Just When You Thought This Blog Couldn't Get Any More Selfish...

My Mom decided that because it's been over a month since my last post, I can no longer claim this as a blog; The Wasatch Report has been demoted to a BLAH.

Here's where I've been:

Brad's injury shook something loose in me, and after ensuring his well-being (he's making a fantastic recovery), I checked in with my own, and found it lacking. So, I quit my job and signed up for a yoga teacher training certification.

I'm serious.

And I'm thrilled.

I also returned to PR, which I'm just loving. I'm working part-time for a boutique agency and really digging it.

And I started playing djembe again, taking lessons and accompanying a weekly African dance class.

All this good stuff in my life--good people, activities that make me smile, a supportive husband who doesn't bat an eye when I tell him I'm quitting my job to become a yoga teacher.

I'm so fortunate.


So that's where I've been, and that's why it's been kind of hard to sit down and write. There's just so much excitement and change--I'm still figuring out how to make sense of it all, still realizing that it's all happening....

As I sit in these teacher training classes, though, my mind whirls with quotes and observations I want to share. And I will, because, you see, I have to. I need to keep a journal throughout this certification process, and I hope you'll forgive me if this BLAH becomes that journal--a place for me to jot my feelings about what I'm learning, what I hear, what resonates, what I hope to avoid in my own teaching.

I mean, I say I hope you'll forgive me, but I know I've likely lost all readers by now. Except one (hi, Mom).

And obviously I can't share anything proprietary to the course work or studio.

And, of course, I'll still post photos of Arnie as needed.

Here's what I loved best about today's class:
We spent some time talking about how it's not the yoga teacher's job to impart some huge philosophical or spiritual ideology to students. The yoga teacher is simply there to remind students to breathe, to be present in their bodies, to breathe, to be present in their bodies....

And as I thought about that, I realized that the most transformational classes I've ever taken have been less "airy fairy" and more "stay in your body, stay on your mat." In fact, for the past few months, I've been setting an intention before every class to simply stay on my mat. Stay on the mat. Don't let the mind stray, don't let the eyes wander to the girl in the cool yoga top who's purse costs more than your car--nothing, nothing, nothing good can come of that. So I've been challenging myself to STAY ON THE MAT. And it's been awesome.

The other concept I've been into lately (in my yoga practice and off the mat, too) is the idea that wherever I am is ok. Whether I bend so far forward that my palms are flat to the floor, or just lean over enough to graze my kneecaps with my fingertips, I'm in a perfect pose. There is no right, no wrong, no better or worse. It's all yoga, and it's all ok, all perfect. The element that interests me there is that the concept of "perfect" is fluid, because as my postures change and develop and my "edge" deepens or backs off from day to day, my "perfect" pose changes, too.

Fluidity. Acceptance.

Those are the words for the day.