December | 2015 | Open Space Practice, (AKA: A Thousand Shades of Gray)

beforeandaftercabinet02

1. Our bathroom remodel will be done by the end of the day. I could honestly make the whole list about just this one thing this week. We’ve already been able to use the shower, which seems like some kind of magic after a month without. All of the people who came and worked on it were great, really knew what they were doing and were nice to us and our dogs. It was a big effort and expense, but I feel so lucky we were able to do it, am so grateful for it.

I can only post this picture that shows how gross it was before because it’s pretty and clean now

2. Quesadillas. Seriously, they just might be the perfect food — the crunch of the tortilla, the warm gooey inside, the salsa and sour cream and avocado on top. Yum.

3. Teaching. I did another Wild Writing, Crazy Wisdom workshop last weekend, and it was so good. This morning, the question in my Q&A 5 Year Journal was “Where do you find joy?” and I surprised myself by writing down teaching as the thing first in my list, even adding “whoa, that’s unexpected!” For probably the first 10 years I taught, I hated it and then didn’t like it and then tolerated it and then noticed a few rare moments that were good, but since I’ve shifted to teaching yoga, meditation, and writing on my own, not for a university, I’ve found what there is to really love about it, and I think I’m pretty good at it too.

4. Dharma of Writing Group. I seriously love everything that Susan Piver puts together, but this is one of my favorites. We wrote together last night, and I realized something that made me feel so happy — I’m living the life of a writer. I had already spent most of the day writing, and that wasn’t unusual for me. I woke up first thing and wrote, and then was blogging, working on content for a writing class about cultivating practice, had just taught a workshop over the weekend, had written another section of the book I’m working on, just got a copy of the latest Mabel Magazine that has something I wrote in it, and am heading to Shambhala Mountain Center next weekend for a writing and meditation retreat with Susan, (another thing I’m extra grateful for). I realized that there were some people in the group who don’t write that regularly, for whom last night’s session was a sort of special occasion, and I remembered that used to be me too.

5. My tiny family. Eric has been taking the dogs to the “little dog park” in the morning, where Ringo chases a tennis ball and they run around. It really wears Ringo out, and that’s hard to do. I’m so happy how well the dogs did with the remodel, with all the noise and the people coming in and out all the time. There were even days with particular people that I could let the dogs out, not have to crate them the whole time. I’m also finding more and more in all kinds of ways big and small what a good partner Eric is, how kind and funny and smart. I texted him the other day that the plumbing was all in and even though the bathroom wasn’t all the way done, our contractor said we could use the shower, and Eric texted me a picture of himself that looked like he’d lost his mind. I laughed so hard I almost dropped my phone.

Bonus joy: teaching yoga without needing to make an exact plan, having studied and practiced enough that I can show up and put together a good class, my favorite student who comes consistently every week, good friends in person and online, being able to see the light at the end of the tunnel in more ways than one, looking forward to a weekend of wrapping presents and making cookies and taking showers and maybe even a long bath and for sure giving my stinky dogs baths.

magicforest

Prompt: When we heal our spirits the ripples are felt from the highest branches to the deepest roots of our family trees. What radical act of love or non-conformity did you embrace this year? How did performing this alchemy affect your ancestors and what is the gold waiting to be shared with future relations?

I stopped working out with a trainer. This was one step of a larger transformation, but it was one of the biggest. I decided to take back my own power, my own authority over my body. I no longer was going to move my body the way someone else told me to move it. I was no longer going to feel guilt or shame about how I looked. I was no longer going to control and manipulate and punish my body. I wasn’t going to force it to be anything it didn’t want to be. I wasn’t going to regret or reject or even hate it for being something other than.

At the end of meditation practice, we do something called “dedicating the merit.” Basically that means whatever good karma we’ve generated by way of our practice, we offer it in the hopes that it does some good. When I teach yoga, at the end of class, I say “may the merit of our practice together ease suffering, in ourselves and in the world.” It’s in this spirit I imagine the “gold waiting to be shared with future relations.” Maybe the more women who live in a way that honors their body, in a way that nourishes their whole self, the less suffering there will be in the world. And if I can be just one of those women, an example to those who came before me or those who come after, even if I’m an example that’s not entirely successful, I’ll feel like I’ve offered something of value.