committed to practicing yoga every single day for the next year and created a chart to track my progress. If I missed a day I would do two classes the next to make up for it. In that first year of being my own boss, having a standing appointment with myself was so helpful. I learned quickly that it was going to take discipline to stay the course all year long. Some days I didn’t feel like it and I’d have to find internal motivation to go. I learned to put myself first, even when that felt selfish. Most of all I realized how desperately I needed the relief my practice offered from what seemed like unrelenting negative self-talk.
During this year of practice, I also decided to participate in a 200-hour yoga teacher training program. While I was excited to learn how to share something that had given me so much with others, I was also looking forward to diving deeper into my own personal practice. I doubled down on my dedication, spending 20 hours or more each week taking class, observing other teachers, and listening to lectures on everything from anatomy to the more spiritual elements of yoga.
Towards the end of my three-month training program I discovered what this whole process had been preparing me for. My uncle was diagnosed with, and then quickly passed away from cancer. While his diagnosis was a total shock, the fact that he was ill wasn’t. My hearing loss years before had woken me up to my own mortality. While it was scary, I had decided in that moment to change whatever I needed so that I could keep my body as healthy as possible. He had muted the messages and symptoms being shouted by his body until it was too late.
I remember saying my goodbyes to him over the phone in the locker room of Core Power Yoga while my fellow teacher trainee’s arms held me tight. The good news about a yoga studio is that strong emotions are not only expected but encouraged. “The only way out is through” as the saying goes. For the first time in my life I wasn’t expected to suppress anything but instead I was invited to honor it. To sit with what was rising up for me, moment by moment.
In the decade since I try to remember how it all began. I think of my Uncle Jeff and how I wish he could have found what I did. A practice of grace and persistence. Space to be free. A place to call hOMe.
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Photo Credit Jamie Ginsberg