Why Fearing

After just spending invaluable training time with senior Ashtanga teacher, Tim Miller, there are more than a few quotable quips!
As he has said in the past, "Avoidance is not the answer!" Along with telling us what Guruji used to say, "Breathe, don't fear". Most of us know this practice brings up sO much - physically, mentally, emotionally. Fear is a biggie. Therefore, avoidance might ensue.
With this recent discussion time with Tim, he has a new perfect line: "Fear and Mula bandha cannot co-exist". Totally the truth. Back bending and Inversions are probably the quintessential examples. In fact, fear is most likely what causes you to lose your sense of proprioception (where we are in space)in asana such as inversions and back bends.

Something I just read recently: "Doubt (Fear) kills more dreams, than Failure ever could".

No Water, No Coffee, No Prana

My husband, an environmental scientist, just recently came back from a conference and this was the take-away gift. The focus of the conference: Sustainable Water Management. A big looming environmental problem for sure. This mug is no joke, especially when it takes many gallons of water to result in each cup of coffee.
Of course this mug's message sure made me think of what just about every Ashtangi has heard or read or recited: "No Coffee, No Prana". A Guruji/Sharath quotable (especially if you're into coffee).
So lets please take a step back, heed this mug's plead as saving our water and how it effects you and the environment - whether monitoring use, reclaiming, conserving, preventing litter, etc.
As a note, our fair city of Cincinnati has some of the best filtering systems in the country, therefore some of the best drinking water.
Obviously, please be mindful.

An Up By the Bootstraps Practice

(here's a ditty from a while back, held as a draft - obviously a bit of a twitch going on, but good message...yo)
Most of you that know me, know that I am less likely to talk about myself, about my problems, about the joys, about the pains, about the pitfalls, about the bliss. It is not to say I deny these things, and it is not to say I sugarcoat everything; I simply want to keep myself out of the way of the teachings, of the yoga, while in the Mysore Room. This is your experience.
I present myself as conduit for the learning of this practice...a practice that is not sugarcoated. Students don't need their teachers spoon feeding them with feel good select postures and affirmations - it just is not real world teachings. A bona fide 'practice' is one that makes us FEEL everything. We come face to face with the real world every day. Sure, wouldn't it be divine to slip away on your yoga mat for an hour or more each day into a syrupy slather of constant positivity swirled in by the voice of a yoga teacher, without even having to try? Well, the reality: the real life feel good can only truly come from inside of us, through actual working hard enough to make an actual dent in the armor we have layered on.
Your practice doesn't have to kill you, granted, but it should be something more in line with pulling yourself up by the bootstraps worthy, rather than everything spooned in (your happy thoughts, your stroked empowerment, your forced sweat, your lifted heart). D.I.Y - Do It Yourself...it is guaranteed to be much more satisfying in the not-to-long run.
Initially it may not be the obvious wow-that-was-just-what-i-needed type of yoga session. But, I have come to a point where just about every practice makes me want to exclaim, 'that's the best thing since sliced bread!'...and I, like many others, do exclaim. Many yoga classes will offer the 'easy obvious feel good sound good' sensations that feed our ego more than our truth. And that is a difficult notion to buy into, or buy out of actually.
Big picture practice.

Worth Its Weight

It's a light yet weighty practice. Light because of it's lifting floating breathy element; Weighty because of its Dailyness and how it rubs up against the you that is you.

I give myself over to the practice and to the students that trust it or are dipping their toe into the trusting of it.