss it. After writing the last entry in September, I ended up going through some shifts in my life, wringing me out and catapulting me so far and so quickly I feel I've lived many lifetimes since. 
 
Today is Easter and I found myself in some nostalgic moments, beginning last night when my son refused to decorate eggs with us (sniff) and then this morning when some music from my college days came blaring through my speakers reminding me of those days I lived for everyone else's vision of who I should be.  How I have changed since then and how many more (sniffs) will I have as I watch my children grow and change.
Easter and Spring encourage the feelings of optimism, inspiration, and growth.  For growth to occur, change must take place, when something changes, something else must cease to exist as we know it.  We often fear change, but without change, we aren’t living. 
 
It’s simple to grasp concrete objects such as eggs bringing forth new life or seeds manifesting new growth and even still, the birth or death of an animal or human being, but what about those things we cannot see, but feel? The cycle of life consists of many deaths and rebirths within a single incarnation as life brings us experiences.
In this life I have lived many and the person I was  just 5 years ago, while at the soul level is still the same, I am now someone I could have never imagined myself “growing” into. The growth I have experienced came from the death of dreams I had with tumultuous relationships, failed goals, and embarrassing mistakes. At the time the pain and suffering of these events were not welcome, but now I view these things as the fuel behind the person I am today and I love who I am today even more because I went through all of these things and never lost the sense of my truest essence.
 
While I have experienced and continue to experience many deaths and rebirths, the most notable came for me when I was married and then divorced within two years. Madly in-love, I married a man when I was in my early 20’s who was an emotionally abusive addict, someone suffering on such a deep level that it brought out every part of me that had been suffering silently from past trauma for years. I never knew I could be so hateful, fearful, and desperate.   He isolated me from my family and friends the best he could, literally telling me to run from him, yet leaving me no way out. I remember one early morning, after one of his drunken episodes and night out with other women, I had locked myself in the bathroom, afraid of what he might do, having already thrown up from his insults, when I realized I was either going to die or this stage of my life had to be over. No matter how much he was suffering, I could not complete this cycle of karma for him or myself if I stayed.  It was time for this dream to die and a new life to be born and so it began. It was a painful death, but one that eventually led me to where I am today. The people I know, the career I have, my current husband and children, I experience because I moved to Texas when I married him. What a wonderful gift he gave me.  From the birth and eventual death of that marriage, came many births and deaths, and more continue still and for each of them I am grateful.
 
As I watch people go through this cycle I realize how necessary it is and I hope they may be as blessed as I have been in understanding it is all a part of our growth process. Life is not made better up on the mountain top, but in the deep valleys where we have the choice to either give up or come face to face with our true grit and move on to that next chapter.
 
One of the first Chants I ever practiced is Sa Ta Na Ma.  The Sa Ta Na Ma Kriya Meditation is used to embrace and celebrate the cycle of Life, Death, Birth, and Rebirth. When we can accept and embrace that change is the only constant and that we are here to evolve and grow, each death we experience becomes a little less painful than the last and each birth comes a little bit easier than the one before.

Sa Ta Na Ma: The Five Primal Sounds
Each Sound Evokes a Feeling:
Sa: Expansion
Ta: Transformation
Na: Universal Love
Ma: Communicativeness

Each Sound Represents The Eternal Cycle of Life:

Sa: Birth
Ta: Life
Na: Death
Ma: Rebirth

For Each Sound You Use a Hand Mudra:
Sa: Thumb to Index  Finger = Gyan Mudra
Ta: Thumb to Middle Finger = Akash Mudra
Na: Thumb to Ring Finger = Prithvi Mudra     
Ma: Thumb to Pinky Finger= Varun Mudra

The Meditation Practice:
Yogi Bhajan once said that if there is any meditation you practice, let this be the one.
Combine each mudra with it’s sound repeating each 3 times out loud, 3 times whispering, 3 times silently, 3 times whispering, 3 times out loud. As you progress, you may then practice this for 11 minutes, then work towards 31!

Embrace the Cycle!

Changing My View

 

When the same situations that cause us suffering occur again and again and we have exhausted all options of changing these types of situations with our current view and/or methods, the only thing to do is change our view and quite possibly, set ourselves free.

I have been a grasper, a person afraid of abandonment, and a dependent on outside appreciation to feel self worth. I have held fast to my ideals, believing my way is the "right" way because I come from love with well wishes for the greater good. I have made others wrong, so I could be right. I have tried helping others, but in some cases have only held them back with my intrusion, not trusting in the natural flow of the Universe.  Each and every time, I have been the cause of my own suffering.

I am making a vow to change my view and have been prescribed by my teacher to meditate more, retreat a couple of times per year, and learn to let go and let flow, narrowing the gap of no return on my negative emotions. To do this, means I will have more energy to do what I love most in the world, which is help people.

Of course, I knew all of this all long; I just needed to hit a personal bottom so the magic could begin to happen. I am now ready to do the work. 

When people see some things as beautiful,

other things become ugly.

When people see some things as good,

other things become bad.

Being and non-being create each other.

Difficult and easy support each other.

Long and short define each other.

High and low depend on each other.

Before and after follow each other.

Therefore the Master

acts without doing anything

and teaches without saying anything.

Things arise and she lets them come;

things disappear and she lets them go.

She has but doesn't possess,

acts but doesn't expect.

When her work is done, she forgets it.

That is why it lasts forever. ~Tao Te Ching

My Breathe into Recovery Article Published

 Yay! Woohoo! Yeehaw!

I can now add "published author" to my resume. I am now more motivated than ever to share my love for yoga through writing.

The following link is to the article I wrote about a program I put together several years ago.  I have trained teachers in this method and enjoy hearing the feedback of those it has touched in some way.

Breathe Into Recovery Article on Yoga Sanga

*pats self on back and checks off goal on bucket list*

Unnecessary Grizzle & Kick Abouts

Just In case you are vocabulary challenged like I am, grizzle and kick about are just fancy names for whining and complaining.

Ironically, I have a complaint or rather an observation.

While I assumed my second trip to India would be as spiritually sound and inspirational as the first one I experienced, I certainly did not expect the result to be what it has manifested itself into. Before I left for India, I was informed by my Reiki Master and Intuitive that my trip to India would not go as planned, that I should not become upset, as we would be exactly where we needed to be in order to cultivate greater compassion. As predicted,  before we ever left for the pilgrimage, things were not running smoothly. From the beginning things were a struggle, why with lost and incorrect identification, to canceled flights, to 1,000 degree heat, to pre-monsoon floods that kept us parked on a six lane highway (which was supposed to be three lanes, but the divider lines on the road mean nothing in India) for hours, to the Bharat Bandh which closed down shops (it was okay, we were out of money anyway, but it kept us hunkered down in our hotel room for a couple of days), and on it went. The entire time I stopped myself from becoming upset and used humor to get through with a positive attitude (when really, I could have just cried so many times). Where was the peace and calm and spiritual advancement I was seeking? Turns out, it was everywhere, even in the most unlikely of places. Growth opportunities are always everywhere, we just don't take the time to see them.

I have this theory that we don't see obstacles as opportunities for growth because we are addicted to being miserable because we, inside, are miserable. Don't you wish all of the "things" we accumulate and work so diligently for could reach out, hug us, and tell us we are perfect just as we are? Things don't do that, so things don't make us happy. We have to make ourselves happy. I am suddenly reminded of this song:



What each of these "obstacles" did for me, was open my eyes and heart to even greater  compassion by looking into the eyes and heart of the everyday Indian people. With these many unplanned chains of events, we were face to face with the poverty (lack of "things") of India, the newspapers, the news on TV, you know, real life sort of stuff, not the hanging out in the Ashram drinking chai tea, practicing yoga, and chanting sort of life I had experience during my first visit in 2007.

Early on in our journey I began watching, making eye contact, being with those who were begging for survival with a smile on their faces. I began listening through the peacefully chaotic sounds of the streets, hearing clearly the joyful singing among the people. The struggle is evident there, but there is an acceptance there also. This is not like Western societies where everything is clean and anything is possible and our accumulation of "things" is the goal.  Sure we have people who struggle in the west and I do believe we need to do a better job of taking care of each other, but what is different, is that the people who do have "it all" aren't happy. So many who have it all are miserable because they have looked for happiness outside of themselves (I know I have and still do sometimes). Furthermore, there is no acceptance because we don't accept others because we are too busy not accepting ourselves.  It really is as simple and as sad as that.

So, I'm not sure where to start, except with myself. I know that I have become more aware of my tendency to complain over silly little things and when I hear people around me do it I want to say,"Look how blessed you are!" It's not easy, we all have our stuff and we all have days nothing goes the way we think it should, but maybe we just aren't looking at things as they truly are? Maybe we need to save our complaints for things that really matter or count our blessings and help those who are struggling through experiences many of us will never know, like the death of a child or a life-threatening illness? Perhaps we can re-direct the energy we use up focusing on "lack" and take action by using the gifts we have in abundance? Helping others is a wonderful way to fill ourselves up along the way.  In any case, we all have bad days and need a friend or two to vent to, but most of us have it pretty good (even with our painful experiences or growing pains).

I have no great insight, no one to quote this time, but I do have this video:

Feeling Significant?

Recently a friend asked me,"Do you feel significant?" I was surprised by her question and she was equally surprised by my answer. "Of course I feel significant, I only feel sad when other people do not accept that my love for them is real," I said.  In this moment I realized just how blessed I am as a human being to feel good about who I am in spite of the things I consider less than appealing about myself. What a blessing it is I treat myself with compassion. While I feel significant, I don't feel any more significant than the next person. All of us have our gifts, our talents, our weaknesses, our light, and our dark. All of us make this world interesting. All of us are other people's teachers. All of us are in this together, or at least we should be.

After I was asked this question, I came across this quote by the Dalai Lama and it struck me as the truth and as the possible solution to this "lack of feeling significant" issue.

"Recently I met a group of scientists in America who said that the rate of mental illness in their country was quite high-around twelve percent of the population. It became clear during our discussion that the main cause of depression was not a lack of material necessities but a deprivation of the affection of the others."

I try diligently to express my love for all beings, even strangers, as often as possible and it's not always easy. Over time I have learned that many people reject my kindness/love because they are suspicious, as I MUST want something in return, or I can't possibly have compassion for everyone. I have also had people turn on me after I have made a perceived mistake (often never really knowing what that mistake was), leaving me devastated, not understanding why they would not accept my kindness/love/compassion as true. My spiritual teacher once told me that people who do not love themselves and who are not kind to themselves can not possibly see this virtue in others. As "they" say, it's rarely ever about you, it is about that person and where they are on their own personal journey.

Then I found this quote that helped me understand why people so easily reject or mistrust those who are kind and who are open to love and compassion:

“It is lack of love for ourselves that inhibits our compassion toward others. If we make friends with ourselves, then there is no obstacle to opening our hearts and minds to others.” ~Author Unknown

Compassion is the desire to help ease other living beings suffering. Compassion for all beings can be developed, but first, it must be embraced from within. For many who have not been shown compassion or who do not believe it exists, this is truly a task to take on.

I leave on Sunday for Northern India for two weeks. The last time I went to India, I felt inspired to create a space to help people heal and that space was a yoga studio. On this next journey, I am not certain what ideas I may walk away with, but this land is the perfect opportunity for me to feed myself so that I may come back practicing even more compassion in my community.


Here is a link to the blog I wrote after my last trip.

Until I Return,

May all sentient beings have equanimity, free from attachment, aggression and prejudice.
May they be happy, and have the causes for happiness.
May they be free from suffering and causes for suffering.
May they never be separated from the happiness that is free from suffering.

Namaste'