Finding Inner Guidence

          Finding our inner guidance is one of the greatest challenges we will ever face as a human. The difficulty is not in the acquisition of information that will lead us, but instead it is the letting go of beliefs that block our intuition, preventing us from trusting ourselves.
        I was speaking with a friend the other day who found herself in the dilemma of making a difficult choice. She was being asked by a friend to do something she was not comfortable doing. She found it difficult to assert herself with her friend to let her know she didn't want to participate. When i asked her why she didn't just speak her true desire to her friend, she said that she didn't want to make her friend feel judged. I assume by her friend feeling judged that could cause conflict, conflict may result in loss of friendship, loss of friendship may result in feelings of loneliness. Our fear of loss is what ultimately leads us toward the compromise of our integrity. I have thought long about this conversation and can see myself over the years making the same mistake. I have forfeited my inner peace many times over the years because i have tried to make sure the opinion of the "other" was always favorable of me. Why would we ever sabotage ourselves in this way?
         I think we sabotage ourselves when we choose not to self-generate our worth. We have been trained to look at the world "outside" of us for confirmation and reassurance that we are okay. We allow others opinions of us to determine our happiness level, confidence level, and overall self-worth. When we externalize our self-worth we give others a degree of power over us. We are easily manipulated because we have relinquished control to the ever changing opinion of the other. The truth is we are in control of our self-worth and no one can affect it until we give them permission. Essentially we are giving others permission to tell us how we are to feel about ourselves when we allow the world outside of us to define us.
         How might my friend find the confidence to assert her desire of non-participation and not compromise her personal integrity? She must first recognize that she is responsible for creating the life she desires. She must be aware that she has authority to control her emotions and perception of self-worth. We are all responsible for generating our own self -love! And then she must allow her friend to assume exactly the same responsibility. If her friend chooses to feel judged by her non-participation....that will be the decision she makes. She should make every effort to be kind and diplomatic in her assertion, but in the end her friend must decide how she will choose to feel.
         What i have described here is not easy! It is so challenging that it takes lifetimes to learn and master...maybe even multiple lifetimes? However, this paradigm will lead us to living fulfilled lives. It will allow us to exercise our personal integrity in a world so desperate for truth and goodness. We will quickly see how our internal needs are met on the internal level. We will begin to pour out the things we have been striving so desperately to acquire....love, happiness, joy, kindness, etc. It all begins within!!!

Are you afraid?

I want to say that it seems more scary approaching a "situation" than it is experiencing the situation. Somehow no matter what it is....i am able to handle it as it is happening....its effortless because its just happening! We have a tough time with the NOW. Death is one of those "situations" that i think will work out quite nicely in the moment. There is no way to die incorrectly....we can laugh, scream, pitch a fit, smile....the whole spectrum of responses are at our disposel. We are free to die as we wish....we cannot mess it up.

I am beginning to see that it is not my body that has the opportunity to be preserved, its ideas that can pass thru the physical plane and traverse time and space without effort. My body is only a conduit for preserving ideas. I am a temporay resevoir. My struggle is imagined. The struggle is remembering.

Eyes are completly dialated, i am fully coherent...my body feels tense...I constantly remind it that it can relax. It wont believe me sometimes, so i just coax it into submission with breath.

Train yourself to let go of everything you fear to lose.

Looking in the mirror

Last night i taught my first yoga class. For the first time in my life i hardly had any fear about such an undertaking. Being the focal point in a crowd of people has always terrified me. I can rememeber in high school giving speaches and feeling my guts twist themsleves in anxiety waiting my turn. I remember in college my mind going blank during a presentation becasue my only thought was....what are "they" thinking of me? I hope its this....i hope its that....now what was i saying? I forgot what to say...oh no, now they think i am uninteligent or weak. I have always been afraid of appearing weak (weak is not the word really but its close enough). Yet for some reason inspite of these nagging thoughts i have pushed myself to confront this fear. I think its what we are all doing. I have this nagging suspicion that everyone is in a mental struggle between fear and love. Every second that we are concious in this physical reality, we are choosing between negative and positive...fear and love.

I realized last night that others are just a reflection of my thoughts about myself. I smiled at them...they smiled back...i said encouraging words during class they said encouraging words after class. I gave my time to be physically present in the gym...they gave their time to be physically present in the gym. What i gave them, they gave it back to me. We created a flow of energy. I was not afraid to be in their gaze...to be exposed...to be looked at intimately without my knowledge (i did have two brief moments of fear jolts but they were pushed on through and not allowed to stop in my mind to rest) because i was not judging myself or my words. I was speaking what i felt, what i believe, and what i want for myself in this existence. I was only sharing what i hold dear to me. I didnt judge me harshly so they didnt judge me harshly. i am sure everyone had an opinion on my presentation style, fluency with yoga, methods, music choice...etc, but i chose all those things for myself. I could never adapt to the variety of opnions others have about me and for me....there are just to many and on too wide of a spectrum. So i have to hand select the Way i want to live with only my needs and desires in mind. I give that to myself. I am learning to give that to those around me. They irony is by doing so others are free to do the same. Judgement dies. We create a scene of openess and love towards one another. Jesus only had two commands, "Love the Lord your God with all your strength, and Love your neighbor as yourself"! We begin to love ourselves when we realize were the ones being so critical of ourself. Then, conciously, we choose to look on oursleves with compassion, kindness, and forgiveness. We let our minds be free to move, free to fail, free to learn, free to succeed, free to climb, free to fall. Once we are convinced there is no punishment we begin to create and shape our reality. Its all so terribly intertwined because we are ONE.

Redefining Miracles

What is a miracle? I am beginning to see the term with a much broader perspective. Our minds are so full of fear and nonsense, we cannot fully appreciate what it means to be alive. We have adopted our cultures opinions and bad habits. We are blindly obeying our conditioning.

I have become hyper aware that i run off electricity, my heart is fueled by a spark. My entire body compensates to best adapt me to my environment. When its cold it adjusts for me. When its hot it adjusts for me. My eyes are my windows to this reality, they are rejuvenated by my blinking, they absorb light. Light gives me confidence!

We are miracles!! We are boundless! WE ARE!!!