Why I do yoga

This was a question I posed for myself in the previous post. As I practice yoga on a (almost) daily basis, I ask myself in the beginning of the practice, "Why do I practice yoga?", and then see where it leads me. Sometimes I forget I even asked myself this question, and continue on with my practice and day. Last Tuesday, when I taught my Hatha Flow class, one of the students talked about when and why she started doing yoga, and then asked me the same question. I bless this student for reminding me! I talked about when I was 21 years old, getting ready to graduate college, I began making changes in my life. I began changing the relationships I had with friends, family, and partners. I started to meet new people who had more awareness of body, mind and spirit and introduced me to different practices such as yoga, butoh dance, and meditation. I also discovered Whole Foods, and started looking at food a little differently too. But it comes back to yoga. It comes to the question, was it a coincidence that I began taking yoga classes during this transition in my life? Or was there a reason?

With all the hours of studying and training I've received in the past ten years, "coincidence" has faded from my vocabulary. I believe there is a reason for everything that happens to us and around us. Yoga, being a holistic practice, supports me in those transitional, and sometimes, difficult times. Whether it's grief, loss, or depression, I find those times on the yoga mat very comforting. Even if I'm in resistance, I start doing some sun salutations and I'm immersed in the experience. It's a time when I can really be with thoughts and emotions--anger, sadness, frustration--and allow them to move through and out my body. It brings my attention to my breath, which supports the movement of energy. It's when we hold our breath a lot, or take quick, short breaths, that's how the tension continues to build up, so we are unable to move on.

I do yoga to relieve that tension. I'm sure most people do without realizing it. But in this last decade of practicing and teaching yoga, I really had to remind myself why I do this. There was a time when I loathed it, and it was a time when I wasn't present and in complete resistance. There was a lot of unacknowledged grief and self-doubt, which was so frightening to face. It was just easier to shut down. With a supportive community and with time, shutting down wasn't a way of being anymore. I was more open to being with the uncomfortable feelings more because I realized they would pass quicker if I just sat with them. I look forward to practicing yoga, and teaching! So how did this happen?

Compassion, love, understanding, and acceptance (to name a few). Yoga teaches us this. It brings us into our body, allows us to look at the mind, and connect with our soul. But we need to go through the dark periods, in order to get to the light. There's no joy, without sorrow. There's no happiness without sadness/anger. There's no yin without yang. It's all about balance, and this is what yoga offers us.

So, if you're a yoga practitioner or other practitioner of whatever passion/hobby/practice you do, why do you do it? What keeps bringing you back? Does it ignite your creative fire, and how do you contain it and then move it? How do you cultivate it in your daily life?

I invite you to take 5-15 minutes a day to answer these questions one at time. Don't feel you have to answer all of them at once. Or see what questions arise within yourself, but without judgment. A little self-reflection and inquiry can go a LONG way.

Namaste ~

Learning to appreciate even when I want to explode

Being back on the east coast is always a "trip" for me. I love visiting my family and seeing friends when I can. Since living on the west coast in the San Francisco Bay Area for the last seven years, I've learned many things about myself and my family. It's amazing what 3000 miles of distance can do! I could go on about that experience, but I only have so much time in this coffee shop in Orleans, MA.

I've been staying with my mom, plus spending time with my brother, father, stepmother and stepfather. So far, I've noticed their reactions to their experiences such as traffic ( to name a few). However, it's the judgments they have toward people in general. I mean we all do it. I know in the past few years, I've learned a variety of tools, especially when I feel myself getting amped up about what someone just did or said. I guess what I really want to acknowledge is the negativity that my family feeds off of, or is the only focus they seem to put their attention on. I'm very careful how I say things so I don't set them off more because I could totally go that route and fire them up more; or say nothing so they can truly hear themselves. I really see what my coaching teacher was talking about. He would say to try and find those things you appreciate about those people who do fire you up. It's so freakin' hard! Especially with family.

So I, now, appreciate all the things my parents provided for me growing up, and still do. The unconditional love and support. I appreciate the fire and passion my brother has about current events and issues in the world, along with his music and art. I appreciate having a family that, although we have our differences, we can still enjoy each others' company.

Even when I would hear negative comments about something come out of their mouth, I would breathe and appreciate something about them. Even if it's that I got them in my life.

One of my 2010 Declarations

I will leverage my debt in a healthy way.

I need to remind myself and say this to myself as much as possible.  That I AM doing it. It IS happening.  What does a "healthy way" look like?  I will trust in my myself that money is always coming my way.  I will be compassionate towards myself no matter what.  I will appreciate myself even when times are tough, and be gentle with myself and say, "I am doing the best I can, and I am doing a great job." I want to create more abundance in clientele for my yoga and massage practice. 

I am love, acceptance and compassion. 

FWD: How Accepting and Loving of Yourself Are You?

(click for this post) How Accepting and Loving of Yourself Are You?

There's a meditation in this post called "Accepting and Love Myself! meditation". I just read it and now want to try it. Acceptance and love for myself is something I've been practicing in my life with pretty much everything I do and say. This is especially big with me when it comes to making decisions and choices. Once I accept and love where I'm at, I become more clear with what I want and what I want to create for myself. It's a hard practice, but it definitely works!

Thanks, Catherine Hidalgo for sharing this post!

Money: A Love/Hate Relationship

I love money and I hate it.  What I would really like is to love it.  So why do I hate it too? This is an area of my life that I would really love to investigate further, but for now, this blog entry is probably going to be a rant and vent, so thanks for listening.

I guess I love money when I can actually use it towards things that are pleasurable such as trips, eating out, shopping, etc. Who doesn't?  I hate it when I have to pay a credit card company who jacked up their interest rates a gazillion times.  I don't mind money when I have to put it towards things like my car, for example, car insurance, gas, etc.  I love having a car and with a car, comes maintenance.  So that's fine. Rent. I could complain about the rates 'til the cows come home, but honestly I choose to live in an expensive city/area.

Now, I could go down the list of things and justify it, but I'll totally bore myself and repeat myself because I know why my money goes where it goes.  Presently, the primary obstacle that I have been running into is that I find out about certain yoga or dance workshops, classes, trainings that I'm interested in but can't put the money down.  Then I go into this whole shpeel that if I didn't have to pay this or that bill I could go. But what ends up happening is that I go down this negative spiral and end up blaming myself for all the debt I created in my life.  I feel sooooo done doing this to myself! My relationship with money has been a roller coaster these past few weeks and before that I thought I was doing okay.  So what gives? I would love to attend a workshop about money relationships, but you have to spend "money" to go. Hahahaha! See.

I, honestly, know deep down that I'm okay. Financially, I'm making it okay.  So why do I feel myself wanting more now! I feel worth more than what I'm making.  I've read about the Law of Attraction.  I always try to use those principles in order to get into a more positive vibe about money.  I guess there are those times when it just gets overwhelming, especially during the unknown times.  When you really don't know when money is going to come in.  It can be scary.  But it's going to be okay.

Listening to our Body: Integrating body, mind and spirit

It's like the yin and yang; love and hate; knowing and not knowing; wanting and not wanting; forward and backwards. We are either in one or the other, or somewhere in between. For the past year, I have been working towards the positive, joyful side of things, even when they are not so good. Through this inner work, I have learned to not be so hard on myself when things happen. I have also realized that there are no accidents. Things happen for a reason. They happen in order to wake us up, to see an aspect of ourselves right in front of us. There may be certain people that show up in our lives that bring us joy or drive us crazy! It is when we ask the question, "Why?" in these situations. Why did this happen to me? Why can't this person just go away? Why did this person go away? There's nothing wrong asking why, but sometimes we get stuck there, we blame ourselves and others, put ourselves down, believe we don't deserve anything better or never will. We all have these thoughts, but do we really check into our bodies and feel? Do these thoughts really feel good? Are they serving you in order to move forward in life? Do you want to move forward? I could go on and on with this inquiry, but I am choosing not to because we all know what we want. Once we listen to our bodies and minds, it's when our spirit, our true selves begin to shine through.

Being in the thick of it
It was this past weekend when I had an awakening. An Ah-Ha moment. A realization. Whatever you want to call it. For the past few months, my menstrual periods were very heavy and lasted longer than 10, sometimes, up to 14 days. I decided to do something about it, so I went to see my doctor. I got blood work done and she decided to schedule me for an ultrasound to do an overall check up. My blood work showed that I was anemic and then the ultrasound showed a thickening in the lining of my uterus which part of it turned out to be a polyp, along with that, a cyst on my right ovary. So my doctor told me I needed a D & C (click here for more info), removal of the cyst and an IUD to keep the lining of my uterus thin. This was a mouth full. This was a lot! When I left the office, I cried. I felt like I did something wrong. The next day it was "I did this to myself". "I am unhealthy". "Why did this happen to me?!"

Then it was in my therapy session that I began to feel what my body was feeling. Having a therapist trained in somatic and other mind/body studies was very beneficial for me at that moment. She asked me to check in with that area (2nd chakra), where our reproductive organs live. A surge of resistance came over me. It was as if my consciousness wanted to completely cut itself off from that area. In the past, I had some trauma around this area and a lot of it is still stored there. Even though, I have done a lot of healing around it, it still can surface. The body memory will always be there. As I resisted, it persisted. I began to allow some of it out and my body began saying, "ugly, gross, and unhealthy". Of course, in my mind, I knew this wasn't true. For years, I was always up in my head about things that happened to me and here was my body telling me things! I was grateful to acknowledge this because it was obviously a part of me that was getting triggered, but a part of me that I had chose to bury away.

Awakening
When the weekend came, I was feeling great because I had the Yoga Journal Conference to look forward to. My intention for the weekend was to be inspired and find connection in myself and others. The three workshops I attended were so interrelated; I didn't even realize it until after I took them. The first was about tuning into your energy centers (chakras) with asana (poses) and mantras. As I made the sounds for each one in the corresponding asana, I began to feel shifts and energy move. It was a very healing sequence of asana because the teacher had us focus on something that related to ourselves and that chakra, whether it was a person or a life experience. Then we would make the sound, breath and let whatever or whoever it was go. Then the second workshop was Yin Yoga, a style of yoga where you hold a pose (all floor poses) for 3-5 minutes, in order stretch the connective tissues, stimulate meridians and have a more quiet, inward practice. We did a lot of hip openers, allowing me to surrender and let go into the pose. When savasana came, the teacher had another teacher sing a beautiful Tibetan chant. The emotions that began to surface felt like a wave inside my abdomen, and then I was crying. I felt safe knowing that this was the healing process, plus I was in a room full of yogis on their own path. After a two hour break, I went to my third and final workshop, which was called "Body Prayer: Entering the Temple". The title says it all. Throughout the yoga practice, the teacher spoke about how we are all one, mind-body-spirit. That there is no separation. We are all similar beings striving for love, connection and community; that we need to let go of our judgments on others and ourselves in order to live our lives. I got choked up during the short lecture, and then while in pigeon pose, I began to ride that wave from the previous workshop. Another juicy hip opener, but then again, the whole practice was hip openers. This area that I disconnected myself from began to shine and speak to me. I suddenly felt whole. I felt light. I felt like I could do anything. Say anything. Love myself. Love this area that I ignored for so long.

Moving forward
I want to clarify that this process can take time. I have been learning to listen to my body for years. Yoga is what really began this journey. My dance and movement training became the catalyst, the self-expression of all the inner conflicts and emotions. My holistic health training provided many tools on feeling my emotions, listening to my needs, the body's sensations and the mind. Then, finally massage training, being a total body experience, also supports the integration of the mind, body and spirit. As I move forward, I realize by going through my various trainings, it was about connecting with me as a whole person. Learning to see the beauty and the positive in others and day-to-day experiences, whether you're at work, school, walking down the street. When I started my holistic health program back in March 2008, we had to create our life's purpose. My life purpose was, "I am love and acceptance". This still rings true for me because through this whole experience, I have begun to see that loving what is moves us through the dark and the fear a little more easily. Acceptance goes along with love. We love our family, friends and partners no matter what choices they made in their life. But remember that, it is all a process and it may take our whole lives to get there. I know I have a long way to go. But if we begin to, at least exercise our consciousness by playing with these concepts, little by little we begin to make baby steps towards what we want and let our spirits shine.

Body tells mind, mind tells body

It's like the yin and yang, back and forth, infinity. In regards to my previous post, a lot came up for me around my 2nd chakra. It's where the reproductive organs are, sexual energy live and breathe. It's an area that I've had trauma and for a long period of time never felt good about. I know in the past, I stored ex-boyfriends there, which resulted in a lot of negative energy and self-hatred in this area. While sitting in my therapy session last week, my therapist had me check in with myself around this area. My therapist does a lot of somatic work which has been so beneficial for me in my journey. When she asked me to do this, it was like my mind said no and my body said yes. I began to speak and feel more from my body then with my head. I realized how much I wanted to completely shut myself off from my 2nd chakra, my hips, my womb, my feminine. All my body could feel was ugly, gross, dirty, unhealthy. However, I knew in my mind that this wasn't true, but my body felt it. I, then realized, this was my body talking. Talking of old feelings and beliefs that I once told myself and this area. My higher conscious wanted to disconnect, but there was a struggle to hold on. To wait. To want. To love.

Being able to love this area is very difficult for me and for a lot of people. Do we really take the time to acknowledge ourselves and say I love you? For me, there hasn't been much love in this area. In the past year, it's certainly grown more, but since the a new project has occurred in this area, these past beliefs have been triggered. They still live in there, even though I firmly believe they're not true. It's interesting what can come up and out.

Over the weekend, I had some emotional release from this area. During the Yoga Journal conference, I cried in all 3 sessions I took. One of the workshop sessions was about chakra purification (how appropriate!), the second was integrating yin yoga and the third was about prayer and empowerment. All the yoga we did was hip openers. It was as if the universe guided me to register for these workshops. And/or my body guided me toward these themes because it's what it needed. It sure did. I've begun to realize there's no such thing as accidents. Things happen for a reason whether we like it or not. People come into our lives for a reason whether we love them or not. What's the universe trying to tell us when these things happen? What innate force is pulling us towards them or them towards us? We are beings of creation and we strive for love in everything and everyone. It's time to wake up. I believe it's a year of awakening.

Connecting with myself

Wow, it's been a crazy month! Lots of stuff, growth and projects. Over the past month, I've realized how important it is to really take care of yourself physically, emotionally and spiritually. A month ago, my friend from college passed away suddenly. It was a very surreal experience for me, my husband and the friends I reconnected with at the funeral. Even though it was a sad time, it was also celebration time. Celebration of life! This friend really moved a lot of people in different ways.

Before this happened, I had decided to cut back on my massage school classes to give myself some space and a break. I decided it was time to really connect with my emotions and my needs. As I've been doing this over the past month, shifts and changes have occurred and I don't feel the resistance. I moved through whatever it was that came up and to just, be with myself; give compassion to myself; give myself time to process and rest. Of course, we all get into bad moods and I sure let myself be in one about a week ago. But it's good to acknowledge that it's happening and choose what to do next. I chose ease and joy. So I dug into my toolbox and did some breathing, yoga, talked to people or had some alone time. These were things that I would never do for myself in the past. I used to feel I always had to keep pushing and pushing through. It's okay to do that to a point, but I needed to check in with myself on those occasions when frustration or anger would occur. I would say to myself, "Hey Liz, what's going?", "How do you feel?", "What do you need?". Sometimes I wouldn't know the answers right away, but that's okay. Perhaps, it was about accepting what is and not getting myself tangled up with it, which would create more tension.

We did an exercise in class last night and it was to answer the question, "Who loves me?". one of the people I wrote was ME! I appreciate myself for connecting, being, accepting, feeling, needing, caring, and loving myself. In the past I never had a lot of self-confidence and now I can say, and believe, that I do! What a ride!

Notice Your Obstacles, Then Conquer Them

I love how yoga relates to life. In this article, I'm amazed how going upside down is so hard for people when we used to do it as little kids. I remember my first experience. I was learning handstand and just couldn't do it. I felt like I was going to go through the wall or something. Even though I knew the wall was there to support me I didn't trust it or myself. I would see others go up with no problem and it both made me envious and hopeful at the same time. Now I do it like it's nothing but I'm aware on those days when I don't feel stable or confident. I inquiry within myself to see what's going on in my life. are there changes coming up? am I looking through a tunnel with a situation in my life and not the whole picture? What I love about inversions is that they give us the opportunity to "literally" look at things from a different perspective. The longer you stay and focus, shifts start to happen in your life and with other people in your life. So if you're worried about falling out of an inversion, let it happen! Be love and acceptance.

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(From yogajournal.com daily insight)

Inversions such as Pincha Mayurasana (Feathered Peacock Pose) present wonderful opportunities for profound physical and mental transformation, but they're also rife with obstacles. Begin by simply noticing the obstacles that keep you from going upside down easily. When you acknowledge these blocks, you have something to work with, and a pathway to new possibilities reveals itself. You can nudge things along by cultivating meditative awareness and breaking inversions down into smaller, easier steps. This makes the goal of "perfection" less important; instead, you can work creatively and enjoy the journey, no matter how long it takes.

If the physical aspect is hanging you up, concentrate on your upper body or your abdominal muscles to create the conditions necessary to go upside down. If fear is the problem and it takes hold, fully experience its texture as it arises, stay steady as those feelings move through you, and observe how they naturally dissolve.


IN THIS ISSUE
Pincha Mayurasana (Feathered Peacock Pose)

http://www.yogajournal.com/poses/1711
This Side Up: Building a Forearm Balance

http://www.yogajournal.com/practice/1775

Feet

Feet are my new passion in life. Well, at the moment, my own feet. I had my first weekend of Structural Foot Balancing class and I have to say it open my eyes! I knew that when we have foot problems it can affect the rest of the body, but not the other way around. With the help of my fellow students, I found so much more space, circulation and relief in my feet. Tingling, pulsing, breathing!

On my right foot, I broke part of my big toe when I was about 10 years old at a slumber party. The cracks and creeks that occurred were indescribable. It was like a new foot was emerging. I guess you can say I'm having "re"-growing pains ;-) I just can't believe that the bones in my feet were that crunched and squished together!

I feel pretty committed to my feet now. I'm thinking of the shoes I wear and how I feel/think about my feet. In the past, I used to think I had ugly, flat, narrow feet. I'm totally re-thinking how I treat my feet and the shoes I put on them. I want to share this foot stuff with others and I hope to inspire them to love and care for their feet.