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

Today is a strange blend of grief and joy, sadness and celebration. I am graduating from yoga teacher training this afternoon along with 10 of my friends. We’ve spent nine months studying together, and while I feel so content, happy to be done, to finally become a certified teacher, so lucky to have spent this time falling in love with my fellow students and teachers and deeper in love with yoga, it comes with heartache because it is also an ending.

At the same time as our graduation ceremony, they are holding Ann’s memorial. As I’ve said before, Ann fought cancer so hard and for so long, but it finally got to be too much. She’s one of the strongest, toughest, and yet softest people I’ve ever met. She’s the reason I kept practicing yoga, showed up to class at 6:30 am three times a week for years. Even if I was too busy or tired or the weather was bad or I didn’t feel like it, I went because I knew I’d get to see Ann. She made me laugh, made me try harder. And now she’s gone. I’m teaching my first yoga classes and she won’t be there. And because my graduation is scheduled for the same time as her service, I’m going to miss saying a formal good-bye, sharing my grief with others who loved her — and yet, I know that she would understand.

Life is just this, staying open to whatever arises and knowing when it’s time to let go, a mix of grief and joy, sadness and celebration. As the always wise Pema Chödrön says, “The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy.” May we make room for all of it, let it be what it is and let it go when it’s time. May we make our way towards a healing space today.

image by Eric

1. Teaching my first “real” yoga class. Eight of my friends agreed to come and help me practice for my final. I’m so glad that my first experience teaching a full class was with students who are wise, kind, and have a good sense of humor — and who love me.

2. Unpacking and organizing my new office. I didn’t do much, because I still am working on things that needed to be done yesterday, but it was enough to make the space feel better, not so much like an empty dorm room or storage closet.

3. Fall, my favorite Colorado season. Although, what is up with all the rain, CO?

4. Obstacles that present the opportunity to practice. The cats and squirrels who hang out in our yard and antagonize the dogs, the delivery trucks with squeaky brakes who do the same, the interns who make mistakes I get to fix, the people who judge me even though they know nothing about my circumstances, the ones who get in my way, the others who don’t consider how they might help, those of us who continue on in our confusion generating suffering — etc.

5. Quiet, stillness. I’ve needed it this week to balance the speed, the rage, the noise, the overwhelm.

Bonus Joy: My tiny family, my soft place to land.