Getting Back on the Horse.

Big breath in. H-A haaaaaaa. Home from Morocco. What a gift to have taught there for a month. A fabulous trip for so many reasons.

One of which I suppose was because I was in a nice little bubble safe from reality. Safe from having to face the aftermath of losing my business. Of a financial crisis. Of the void left from the studio that was my dream.

Although I know moving forward is the only way, it has not been easy. I hear the words in my ears “You have to let go” and in fact it has turned into a constant, very loud ringing. I hear loved ones around me “You have to let it go”. I KNOW. How much do I talk about this when teaching class? The art of surrender and the jewel of Ishvara Pranidhana. Yes folks, I have as much to learn and practice as you my fellow students do.

The philosophy is very clear to me. Practicing it is quite another and man, have I fallen off the horse again and again. When I witness friends around me going through their own catastrophes and troubles, I feel very small being stuck in my little mud puddle. Everyone has troubles, some mammoth, some minuscule, all valid. For some reason, I have trouble giving myself permission to be sad, upset, turned upside down.

Turns out, my little stint in the emergency room that I wrote about in the first post was.......drum roll please.....a nervous breakdown. Whaaaaat?? Yup, it's official, I am a member of one flew over the cuckoo's nest. I saw my doctor upon returning home (mandatory after ER visits) with my novel size stack of paper work and tests. He said that after all the strain from the last few years that my body gave up when I finally decided to relax, let go, that my trip to Morocco was such a relief of carrying the weight that my body said “Enough”. Wow.

Part of me feels better to know that it really was a lot to handle and the other part feels extremely vulnerable admitting this. Like my dirty little secret is out of the closet. This was a dream that my husband I put all our money and soul's into. A state of the art yoga studio that cost roughly $9-$10,000 per month to operate and it did well from day one. It was a mission to offer a beautiful space that was financially and physically accessible to all.

The cherry on top was that it was built to make difference in people's lives. 10% of all proceeds always went to my dear friend Molly's orphanage in Africa- Springs of Hope Kenya. Since the time we were open, almost $15,000 was sent directly to this life saving place as well as to local charities like Family of New Paltz. The reasons behind the studios struggles has it's own story that involves others. I have always chosen to remain quiet on this as I would not want to hurt someone the way we have been. Instead, I am more interested in how I co-created what has happened and how to move forward. The studio always paid for itself which is no small feat for a small town. The thing it did not pay for was me working around the clock to keep it a float.  After 4 years of this and as much as I loved the studio and it's community like a child, I realized this was not a sustainable way to live.

So how are we going to deal with ourselves? The situation of losing the yoga studio hit us hard in the pocket but it's the emotions that are harder to deal with. The love and care we put into creating this place from the ground up- from the blue-stone floor my husband cut by hand, to the paint color right down to the kind door knobs installed were part of the vision, but it's the relationships with students and community that has left the biggest hole. 

There's the teacher's voice in my head again yelling so maybe I can finally hear- “This is attachment! You have to let go! We are not our situations, or job or debt, or material things! The obstacle is here to teach us. Surrender!” Blah, blah, blah. Oooooh I get it- yet it's been a rough ride and I keep falling off the horse.

The crush of finances left from the studio and me wondering if I somehow were a better teacher or worked harder, I could have saved the business has kept me in the murky mud puddle. Ding! There it is! The voice of the inner enemy.... a killer for many of us. How long I have battled that inner foe thinking that If I were better..... And never mind that thinking this way probably did in the end shadow me in classes.

I felt so transparent trying to keep this face of strength on for the past couple of years. It did not matter how many emails or testimonials that said the opposite of my internal thoughts.  I could only hear my own tiny voice. It drove me to be almost fanatical in my own training, study and growth. This part I am thankful for, as I am better all the way around for it, but funny when my therapist (Oh God, I really am a walking soap opera!) said “No more yoga!!!!!' No more reading about yoga!” He said something key- that I also heard from my mentor Nikki- To trust myself. To know I had the light inside me and that I already know. It's just me that's in the way.

It is not acceptance that I needed for the issue- it was and is acceptance for myself. This is the truth of surrender. It is not giving up and turning into a marshmallow on the couch watching 18 episodes of Game of Thrones in a row (although, I admit enjoy especially on a rainy day). The surrender is to stop the internal fight. To recognize the situation so that a fresh perspective can enter our tiny pea brains. It means putting a halt to the inner enemy, the questioning self and get back up on the damned horse to embrace new possibilities.

I love Hafiz's quote -”We have all the ingredients to make our lives joyful and all the ingredients to make it a nightmare.” I have been making mud soup at times through this process-Sorry to my friends and family who had to endured me! - but I think part of the problem is not giving ourselves time to grieve, time to not be perfect. The guilt I had from feeling this way only fed the beast to make it worse. Tearing ourselves apart for how we feel does not help with the healing.
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Ah. Can I finally learn? Can I finally understand that it took something this massive to reach my true inner voice- the one that is a divine light that each and every one of us has?
Time to pull up the boot straps and ride.

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