Lessons from the mat

The best thing I did for myself in 2011 was get back on my mat.

faith like a child

Yoga is my favorite form of everything: physical movement, emotional release, mental training, personal satisfaction, personal growth, sharing and receiving. Yoga completes me.

I have increased my personal practice and, by the grace and flow of all that is right in the Universe, I am teaching again...taking my sense of honoring my being and purpose to a whole new level.

Today's lesson from the mat came during the practice of my life, rather than the practice of asana.
I decided to put a bit of "poetry" on my mat. My hub got a new mat for Christmas so we had one to spare where I could try the medium (permanent marker) and my technique (my own handwriting).
I measured, I spaced out my words, I picked the right colors, measured again, counted letters per line, taped, and measured again just to be sure...and then I put pen to mat.

This is the year. My year. 

I will dream big, grow ideas and take leaps of faith. I will do yoga everyday.

I will rest when I'm tired. I will run, jump and play when I need to be re-energized. 

I will continue to open my heart, lead from that place and allow it to be my guiding force. 

I will get grounded when I feel uprooted and expansive when I feel stuck. 

I will nurture myself with nature in a way that supports my health and energy. 

I will embrace the dark times with love and gentle grace, enjoy and rejoice the bright times with love and laughter, and do my best to be grateful for both. I will say yes more and soften my face. 

I will let others in without losing myself. I will drink deeply from the well and offer back freely and fully. 

I will forgive those who've hurt me and I will forgive myself. I will speak my truth out loud and often. 

I will look for the good in others and in myself. I will dance. I will sparkle. I will cry freely. 

I will revel. I will fly. I will sit quietly. I will live out loud. I will laugh. I will teach and I will learn. 

I will allow myself to be as I am.

It only took a few lines in for me to have a write-o (I wasn't typing...couldn't be a typo)
It gnawed at me
I brooded
I furrowed my brow
I sighed...and not a relaxing let everything that no longer serves you go kind of sigh...
Then I kept going
and had another
The first one obviously still eating at an edge of a thought somewhere...
And then came the lesson, my practice is about accepting where I am and understanding that while I'll never be perfect, in the same breath I already am perfect.
Perhaps it wasn't a write-o but a riiight...ohhhh!

Now, I still haven't competed the entire mat
In my self-ed-ness, I am still wrestling with whether or not the error, which would line up with my drishti in downward facing dog, will be a humble reminder of my not perfect/perfect revelation in a positive way, or in a negative way...
So for now, I haven't thrown it away...as I threatened to do through furrowed brow
But I know today, I cannot work on it any more.
It's a process
Like me
Like my practice

Good lesson, mat!
"

I Heard An Owl