There is no us and them

Wow. What a week. I feel as if I've been living my life in a dream - a bad dream. I'm sure many of us felt that way. Tonight we feel the end of this horror, but in many ways it's the beginning. I sit here tonight as I get ready to meditate with a heavy heart. I do not feel joyous one suspect in the Boston marathon bombing has been killed and the other captured. I feel instead very sad. Let me first say I do not take lightly the loss of the lives of Martin Richard, Krystle Campbell, Lingzi Lu and Sean Collier, nor the hundreds that were injured, the dozens who lost limbs or the thousands who have suffered trauma as they witnessed these events, lived in a city on lockdown as a suspect was hunted, or lived in a town where gunfights and heightened police presence dominated their day. I think many of us out there at one time or another have subscribed to the idea of there being an us and a them. Perhaps even right now. We sit in fear, judgment and disconnect. I know I have. I think that many of us also on the flip side, certainly in the yoga community but I am sure elsewhere too, have come to the conclusion that there is a universal source or ONE that we are all a part of, that we stem from. If we hold this to be true, then there can be no us and them. We are all joined as human beings on this planet. And if we believe that then we too are responsible when tragic events such as these happen. No, we did not plan this attack, or put the bombs together or place them or detonate them. I don't believe that any of us are cultivating a home based around terrorism and fear. But we do form a society. A society that stretches beyond our towns, beyond our countries, our borders to include the entire human race. We then share the same human wants and needs, the same suffering, the same hopes and dreams, the same loneliness of our own minds and pain. And every time we have acted in a way that breeds fear, that breeds judgment that is any way not compassionate or loving toward ourselves or another individual, then we too are responsible for perpetuating this feeling of disconnect and loneliness and this feeling of an us and them that keeps these events happening. I recognize there are political implications often, but I do believe that on a truly cellular level we are human, we can connect with whomever if we come from a place of seeing each other, of hearing one other, of feeling on an emotional level with one other. So yes I have a heavy heart. I am saddened that another tragedy like this has come to pass and it occurred in the place I've called home for 11 years. I'm sad that people will cheer and say nasty things about these men forgetting that they too are people, they too have families, parents who are hurting. I feel sad for all the loss that happened that day at the Boston marathon and people whose lives with never be the same. And I feel sad for all of us who will go on not sitting with this pain in our hearts, using anger and blame to cover it up, and soon another event like this will happen and we will again question why. It's time to wake up folks. I am including myself in this. It's time to take responsibility as ONE human race that we are. Community is needed. Connection is needed. I am looking to foster it wherever or however. I am opening up my home, my heart, my ears... you name it. Let's talk. Let's cry. Let's heal. We'll move forward with heavy vulnerable raw and beautiful courageous hearts. All my love Boston. All my love to you all.

We ebb and we flow

Ah post engagement bliss! How long does it last? It lasts until we let doubt step in again surrounding our fears of what we should or shouldn't do, what people think, what the future holds... So, it's been a rough couple weeks! I told my fiance last night... sometimes I just want to scream "Why the fuck did you ask me to marry you? Everything was going just fine!" Perhaps you can't relate to that statement, but I bet some of you can. He chose me! He chose me out of all the many many women in this world. And suddenly a voice inside me screams, WHY? Why would he choose me? And just like that I'm back in the pattern of not feeling worthy of love and belonging and I start to feel closed off. I don't sing out loud or dance around the house, I don't want to listen to music something I like to do, I don't want to have sex, I don't want to see friends, I don't want to teach or practice yoga, I just want to hide hide hide... Luckily I have here to write about it and thankfully my future husband will listen to anything at all I have to share or dish out - and you know what he tells me? I too think these thoughts. You aren't alone. You aren't crazy. I am engaged to a man my parents met the day after we got engaged. I am engaged to a man some of my friends have not even met yet or had a chance to really hang out with. So as one friend told me the other day, she had her reservations. I don't blame her. I don't blame any of you! It's very good off the mat yoga practice for me. I feel as if people are judging and questioning my choice to marry my fiance and perhaps they truly are - yet the person who is really judging and questioning myself is ME. And I tell you this as a girl who just got a huge tattoo (a full sleeve) all along my left arm!! A big tattoo? No biggie. Quit my job and teach yoga full time? No biggie. Surviving emotionally in the raising of my son on my own for 6+ months? No biggie. As Nike says, I just do it. I don't care what people think. Doing many of the self sufficient independent and sometimes off the wall outside the box things I have done comes easy to me. I am a passionate person! Yet choosing a partner for life who no one I am friends with knows that well, who I met in the most fated way, who is in many ways nothing like my family or the family I grew up with - that I struggle with. I struggle with being unconventional even though it's the only thing that makes me happy. I struggle with people who say when they hear of my engagement "Well that was fast" or people who say "You're going to have a long engagement, right?" We aren't by the way - we are getting married THIS September! I struggle with people who when we tell them of our plans after the wedding - to travel to India with Julian for 3 months Nov - Feb - "That's crazy! With the baby? You can't possibly be serious!" And the answer is, yes, we are serious. I struggle with putting the power behind my words, behind my actions and not getting swayed by that need for approval. I grew up wanting the approval of those I loved most, and trying so hard to please those around me. I grew up doing what I was supposed to do, what was expected, until I got to college where I *secretly* rebelled in all kinds of ways. I was not doing what I was supposed to be doing, but nobody knew - but me and my close friends. I kept doing what I was supposed to do - until I quit my job to teach yoga full time. Yoga when it came into my life in many ways was the start of me figuring out who I was and what I wanted. I will tell you this - I haven't figured it out fully. I still struggle sometimes daily to answer that question - what do I want? I know this. I want to be happy. I recognize that I am making choices to make me happy. I fully believe those around me also want me to be happy even if some of them aren't in my "yoga world" so to speak. The whatever that keeps me from my happiness lies in my palms only. So I honor my feelings. I honor that I get stuck on what Julian will ask as he gets older and knows his biological Mom and Dad aren't together and what I will tell him, what will his Dad tell him. I get stuck in that I don't feel fully resolved in the ending of our relationship because it was so sudden for me and how suddenly his Dad moved on and I feel there's a lot more to be said besides simply I'm not in love with you anymore but I see the truth in that statement and even if there was more to it would it even matter now? No. I get stuck in when people ask about my fiance and I and our relationship I can't exactly put into words what it is that makes him the man I want to marry (we're writing our own vows, so I hope to have a few more words by Sept!) but that I could speak to his actions - how he is the man who brought over food from his fridge as a gift when he first came to visit Julian and I on his own at our home, how he is the man who encourages me to tell him whatever I am thinking or feeling (I told him about my fear of him having a double chin when he gets older and how vain I feel to say that but I truly think it!) he is the man who said we should have a box in our home and a sign next to it that says need a dollar? take a dollar. have a dollar? leave a dollar. (and there's money in there folks) He is the man I meditate with before bed most evenings, who cooks and does the laundry and picks up around the house, who spends time with Julian painting, hanging out, playing music, who is authentic is his concern and compassion for others, who hung up a painting today that I mentioned Julian had scribbled all over and he said it's Julian's masterpiece! the man who reminds me to be gentle and at ease with myself the man who says yes we can travel to India for 3 months with a year and a half old and come back to the states and if our jobs our work doesn't look the same we'll figure it out... the man who believes I am enough. That being a mother and teaching yoga and just being me is enough. I know that it's me who doesn't always feel enough but he reminds me I am. So we ebb and we flow. And I can tell you this. When I am practicing yoga, on and off the mat, when I am in that state of bliss - of love and light - of namaste - he is the man I want to be with. I am enough. We are enough. There is nothing more. We are not going into marriage as a couple who's checked off the checklist so to speak - we are going into marriage challenged, and scared and blissfully happy. We are planning a wedding at the home he grew up in, in our bare feet, with a drum circle, BYOB (no alcohol), yard games like horseshoes and croquet, good local food, music, dancing, no bridal party, nothing fancy, just us, our friends, our family, a celebration. So we hope whoever comes is happy for us - cause otherwise honestly - stay home! You know I say that with love ;)