Let it Rot

I don't have much time to write. I need to be asleep in 15 mins so I can wake up at 4am.  I'm at the beginning of my training journey and I can't tell you how much I am loving it - devouring every second I can. It's also surreal. I am tempted to pinch myself to make sure I'm not dreaming.

It's intense, and it's amazing.

Yesterday, we touched on the concept of rotting...as a very powerful and good thing.  I think of a rotting apple and I want to puke...but then...I think about holding on to resentment and expectations of forgiveness and that makes me want to puke too. Why would I want to keep putting my heart (and expectations) in the hands of someone who hurt me?

A thought came to mind that I hadn't thought of in years. A long time ago, I was stood up by a boy. Now I know it sounds silly and juvenile...and it was, but it also deeply hurt me. I remember how excited I was about this date: how I had carefully planned my outfit, how I had cancelled plans with my best friend - and then, how my heart started to sink when the time neared 9pm and how I knew that he was not coming. And all these years, (subconsciously and consciously) I have been waiting for an apology...some sort of closure, some explanation for what on earth happened?  Yesterday, I let that expectation rot.  I released myself and that person of my expectations. I resigned, "I don't need your apology, my life is complete as is."

And it felt good. No, I wasn't in tears...and I wouldn't consider it a huge "Aha" breakthrough moment. But I waved the white flag of surrender.

Today, I received a message from an old friend. We had a falling-out moment in college and haven't spoken much since. She apologized to me for the loss of our friendship. Today I was in tears. I had never expected an apology from her because I felt that I was responsible for the end of that friendship, and was waiting for the perfect time to apologize myself.  I was deeply touched and humbled by her authenticity, and I was floored by this gift the Universe brought me.  The gift of rekindling a relationship with a friend I deeply love.

Life is so much sweeter, so beautiful, and so wonderfully raw if we live without expectations. Let them rot...they could become the fertilizer for something more beautiful than we ever imagined.

Fear not

I love this quote Rebecca posted on our study group page a couple weeks ago,

"People decide to live a spiritual life, they think it's going to be all flower petals

and incense; but really it's much more like 'I can't eat my dinner because I've just learned
something upsetting about myself.'"

- David Hawkins, Transcending the Mind

I couldn't agree more. I actually feel sick to my stomach right now.  I caught myself in a pattern today.  I've mentioned this before but I am hyper-competitive. Like to the millionth degree. So much so, that I even do it subconsciously: in the Starbucks line, in the mall, on my mat, even in church!

New to our class today were two Forrest Yogis. One girl I had met before, and the other I met for the first time. They were lovely - smiling, beaming, and happy to be there. I enjoyed meeting them but I immediately felt that feeling...the heart pounding competitive, "can you pike," "how good are you," emotion that haunts most of my new experiences and encounters. I caught myself and made a pledge to myself at the beginning of class: keep your eyes on your mat. On YOUR mat. I managed to do that somewhat successfully. But as much as I'm ashamed to admit, class flew by in a blur and I was left with that kind of feeling you get when you park your car because you've arrived at your destination and think "how the fuck did I even get here?" My mind kept conjuring up thoughts like "What if they teach here, and then there's no room for you?," "What if they're better than you?"

And so I used the only tool I had on my way home. I stalked my fear. Then I saw the pattern. I meet someone, I see competition, and a wall immediately goes up. I did this in Community College when I knew there were only two full scholarships available at TCU. I made one good friend and 15 enemies. I did this in Ballet. I wasn't the best and I knew that, so I became one of the mean girls. I went over and over tons of situations until I came to a painful discovery. It started with my sister.  I resented her existence from the moment she was born.  She was a threat to my codependent relationship with my mother. I thought she would take my mom's attention away from me.  

But she has never come close to doing so. She has always loved me, and always been there for me. She protected me from my nightmares as I would sneak into her room so I wouldn't have to sleep alone. She always defended me when my parents were upset, and she was and is the biggest supporter of any leap I've taken in this life.  I don't see her as competition anymore, but I do see that our relationship is not where I'd like it to be because so early on I allowed fear to take the steering wheel.  

And then I looked deeper.  Why was I so scared that my sister would take my mother away? Why am I scared of meeting new people? What's the big deal? There will always be someone better at handstands, better at back bends, better at eating healthy, better at curling their hair, etc etc. Could I not just set the competition aside and let it go? I'm perfect and enough right where I am today, this second, and the next one.  Competition, building walls, and pushing people away have only hurt my relationships in the past. I want to put those fears aside - better yet, I want to keep stalking them and rewire my mind.

Ok Fear, so what if she wants to teach here? I see your point, let me raise one too - what if she becomes my best friend?

Just keep swimming

So I leave for training a week from today. I'm scared, nervous, excited, anxious....I could go on.
I wonder so many things. How many people will be there? How good are they going to be? Am I good enough? And I don't like to admit that because I am working on accepting that in all moments of my life I am enough.  But I'm human, and I have moments of weakness, and in those moments fear abounds.

"Karmen why do you like yoga?" Rebecca asks in the middle of my practice teaching sun salutations - completely blindsiding me. "uuuuhhhh...."(silence. shit shit shit, I can't think of anything. say anything, lie damnit! but lying isn't an option and its almost like my body can't even do it anymore.) "Because it gets me out of me head!!!" I'm finally able to blurt out, thankful that my body produced a response.

But it's true. I have such a busy mind and its torturous at times. Yoga calms that shit down. People wouldn't believe the crap my mind can conjure up.  Every time I get on a plane (I have a phobia of flying) I imagine how I'm going to die in a plane crash and text my parents and fiance how much I love them right before take off because I'm convinced that I won't survive it; and I strongly feel the need to send those I love you texts so they can have them as my final words.  Much like my plane phobia, I let fears get the best of me a lot of the time. I fear that I won't be the teacher my community needs or wants.

As we study the 6th chakra (the power of the mind), I'm learning the difference between my perception and the illusions I've created to form my reality.  Every single time I finish a round of practice teaching all my classmates cheer and clap...and it's hard for me to accept that they are clapping for me.  But watching and experiencing this out pour of love, acceptance, and encouragement has been like having laser surgery for my cloudy vision.  I'm slowly but surely beginning to see that my peers already perceive me as someone with an ability to help and to teach others.  And it feels good.  It feels great, especially as I move on to my Chicago adventure.

This week I received my animal spirit guide in my energy session with Bridget. An animal spirit guide is a teacher/ mentor/ friend who comes in the form of an animal, to guide you.  And I'm totally excited about this: it's a Sea Turtle!!!  A little bit about my wise friend:

 "These creatures are methodical, determined and patient. Whether they live on land or in the sea

 they represent steady energy and long life. They also both represent independence, travel, and the ability to not be tied down or chained to one place as they both carry their home with them wherever they desire to be. 

They posses strong self-protection in the form of their home shells, they can pull their extremities into their shell which offers them safety from outside threats." 

My fears are not gone. I'll probably always walk with them, but I can choose to let them create my reality or I can choose to see right through the illusions they create.  As training approaches, I know the fears will come and go.  That's the nature and beauty of this life.  But I won't allow my fears to paralyze me.  Instead, in honor of my friend the sea turtle,  "Just keep swimming," will be my motto for the next two months.

 

Follow your Throat

Follow your heart throat.

That's right. We have moved on to the throat Chakra.  My feelings towards this one vary from excitement to fear.

Have you ever had the feeling that there is something you need to do? No particular reason for it, but you know it's just something you should do? If you're like me you might run it by your fears first:

"How will I make money if I leave this job?"
"Who will love me if I leave my boyfriend?"
"If I stop running, will I gain weight?"
"What if I say no (which is what I really want to say) and then my friends don't like me anymore?"

These questions are symptomatic of one who leads with fear not FAITH. Something I'm trying to change as I move into the next chapter of my life.

How can you not???  Is a question that now pops up for me when I look at guidance and willpower. I'll do my best to illustrate.

example 1: Boyfriend number 1 - we got  to a point in our relationship in which we were together simply out of comfort.  I had this feeling (ahem guidance) that I should break up with him...but I didn't, in fear that I would lose something so comfortable. So what happened? As I've written before, I cheated on him multiple times until our relationship came to a painful end.

There is never a perfect time for change. Don't wait for it...it won't come. If you make the change yourself, you will feel alive again. It will be worth it.

example 2: Career number 1 - I've always wanted to be an actress. So, after graduating from college I followed the American Dream and moved to L.A. to become a star. After a two year struggle with energy sucking people, talentless schemers, and slave driving side jobs I started to get this feeling that maybe I should leave Los Angeles. So what happened? I didn't trust Divine will. "I will not be a failure" I kept telling myself, loading on the self-judgement.  But the Divine had another plan for me.  I got sick, got into 3 huge car accidents, and got robbed. Finally I surrendered to Divine will and moved away.

After leaving Los Angeles, I felt lost and I felt like a loser. I didn't know what to do with my life. I was embarrassed but I must admit I also felt relieved.  I spent some months in total confusion, with no set career path or ambitions. This is when life got FUCKING awesome.

I knew I couldn't sit at home all day in my parents' house so I got a job in retail at lululemon. One day one of my leaders at the store took me out to lunch to meet a yoga instructor. "She's badass," I remember her saying.  And she was. She was more than badass, she was and is a walking talking inspiration.  I had always contemplated teaching yoga but fear (that trusty bastard) always chimed "you won't make enough money."  After lunch we took Rebecca's class at Karmany and I was hooked.  Three months later I signed up for teacher training with Ana Forrest.

I'm not gonna lie. I'm scared and I'm nervous. Fear is making it's best attempts "You won't ever be as good as Amber or Rebecca."  But I'm also pretty damn excited.  And it took some courage. And it took a LOT of willpower; It took giving up coffee!!!

I'm sure my parents would rather me be a doctor or a lawyer.  There are people who ask, "You went to Stanford, and you're going to be a Yoga Teacher??" Fuck yeah I am.

How can I not follow my dream???

Be honest with yourself...say the things you need to say, do what you need to do. Trust your intuition, and surrender to the Divine. Even if you don't believe in anything...surrender.  We only get one life, make it BADASS!

Let me see

Dad please don't go. We are happy. We are perfect. We need you.

If you go, I will pack my bag, (my little red suitcase) and leave too.

Mom please say "sorry." Please make him stay. 

Don't ruin us.

If he goes, I will beg. I will try to go too because we all need to be together.

Forever.

It will tear me apart. Please don't fight. Please be my friends. You know me well, You know me best.

I need you two to stay and be my friends or else I will have no friends.

I don't want to lose our happiness. Mom and Dad should always be happy and together.

I will cry, cry, cry.

I was five, and it was the first time I had ever witnessed and mentally processed that my parents were fighting. It wasn't the end of the world, and it was perhaps not a huuuge fight...but it was my first memory of pain. It was a pain that made me fear my world was coming to an end.  A pain that set the tone and created a lie I would live by: I'm not worthy of love outside my parents...thus, I'm not worthy of love. 

We did this exercise in our study group today. We recreated our first memory of emotional pain and journaled from the perspective of that child.  We then coupled into pairs and read our stories over and over, uninterrupted until we could read them without being overwhelmed by our emotion.  

While this may seem self-indulgent, narcissistic, or even masochistic to some...it's not. Consider for a moment that it could be liberating. Because in actuality it was. Entertain the thought that you have lived a lie your whole life, blinded in a pattern of actions and reactions stemming from your first painful infantile memory.
 

The beauty lies in discovering that lie. In the way that we wipe our windshields when there is too much shit to drive safely, we must wipe away the lies we created to live authentically.  It's deep work, but it's totally worth it. 

I'm currently reading a book called "Women Who Run With The Wolves." It's filled with intercultural myths, fairytales, and stories to help women reconnect with their instinctual nature. 

"...La Que Sabe [The One Who Knows] had created women from a wrinkle

on the sole of her divine foot: This is why women are knowing creatures;

they are made, in essence, of the skin of the sole, which feels everything. This

idea that the skin of the foot is sentient had the ring of a truth, for an acculturated Kiche 

tribeswoman once told me that she'd worn her first pair of shoes when she was twenty

years old and was still not used to walking con los ojos vendados, [with blindfolds on her feet]."

If we don't do the work, if we don't delve deep into those memories, we might forever walk blindly. Blind to the fact that our intuition is telling us something, blind to the patterns we continually recreate in our lives, and blind to the lies we create at the beginning of our journey: I'm not worthy of love.

Find that inner child and grieve for her; hold her hand, tell her the truth, and be weary of the lie that does not allow you to see.

The Truth about Lies

"And then I turned 10. and this...here, this is when I started lying." gulp. I suddenly remembered to breath. It surprised me to feel the weight of this confession because it didn't feel that heavy when I wrote it the night before. Bridget had me create a timeline of my life - from birth to present day.  "It will serve you to see the patterns in your life so that you can begin to see what happens before and after the huge events." she said.

I have a hard time with trust. I don't trust boys, and often times I don't trust girls either. I've been cheated on before and it feels like a stab to the heart with a simultaneous kick to the gut. Just plain awful.  Since the cheating (circa 20 years old) I blamed my problems, behaviors, and beliefs on that doomed relationship. "Oh well you see, I went through your phone because my last boyfriend cheated," or "I can't trust you, I trusted my last boyfriend and look what happened," or even worse "you must be cheating, because your roommate is cheating." Regardless of  the circumstance, trust has been a continual battle for me.

I kept reading...

"And then I turned 18, and I cheated on my boyfriend, and then I turned 19 and I cheated on him again...and then I was about to cheat on him again, but we broke up."  Shit. I DO remember feeling the weight of that as I had written it on the timeline.  I had honestly forgotten about my cheating...for the longest time I had looked upon cheating with so much judgement and disgust, that I failed to recognize...I'm the person that introduced this to myself! I was the first cheater....

Then...the breakthrough. "Consider for a moment, that you don't trust yourself," Bridget said. Silence. I knew my heart needed some work...but I never thought I could've been the cause of my own heart break. In truth, I am.  And it started at age 10. When I began to betray the person I should've loved the most. When I began to lie to make friends in a new school, lie to ward off rejection, lie to get a boyfriend, lie lie lie.

So I see this timeline in front of me...and I see the patterns. Make a big transition, lie to make it comfortable - get hurt, lie to callous the heart - stay in a city that's eating away at my soul (and body), hmmm denial (fancy lying)!

I have amazing intuition but I betray it constantly.  "Don't second guess yourself," Rebecca constantly tells me. Love is Divine power.  LOVE and TRUST should radiate from within. How can I ever expect to trust anyone, if I don't trust myself?

I've made an oath to myself: no more lying...even the small stuff. Because whoever said "A white like never hurt anyone," is full of shit.  Lying is poisonous. It took 3 car accidents, one apartment break in, and a scary biopsy result for me to break free from denial and get honest with myself.

I have read this passage from 1 Corinthians several times, but it's really hitting home these days:

 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 

⁵ It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.  

⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

And p.s. if you get offended because I'm late to your party because I tell you that I was sitting in my underwear unable to pry myself away from a book - don't take it personally...I'm just not making up fancy lies anymore.

24 and Anorexic

24. 101lbs. 5'7".

Ridiculous, is what that is. But I wasn't ready to process that. I was at a go-see, looking down at the jeans I had just ripped. How the fuck am I going to walk out there and tell them that my fat-ass ripped these jeans? Not only would I clearly not book the job (= deducing points from my self worth), but now I had to walk out there and tell the client that I ripped their precious 500 dollar jeans (humiliation = extra deduction points). Coffee was all I had consumed that day, and I regretted even those 10 calories. It never occurred to me that maybe the jeans were made out of cheap fabric (as they usually are), or that millions of girls before me had tried them on (which was most certainly true), or that maybe my sharp bony deprived knee punctured the hole.

Those days are somewhat blurry now. I'm sure I went home and ate even less and worked out even harder. I hated my life, I'm sure I hated myself, and I was awful to most of my loved ones.  Every time I booked a job, or got a pay bump I was elated for about a couple hours, then I'd go back to wanting more, never stopping to acknowledge that I was enough.

My teacher Rebecca studied with Dharma Mittra a couple times and I love listening to her quote what he once told a whole workshop of yogis.

"Look at how beautiful and young you all are. 

You have a nice car, you have a nice house. 

You have beautiful children, you have a handsome husband. 

One day it will all be gone. 

Your husband, gone.

Your house, gone.

Your children, gone.

Your car, your job,  and your poses,

POOF - they will all be gone. 

And what will you do?"

Hah, I thought I had the third Chakra down. "No problems here lets keep moving - I know I will need help with the fourth." But when Rebecca asked if we subscribed to beauty being defined as 24 and anorexic...I hated to admit that I did. And that shit, in reality, I've been 24 and anorexic.

I want honor myself.  Honor my personal code of ethics, my emotions, my body, and my desires.  Even honor those scary moments I toyed with death.  The beauty of having been 24 and anorexic is that I realized...it's not all its made out to be. I still didn't fit into designer jeans and seriously who the fuck cared? Now, I don't recommend taking that path; its a very scary, lonely, and angry one. And it hurts a lot of people. 

I DO recommend telling yourself that you are enough. I'm working on it daily. I can't pike, but I'm awesome. I can't afford my own place, but I'm beautiful.  I'm choosing to go to Yoga Teacher training and that's not selfish, its brave. My body can no longer fit into size 0's, but I can arm balance my way through a yoga class, and frankly, that's just BADASS!