shining up my details

each time we make a decision, we create history. we affect other's history. we create our future. and we affect each other's destiny and future.

those little decisions, those little details, matter just as much as the big ones. in fact, i've recently realized that they probably matter much more. the details happen every day. and that's how we can really make a difference in our lives.

make the bed every morning: create order and peace.
keep your nails filed: create neatness and beauty.
sign off emails with something personal: create connection.

little details exist over and over. eternal opportunities for creation.

in yoga, paying attention to setting the foundation and to shining up the edges creates beautiful poses. i taught headstands in yoga tonight, and i had a student tell me that he had never tried one in 12 years of being a gymnast and teaching gymnastics. but through the details and intentions we set, he did his first headstand.

woah. it works.

i was talking to a bff tonight and off the cuff she said "i hate myself." and i thought, "god, how many times a day do you create that in your life?" i've done the same thing. i noticed a few months ago that every time i looked at my phone and it didn't have any notifications, i'd say to myself, "nobody loves me!" when i heard myself say this over and over, i was creating that. i had to re-train myself to say "i have lots of friends who love me; it's just that none of them are contacting me right at this moment."

and with that, i started to create more self-acceptance and love. i shifted. and shifting those little details makes a very real difference.

last night i binged and purged. just a little bit. but it sucked. and it left me feeling depressed and like a failure this morning. but you know what i did before i binged and purged? i reached out. i asked a friend for some reassurance. (thanks babe.)

that was a change. a little one, but a change. that little detail mattered. and i'm proud of that little detail. and being proud of that detail helped me get past the rest of it.

i think i reached out because i had a bff reach out to me last week. i remember feeling so proud of him. so thankful that he asked for help. and so hopeful for him creating the rest of what he needs.

kelli asked us saturday what we wanted to create in our lives. i want to create grace. beauty. heartfulness. love.

details.
create it through the details.
try this one kk: "i love me."
try this one c: "i have so many friends here that care about me."
i'm gonna try: "good job, spring."

ruts

my bestie asked me to call her hairdresser and schedule an appointment for her after she had to cancel one last minute recently. i said "sure," because i knew that i didn't like doing things like that. she asked me to pretend to be her, which i did. little did i know how poorly this salon takes to cancelling appointments. after chatting with the first woman that answered the phone, i gave information about "myself" to book "my" new appointment. i was then quickly put on hold while a new person came on the phone. the next person to talk to me started by stating "my" full name sternly. i knew "i" was in trouble. and i freaked out.

when i feel strong negative emotions, or when i think others will put negative strong emotions on me, i resist. and i put up cushions and cushions of softness and avoidance to prevent myself from experiencing these things. i was talking about this with someone recently and she asked me why was i so afraid of people being mad at me. i said, without thinking, "i guess it's because someone might be mad at me and not like me any more and leave me."

woah.

so, yeah, what am i actually afraid of? being left.

we can go back to the millions of times i moved as a child to understand what leaving friends behind over and over did to my psyche. or we can examine the two 4 year plus relationships i've had and the break-ups that involved them leaving me and not telling me (yes i'm serious).

or we can simply say "no one likes feeling left; no one likes feeling alone; no one likes feeling lonely."

my ink droplets, following
the path of least resistance 

but the danger i fall into is that i grab onto the path of least resistance. just like water droplets that will find another existing pathway and follow it instead of making their own. that existing pathway is the easiest. so i avoid potentially upsetting someone. i put up cushions so that i don't feel any uneasiness of my own. i try to make everything ok for everyone so that everyone is happy. i follow that already-created-path. because i'm used to it.

i fall into a rut.

but kelli gave me a reminder saturday night. she said we should be like YEA... RESISTANCE... I CAN GROW!!! which is what #miraclesnow and gabby taught me: be grateful for what we can learn from our fears. and it's also what my energy healer told me: when you feel those uncomfortable feelings, take them as a SIGN that you need to change something.

it's the same lesson over and over, but in different words: "don't avoid. feel. do. evolve."

so why do i keep forgetting this lesson? i don't know. (yet.) but i do know that i see lots of my friends forget it. one of my BFFs in yoga the other day PUSHED and pushed through the practice; ignoring body signals and feelings of tiredness. the result was not pretty (crash landing anyone?)... but it was just the physical interpretation of the same lesson. there was no acknowledgement there: it was "nope. gonna ignore that. gonna do what i always do instead."

and when i saw it in yoga, in someone else, i cried. i recognised this for what it was when it wasn't me. but when i do it? shhhhh. avoid. let's not acknowledge that, k? k. thanks.

it's sad when we avoid what we need. when we avoid what we feel. when we avoid what can be an opportunity for more in our lives.

when i was in my marriage, and unhappy, i wasn't going to do anything to change it. i thought "this is where i live now," and i wasn't going to even try. i resigned to it. i used to wish for ANYthing to come along to change the situation for me: even an illness or death. i was desperate for something to get me out of where i was--but i couldn't see a way out on my own.

last week i had a friend express almost that exact same sentiment to me: she said she wished sometimes that a certain person in her life would just drop off the face of the earth. why? because the situation she was in with this person seemed hopeless to her. she didn't know how she was going to get out of it; how she was going to change it; how she could ever be happy.

part of all this is that avoidance. part of it is not wanting to feel those strong things. part of it is being afraid of being alone. and part of it is just being stuck in a rut.

who new ruts could be so fucking heartbreaking?

so?

change the pattern; shake it up:
feel what's happening.
forget about the fears.
react in a new way.
and then: let your heart sparkle;
be glitteringly happy.

that's the plan anyway. xo

through your eyes

i was at a birthday party a couple of nights ago talking to a friend i don't see very often. he gave me a few compliments that were hard to hear--because they were so genuine and nice.

like SO nice. i kept saying "really?!" to things he was saying, and he kept saying "oh, come on, you know this; i'm sure your five best friends tell you this all the time!"

when i repeated these things back to kitty (still in disbelief), she said "umm, i tell you that ALL THE TIME!" oh. hmm.

three lessons here: 1) we don't tell our friends genuine things enough. 2) sometimes we may not hear or believe the things our very best friends tell us. 3) we often have no idea how others see us.

if you asked me how i see myself, this is what i would say: i'm just a girl.

sure, i know i am talented and have a lot of good qualities. but everyone has their own talents. and everyone has some great qualities. so i guess i just don't really feel that special most of the time. but it's really a strange thing to hear yourself described by someone else. luckily for me, it was also positive.

there's this old episode of "this american life" that i love so much i've listened to it a few times, and i never listen or watch things more than once. this episode is haunting, but amazing: it's called see no evil. the episode is all about pretending that things are ok and ignoring things that are uncomfortable--on personal, business, and national levels. in the first segment, there is a family struggling to see the bad in one of their loved ones. even when that something is really bad.

why is it that we can only see the most amazing things about our loved ones but we struggle to see those things in ourselves?

there's this exercise in gabby's 40 days book that has you look into the mirror and say things to yourself as if you were saying them to a best friend or lover. the exercise is quite confronting, and hard to get through. i've gone back to this a few times to try to get it "right." but it's always hard. (i dare you to try it.)

telling yourself those nice things, and believing them, is something that takes practice. we can do it on the mat or off. we can practice cultivating inner strength and power by breathing through a challenging yoga pose or by breathing through a difficult conversation.

after seeing kanye friday night, i taught a theme in yoga about stepping up to a stronger more powerful version of yourself: like believing SO MUCH in your inner strength and power. but not for ego reasons (yeah, i'm calling you on that one kanye). when we truly believe in ourselves, we can do more; we can give more; we can become more; we can inspire more.

we can manifest miracles.

and it's important to do. hard work... but super important.

practicing believing what i hear. love to you N for your words saturday night. i actually heard what you said. and it means a lot to me.

sharing the love back. words to KK you may need right now: you're smart, intelligent, genuine, kind, caring, loving, and loveable. to A going for a job interview later today: you're going to rock it. #nodoubts and to all y'all: you have it inside you too. xx

spring cleaning

i once went to a comedy show where the comedian started off the show saying "does anyone out there actually know what their name means?" me, sitting in the front row: "umm, yeah."  he asked what my name was, and as i replied, he immediately followed up with "and what does it mean?" i looked at him like he was insane and said, "it's a season!" he replied, "oh. yeah. ok; you win that game!" and moved on. everyone laughed and it was hilarious.

i love all the opportunities my name has for jokes and teasing.  and i'm obsessed with things that have my name in it. when springtime comes, i get to see my name EVERYwhere.  and the really great thing is that i get to have this when it hits springtime in the US, and when it hits springtime in australia.  i'm a super lucky girl.

anyway, it's spring in sydney.  finally.  spring is the most exciting of the season changes (yeah, yeah, i know, i might be biased).  but the reason i think it's so exciting is because it really is the time of year when everything is fresh and new. we get to break out of hibernation.  we get to blossom.  we get to really glow.

you'll notice people getting outside more; breaking up their routines; smiling more; reconnecting with others in their lives... getting happier.

and one of the super typical things we associate with spring is "spring cleaning"--the act of getting rid of stuff we don't need anymore; clearing out our space; making room for the new.

we do this in our closets regularly. but we also need to remember to do it in our lives.


i went to kelli's day retreat on saturday where she used "spring cleaning" as a theme for the day.  i stole the idea of the theme and made it my own when i taught both yesterday and tonight: the idea of letting go of things that aren't serving us in our lives is one of my favorite yoga themes.

i like this theme so much that i usually go back and teach it about once a month. because there are ALWAYS things we need to let go of.  there are so many little habits and ways that we get stuck. and being reminded that we have the power to let go of them, to move on, to expand and blossom--well that's just about the most empowering thing in the world.

when i practiced with kelli on saturday i thought of the relationships in my life that weren't giving me everything i needed.  i meditated on thoughts of my heart blooming.  and in savasana, these images of angels dusting out my heart snuck in front of my eyelids.  i was lying there, completely calm, completely at peace, and i just felt myself being dusted out.  i felt myself shining a little brighter.  and it felt amazing.

after i taught this theme sunday afternoon, i had a few people tell me how much they got out of it.  one student told me he had never had such an emotional experience in a yoga class. another told me how much she shifted during that hour. a few others told me how much they enjoyed it.  tonight, the same thing happened.

but you know what's so cool about that? each of us has that power. each of us can do that for ourselves.

i had dinner last night with a friend who is on a super high vibration right now.  she's got her duckies all lined up and she is ready to take on the next stage of her life: no doubt about it; she's gonna rock it.  she and i talked a bit about that idea of realizing your power in a situation, or even just realizing your power to change your attitude in a situation.  and about how easy it can be to forget that we have that power.

so, here's a little reminder: you can do it.  you can let it go.  you can have a little more spring in your step.  even if you're living in the "other" hemisphere right now.  clean out your inner closet; let go of that thing that's holding you back--why would you want to keep hanging on to it any longer than you have to?

to my friend that's on the verge of a divorce. to my friend who isn't sure what her marriage might hold for her. to my friend that doesn't know what career she'll have next week. to all my friends.

make room for new patterns, new ideas, new opportunities, and new people in your life. make room for the next, better thing. make room for yourself.

work work work work workin' on my sh!t

(i seriously have that song stuck in my head right now.)

every relationship is hard work. not just romantic ones. not just the emotional friends. not just the crazy second cousin. every relationship. each friend, each family member, each co-worker. every person we interact with is a whole complex person that deserves a whole complex understanding.

in the past week i've noticed this theme over and over: one of my bff and i got in a disagreement over a miscommunication and didn't really talk for a few days. another bff received an embarrassing text from me that we had to work through (hell no i'm not sharing what it said). another bff (yes i have this many best friends) felt left out when i didn't get an invite out. another friend called me and worked through a misunderstanding we had. two different friends got back in touch after a several month hiatus. a co-worker broke down and shared something personal after feeling under-appreciated. ...this is just off the top of my head, but there are so many examples of how important it is to put time into each communication and each interaction we have.

the theme also popped up this weekend when i went to a few festival of dangerous ideas talks at the opera house. in a talk about loneliness and depression, someone said (my interpretation): we spend so much time being busy. busy-ness is a stand-in for fullness in our lives: if we're busy, we're full, complete. but busy-ness doesn't allow time for connection. in fact, quite the opposite. we end up rushing through our interactions to get to the next one, not allowing space for fully connecting with the people in our lives.

to fully connect with someone is hard work. it takes more than a few minutes. and it takes empathy as well. it needs time, space, compassion, and understanding.

friday afternoon i spent time with my favorite four-year-old: adi is brand new big sister; her little sister is under two weeks old. adi has been feeling a little left-out since her little sister was born, so she and i had a special "big sisters club" afternoon on friday. she and i put on shiny tattoos, went trampolining, and then spent a couple of hours working on a dinosaur activity book and coloring. adi soaked up every second of time that was fully focused on her: she didn't want the time to end and made sure we scheduled the next meeting of big sisters club before i left. "umm, how's friday?" she asked as i was walking out the door. i don't think she even knew which day it was, but she knew she wanted to get her special time scheduled in.

after i left i thought about how adi might be feeling, and i thought about my own sister and how i might have felt when she entered my life. and i thought about how much she drove me nuts for several years. and how she copied everything i did and wanted to steal everything that was mine (like when she ripped the arm off of my favorite doll trying to pull it from the crib so she could play with something dear to me).

and i thought about how my sister and i are best friends now.

i'm super grateful for where we are. but it wasn't easy; it was work. and it still is. just like every other relationship. so part of this blog is a promise to myself and the relationships in my life. part of this blog is a reminder to keep working. part of this blog is an apology for the places i haven't put in as much effort. and part of this blog is dedicated to all of those siblings; all of those co-workers; all of those ex-partners... just all of the people: all of the people who have ever felt like they didn't get the time they deserved from somebody.

relationships are hard work. but they're worth it. and they're probably the only things in this world that are worth that much hard work.