I flew out to San Diego a week ago tomorrow, and on the plane ride over I took some time to write the post below. Although I've thought about posting this every day since I landed I haven't, simply because I'm in California, one of my best friends was in town, I've been catching up with old faces, and I'm soaking in as much salty air and sunshine as possible. However, I've finally forced a little discipline on myself to organize this small entry- so below are some thoughts I had almost a week ago, and some.. well actually lots of pictures from the past two weeks :) I hope you enjoy xo

(*some brooklyn fun before the flight out west)
I'm currently on a plane flying out to San Diego. Although my usual reaction to flying is excitement, the closer the day of the flight comes the more I start to get really superstitious. Everything is a sign that this is it, something is going to go wrong, and it's my turn and everyone else on the plane's turn… to die. It happens every time. I eventually end up getting on the plane regardless, and once in the air I'm usually more excited about how incredible everything looks from the height (not to mention the clouds!!) than anything else. I resign myself to the fact that, if this actually were my time, that's exactly what it would be- my time, and I'd have to accept that because what other choice to I have?

(*pre-plane stretching - so important!)

I feel like a lot of things in life are like that- we don't have control over nearly 1% of our lives really. From the food that's put in front of us at the grocery stores, the quality of the air in neighborhoods we live, even what we'll encounter once we step out of our doors- all of those things have already been determining themselves. The food has already been picked by the farmers and been transported by the pilots and/or the truck drivers, the people in our cities have already been driving and the planes have already been flying, seeping their exhaust into the air while the trees and plants keep trying to soak it up, and we all have our own agendas which usually lead us to come into contact with everyone else that stepped out their own front doors. All of these things and millions of other little decisions and actions are happening and occurring throughout the world and the universe all the time, and to think we have any control over any of it is incredibly arrogant. We each have an effect on the ongoings of the world, and thus our decision making (each and every decision) is incredibly important and symbolic, but our level of control externally is minimal.

(*when cec was in town we made sure to go to the beach every single day)

Which leads me to my thoughts on self control. The one arena we each have the opportunity to hold complete power is our own selves. Our minds, our bodies- our thoughts, words, actions, beliefs, attitudes are all things we have 100% control over. Most of the time I'm not sure most people realize the immensity of this power we are capable of having. Most of the time we're all too busy and too distracted trying to control the impermanence around us to even recognize the sheer wonder of our own bodies and capability of our characters.

The movie for the flight was 42 - the movie about Jackie Robinson's first few years in the major leagues. What a story. He is a man who is an incredible representation of what inner power and strength of self can prove. The sheer stamina let alone grace, patience, and determination came all from within him, despite the excessive and ignorant opposition he faced.

(*california yoga <3)
While watching the movie I felt incredibly humbled and inspired by how strong of a character he had. And I just kept thinking- we are all capable of that kind of strength. Every single one of us. It's just allowing ourselves the opportunity. Clearly we won't all find it through baseball (some of us will find it through yoga ;) but the natural ebb and flow of life forces challenges on us whether we like it or not, and those are truly our opportunities to look within ourselves to see just how strong we can be. The external world wants to hand us challenges, and we all go through different ones that become unique to each of our lives. And that's exactly what they are- they are the bumps in our journeys.

I was thinking earlier about how much I've learned in the past few years. About how much I've changed and how much stronger I've become because of certain experiences I found my way into years ago. And I realized that all of the people who I have for so long considered to be the negative people that were the source of a lot of my pain, self doubt, self loathing, and personal confusion were also the source of my positive change. Had I never met those people and made those unhealthy decisions for myself, I never would have stumbled, fallen, learned to pick myself up, and then kept walking. I would have never found the strength in myself to choose differently and move away from those people because I knew I was worth more. I would have never started my journey of proving to myself that I feel that I'm worth more. So really, all of those people helped me and guided me. Not in the most nurturing ways, sure, but where would I be without them?

(*moments...)


The challenges we encounter are not there to beat us down, or destroy our spirits. They may do that for a period of time, but that's just what it is - a period of time. Because what they're really there for is proving to us that we are all capable of finding strength from the obstacles. They're there for us to be reminded of how strong we are. Because we are. Just think about the human body and how much it can physically endure, right? Well our spirits, our characters, our selves (as much as it seems the world at times is telling us the opposite) are just as strong- if not stronger. Because sometimes just will power can make the body do seemingly super human things.

So I'm still on this plane, and I'm not scared, because if it goes down I'm ok knowing that it was just my time. My family, my friends and my boyfriend all know how much I love them, and that's what matters to me. And at the very least I've learned, and hopefully helped other's learn, a few awesome things about life. And I feel really good knowing that although I am still really scared to be strong, and really scared of finding myself, and really scared of being myself and being strong in a world where so many people are so judgmental and critical (mostly out of fear and fear of facing themselves I know!) I'm still really glad that I'm trying and I've given myself the opportunity to try.

(*more california yoga <3)
Finding inner strength is not easy, and like everything else it takes practice and many reminders. So this post has become one of my many official reminders. BE STRONG. You'll end up hitting home runs like Jackie Robinson.

I've been wanting to write this post for days. I keep thinking about it, wanting to write it, and then getting caught up in something else- whether it be cooking, working, cleaning, anything- and it needs to be written! I feel like I'm at this really exciting mid-point in my practice where I can reflect on all the challenges I've encountered, and the distance I've covered just before I hit a major lift off point (aka teacher training!) which I know will be an incredible journey all in itself. But I want to take this time before training kicks in to really talk about progress, because it's taken me a long time to understand what progress really feels like, looks like- what it really means.

(*All photos go from left to right in progression- the earliest start in March 2013, the most recent are from today or yesterday)

It wasn't until a point a couple years ago did I start really understanding the importance of time with regards to progress. To be honest I think it really hit me when I decided (after shaving all my hair off) that I wanted my hair to grow out really long. It took years for it to grow out even to the length it was before I cut it all off, and during those years I would continually look in the mirror, pull on my hair, and think "just grow fasterrrr!" But of course it didn't. My hair took it's precious time growing out, torturing me through its phases along the way.

When I started up my yoga practice full force after a few years of it being off and on I made this decision to find a strength in my practice that I hadn't found before. I wanted to transform my body out of the stagnant shape that it had been in for so long, and release a lot of what was being held in me. I knew at the time about the scar tissue in my hips, I knew about how energy stores itself in pockets of the body, and I knew that unless I found a pattern of physical activity in my youth I might not find it later in my life (which I also knew is extremely important for mental and physical longevity). I was feeling weak in my body and in my spirit, and I knew that a consistent yoga practice would help to alleviate those dispositions.

So I jumped back into it. And I quickly learned that my body, just like my hair, requires its own time to strengthen and grow. I had to accept that nothing I could do would help my hair grow faster- it would have to grow in it's own time, and I inevitably had to accept this for my body as well.

Progress is not an instantaneous thing. Nor is it something that requires years and years (unless we really believe it needs to, or we're counteracting our own growth simultaneously). It is something that takes a little at a time, otherwise how would we be able to digest all the change all at once? Granted sometimes life will throw us curve balls and we'll have to adjust quickly and appropriately, but most of the time, for our own personal growth, we can only ask of ourselves to do a little more than we think we can each day.

The beautiful thing about yoga is that if you can't physically do something or go to a depth you want to go to that day, your body will make it VERY clear that it's not an option that day, and you become forced to accept that. The extremely important thing to take away from days like that, however, is not disappointment, or frustration, or excuses, but rather faith in oneself. Because even though we may not be able to do something one day doesn't mean we won't be able to do it the next day, or the next week/month/year as long as we have faith in ourselves ad our natural capacity for change.

In Anatomy of the Spirit there is a line that says: "Belief in oneself is required for healing." Belief is faith, and without faith in oneself we will be completely unable to overcome any obstacle in our way, whether we put it there for ourselves or not. Healthy progress, mentally and physically, requires a natural ease from one point to the next- no short cuts allowed. But the beautiful thing is that with all the time and energy we use comes an incredible satisfaction and fulfillment, because the results surprise us and excite us, and we begin to learn that it's not just the results that we're working for, it's the work itself.

When I was once in a really low place, where I was lost in my process and I didn't know if I could get to the other side, a person, not even that close to me, who I admired and looked up to sent me a message that contained, "Hold on tight. It's going to be okay. Live the question, ride the process, find solace in the unknown." And those words helped me more than I think this person realized. Because that's what matters- it's not the goal, it's the challenge. If we look only at the goal so far off in the distance it will seem impossible to get to that point, and we will likely lose our faith in ourselves, but if we look just a few steps ahead of ourselves, and work forward towards just those few steps, before we know it the goal is right in front of us. And we'll realize all those steps we took to get there were the guidance we needed to overcome our obstacle.

When I was ruminating about this subject of progress, a clip from one of my all time favorite movies popped into my head. Progress is not something that can ever be achieved alone, and more people than we realize contribute to our individual progress daily. Travis Birkenstock from Clueless describes it almost perfectly when giving this acceptance speech for accumulating the most tardies in his class. Just imagine him saying "progress" instead of "tardiness" and you'll see exactly what I'm talking about :)



And on that note- don't ever give up on yourself. Because if you keep working a little bit day by day towards what you're trying to achieve, eventually you'll get there, and you'll realize every step of your journey was a piece in the puzzle of that achievement. So enjoy the ride. x

I want to dedicate this post strictly to talking about body image. It's something that's been on my mind a lot lately, and I'm not sure how or why it came up, but discussing my feelings about it with regards to yoga seems appropriate.

I never had confidence in my body when I was younger. I was ridiculously tall when I was in elementary school, and too thick (the girls were so thin in junior high), and I just felt plain awkward in my skin. There was no connection between what I felt in my body to what I thought in my head, and I felt incredibly disconnected because of it. The disdain I felt for what I looked like developed into a fear of what I looked like, making me extremely self conscious. When I decided to finally try out for a sport, I would crush myself under the pressure because I was always thinking about "what I looked like" whenever I did anything - including hitting the softball. So needless to say, I stayed away from sports or anything too physical.

What I thought was my appearance was very far removed from what I actually looked like, and when I did finally look in the mirror with objective eyes in my teenage years it was really hard for me to accept what I saw. There was nothing disfigured about me, there was nothing ugly about me, and now when I look back I realize I was completely normal. But I never felt normal, I felt ugly, and that's what I saw when I looked in the mirror.

I realize this is a feeling tons and tons of people of both genders feel. We are all pressured to look and appear and preform to level that society places on us, and we all pick up that pressure at one point or another in our lives. Some of us are better at shaking it than others, and I happen to be one of the people who had a much harder time. It can be so painful for those it really effects because it becomes subconsciously saturated into all of our decisions, reactions, and interactions, and over time it's increasingly difficult to let go.

My negative self image continued all the way through college. As I did in high school, I sought approval through what I wore, how I did my make up and hair, trying to mask the discomfort of everything underneath. But nothing anyone ever said really made me feel better, and no compliments were ever really accepted because I didn't believe them. It continued to eat at me, and I made really poor choices out of the bitterness I felt toward my body. Even after I started my yoga practice I still continued to feel this way.


Only recently did I start feeling sincere love towards my body. It took years of wanting to change, years of wanting to accept myself for just how I was, and finally months of very consistent yoga practice and dedication towards making choices that were good for my body for me to start to feel comfortable in this home of mine. I still struggle with it, but not nearly in the same way as I did before. It took me waking up to the fact that I had to take action, literal and consistent action, because nothing connects you more to your own body than physical exercise.

Yoga practice is a practice of connecting to the energy that moves throughout your body, and no area is seen as more or less advantaged. Each part is as valuable as the next - the toes, the thighs, the abdomen, the skin, the joints, the tendons, the eyes, the tongue, the heart, all of it- and as you begin to feel the importance and interdependence of each part, you begin to enjoy and appreciate each part for exactly what it is and what it gives you.

I have grown to sincerely love my body because I now feel and seek the feelings my body provides for me. When my body is happy, my mind is happy, and there is no way I would have felt this way had I stayed as disconnected as I had been.

I know now that people make such poor decisions for themselves because they don't hear what their body is telling them. I know the reason why people seek bad habits and thoughtless consumption (of all things, not just food) is because they're trying to seek a fulfillment of something that seems to constantly evade them. But that fulfillment is right inside of you, it's RIGHT THERE, it's so close you can't even touch it but you can feel it so deep within you if you find it. And when you find it you know and trust that it has and will always be there. Finding it and holding onto it takes a lot of work, but all great things do. And although the search and discovery is different for everyone, I am convinced that if a person has a negative self image that their search must start with a surrender to the body, exactly how it is.

If there could be any advice that I give to anyone out there who suffers from a negative self image it would be to take time every single day to be in your body and not in your head. To sit and feel all of the things that are moving through you- all of the energy because there is a lot of it, and it's constantly moving and evolving within you. Notice the tension in any little area, whether it be in your jaw, your toes, your neck, your spine, your forehead, anywhere, and relax it. Notice if you feel good in your skin, and if you don't, ask yourself why. And if negative thoughts come up, let them come up, but make sure to let them go and replace them with positive thoughts. That may be the hardest part, because having a loving self image starts by first showing yourself love, and it can be soooo much harder to sincerely give yourself loving thoughts than it seems.

Be with yourself. Remember that this is your home, and just like any standing structure that you live in you have to do your part to organize it, clean it, and keep it up so that it doesn't collapse but can keep you comfortable for as long as you need it to. Be good to yourself, because your body wants you to, it always wants you to.

And always remember that the beauty of you is that you are changing every single second of every single day, and if you sincerely want to change and become more of who you want to be, all it takes is making that dedicated choice to becoming better little by little.

And yoga is always an option :) haha! But seriously- it changed my life, it could change yours too. Even just a few months ago I could have never thought to put a blog post out in the world like this. But today I think I'm pretty okay with it. x

Quick Edit: I realized I have a lot more to say on this subject, so this post may be a part one!

 In the week since my last post I have not gone to a yoga class every day. I regret to say that my goal of 40 days has been squelched, simply because work has been very busy (which is good) and I've been enjoying a lot of time with friends (which is also good) so I regret to say that I don't really regret not going to class! In my post "Rest" I stated that "in yoga, rest is 50% of the growth" and I have to say this statement is very true. In the time that I have not been in class I have found a breathing room that I didn't have before, and when I have been in class that breathing room translates into my physical practice. For the first time in a very very long time I feel very strong, and not just in my muscles.

(*Below - it was a really fun weekend with the boyfriend and with some good friends)
In the time I haven't been in class I have also been catching up on my reading. I've been slowly making my way through Anatomy of the Spirit by Caroline Myss, and it seems that whenever I pick up the book I learn something more about myself and the people around me. That's essentially what the book is geared toward anyway, but it's always pleasantly surprising when something seemingly unrelated to certain aspects of your life parallels exactly with those aspects. It gives me the feeling that I'm moving in the right direction.

(*Below - been making so much good food lately! Still trying to keep it raw when I can)
Anyway the part of the book that I'm reading currently is focussed on the second chakra which is considered the partnership chakra. It's main location in the body is the lower abdomen to the navel area, and it effects the sexual organs, the large intestine, the lower vertebrae, pelvis, hip area, appendix, and bladder. The energy here is considered to be the source of our creativity, the source of our need for relationships, and the source of our (limited) control of our physical environment. It effects our perception of sex, of relationships, of money, authority, and morality, and in the book it states that the sacred truth attached to this chakra is "Honor One Another."

When reading this chapter of the book I noticed a lot of the emotional discomfort that I've felt over the years is described as being attached to this chakra. Fear of loss of control or being controlled by another person, fear of betrayal, abandonment, addiction, rape and loss of power of the physical body. Before I had no idea where these fears were coming from, and I assumed they developed over time from certain things I was exposed to and subconsciously held on to, and that's really exactly what happened. I held onto these fears so strongly that they began to build themselves into my body, and whenever they were triggered the scars only got deeper.


Since I was a teenager I started developing issues in my hips. I had no idea what it was from, but if I walked for extended periods of time it would feel like my hip joints had been rubbing together creating this deeply warm pain that wouldn't go away for hours. I've held a tightness there that only grew over the years, and it wasn't until I started my yoga practice did I really realize how bad the tightness was. It began effecting my knees and lower back, and I started getting really scared of what might happen if I didn't do something about it.

After seeing a few different therapists and physical therapists I was told that I had a large amount of scare tissue build up throughout my hips and up through my lower abdomen. I came to the conclusion that the only thing I could do was to stretch this area often and as much as possible to bring blood flow through the tissue and allow it to heal naturally over time. This has been a main focus throughout my practice, and I have to say through the years I've been seeing a lot of improvement physically.




At the beginning of August I started a new physical challenge for myself, which is to really work on releasing the tension in the lower half of my body much more so than I have before. This requires me stretching out my hips and lower abdomen everyday for 30 or so minutes. Since I've started doing this, the energy I feel pulsing through my hips has been crazy! It's as if I've been slowly opening a blocked river and the water is just pouring through.

But the parallel to my challenge has been this chapter of Anatomy, making me entirely aware that this is not just going to be a physical challenge but also a spiritual and mental one. One that requires me really letting go of my fears listed above along with my fears of money, sex and power (funny how those three things are always linked, huh?). The really exciting part of this challenge is that the energy is linked so much to creativity that by utilizing the creative power within me I'm encouraging this chakra to open, and my physical body to open with it. Which means any time I get the urge to do anything artistic or creative I'm taking it!

(*Below - these and the few images above are a few of my daily hip openers)

So although I haven't exactly been in class, I have still been practicing every single day. After the 30 day challenge I've realized that my journey with yoga must extend past my physical body, and I must let it envelop my emotional and moral world. And really I'm not even trying (in the sense that I feel like I'm forcing) it's just happening. It's really exciting.

As an end note, I have a few awesome quotes from the book I'd like to share. I hope you guys enjoy :)

" Paradoxically, while the energy of the second chakra inclines us to try to control our lives, the lesson of the second chakra is that we cannot be in control. We are physical beings and energy beings, but since the physical world cannot be controlled, the task before us is to master out inner responses to the external world, our thoughts and emotions... The truth contained within the paradoxical nature of dualism this: It is not what we choose that matters; our power to influence an outcome lies within our reasons for making a certain choice."

"If allowed to flow, creative energy will continually act to reshape our lives and reveal more meaning for why things happen as they do than we could determine on our own."

"...relationships are essentially spiritual messengers. They bring into our lives-and we into theirs- revelations about our own strengths and weaknesses... We can more easily see the symbolic value or our relationships when we release our compulsion to judge what and we has value and instead focus on honoring the person and the task with which we are involved."

"So long as we focus on trying to control another person and forget that that person is a mirror reflecting back to us our own qualities, we keep conflict alive within ourselves. Seeing ourselves and others in symbolic unions, however, helps us accommodate differences. "

"Habit is a hell to which people cling in attempt to stop the flow of change."

Expect a million more of these from me in the near future. x