"Sometimes I need

only to stand

wherever I am

to be blessed."

~ mary oliver

where have i been?!

MAY-nifesting dreams and changes at the yoga journal conference. meg & i had the distinct honor of spending the day with elena brower, seane corn, kathryn budig & faith hunter at the women & leadership intensive.

my body is wiped and my bones are tired, so more is en route! (but i couldnt help but share this cutie pie pic of meg & i from this morning!)

love + light,

M

Yoga isn't about executing the poses perfectly, or having the best balance. Yoga is connecting with yourself. Yoga is like learning to breathe again. Or that moment when you jump out of bed in the morning, rush outside to do the sun salution and you're blinded by how utterly brilliant the world can be. Yoga is taking a moment from your stressful, up-beat life and remembering you have a soul that needs tending to.

gratitude is the best attitude!

i walked into work one day exclaiming "GRATITUDE IS THE BEST ATTITUDE!" to my clients, all people who used to live on the streets and currently have little to look forward to in life. with a big grin on my face and my arms in the air (i was also probably dancing around them as i said this) they looked at me like i had ten heads. i could hear the whispers "what is this white girl preaching about NOW?"

but it's true. a belief i stand strongly by. and my current focus is working with my clients to teach them how to express gratitude, for what little or nothing they have in their lives.

for some of us, we're lucky. we have an abundant life filled with so many blessings. sometimes i want to cry when i look around at my supportive friends, my loving family, some extremely talented + patient teachers, my quaint apartment and my beautiful feline children. i am SO lucky. i have had a rocky life and am so thankful to have turned into the blossoming woman that i am today. i bow to the family and teachers who have helped guide me, challenge me and hold my hand on this journey.

a few years ago, i was helping run a retreat for teens that was focused on gratitude. we took the teens to the lake and asked them to find a rock that resonated to them - which soon became their gratitude rock. to this day, many months days and years later, i keep this gratitude rock in my coat pocket, and everytime i touch it, i name three things i am thankful for that day. my rule: i can never repeat something in the same day. if i switch coats, my rock comes with me. in summer i keep it in a bag.

a simple exercise like this allows us to take a few minutes in our hectic lives to express that gratitude and take a moment to reflect on what we are truly thankful for.

today, what are you thankful for? how do you express gratitude?

(i am taking the time to be thankful for: learning self love, sunshine, fresh strawberries, caring co-workers, a healing hamstring & a peaceful home + mind).

love & light,

m XO

happy new moon in taurus!

as we begin this gorgeous month of may, we begin to see the earth blossom and unfold right before our very eyes... especially, if we are one of those human beings who are lucky enough to have all four seasons. we can feel spring, see spring and certainly smell spring.

as with any new month, we also are blessed with a gorgeous new moon. this month our new moon took place on tuesday, may 3rd at 1:51 a.m. and is in TAURUS. how did you take it in? did you moon salute to that gorgeous beauty in the sky yet? (no? get on it!)

if you are like me, i set an intention every new moon. i also meet with a group of powerful women during the new moon inside my yoga studio, and we share every dream possible by candlelight. we cry, we laugh and we help each other grow. we pick a goddess card for the month, and set our intentions, while washing away what does not serve us.

as the new moon is in taurus, i am focusing on my future. what i am desiring. i am being held back from my self-doubt, so i am washing that away and riding myself of self-sabotage. i want to be free and i want to live my life with passion, doing what i love.

my intentions for the month lay here. (all information comes from jan spiller's book - new moon astrology.

taurus rules ACCUMULATION, including:

money, material comforts, ownership, possessions.

sample wishes to appropriately increase money & possessions:

"i want to easily find myself creating financial independence in a happy way!"; "i want to attract & purchase the right _____ (possession) at a price i can afford!"; "i want to easily find myself living in comfortable surroundings."

taurus rules the PHYSICAL SENSES, including:

sensuality, heightened tactile enjoyment, massage, physical comfort, aromas, tastes.

sample wishes to appropriately increase sensual experience and enjoyment:

"i want to begin purchasing clothes that feel comfortable and sensual against my skin"; "i want to find myself enjoying and appreciating the tastes, smells, and textures of the food i eat."

taurus rules the ENJOYMENT OF LIFE ON EARTH including:

appreciation, gratitude, simple physical pleasures, rapport with nature, satisfaction, contentment.

samples wishes to appropriately enhance enjoyment of life:

"i want to enjoy and appreciate my life"; "i want to count my blessings and feel thankful for the good things that are in my life"; i want to easily find myself consciously and consistently appreciating the abundance of life and Mother Nature."

taurus rules SELF-WORTH including:

awareness of personal needs, setting appropriate boundries, strong values, determination, self-acceptance.

*HUGE FOCUS FOR LITTLE OLE ME THIS MONTH!

sample wishes to appropriately increase self worth:

"i want to find what's important to me, and easily find myself living according to those values"; "i want to consciously and consistently experience feelings of self-worth in every area in my life."

taurus also rules in: building (solid foundations, persistence, progressing step by step, thoroughness, perseverance), reliability (patience, dependability, trustworthiness, steadfastness), inflexibility (stubbornness, attachment, resistance to change, possessiveness), restoring health (coughs, throat, chin + neck, thyroid gland, voice & vocal cords).

so, where do you stand this month? what do you want to may-nifest? change? work on? it's all new. and it all starts today, right now, with you and your wildest dreams.

"tell me ~ what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" -mary oliver.

om om om,

m xo

how to be alone, a poem by tanya davis

If you are at first lonely, be patient.

If you’ve not been alone much, or if when you were, you weren’t okay with it, then just wait. You’ll find it’s fine to be alone once you’re embracing it.

We can start with the acceptable places, the bathroom, the coffee shop, the library, where you can stall and read the paper, where you can get your caffeine fix and sit and stay there. Where you can browse the stacks and smell the books; you’re not supposed to talk much anyway so it’s safe there.

There is also the gym, if you’re shy, you can hang out with yourself and mirrors, you can put headphones in.

Then there’s public transportation, because we all gotta go places.

And there’s prayer and mediation, no one will think less if your hanging with your breath seeking peace and salvation.

Start simple. Things you may have previously avoided based on your avoid being alone principles.

The lunch counter, where you will be surrounded by “chow downers”, employees who only have an hour and their spouses work across town, and they, like you, will be alone.

Resist the urge to hang out with your cell phone.

When you are comfortable with “eat lunch and run”, take yourself out for dinner; a restaurant with linen and Silverware. You’re no less an intriguing a person when you are eating solo desert and cleaning the whip cream from the dish with your finger. In fact, some people at full tables will wish they were where you were.

Go to the movies. Where it’s dark and soothing, alone in your seat amidst a fleeting community.

And then take yourself out dancing, to a club where no one knows you, stand on the outside of the floor until the lights convince you more and more and the music shows you. Dance like no one’s watching because they’re probably not. And if they are, assume it is with best human intentions. The way bodies move genuinely to beats, is after-all, gorgeous and affecting. Dance until you’re sweating. And beads of perspiration remind you of life’s best things. Down your back, like a book of blessings.

Go to the woods alone, and the trees and squirrels will watch for you. Go to an unfamiliar city, roam the streets, they are always statues to talk to, and benches made for sitting gives strangers a shared existence if only for a minute, and these moments can be so uplifting and the conversation you get in by sitting alone on benches, might of never happened had you not been there by yourself.

Society is afraid of alone though. Like lonely hearts are wasting away in basements. Like people must have problems if after awhile nobody is dating them.

But lonely is a freedom that breathes easy and weightless, and lonely is healing if you make it.

You can stand swathed by groups and mobs or hands with your partner, look both further and farther in the endless quest for company.

But no one is in your head. And by the time you translate your thoughts an essence of them maybe lost or perhaps it is just kept. Perhaps in the interest of loving oneself, perhaps all those “sappy slogans” from pre-school over to high school groaning, we’re tokens for holding the lonely at bay.

Cause if you’re happy in your head, then solitude is blessed, and alone is okay.

It’s okay if no one believes like you, all experiences unique, no one has the same synapses, can’t think like you, for this be relived, keeps things interesting, life’s magic things in reach, and it doesn’t mean you aren’t connected, and the community is not present, just take the perspective you get from being one person in one head and feel the effects of it.

Take silence and respect it.

If you have an art that needs a practice, stop neglecting it, if your family doesn’t get you or a religious sect is not meant for you, don’t obsess about it.

You could be in an instant surrounded if you need it.

If your heart is bleeding, make the best of it.

There is heat in freezing, be a testament.