Luminous Lotus~

In the year 2011, the Anusara community that I had been a part of for more than a decade crumbled and fell apart. Like so many others in the Anusara community, I felt like I'd been left in the middle of nowhere with one question hanging over my head: What next? Eventually I resigned my Anusara-inspired title and distanced myself from whatever "community" was left.  Since the Anusara fall apart, I purposely chose not to make a choice as far as teachers or styles of yoga go. I purposely chose to just step back and work at stepping in, listening more intently to my own inner guidance, and just practicing letting the teachings that needed to be shared to come to and through me. I knew I had learned enough and had enough teaching experience to continue to teach minus the Anusara-inspired title. So that is what I did, I continued to teach and find my own way forward. For a good chunk of time, I just kept teaching but didn't really know what to do...

July was a crazy packed month.  My family and I traveled to California to visit family and attend a mountain bike race in Mammoth, California.  Then I went to San Francisco for a week by myself for a Restorative yoga teacher training with Judith Hanson Lasater.  Then a quick stay in Flagstaff before we drove out of town again to visit my mom and dad in Tucson. We are back in Flagstaff. Since coming back to the mountains, Jason had surgery on his broken thumb, summer has come to an end, and a new school year has begun. It's all been a bit too much, a bit too packed, a bit too fast. And now I know, that kind of a schedule is not for me or the kids.  Jason does better with the busy than the rest of us do, but I think we are all feeling the impact of the last month. So that's it, that's life over the last month in a nutshell. Except for the highlight hidden in the middle. The highlight of the last month was my visit to San Francisco, which was so wonderful and so nee...

Photo by: Matthew Dols  My last post was in January. It's been 4 months since I've last written a thing. I guess I've been away so long because I haven't really known what to say or think or share. On some level, I've been reluctant to share what's really going on for me for fear of how such information might be perceived. Maybe it's all part of this strange change that I seem to be in. I find myself questioning everything from teaching to parenting and everything else in between. I honestly don't know why I feel so displaced and uncertain, but I do. And I find myself less and less interested in the things I used to be interested in, and more and more uninspired by those things that use to really inspire me. I find myself getting bored, to some degree, with the whole yoga scene. It's all become so trendy and bendy and ultra ego driven. It's a bit too much-look at me- for me. Don't get the wrong idea here,  I'm not writing this post...

Life, over the past couple of months, has been a lot like muddy water settling and, little by little, clearing.  It's almost like the moments when there is time to settle and be with the quiet that I get some small insight or understanding.  And those little flashes have been so helpful as they are directing me forward when I have felt very stuck. I think for the first 6 months in Flagstaff, everything felt really hard and overwhelming in every possible way.  And because of all the intensity and overwhelm,  I was feeling zapped of any inspiration, direction or clarity as to what to do next and how to get the needed things done. This last month, month 7, I have felt a noticeable shift in the intensity.  I do feel the intensity easing up in most areas and am relieved.  I think as I get little hits of understanding like letting go of expectations, learning to let life here take shape, and trusting that things will shift and feel better in due time, is helpin...

"Into the same river, we do and do not step." Christina Sell shared this teaching in a workshop I attended a little while back. She was paraphrasing a well known quote by the Greek philosopher, Heraclitus, which is: "No man ever steps into the same river twice." They both mean the same thing, but like the above version best.  Anyway,  when Christina shared this teaching in class,  I thought I understood the teaching then.  In hindsight, however,  I really understood only the basic premise of the teaching which is:  things change and we change.  Yes, this is the gist of that particular teaching, but it's not the heart of the lesson, at least not for me anyway.   As I was driving Lila around town while she slept the other day, I was taking in my new and not so new surroundings.  And what I realized during my drive, is that Flagstaff has lost a little bit of it's charm for me.  Now, this sounds worse than I mean it to, so let me ex...

I just read this great quote on Face Book and it couldn't have come at a better time... "Done is better than good." (Liz Gilbert and her mom) And/Or "Don't let great be the enemy of good." (Unknown) Just start and get it done!  I have been working on this blog post for nearly a week and have yet to finish it!  So here I am, sitting in the living room, tapping away on the keys while Lila sleeps.  So, where shall I begin?  Oh, that's right, anywhere will do.  Just begin and get it done and out there today! So how are things?  How is life up North? And what's going on in general?  Well, let's see, Summer ended the day after the Fall Equinox. Not long after that, came the cooler temperatures and colored leaves, and the socks and shoes and the long sleeves. Fall here has been beautiful, and I have loved being able to feel and see the beauty of this season in all it's radiant glory.   It's funny the details you are able to n...

Not that long ago I listened to an interview with Judith Lasater about whether or not it was the teachers job to challenge the student.  Her reply went something like this: Well, first of all I think it's important to get clear on what we mean by "challenge".  Taking one breath with awareness can be a challenge.  And she went on to say that it was important to talk about challenge and the concept of mutuality.   And this is the part that really stuck out to me and truly resonated with me.   She said, "It's not me challenging you.  It's me inviting you to challenge yourself in an intelligent, cadenced way. In a gently questioning way.  Don't push past your limit-- find where it is and respectfully step back from it a bit.  It means inviting the student to explore their own freedom and growth, in their own time and way."   In other words,  it's the students responsibility to challenge themselves and grow their own practice...