playtime

Do you know what we did in yoga class this afternoon?

We laughed. We laughed so much we were all crying.

Sometimes in yoga we deal with "serious" issues. That's to say, we deal with an exploration of ourselves, of our emotions. We learn to feel complete despite our "imperfections." We learn to survive, in a sense. Think about it... for some of us, yoga is what's helped us get past some serious mental ordeals!

And so for me, it's a truth that I take yoga seriously. Besides that self exploration and awareness that has been so essential to my health, my dedication to my practice and desire to teach have lead me to be a pretty serious yogini. It's safe to say that yoga means a lot to me and I am certainly no fairweather fan.

Of course, I have fun in class. Everyday I enjoy myself, otherwise I wouldn't keep coming back. But today, I was gently reminded that yoga is not always meant to be so serious. In fact, it is just as playful as it is introverted!

Incidentally, my plan today was not to go to the lunchtime class, but something came up and I decided to attend that class instead of my normal, Friday night class. As soon as I sat down on my mat and started to center myself, I just knew that my change in plans was so perfect and the afternoon class was where I was meant to be. I didn't know why, or how, but I knew that I was exactly where I was supposed to be and that something good was going to happen while I was there.

It began by class getting a late start because those of us there, and the instructor, were a bunch of Chatty Cathies. And then we all came to a group decision (there were only 3 of us in class besides our instructor) that we'd work on some inversions. So when the time came we all started playing with forearm stand and the like. And at that point it ceased to be a stereotypical yoga class. Instead we were all talking, and trying things out and asking questions. We'd stop and listen as we gained education about the intricacies of our bodies and our poses. We were learning together and experimenting. We do this in all of our classes, to an extent, I think, but today was different. Truly the only word I could use to describe this today was "playful." We were playing! I haven't felt like that since I was a little kid!

It felt so freeing to just throw everything out there and feel absolutely no regret or embarassment if something didn't work. We were giggling and sometimes toppling over and then maybe we'd get it and we'd be cheering a little too. It was so fun. And the laughter.... If you could've experienced the laughter with us... Red faced and tears in our eyes. Absolutely, the lightest hearts in the midwest were sitting in EYC West today.

At one point I remember being overwhelmed with gratitude. This is my life. How lucky am I that I am making a living (or will be someday!) playing?! Incredibly so.

It was also nice to have that little reminder that, yes... yoga can bring is to deal with serious issues, but also, at the end of the day, yoga is simply fun and playful. It's about playing and exploring and being curious and just trying, completely unattached to the results.

Friends, I believe I tasted Freedom today.

Tree. Friend.

I went to Wesselman's Wildlife Nature Preserve this morning to enjoy the weather and ground myself just a little. As I was walking, I thought to myself, "Everything is still dead. It will be so pretty when things are in bloom again." I looked down and saw this.

Touchée, Mother Nature. Touchée. Nothing is dead. Everything is alive and blooming and beautiful in it's rarity right now.

Further along the walking trail, I came across this section of a tree trunk laying on the ground. I was drawn to him for whatever reason. I got this feeling that I might have known him. So we sat together, quitely for a while. We shared our stories. I told him mine and he told me his. I realized they were the same.

I put my hands on him and I felt the pulse of my energy, of his energy and of life energy. All at once, there was no difference in these energies. We were the same, one pulse beating in time.

I left my friend there, in the woods, and as I walked away I wondered if we'd ever meet again or if our acquaintance was one that was not meant to be repeated. Like many other questions in this life, I don't have the answer and that is okay. I found joy in having known him for a short time. And that is enough.

i have the power

i just taught my third yoga class ever in life. it was a great morning class with 3 students, one of them totally new to the studio, but not new to yoga. my first two classes went perfectly fine. but there was something about this class today, that, as i was going through the asanas, i just felt this vibe. i remember thinking, "man, this is a good class." i thought it could've just been me, but i was feeling an energy. i felt like we were all getting a challenge, building heat, doing good things and doing them together.

then, at the end of class, as everyone was settling back into seated postures and i was preparing to read a thought for the day, i met eyes with one of the girls in the class. at that moment, the realization that it wasn't just me that had felt that vibe. afterwards, she came up to me and said, "that was just the best class!" and then proceeded to list all the things that she thought were interesting, different and that she had enjoyed.

i know this is partly ego driven, but my heart has swollen to ten times its original size. (think, "they like me, they really like me!") but another part of why this makes me so, so rapturous is the reason why i wanted to teach yoga in the first place. i have said before that if i could just make one person feel for a fraction of a second what i have felt from doing yoga, then i would have done the greatest good and completed my purpose. three classes in and it seems to have happened! i am so filled with love for yoga and for the students and for everything right now. this is why i'm sharing yoga. to know that i have the ability to open people up to that feeling, to be able to guide them to that feeling... it is miraculous.

i am so fulfilled. i certainly enjoyed the compliment but more than anything, i feel as though i've never given so much back to the world, the universe, life as i am giving right now and it. feels. good. giving joy, giving optimism, giving an open mind... when before i only thought i had the power, i know now i do have the power. just like knowing that there is peace inside of me, that there is strength, that there is radical self-acceptance, there is this ability too. all i have to do is call upon it, share it, send it outward.

it feels to me as though this is the culmination of all the inner work i have done (and continue to do). finally, i have done enough work that i may shine my light outward. i never would've imagined that shining it outward would feel so, so wonderful.

this is a good day.

twitter can't support this kind of update

I've got a little down time tonight so I thought I'd take the opportunity to fill my pals in on the latest Jenny-related news.

This past weekend was the retreat in New Harmony, "Stressed Out to Blessed Out," hosted by one of my most respected yoga instructors, Stacey Shanks, and the wonderful and amazing (did I mention Martha Beck certified life coach) Susan Hyatt. I spent the weekend with these 2 women as well as 10 others and we talked about making our lives everything they deserved to be, replacing our negative thoughts with positive ones; we did yoga; we made art with the help of the fantastic Laura Mitchell and we got massages from the magnificent Joy Timmons. It was a truly inspiring and empowering weekend and it was exactly what I needed.

I was given the opportunity to sit down and really think about how to take on my goals for my life and make them less dream, more reality. I'm very happy with the outcome and I'd like to share it with you all.

Obviously, my main goal is to be able to support myself solely by teaching yoga. What I hadn't thought about was taking my yoga outside of the studio. Absolutely, studio teaching is something I want to do, I love a good, physical class and I love the community we have at EYC, but with the help of Susan, I was able to begin thinking outside of the box. She asked me, who would I most like to offer yoga to, if I could offer it to absolutely anyone. It was about then that I knew: I need to reach out to girls who have been affected by body image issues and eating disorders. Suddenly the reason for that period of my life became clear. (Incidentally, this became even more clear to me today when I went hiking with my friend Beth, who is also a yoga teacher, and we were talking about our similar experiences and I mentioned to her that I sometimes felt like a "fraud" with my ED because I didn't have it nearly as bad as other girls- and guys - do. Because I was able to catch myself before it had gone too far, because I had an easier recovery, I thought I was just lucky. The more I think about it though, the more I have come to realize that my struggle was just enough for me to be given the tools to go out into the world and help girls in the same position as I was.)

I have already taken some steps in the direction of making this happen and will continue to do so. I want to help people, through yoga, who need to reestablish their mind-body connection. I want to host classes and I want to host retreats. This is also the reason I established my new blog, Off the Beaten Mat (which, by the way, has it's first official, new post up at this time). I post a lot of my blogs on the Yoga Journal community page as well and have gotten some very affirming feedback from the people there. By way of my blog, I hope to be able to shed some light on the mental transformations that we experience when we practice yoga.

Those are my next moves "career"wise/ business wise. I am convinced I can turn these ideas into something great, something needed and useful in Evansville.

Also, March 7th is my first official day as a yoga instructor. Chris has given me the Saturday morning class on the East side of town. I'm also substitute teaching for her and Stacey several times in March and tomorrow I'm giving a private session to one of my Starbucks coworkers, trying to help her in her efforts to quit smoking, so I will be getting lots of teaching time in! There has also been mention of organizing and co-hosting a couple of workshops and/or retreats at the studio. All of this plus I'm still doing the Starbucks/Hallmark thing and trying to fit in time for a new hobby: hiking.

It's a busy life down here in Indiana, but I'll tell you what, it's exactly the life I've always wanted for myself.

stretch and strengthen

A lot of things about me have changed since I began doing yoga at EYC about 6 months ago. Physically and mentally, I am a stronger person than I have ever been. I am more forgiving to myself, am quicker to recognize hurtful thought patterns and have a progressively easier time reminding myself about that which is my Truth.

I have stretched and strengthened more than muscles, but also my mind. I am more open to new ideas than I have ever been. It's been years since I said with any morsel of true faith that I believe in a higher power and now I say it proudly and, what's more, I feel it with all of my being. I have developed more than just physical flexibility. Now I find it easier to adapt to changing situations, to get in where I fit in, to deal with situations as they occur rather than ignoring them and fighting with the emotions they bring up.

But perhaps one of the most remarkable changes in myself that I noticed was the stretching and strengthening of my compassion towards others. I was known in the past as a very sarcastic person. I've got it in me to be condescending and stuck up. I spent a lot of time with a "holier-than-thou" mentality. But two things happened to begin changing this in me. (It's still in the process too-- don't be mistaken and think that I'm saying I'm Mother Theresa over here. In fact, the reason I'm writing about this now is because of recent struggles with compassion.) The first was my yoga practice. The second is thanks to the novels by the YA author and beloved Nerdfighter, John Green, who themes his works around the idea of imagining other people as complex beings and not just props and scenery outside of ourselves. As I got deeper into it and began to understand more about the energies flowing throughout the earth and the power of love and gratitude and kindness, I softened. During our asana practice, it's important to be soft in all of our poses. Even if it's a powerful pose and takes concentration and strength and we feel ourselves tighten on that edge, we must find the softness. And so did my heart find that softness. I found myself considering the feelings of others more. I became more aware of how what I said or did may have the power to either help or harm someone and I gradually, and unconsciously, began straying from the behaviors that may hurt others.

For instance, without meaning to, I began cursing less. Me. Who loved to throw out the F-bombs and other powerful, almost pornographic words with astonishing frequency. Also without knowingly doing so, I gradually left my sarcastic nature behind me. It didn't give me anything to feel good about to be insulting or belittling to others. Then I started noticing a pang of guilt when I said something judgemental about someone. This has become something that I am making a conscious effort to control. (Also, let me say that it's not that I've become uptight. There's good-natured ribbing and joking with friends and then there's the behaviors that I was engaging in. They're totally different and it's the latter that I am trying to more fully release.)

The more I've come to understand ideas of interconnectedness and unity of life, I've realized that these negative behaviors hurt me too. When we consider that we are one, everything is part of the same whole, and I am hurtful to another, then I am hurtful to myself. I am more fulfilled when I honor others and respect them.

Lately I have felt that I haven't been so true to these ideals as I should like to be. I've consciously engaged in negative behaviors and sent forth negative thoughts to others simply because that is what the company by which I was surrounded was doing. I took their cue. My mind and my mouth were saying two different things. My mouth uttered negativities and my mind watched in silent disgust. And I felt badly because I knew that the things I said were not me. I am not that person any longer.

Thus, I've got a new yoga practice to work on right now. I am going to continue to stretch and strengthen my compassion towards others and remain true to myself, for mine is a quest for truth, peace and honor.

The Flip Side of the Coin

You know... chakra work and meditation sure are two bittersweet things in life. The whole idea of opening up and releasing attachments can be so good for you. But I discovered today that sometimes you can open up and you can let go and once you've done that, you really see what's left. Sometimes in your practice you finally let go, more than you ever have before and you see what all those attachments were attempting to hide, what feelings they were trying to protect you from. And sometimes it catches you off guard. Sometimes meditation doesn't make you feel like you're sleeping on a bed of roses.

I don't mean to be melodramatic or sing the blues. I'm really just in shock, the same way I always am when chakra work/meditation makes me feel euphoric. Between circumstances surrounding the last week and the meditation-yoga combo I worked through at home today, I'm seeing a clearer picture of the methods I've invented to protect myself from vulnerability and rejection-- methods that are generally fall in the "isolationist" category. It's hard to be hurt by others when you remove yourself from their presence. It's equally hard to feel the essential human connection using that same tactic. It's that pattern, again, of me turning inside so much and so often that I stop reaching out. The only thing that's changed is that it's just getting easier for me to see it.

I have a hard time blogging when I'm in this kind of a mood because I don't like to let other people see that I'm vulnerable, that I make mistakes. It's hard to admit that I get scared. It's hard to admit to myself that I get scared of yoga because of how much more clearly I can see me, and see the things I've tried for so long to ignore. It's hard to admit that I am not enough, that I need others and that I need proximity to others. But here I am, admitting it even though I don't want to and posting this blog even though I don't want to.

This is not a blog of hopelessness, though, hear you me. This is a blog of confronting the skeletons in my closet. I see them, I recognize them.

Now it's time to start clearing them out.

What I Bring to the Mat and Christmas,t oo.

So, I was taking a jaunt around Yoga Journal's Community page as I do more and more often these days (it's like facebook but for yogis, don't ya know!) and I happened upon someone who posted a blog about what he brings to his yoga mat each day. It was really moving to read and I think that it's definitely something we all ought to think about for ourselves.

What do we, individually as yogis and yoginis, bring to the mat? Yes, yoga is about union and about letting go of the ego, but like we say and I've said before, it has to start within. So I think it's important for all of us yogis to highlight what it is that we bring to the mat, to our practice, to our community. I think it would be neat if this started a chain (and we can all credit sat-nam for being the inspiration). In that spirit, I'm going to go ahead and go next:

When I step on my mat, I bring with me a girl who is only beginning to learn and live life. I bring a girl who is healing from mental wounds, self-inflicted. I bring a girl who was lost in the world and who punished herself for it. I bring fear. But I bring courage, too. I bring a yearning and willingness to let go of the past. I bring a girl who has only begun to taste true freedom. I bring a girl who knows deep down that she is beautiful and worthy of the good in life. I bring persistence in my quest. I bring a girl who is resolved to never give up on herself again.

I bring intellect, thoughtfulness and insight. I bring a mind that has faith in a power outside myself and longs to be united with it. I bring a heart that continues to open. I bring a desire for peace, inside myself and out. I bring compassion.

On my mat, I am a student of life who is no longer reluctant. I am inquisitive. I ask for help when help is needed. I am a girl who is learning to release her pride. My mind and heart are sponges. I am a leader too. I bring a dream of helping others like me to find peace. I bring a message to everyone so they may know they deserve peace.

I express myself with the suppleness that comes from youth and am grateful for the opportunity to grow and mature. I begin to express myself without fear. I learn to stay true to myself. I bring awe inspired by the beauty of life. I bring appreciation for my fellow yogis and yoginis. I relish in the energy we create.

And I try with my whole being to bring mindfulness to my mat. To live in this moment and to know that this moment is perfect. I bring the gentle reminder that there is no fight to survive. Everything is as it should be in this very moment and so everything is perfect. I bring an inner light that glows brighter the longer I practice and reaches out to the world.

When I come to my mat and I sit down, I imagine myself as a child sitting down for story time. I am the Earth's child, eager to hear Her story and beside myself with joy to learn that I, that we, are Her story.

When I am on my mat, and I am in this place in me, and you are in this place in you, we are one. When I come to my mat, I cease to exist as an individual and I am home.

Namaste.

~~~~~~~~~~~


So there was that. I'm separating that from this bottom bit because the top part was really for my YJ Blog, but I thought I'd share it here too.

In other news... You ought to have seen the look on my mom's face when I asked her if we could all go to Midnight Mass tonight. It's very un-me to want to do anything related to organized religion, but as I was driving in from Evansville and I was listening to one of my favorite religious Christmas songs ("Mary's Boychild," if you cared to know...), I got a nudge from outside myself to attend Midnight Mass. In my quest to reach the Energy outside of myself, I understood from this sudden urge that if I keep my heart open to it, this is the right place for me to be tonight. Where better to go to honor peace and love in this world? Maybe Catholicism has ceased to be the way for me, but I feel on this Christmas eve that there is a phenomenal energy buzzing through the land and I need to be there for it.

Fear- the extended version

So today I had a lot of pent up energy and I felt a little scattered and spastic. Then when I was at yoga, laying in relaxation after our practice and it hit me what that energy was that was coursing through my veins: fear.

I don't have a lot of deep revelations about fear or anything really insightful to say about it. I actually just want to air my fears. I'm looking at it this way: I'm going to lay them out there, say them to you, say them to myself and then I'm going to practice letting go of them. I'm going to practice confidence in myself and I'm going to practice trust in myself. I was laying there at the end of class today, trying my best and, I'll admit, struggling to relax and let idle thoughts pass me by, recognizing them with out judgment and just letting them go right out of my mind again, to be attended to later. Somewhere in there it dawned on me that of all the people in all the world, it often happens that I am the person I trust the least. Sometimes when I am about to embark on a new journey and a new experience, before the time comes to take action, I will doubt myself and my abilities. Sometimes I don't trust that I can be a leader.

Okay, I'll stop being ambiguous. The time for me to begin teaching yoga is drawing nigh and I'm scared. I did a home practice recently and while it was good and fine... it didn't feel the same as when I'm being led by a teacher. When you go to a yoga class, you do the yoga that is right for you but in the style of the teacher. I was at home and it occurred to me that I don't know what my personal yoga style is. So I'm slowly discovering it; I won't fully know until I do more practices on my own. It's exciting, absolutely, but it's also scary. It's like starting all over from the beginning. So then I got nervous about leading a class when I'm not even sure what my style is. And what if my style doesn't suit the students? What if people leave my class without a feeling of satisfaction and fulfillment? How can I possibly ever be as effective a teacher as the ones I look up to so much?

You see where this is/was going? I say is/was because in relaxation tonight I felt a release. I still need to really, really, really let go of these fears. I must practice with resolve my ability to recognize that I am not those fears and they will not rule me. Recognizing the source of my feelings and my fears today felt like the first huge leap to letting them go. My yoga is a budding lotus flower. It is growing and blossoming. With practice and time, I will become comfortable in my style. It might be different than what people at our studio are used to. I'm not Chris. I'm not Andrew. No one expects me to be them. Yoga is inherently "perfect," when practiced mindfully and with intent, it can never be wrong. In such a way, we will always receive something we need in each of our practices.

Also, I need to take the teachers off the pedestal I've put them on. They have opened their arms to me as a peer. The saying goes that it is only when we achieve non-attachment that we are free and equal. So then, only by detaching myself from the notion that these people are somehow greater than me (physically, spiritually, emotionally), can I become their equal. It's so simple yet I continue to see this theme and a struggle in my life. (Who doesn't though, really?)

I'm beginning to see this pattern of fear and lack of confidence and trust in myself and am becoming familiar with what brings it to the forefront. In savasana tonight, after my little revelation, the first thing I did was affirm myself. It's the jumping off point here, really. I know I'm strong and ambitious and dedicated to this and when I pause, breath and envision myself as a yoga teacher, deep inside of me I feel the truth and I know my capability. I have astounding potential inside of me.

The same goes not just for me, but for all of us. For all of us who suffer at the hands of our fears. So let's all practice together. Let's let go. Let's release our fears. Let's rise up above our egos.

Let's all be the blossoming lotus and most certainly let us remember how this flower is beautiful in all stages of its growth.

On Being Who I Am

Yesterday traffic in Evansville was awful. A drive that normally takes me 8 minutes took 20. It was quite possibly one of the most annoying experiences in my life. So there I was in my car, fuming slightly and talking to myself road-rage style: Not sure why the guy in front of me was such a huge jerk and had to leave so very many car lengths between himself and the car and the one in front of him. Pretty miffed about the fact that only 2 or 3 cars were making it through stop lights because the idiots making left hand turns were running red lights. You know... the usual. And then, after a while of this (I mean, relatively speaking, I was in the car for a long time...), the thought occurred to me that I was sitting in my car, headed back to my apartment to do yoga, thinking bad thoughts about people. In that instant, I felt like a fraud. When I go to yoga, and when I meditate, I create an atmosphere inside myself of peace, quiet and love and I feel good about myself, sending love outwards to others. Yet here I was, settling into my frustration and allowing it to envelope me. I didn't feel very true to the yogini in me at that moment. It made me feel... well... bad.

Tonight at yoga class, true to form, Andrew hit the nail right on the head with his intuitiveness. (I'll leave my theories about his unique abilities to read my mind for another day.) At the end of class he said this: "Remember when you're outside of here that you are the same person as you are in this quiet place on your mat." He went on noting that when we get frustrated or impatient or angry in public, it's important to come back to our breath and remember who we are when we're in that place. (Seriously... Andrew just plain freaks me out sometimes...)

The point is, we are calm, loving, peaceful people. When we come to the studio, we make it a point to leave our baggage at the door. I'm realizing now the importance of carrying my yoga practice outside the studio and not leaving it on my mat. The outside needs the work of the inside to function properly.

So we arrive at my new goal: to carry my yoga practice with me outside of the studio, and off of my meditation mat. To remember that I am the same person in both circumstances. I cultivate peace and love. I breath in strength in the midst of a challenge. I let go of attachment to ideas.

I am a yogini.

Campaign of Gratitude: Day 4 aka Gratitude Vomit

Today, I'm thankful for... well... today.

I'm thankful for a really fantastic morning yoga class that I really feel brought me in to spiritual alignment with this Thanksgiving day. I'm thankful for the energy of love and compassion and gratitude that resides in my Sangha and thus, resides in me.

I'm thankful that my kitten has little ways of showing me she loves me and that she misses me when I'm not home.

I'm thankful for a my 30% employee discount at Starbucks. I'm VERY thankful for Starbucks Lemon Loaf. I'm EXTREMELY thankful for triple shot lattes.

I'm thankful I made it to St. Louis safely. I'm thankful gas is even cheaper here than in Evansville. (Although I'll save my concerns about what deflation does for those of us paying back any sort of loan for a day that I'm not supposed to be giving thanks...) I'm thankful for getting to do 2 loads of FREE (to me) laundry.

I'm thankful for a kitchen full to the brim of delicious food today, when, for so many others in the world, today is just another day they are hungry. (Wow... all of a sudden I don't feel right about my impending over indulgence...)

I'm thankful to have gotten to spend a portion of this day with my Sangha, for getting to next spend a portion of this day with my family and more still, for getting to spend a portion of this day with my best friend.

I'm thankful to have so very many things to be thankful for when the day is barely half over.

I'm not just living dharma today, I'm living luck.

i begin to wonder

Sometimes I go to yoga class and I really can't help but wonder. Sometimes I have something really pressing on my mind and Chris' closing zen phrase will seem to address me directly, as though she knew. Sometimes I build my intention mentally before class and that night's instructor will ask as a class that we build that very same intention on our mats for that practice. Sometimes I can't help but wonder what it is... How, how, HOW is it always seeming to be in tune with exactly what is going on in my mind? Tonight, our teacher was Mark, who hasn't been to instruct us in 5 weeks. Just last week I realized that my upper body strength was improving vastly. No... I still can't do a push up, but I realized I can lower myself with impressive (to me) control, leading with my chest instead of my hips and... what's more... I can hover. I can hover. I can hold myself an inch off the floor for about 10 seconds without struggling. Wow, I never thought I'd see the day.

Anyway... sure enough, Mark walks in class tonight and almost as though he knew I was mentally tooting my own horn about my great arms... he humbled me. Not with spite, obviously. And not in a way that made me think, "Oh, I'm not so strong as I thought after all." There was no mental frowning. He humbled me but he gave me confidence. He worked my arms. He let them show themselves off (again, only to myself) but he also seemed to let them know that they certainly aren't done. I'm digressing, but it was exciting. It was like my arms were getting a chance to be excited about the adventure that lay before them. Lucky for me Mark will be teaching the next 2 Tuesdays, so they'll probably get some more action, those arms.

The point is... I am beginning to wonder. How much of this "speaking to me" is just chance? How many times can that happen? Could it be that the message is just all encompassing, so it could speak to anyone in any situation? (The thing is, I know I've been skeptical about this kind of stuff and I'm very, very hesitant because the words I'm going to have to use, for lack of any better, are going to have a religious connotation, despite my not intending them to have one at all.) But I really just don't know if I think it's all chance anymore.

Laura said in her blog the other day, "I believe in energy." And I loved that. Simply and beautifully said. So now I'm really thinking I'm on my way to tapping into that energy, that it's really there. I think it's energy that goes by many different names: God, Brahma, Allah, Mother Earth etc etc. But tonight I think I realized it's there. I believe in it. I believe in Energy. It's there for us to touch 24/7. It's speaking to each of us in every moment. All we have to do is come to the moment, to learn to be alive, and it can be ours.

just be

Another reminder of our ideas of perfection showed up in yoga class today. I mentioned it before, about the bread: I had to let go of the idea of what "perfect" bread would be and once I did that, I discovered that what I had made was perfect because it was made with intention, concentration and mindfulness. Today, one yogi asked our instructor for tips on coming into a pose with more ease, such that it would "look right" or "look better." It lead into this conversation about what is "right" in yoga and the lesson came up. What is right? What is perfect? There's freedom in letting go of this notion. Once you can do that, you can see things as they are in this moment. Where your body is in this moment, that is perfect. What your body can do in this moment, that is perfect. When you lack the notion of perfection, you lack the notion of failure. When you lack the notion of beauty, you lack the notion of ugly. When you lack notions, you gain the freedom to simply be.

Ironically, all the moving and bending and stretching that we do in yoga is to prepare our bodies to be still. We are doing these postures so that we can meditate, so that we can just be.

Namaste,
j.e.n.

saying my peace

Global mala weekend left me feeling like I'd been on spa holiday and it's carried over through this whole week. I feel pretty serene and calm. Global mala invited me to work on building compassion, to send out positive energy into the world. Karma reminds us that the energy we put out into the world will return to us, whether it is positive or negative. On my mat last Saturday, I stopped doing sun salutations just to be doing 108 of them. Instead, I dedicated every movement I made to someone I love, to people I know, to people I don't, to people who need peace all over the world. And this week, I am peaceful. I'm amazed that I was capable of creating this energy. It transforms me every day.


"I'm a human being. Not a human doing, not a human thinking. A human being." Deepak Chopra

global mala

Well, if I didn't know it before, I know it now. I realized Friday morning as I was doing my practice before work that I had a sangha- a community- in yoga. The last few yoga classes had seen all of us students talking more and getting to know each other. But tonight takes the cake.

Together we were one entity, completing 108 sun salutations, as did so many other yoga practitioners across the globe, in the name of world peace. Afterwards, we ate dinner together and it hit me like a wave again. I have belong to a sangha. We sat there, people of all ages and walks of life, with this one, amazing link between us that goes deeper than you might imagine-- our yoga practice. We talked about what it meant to us and how we got into it to begin with. We talked about completely non-yoga things. But no matter what the subject, I couldn't help but feel this sense of one-ness with all these people.

Chris ends every yoga class with this phrase, "I honor the light in each of you that is the same light in me. Namaste." That's what the one-ness felt like. Honestly... I don't think I've passed a more content night in Evansville since I moved here. I'll tell you what, too: I'm not going to miss much about this city come January, but above all of it... I will miss my sangha.

namaste,
j.e.n.

my body is a temple

This week I'm praising my body. I know I've been working up to it for a few weeks, but it just feels like over night my body has suddenly become able to do things it couldn't before. It's stronger, more limber. It's amazing.

I'm proud of the changes I'm seeing and feeling, and what's more, I'm realizing, finally, how much respect my body deserves. It's precious and I'm going to treat it that way.

his trikonasana is such a turn on

In life, there is such a thing as a "non-sexual crush," which is essentially an umbrella. Under this umbrella is the all-important "intellectual crush". And today I'd like to add a new category. I think I'll call it a "divine crush." What's this all about?

I have a divine crush on my Wednesday night flow yoga teacher. He's tall, lanky (very bendy, you can imagine), a hippie. He's cute enough, I suppose. You can tell he's full of tranquility and calmness. Very endearing. These are all good qualities, sure. But where it's really at is in the spirituality of it all. Not only do I leave feeling absolutely amazing, tall, and physically fit... but I leave feeling so mentally sound. Now I realize that I generally leave um... EVERY yoga class feeling this way but he's the only guy teacher so he's an easy target. Any guy that spends an hour and a half making me feel that way is definitely going to find himself as the apple of Jenny's eye, that's for sure. Mmmmyogateachergurummmmmm.

In other news. Plans are pretty much official now, so, some of you know and some of you are hearing it here first: I'm moving back to St. Louis in January 2009. A whole new chapter of my life is going to be opening up and I really couldn't be more excited about it. I'm not ready to reveal all the plans just yet, but I've figured out what it is I actually WANT to do for the rest of my life and St. Louis is where I'm going to start.
In the wake of this great place of stability in which I've found myself, I've also found that my attitude towards St. Louis has changed too. It doesn't represent the younger, more naive, more dependent Jenny anymore. Now, it's the new horizon. The Gateway to the Rest of My Life. It's going to be good. I have to thank Evansville for what it's done for me. I've changed for the better, and I wouldn't have gotten here if it hadn't been for this city. I've learned so much about myself. But in January, I have to go. Evansville, I discovered, was just here to serve a purpose in my life. It fulfilled it's duty and it's time to move on.

Again I remember the quote about preferring the journey to the destination, and I think that this just might be the most anticipated journey for me yet.

namaste,
j.e.n.

when bad lighting is what you want

Yea folks, you're getting a two-fer.

The exciting thing about yoga class is that with every class, I leave having learned something new about myself or having discovered new depth to my being. Sometimes it's a physical capability, sometimes it's a personality trait.

Today was sort of both.

To begin with, it was Fusion, which meant that we have a different teacher, a different style of yoga and it's a little more... aerobic. Today I got to class and our teacher had all the fluorescent lights on. No soft lighting, no incense burning... it was like being in a gym. She was talkative, she interacted more with us, engaged in conversations about poses while we were doing them in a way that was more "teacher" than it was "yogi" or "guru". Her style was different from what I've been experiencing: a calmer, subdued personality and an atmosphere that promotes an introversion of sorts, or concentration on the inner-self. At first I was thinking, "geez, I came here to unwind, to think, to zen out. Not to walk into a bright room like this and chit chat." But as class went on, the fluorescent light became a bit more symbolic. Sometimes, we need to do our yoga in a bright light, to see where it is we need to improve. What's more, sometimes we need to be reminded that there's room to improve.

The fluorescent light put my expectations and my ego in check. For starters, like I mentioned in my post earlier today, I walked into class today with an expectation of how it was going to be. I had set myself up to disappointed. Instead, I should go to class expecting nothing and everything simultaneously. Each experience is going to be different, as it should be, and it's up to me to accept the way things are and respond accordingly, making the most of the situation.

Secondly, this class reminded me, very positively, that I have room to improve. Our instructor helped me align myself correctly, and introduced me to the way certain poses should feel. At first, I was embarrassed. Just yesterday I raved to Erin that the instructor (a different one) had complimented one of my poses, and now here I was being corrected. I started to get agitated, with the instructor and with myself. Then I realized, I should be thankful that this "fluorescent light" was on me, like the unattractive lights in a dressing room... Feeling a posture correctly, understanding it fully and recognizing what I needed to do became refreshing for me. I'm there to improve myself, physically and mentally. And that's just what happened today.

I began the class a little disconcerted, and thinking I would be unfulfilled after our 75 minutes were up. Instead, I left class with a better foundation and consequently greater confidence, but also a different kind of zen. I was, in the end, really happy with this class, hoping to experience this instructor's yoga again in the future.

namaste,
jenny