#yogaversary

Today is the 4th anniversary of my graduation from Yoga Teacher Training. This inspired me to jot down 10 things that have happened since then.

10. I completed a master's degree in addiction counseling and a post-master's certificate in marriage and family therapy - yay, student loans!

9. I tried out being a corporate yoga teacher and found it wasn't for me

8. I tried out a ridiculous idea of pairing yoga with geekery and it worked...nobody was more surprised than me.

7. I now own more cosplay than business attire

6. I stood up for myself and let go of some negative people and situations

5. I found my own voice as a teacher and continue to find my voice as a therapist

4. I opened my own f*cking yoga studio

3. I cultivated the greatest friendships of my life

2. I celebrated 13 years of a most profound bond - don't let anyone tell you that 13 is unlucky

1. I have a clearer understanding of who I am, what I want, and how I'm going to get there. Stay tuned for what the next chapter holds.

This morning, while putting away the props after an iyengar yoga class at the Yoga Club in Berlin’s Prenzlauer Berg neighborhood, I remembered that it has been just over 10 years since I have been studying yoga seriously. By seriously, I mean regularly, with good teachers. I am not counting the times in college I tried to teach myself yoga from a book!

It is interesting to reflect on the other “long term relationships” I have had with other activities. I took piano lessons for 10 years, too. From age 5 to 15. And I probably sang in choirs for that long, too, perhaps longer. I worked at one company for almost 8 years continuously.

And of course, there are many relationships with family (nearly 34 years) and friends (two of them going on 30 years) that are three times as long.

All of these relationships require dedication, consistency, and simply “showing up.” And any time one gives oneself to a practice, a friend, a relationship, an art form, or a career, one reaps great benefits. The seeds sown in the challenging times grow beautiful and tasty fruits eventually.

I am so very thankful to have yoga as a practice. It’s hard to express in words all that it has offered me over the years. It started as a way to connect with myself through a physical means instead of a mental process, which was really valuable during graduate school and after. This aspect continues to be important, since I can easily get stuck in my head and exhaust myself with thoughts. Yoga is grounding.

Yoga has also given me many communities and friends. In Cambridge, it gave me a chance to be with people who weren’t in my program or even in school - a really important reminder of life beyond the GSD.

In San Francisco, yoga also provided an anchor of friendships and an even broader circle of acquaintances. It took many years to find my niche in SF, but I did eventually find not one but a few yoga niches.

Yoga has been the foundation for the best vacations I have ever had, the reason for many of the best days of my life, the source of energy and inspiration for work and play, a safe place to feel really emotional and process difficult experiences, a method for balancing strength and flexibility, the best way I have found to stay fit and get stronger, and also a confidence builder - big time! Who doesn’t feel awesome after their first ever handstand (as an adult)?

The art and science of teaching yoga also provided a forum for me to develop my “voice” and learn to trust myself more and more as a leader. The barriers I faced in teaching were most often around trusting my own experience as valid and believing my story or my approach to a pose was worth sharing rather than something technical. Once I could jump over that walk, I found the grass quite welcoming on the other side and usually really enjoyed the experience of sharing yoga with others.

So today, I offer lots of thanksgiving and gratitude to the yoga as a practice, to teachers throughout centuries who kept the practice alive and vibrant, and to my own teachers who shared their wisdom with me and poured themselves into me. Here’s to many more years with yoga!

I miss my teachers and yoga friends. But thankfully, I can be my own teacher, and I can benefit from teachers around the world as I journey.