Well, it's over. One month spent in beautiful Costa Rica doing two things I love: teaching yoga and surfing. This month long leap of faith definitely began as an experiment and ended as a wonderful experience. It wound up taking two or three (dozen) different turns, but finally I ended up exactly where I needed to be and with a small group of yogis who were willing to learn and dedicate themselves to this practice. Now that it's over, I can honestly say I have learned some things about myself. I start out my teacher trainings by telling my students to expect to have epiphanies. I am no exception to this process, and so I am writing some of mine down with hopes that they might inspire others but mostly so that when I forget them and start freaking out over the next time I need to have faith, I can re-learn.

The List:

1. Let go of comparisons and expectations and embrace the process. While you're letting things go, let go of toxic relationships and environments too.

2. It will all work out exactly like it should.

3. There is no down side to trying something outside of your comfort zone. Human beings excel and grow through discomfort. If you aren't working your tail off, you are probably not getting anywhere.

4. You are 100% as capable as anyone else of achieving your goals. That being said, you may have to work harder than other people to achieve your dreams. So what?! See number three.

5. Patience the most underrated of virtues. Just like with surfing, you may have to wait and paddle one more time before catching the perfect wave. Patience often awards you the element of surprise. Be patient with your reactions, your responses, and your endeavors. Think about quality over quantity. Saying yes and figuring everything else out later will only get you so far, for so long.

6. That being said, sometimes you have to say yes and figure it out later. =p

And so, I finish teaching my first international intensive certification program with a sense of appreciation for all the support I have received along the way. THANK YOU! There are even bigger waves on the horizon. Let's go get them!

Special Congratulations to the Summer 2016 Graduates! You ladies have made me proud.

Another year older and what do you get? If you’re lucky, I believe you gain wisdom. What a year this has been! My 39th turn around the sun was a spectacular blend of amazing and painful. I taught hundreds of hours of yoga, built and developed this website, began my goal of publishing online classes, started my own yoga certification program, wrote a new manual, dissolved one business and started another. I got seriously injured, literally fell on my face (I have the scar to prove it), and battled internal and external demons for the freedom to be myself. I laughed, cried, stood on my own two feet, and learned to lean on others. I traveled farther and more often than I have in any other year on this earth. I worked…boy did I work! I broke down…boy did I break down! If I had to sum up the last year in a tag line it would be: when the student is ready, the teacher appears.

Those teachers came in so many forms! My close friends, my family, my husband have all given me amazing advice and support. They endured incessant phone calls, text messages, brainstorming, hand -wringing and freak outs. I would like to take a moment to thank them. I would be nowhere without my Tribe.

Injuries have also been a great teacher. They have shown me that I have an amazing power to deny reality. (feel free to stop nodding your head in agreement). They have also shown me that I am not as attached to this body as I had previously believed. There is a saying in Spanish "joven eres, y viejo serás". I came face to face with the fact that my yoga practice needed to develop past the physical. My meditation practice has become one of of the greatest gifts of this past year. I look forward to developing it in the years to come.

In the end I am reminded of this quote from Elizabeth Gilbert:

“…I’ve come to believe that there exists in the universe something I call “The Physics of The Quest” – a force of nature governed by laws as real as the laws gravity or momentum. And the rule of Quest Physics maybe goes like this: “If you are brave enough to leave behind everything familiar and comforting (which can be anything from your house to your bitter old resentments) and set out on a truth-seeking journey (either externally or internally), and if you are truly willing to regard everything that happens to you on that journey as a clue, and if you accept everyone you meet along the way as a teacher, and if you are prepared – most of all – to face (and forgive) some very difficult realities about yourself….then truth will not be withheld from you.” Or so I’ve come to believe.” Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat Pray Love.

First, you have to be brave enough to dream. Then, you have to be confident enough to believe, and humble enough to ask for help when you need it. My last bit of insight about this last year is that you have to be unapologetically authentic. The minute you become so, the universe will show you the way.

I can’t wait to see what this next year brings!