Mindful Monday: Expectation is the root of all heartache

Good morning, mindful ones!

Think about the last time you felt hurt, disappointed or let down. If you examine that situation, you’ll see that it was your expectation not being met that caused your disappointment, not what actually happened.

If you didn’t expect a certain outcome, there would be nothing to react to!

It’s pretty darn simple but so very challenging. I mean how can we go through life without expectations? We expect things to go in a logical, linear direction. We expect to work hard toward a specific goal or outcome. We expect those we love to treat us in a loving, respectful way. We expect to go to the market and find the items we need and purchase them. We expect our cars to start when we push the ignition button. We expect someone to call when he/she says he/she will. We expect our friends to have our back. We expect our children to behave in a certain way. We expect our parents to love us. We expect to pay our bills and have our utilities work. We expect to wake up in the morning and the sun will be shining. The list goes on and on and on of our expectations. I mean they are all pretty reasonable, right?

Sure they are! And when one of our reasonable expectations is not met, how does that make us feel? Resentful. Disappointed. Downright pissed! Sad. Betrayed. Hurt. These feelings can fester in a relationship. All caused by certain expectations.

It’s so important to turn our attention inward when feeling that bitter sting of disappointment. Rather than project it outward and blame the easy target, look within and see where the disappointment is rooted.

We cannot control others. We cannot control life. This is a lifelong lesson we continue to resist. The more we resist it, the more painful these lessons can become.

So we continue to practice our yoga and meditation to use for self-introspection. It should never be about the other person or outside factor. What am I doing today about my anger? Jealously? Self-doubt? Expectations?

Can I give and love more freely? What was my motivation when I did x, y or z? Was it pure or was I doing it to get something in return?

For me, it’s always about shifting my perspective back to gratitude. Focusing so much on all of the abundance of blessings and love that surrounds me each day. Giving for the sake of giving. Loving because it’s my true nature. Accepting because it’s my only way to stay sane!

Have a great week, dearest ones! Hope to see you on your mat this week – but I won’t be mad at you if you don’t show up!! ❤️

Mindful Monday: Tempus Fugit

Good morning and happy Monday, mindful ones! Happy President’s Day! You may have the day off today, but all of our studios are open with our regular schedules!

I was talking to a friend the other day who expressed so much fear surrounding money. She is overworked and overextended, but she continues plodding on at an unsustainable, breakneck speed driven by her fears. I think we’ve all been there. I know that was my reality when I left my role as the spokesperson for the City of Naperville to teach yoga full-time.

But the reason I left the career that I once loved so much was that I wanted more freedom and flexibility with my time to spend more of it doing what I love.

And I slowly realized that money is the currency that we use to purchase goods and services. It is a tool to use in the pursuit of a full and fulfilling life. It is not the purpose of life.

The true currency of life is our tempus TIME. We exchange our precious, limited, finite time for money when we work. It’s a steep price to pay.

Each day, no matter how good looking you are or how much money you have or how talented you are, you are given 86,400 seconds or 1,440 minutes. That’s all you get in one day. You can’t bank it, roll it over or save it for later.

I always think of Steve Jobs and how all the money in the world could not prolong his life. He couldn’t cash in his vast fortune and buy another decade of life. But he certainly spent his seconds, minutes, hours and days in a way that impacted and changed our entire planet.

Like death, time is our great equalizer. It does not favor the rich or the poor, the believers or non-believers. How you spend or squander your time determines your life, your future, your karma.

Tempus fugit, carpe diem et memento mori

“Time flees, seize the day, remember death”

How will you spend your precious time this day? What will you receive in exchange for this priceless commodity?

Mindful Monday: Snow Day

Good morning, mindful ones!

Well last week’s blog was called Slow Your Roll, and it was about slowing down our instant-gratification-and-endemic-busyness-plagued-society by releasing expectations. How apropos that we had the very opportunity to incorporate that attitude with the huge snow storm that hit us late last week!

We were all literally forced to release expectations and slow down, because we had no other choice. Roads were treacherous and many businesses actually closed or opened late morning or early afternoon.

Things like huge snowstorms give us an opportunity to observe ourselves (without judgement) and to witness our instinctual and also conditioned reactions. And through our yoga practice, we have learned the precious art of finding that space between breaths and pausing before reacting. Then choosing our response.

One of my all time favorite quotes. Victor Frankl survived the Holocaust and several concentration camps, and he used his experience to help others find the beauty of life and the will to live.

In the most wretched of human circumstances, Frankl observed that some people maintained their deep humanity through simple acts of sharing their last scrap of bread or still finding beauty in nature.

We, who have so much to be grateful for, can still catch ourselves reacting to unexpected circumstances with annoyance, impatience and even anger. Often we react without thinking. Our behaviors are acted out and reflexive rather than thoughtful.

Through our yoga practice, we have learned to breathe and pause. In this paused space lies our growth, happiness and freedom. With such awareness of this space, we find the freedom from both internal and external pressures and we choose our response.

I think of it as a game. I watch a strong reaction arise within, and try to pause and just look at it. And then I know I have a choice: continue on with the emotion or realize that’s it’s temporary so I can choose a less reactive response.

And we don’t have to wait for a huge act of nature to practice this. We have these opportunities all day long! Sitting at the breakfast table. Walking into a restaurant. Standing in line at the grocery store. Shopping for food before a huge snowstorm hits. Even on our yoga mats, we have sixty minutes to observe, pause and then respond.

It is in the little every day moments our true character is revealed to us. How we behave on our yoga mats shows us how we will respond off of our mats as well. How we train each day determines how we will handle the big stuff when it arrives.

Have a great week, friends! Be safe and I can’t wait to see you on your mats this week!

Pose of the Month – February 2018 Eka Pada Rajakapotasana

Happy February, yogis! This is the month of  LOVE so we are featuring eka pada rajakapotasana or one-legged king pigeon pose as our Pose of the Month! While you can see from the image above, in addition to the deep backbend, your hips enjoy a really deep stretch as well!

Benefits:

• Opens the hip joint
• Lengthens the hip flexor
• Stretches the thighs, gluteals, and piriformis and  muscles
• Extends the groin and illiopsoas
• Opens chest and shoulders
• Stretch abdominal muscles and internal organs
• Brings spine to natural flexion
• Opens your heart and mind
• Relieves anxiety and stress
• Provides a fresh perspective
• Relieves insomnia

How To:

• From downward facing dog, lift your right leg up toward the ceiling
• Bend your right knee and bring that leg forward as if you were going to step into a lunge. Instead of placing your foot down as you would for a lunge, bring your right knee to the floor on the outside of your right hand.  Your right shin may angle back towards the left hip or be more parallel to the front of your mat, depending on your flexibility.
• Release your left knee to your mat. The front of your left leg is as flat on the floor as possible. Take a look backwards and make sure that your left foot is not sickling inward. It should point straight back.
• Square your hips towards the front of your mat.
• Take a block under the right side of your butt as necessary to make the pose more comfortable.
• Bend your left knee and reach back for your left foot with your left hand.
• Draw your left foot toward your left glutes, stretching left quads
• Reach your left hand to your left foot and rotate your shoulder so that your left elbow faces the ceiling
• Square your shoulders to the front of the room.
•  Lift from your lower ribs away from your hips to lengthen spine
• Draw navel to spine to protect your low back
• Lift your chin toward the sky and drop your head between your shoulder blades
• Draw shoulder blades together and down your back to open chest toward the ceiling
• Take five deep breaths into lungs
• Repeat on left side

Variations:

• Rather than the backbend, square shoulders forward and lengthen spine
• Fold your torso  over your right shin leading with your heart, keeping spine long
• If you have knee issues, lie on back and make a figure four with your legs

Mindful Monday: Slow Your Roll

Good morning and Happy Monday, y’all! What an eventful past week we’ve had. The Super Blue Blood Moon and the Super Bowl! Not to mention the snowstorm and just the hustle and bustle of every day life. Whew! 2018 is off to a busy start.

Life continues to unfold at its usual brisk pace, which is why we are so grateful for this ancient practice of yoga that we have. It reminds us to slow down and be mindful.

When life gets really busy, we can get overwhelmed. We put unnecessary pressure on ourselves to do more, to achieve more, to be more. To get stuff done! Rather than amp up to a more frenetic pace, this is the best time to slow down and be more mindful.

In order to reduce the level of stress in our lives, the first thing we should do is reduce our expectations. Yep. That’s right.

While you are plowing through your endless list of things-to-do, notice if you feel road rage bubbling up because of traffic or if you feel annoyed if your barista or server or sales clerk is taking too long to help those in front of you. Or if you are out of sorts because it snowed (during winter, in the Midwest, no less.)

At these moments, rather than get caught up in the negative emotion conjured up, use the opportunity to realize that most of our expectations are completely unreasonable and self-centered.

Without expectations, we aren’t terribly disappointed when he/she doesn’t call or when you open a perfect looking avocado only to discover that it’s already brown on the inside. These things will continue to happen, but we stay open and are therefore not hurt or disappointed by any outcome that unfolds.

This attitude is in direct contrast to the open 24 hours, overnight delivery, express checkout lines, instant messaging culture in which we live. We are taught to have high expectations, demand a better deal, and expect what we want when we want it. The result is that we have been conditioned all of these years to move quickly, multi-task, speed up and drive through. The problem with this hectic lifestyle is that we don’t have the opportunity to practice important attributes for peace and happiness such as patience, tolerance, compassion, conscious breathing and listening skills.

So slow your roll, breathe deeply into the present moment and don’t forget to actually chew your food.

With this newfound space and groundedness, we can focus much more consistently on the top priority stuff like our yoga practice!

Have a great week yogis! Slow down and savor each breath that is coming your way!

Annica! Be happy!