Hungry Girl Healing Story

      I remember feeling so hungry and bleak a hunger that had nothing to do with a growling stomach or a need for nutrition. I was just soul hungry and I chose to answer that need with grilled cheese. So I made a sandwich and then another and another until I had compulsively, mindlessly and joylessly shoved seven grilled cheese sandwiches into my suffering body making it a matching set with my suffering soul. My history with food has not been a pretty one. I had alternately practiced binge eating and bulimia for most of my teens and young 20's and I was a dangerous combination of an unhealthy body mind and spirit. But this is not a story about then; this is a story about now. Now I eat when I am physically hungry, stop when I am full,  enjoy a variety of foods with a healthy appreciation and my only limits on food are that I must obey God in eating. So what does that mean and how did I get there? Here is my healing story.

      My story begins way before I will begin here, but I do try to keep my posts to one page! So today it begins at a diner in Nashville over pancakes with girlfriends. I had recently had a soul awakening that led me to bow at the feet of Jesus acknowledging Him as saviour and this led me into sweet relationship with God. I had seen the directive in scripture to not be gluttonous but I had no idea where to begin. Thankfully God had a plan! Enjoying my pancakes I made a casual statement to one of my friends  "I love pancakes" I gushed.  As soon as this observation had passed my lips I felt a heaviness in my soul and as clearly as I have ever hear the Holy Spirits whisper I heard "Do you? Do you LOVE them?". The question stopped me dead in my tracks. Did I understand love? How was it that I loved food? Thankfully I was dining with girlfriends in Nashville because we were at a woman's conference on God and food. That weekend God showed me that I had made food into a false idol that I turned to for comfort and I left the conference armed with a book on how to give my food to God. First there is a fast where we wait for hunger. True stomach hunger not emotional hunger was what I was searching for. The fast part was not that hard, self deprivation is a buddy to self loathing which is a pal to binging. I had a whole family of neurosis living in my hungry belly. So I fasted until my stomach was clearly hungry.
    
      The next part was harder: identify fullness, this part was horrifying because I was supposed to allow myself to eat whatever I wanted whenever I wanted and that to a rapidly expanding fairly vain young woman was a terrifying proposition. The idea is that denial makes desire stronger and sure enough after a week or two of binging on all my favorite foods I woke up definitely craving vegetables. The next part while simple enough took almost a year to come to pass. We were to ask God before every meal to tell us when to stop. I had muffled Gods voice around this issue so much that about a year into repeating this request when I had the fork halfway to my mouth and I heard the still small voice of God whisper "stop" I just froze from surprise. Then I finished eating. Months passed with God whispering "stop" when I was full and me putting down the fork about 10% of the time, then 20%, then 30%, then...well you get the picture. This dance lasted for quite sometime until God got it into my head that nothing tastes as good as fellowship with His Spirit. That peace does not come from mashed potatoes and soul hunger is never satisfied with one grilled cheese. I generally blog about where I would like to go with God (deeper and deeper) but this Thanksgiving season soon after facing another Thanksgiving meal, but this time without dread but instead with true joy I just wanted to take a minute to thank God for where He has already brought me.. This was about a two year healing process, nothing instant or miraculous. Just a repetition of practicing surrender, falling down over and over and God picking me up over and over. I brought to the table a willingness to try to obey God and God brought everything else. Today it is nearly unthinkable to continue eating past my "stop signal" not because I am scared of getting fat or because I live under a vengeful God who will punish me for disobedience. But I cannot bring myself to continue past stop because God has showered me with an eternal love that is soul satisfying and unlike grilled cheese God is faithful and loving and completely soul satisfying. Why would I want to endanger this relationship for a sandwich, no matter how gooey?

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest

Matthew 11:28

The Weight of Silence

     It is amazing the weight that silence can carry. Sitting peacefully and silently next to a loved one the quiet can wrap its arms around you both weaving a cocoon of companionship while sitting next to an angry loved one can feel as heavy as a soggy woolen cloak. This is about about another silence altogether. The silence of secrets is a heavy stifling kind of silence. A silence that whispers shame in your ear and convinces you that you alone are so wretched with your secrets. This silence is alluring to the ego as we work to protect our "image" The mind and ego work together well convincing us to keep our secrets. But as spiritual seekers secrets can begin to erode the soul dimming our connection to God. We are instructed to "confess our sins to one another" not for the purposes of shaming and blaming but to shine light into darkness. We stumble along our paths not realizing that all we need to do to shine a light along the way is be humble and truthful. Secrets and lies create only confusion and darkness.

     But here's the thing, when you set your sights on growth often times things get dark and ugly before they get better and at times the biggest obstacles in self growth are our secrets. Sometimes when we make it through little tests of growth the tests just get bigger and uglier. And I have arrived at such an ugly place that I don't wish to share. So my choices are to continue to write this blog and hit publish or to stall my growth in a cloak of secrecy. My secret is addiction, a sad statement that "no" my life is not enough.  It doesn't really matter to what "big 3" I turn: food, pot or booze, all three numb me enough to temporarily forget the tough parts of the journey. All three make me heavy enough to continue in the fog of self loathing that I am accustomed to. And, yet....I still hear the still small loving whisper of God calling me to self love. Love yourself...love yourself....love yourself. The constant caress of Gods truth like a raindrop carving the Grand Canyon begins to seep down into the cracks and crevices of my soul.

     Almost immediately after beginning to pursue God in 1995 He healed me of gluttony and supernaturally gave me a peaceful relationship with food. For this I am eternally and inexpressibly grateful.  However gluttony was not the root of the problem, dissatisfaction with a perfectly good life is. So with food in a healthy place I began about a decade distraction with alcohol. No drinking during the work week but boy Friday night I would attempt to glamorize the situation with precise martini recipes. Thanks for nothing Mad Men! There was about a year where I shook that martini shaker at least 50 times every time to achieve my "dirty bruised martinis" boy what an analogy for what I was doing to my beat up soul. I would end each weekend Sunday morning hungover at church which was not a edifying situation at all.

     So fast forward a thousand hangovers and ten thousand self lectures. Add one move back to Austin and here I am, no longer drinking to excess almost every weekend. As a matter of fact now I drink maybe once a month. Problem solved, hey? Um, yea not so fast. Alcoholism was not the root of the problem, once again dissatisfaction presenting as addiction continues to tear away at my life force with small sharp teeth. So, today, despite all of my judgement against it I have transferred my addiction to marijuana. And the "rules" remain the same. Clear headed during work hours but, boy, as soon as I am done I can grab my iPad and smoke a little pot and my mind is completely occupied as my spirit is slowly suffocated. OK, so no problem, right?  I have already shown the strength to put aside addictive substances, let's just do it again, right? Um, WRONG! I have only shown I can replace them but addiction continues to trip me up with one substance after another. So while I have no issue at all with drinking or smoking, I do have an issue with numbing and it is a mighty fine line I keep crossing. I have often spent long periods of just abstaining, but this was not curing anything just masking my pain. My study of scripture and time with the Lord all lead me to two conclusions: I need to be present and I need to be satisfied with the circumstances God has put me in. Addictive behavior is a symptom of dissatisfaction and it pulls me straight out of present moment awareness. I don't know where this is going but I do know that the only way to move through your spiritual blocks is to shine a light on them again and again. I no longer want to keep switching additive substances but rather I chose to til the soil of my soul enough to pull out the roots of addiction. So, today, I actually hope this blog goes overlooked in the vast blogoshpere....because maybe exposing my secrets here shines enough light to continue to move towards God. All I know is it is too painful to stay in the dark when the glorious light is close enough to taste and I am reaching my hand into the light hoping God will pull the rest of me through to Him.

      If I drank myself to the point of homelessness or began to foray into "hard drugs" the need for change would be more obvious. I do have a sweet life that I am very happy with and that makes it all the easier to overlook the need for clarity. But, here's the one "small glitch" in my plan. My primary agenda for my life is to grow closer to God as I age and my behaviour is not supporting my agenda. When I overindulge, the still small voice of God  begins to grow dimmer dissolving into a smoky haze of illusion. But slowly God is showing me to keep filling my days with good things, yoga, meditation, prayer, nature and He will continue to faithfully heal me. It is not through self loathing that healing comes, it is not even by fighting my demons. But rather by continuing to pursue God and nurturing myself. So for the last few weeks I have argued with myself and presented myself a thousand good reasons to not write this blog. After all it is tied to my professional site. If I lose students, friends or your esteem that has got to be ok because it all keeps coming back to obeying God's voice while it is still to be heard. If Quiet goes down in flames and my employers cut their ties to me it still has got to be ok.But God has commanded us to shine light into the darkness of our secrets.  Do I want to stifle the Divine whisper or sit in the stillness and listen? This is the question I must ask now. Not "what will they think?" So today I risk your judgement for the chance to sit in stillness and clarity with God. And that is a gamble that today I am ok with.

And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom. Anais Nin.

Homecoming

     We all have with varying degrees the privledge of defining ourselves personally and professionally. A few years ago my Dad was rock climbing the greenbelt with a group some familiar faces and some new friends. My Dad was at the top of the rock when a new friend called up to him "What is it that you do?" Despite the less than optimum timing of the question my Dad still replied, yelling down "I am a landscape architect". There was a pause in which you could almost see my Dads ego quivering and he yelled out again "No, damn it, I am a gardener". This story makes me so proud of my Father's quest for humility and it also makes me wonder how I define myself.  As a yoga teacher my professional parameters are broad. I have chosen to link my spiritual growth with my profession. This serves to discourage complacency in myself and with a fairly strong lazy streak that is a good thing. At the same time setting yourself up as a spiritual teacher can be quite a dangerous place if you start to think you have "arrived" anywhere. I do not teach what I have learned as often as I share with a class what I need to learn. I am not pretending to be the capitian of any ship but I am happy to grab an oar and row along with my students as we navigate the currents of spiritual growth.

     So, when I hear myself struggling to articulate spiritual paths with students it is ok. But when I feel my ego step up onto her soap box I remember spirituality is a practice and it might be time for more personal practice. Thankfully I believe I have identified the primary area where the great majority of us need to practice. The foundations of our spiritual life are laid at home and within our immediate family. We are familiar with the scripture that instructs us to "love your neighbor as you love youreself" I saw this scripture translated from an ancient text and the translation read "love your closest one as you love yourself". Closest one? Um, spouse, parents, siblings, children...these are our closest ones. So why is it that we so often put on shiny spiritual faces for stranges, students, homeless people, everyone but our family? Why is it when we get home we get complacent with the behaviours such as patience and service, the behaviours that feed our spirit?
    
      I can read scripture and meditate with my classes until I am blue in the face but if I am not practicing all of this at home then my spirit life is a shell. I cannot patiently listen to a students challenges and dismiss my husbands and consider my actions godly. It is easier sometimes to recognize that annoying stranger as a mirror reflecting ourselves than it is to see yourself in your parent. But we must be careful to nurture our spiritual growth first in the home, then with the family and then with others. Spirituality is after all measured relationally and God has given us our nearest and dearest with purpose in mind. Our in laws and families of origin are no random choice but the very people we are meant to grow with. So while it is nice to put on a spiritual face in church or in a yoga studio it is imperative that we authentically practice these practices at home. It does not matter if you consider yourself to be a spiritual seeker and your family could not give a hoot about growth in God. It does not matter if your family is comprised of saints or sinners, winners or whack jobs...these are still your primary spritual partners. So , while I love to remind my students of Gods love for them it is often just calling my Mom or making my hubby a sandwich that is the true spiritual work. So sometimes from the top of that rock I want to yell down "I am a landscape architect" but then I remember I am really just a gardener and perhaps instead of lecturing it is time to til the soil. So, today I will define myself as wife, child, sister, aunt and within those parameters I will set my sails to catch Gods soft breezes.

I know why families were created with all their imperfections. They humanize you. They are made to make you forget yourself occasionally, so that the beautiful balance of life is not destroyed.
-- Anais Nin

Fear No Evil

     There is a scripture in Ecclesistes that says a cord of three strands is not easily broken. I first discovered this scripture in the mid 90's about the same time God graciously provided me with two amazing prayer buddies. We used to reference this scripture alot to reinforce the idea that the three of us were stronger together in prayer than we would be alone. That's where I was at the time. But fast forward a decade and while we still pray together "in the spirit" we live thousands of miles apart and so here I am no longer a triply braided cord but just one small strand in Gods hands. But even as the scripture kept whispering to my soul I just did what I know to do, I prayed and prayed some more and waited.

     Meanwhile, I am moving deeper and deeper into yoga teaching and as my practice progresses I am really getting to know myself and some of it is not quite so pretty. When I discover my capacity for perseverance and  kindness it is certainly a heartening moment but when I discovered my equally strong capacity for impatience and control let's just say it isn't such a sunny moment. We are all wonderfully awesome and we suck, such is the human condition and no one escapes it. So one day after God revealed to me alot of deep inner darkness I felt particularly sad and I turned to a familiar pray:

"Yea, though I walk through the shadow of the valley of death I will fear no evil" my prayer was recited with a pretty weak voice full of self judgement. And God interrupted me, God Who is Love whispered to my heart. "fear no evil including the internal evil". Wow. Now let me clarify, I do not harbor fantasies of violence or hate no Hitler style evil here. My evil, much like yours, is the evil of judgement, haughtiness, the evil of greed and fear the evil we excuse as our character flaws. The part of myself I have labeled "Hungry girl"...that is my evil. But God made it clear I was not to fear "my evil". Here's what fearing my evil might look like:

Hungry Girl "You really deserve that ________, it's been a hard week"
Me : "My voracious appetite is going to take over and snuff out my light" (whimper) "I will never amount to anything, I will never get into handstand off the wall, I will never...I will never....I will never!" (stomps foot)

     All that internal fear triggered by one suggestion from my dark side and here is God saying to not fear any evil. Doesn't He know my potential for self destruction? Of course He does! And, still God whispers to not fear this part of myself. Much reflection and prayer brought me back to the idea of the triply braided cord. God says a triply braided cord is strong and who doesn't want the kind of strength God admires? I have come to believe that this triply braided cord refers to me alone and you alone. Humans are dark and light and divine not always in equal measure but those are the three components of man. So we work to shine our light, hide our dark and get closer to the divine, but it doesn't work to keep stuffing our darkness. So here's how it goes now, at least some of the time!

Hungry Girl "I really deserve that treat (whine)"
Me: (setting an intention of loving Hungry Girl) "well, let's pray about it" and I come home to my breath & stillness for a moment.

     I don't have to always say no to my desires but I don't automatically say "yes" without a moments connection to the divine element of me. Triply braided cord: dark, light, divine and fully human! So what if today instead of taking your dark side out for a beating or letting your ego control you, what if you stepped back and took a look at all sides of you with compassion? Shine a light in the corners of your soul. No matter how much you feed your light side your dark side will always exist and you cannot ignore it without damaging consequences. So what to do about it? Well, for you, I don't know  that is your journey. What is working for me is compassionately being with my dark side. Not so that Hungry Girl can take over and "turn me evil" , but it is with love that Hungry Girls sharp edges are softened and she becomes more of a team player. her voice grows softer and less demanding as I turn a loving eye towards her.

     So today I will not beat myself up and try to wrestle my ego, but instead I will remember that just like you I am good, I am bad and I am divine and when I put it all together and reject no part of myself I am doubly strong. When God tells us to love ourselves I do believe He means all parts of ourselves. May the Hungry Girl or Boy part of you find themselves nourished with a diet of compassion, hope and perseverance.

The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.
     He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet waters,
     he refreshes my soul.
He guides me along the right paths
for his name’s sake.
 Even though I walk
through the darkest valley,
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.

Yoga is ...

     "You cannot call yourself a yogi if you are not a vegan. Real yogis don't use props. Yoga is not calisthenics."  This is just a tiny sampling of the attempts I have heard from people to define yoga lately. Ego yearns to establish control of situations by labeling them. In Exodus Moses demands from God a little more information about who God is. Moses needed to be "in the know" and God simply answers "I am who I am". One of my favorite "names of God" is the Ineffable, which simply means the unknowable. In a lot of ways yoga to me is the ineffable activity. Of course, there are parameters of "what yoga is". Yoga is an 8 limbed system of body mind integration that usually but not always includes making shapes with your body, examining your mind and using breath intentionally to effect internal shifts. Usually but not always...

     So, to get down to it the word yoga really just means "to yoke" and in this instance the objects being yoked (or integrated) are an individuals mind and body.Sometimes, but not always, this mind body integration leads to spiritual awakening or deepening and sometimes this yoking leads to a tighter bum and stronger arms. Sometimes yoga may lead to weaker arms and a stronger mind. Maybe the yogi in $100 yoga pants performing sweaty calisthenics in a trendy downtown gym is meditating deeply on God in those pricey pants. The thing is "we don't know". We don't know the true nature of much, even ourselves.  My faith is a huge component of my life which I cannot imagine living without but I know it would be delusional to insist on labeling God and in the same vein I reject labeling yoga. Yoga is too big and generous to tie down with our tiny ideas.

     It took a sixteen hour road trip and a premature return to work to make me blurt out in front of a class "What the hell is yoga anyways?".  This outburst immediately followed by the thought "well, I am the yoga teacher and I am supposed to be teaching this very thing". Yikes. Who can teach how the wind blows, or how a soul awakens? Can we teach one another body/mind integration? I mean really? The thing is, I will admit I don't know. And that is OK. Because sometimes thinking we know something stymies our efforts to learn and grow. Buddhists call it beginners mind.  Beginners mind asks that we don't assume we know stuff but rather we sit with what is and observe without judgement and perhaps growth will occur.

     This need to label and control situations, of course, extends way beyond yoga and religion. We almost automatically do it with every person we ever meet. Glance at someone in the lane next to you going 70 miles and hour down the highway, your thoughts about them will offer a myriad of labels based on a glance. If they have a gun rack in a pick up truck the thought "redneck" may pop in your head, if they have an Obama sticker on a Lexus you will probably assume they are liberal. But the truth is you know nothing about that person save for the fact they can drive. We take a yoga class or two and soon need to label the activity rears its ugly head. But yoga is what you make it. If you need yoga to be a daily three hour chanting, meditating, whirling dervish activity it will be. If you need your yoga to be sweaty exercise it will be. But is the act of practicing your yoga quieting your mind and healing your body? Well, if you are busy labeling what yoga is and judging people who don't practice it like you then the quiet mind is not operating in that moment, is it?  So, what if we all quit pretending we know what yoga is and just allowed to it show us who we are instead? The next time you have a thought "yoga is...." recognize that this is your opinion and take a breath. Then the next time you assume you know something about God or about another person simply recognize you are assuming an opinion rather than recognizing a fact. To simply awaken to the idea that the great  majority of our thoughts are opinions not facts is to awaken to possibility. With the extreme divisiveness in our society at this moment wouldn't it be nice to lay down some of our labels and opinions and just recognize our fellow humans as just that fellow humans. It can begin on the yoga mat. Quit trying to label and control and set yourself free because the beginning of knowing is knowing you don't know.

 

Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Proverbs 18:12

You Are Awesome!

     A few years ago trying on jeans surrounded by women calling out their flaws from ill lit dressing rooms, calls of  "butt's too big!" and "oh,my god, my thighs!!" rang out as we all reinforced our mediocrity and lack. The calls continued until this moment when I tried on a pair that actually flattered my form and instead of calling out "perfect fit!!!" or " I look awesome!" I let the calls of self criticism ring out unchallenged by my joy. I actually considered for one moment calling out to my sister "damn my thighs look good in these jeans" but the discomfort at the idea caused the thought to die before it reached my lips. Perhaps I was vaguely afraid of upsetting the female camaraderie built on ill disguised self loathing I remained silent. I am sure I was not the only one. Every week when I ask my yoga classes for input before we begin I get a litany of wrongs. Quick to share what is limiting them whether an injury or a perceived limitation the students call out whats wrong, what needs fixing, what's not good enough. But never once has someone said something like " I noticed I am getting stronger in my __________, so lets keep working there" or "I am so proud I touched my __________ so can we practice that?" Now I know it important to protect an injury during yoga and probably many of the yogis calling out limitations have just fine self esteem. But why was it, I wonder, when I asked a class to meditate for 60 seconds on the phrase " I am awesome" did a palpable tension fall over my group of beautiful yoginis?

     This was not the first time I have meditated in this exact style with this same class. This particular meditation did not awkwardly interrupt a fun flow. I did not poke them in the eye as I asked them to consider their awesomeness. The only reason I can conclude that their uncharacteristic discomfort came up was the focus of the meditation: their own awesomeness. Every thought we think, every word we say weaves the crazy colorful tapestry of our identity. So, it is logical, is it not to use positive thoughts and words about ourselves? But why is it so hard? Perhaps we are afraid to stand apart from the dissatisfied masses, afraid to shine. Embracing our awesome light does not mean burying our darkness. This morning reading the blog of an amazing teacher I was surprised to discover that one of his biggest fears is his own capacity for cruelty, his dark side, and yet his teachings shine light on so many. Last night conversing with a student I discovered our shared fear of our own "dark sides" and yet we both continue to endevor to do good.  So here we are,  afraid to shine our light and afraid our dark sides will eat us up in the night, caught in the middle of dark and light where there is only gray. But, here's the thing: it is never too late to shine light and by accepting all the facets of ourselves dark and light, scary and awesome we become whole and healed. We cannot hide our dark or our light and expect to live holistically.

     Scripture calls us to not hide our light but to glorify God with that light. So what if the next time you noticed something awesome about yourself you shared your joy with someone? Not ironically and without negative qualifiers we share that joy and the light you shine brings enough light to the room for the people around you to see their light switches and tentatively take a step into their own light. Perhaps, we think shining our light diminishes others, but just the opposite, owning the fact that parts of you are dark and parts of you are light but all of you is awesome, well that just may encourage someone near to embrace their awesomeness. And when we embrace our wholeness we embrace the fact that we are Gods masterpiece and that is worthy of some awe. Our mechanical yet spiritual bodies, our monkey minds perhaps not yet tamed, our heroism and humor, our lusts and temptations all of the threads of us woven together with stitches of self love and humility, all this this makes for a beautiful and, yes, awesome tapestry. Not taking the overused word lightly, you are AWESOME! Worthy of awe, you are Gods masterpiece. Beautiful in your flaws. Perfect in your imperfection...take a chance today and allow your awesomeness to shine.

 

God helps us to accept the truth about ourselves no matter how beautiful.

It Depends

      Here's the thing that would make me crazy.Or should I say here's A thing that would make me crazy? So many opportunities to hop on the crazy train!! But I digress, so here's my story. I was in a yoga training a few years ago with a teacher I greatly admired in so many ways but who would answer a great deal of our questions with a confounding "it depends".  Now, I have been programmed with alot of "whys" and in a family and culture that values knowledge it can be an ego bender to admit " I don't know" and  "it depends" has a whiff of  the same dangerous vulnerability.  Also, like many people I like neat and tidy answers, resolved questions, and concrete certainty. "It depends" was not an answer that left me feeling warm and tingly but rather a little off kilter. At the very least weren't we paying for rock solid answers? Perhaps she not know the answers, I groped in the darkness for certainty to wrap around my shivering ego. Or perhaps she was just trying to make us think for ourselves? There had to be a reason this smart woman kept answering "it depends" Thoughts tumbled like agitated marbles upon hearing "it depends" so many often when I was craving a solid 2+2 =4.

     "It depends" was simply not an acceptable answer to me at the time. But  how quickly times do change! Fast forward to this morning and I am reviewing a lengthy email response  I wrote to a students question when I notice I really could just sum up my answer in two words: "It depends"! The thing is, I wasn't trying some teaching technique in the email,  the answer just really was "it depends". And although answering  "it depends" made the ground shake ever so slighly it was ok to not have a rock solid answer to stand on. I gave the same answer to a yoga student last week asking for definitive permanent alignment directions. Alignment can depend on the postural intention, the personal body structure which subtly changes pretty much continuously, the therapeutic needs, alignment can depend on the moment. So, once again "it depends" was the answer. Sometimes a definitive answer shuts down exploration while "it depends" can fan curiosities flames.

     The thing is, so many times when I have given an "authoritative" and definitive answer to someone about their yoga journey not long after other alternative answers have presented themselves. There are infinite ways to move and live and breath. When we clutch at the certainty and permanence of our beliefs we are stifling our growth. Just when we know we are right is when we often become wrong. So, "it depends", really is the very best answer in so many circumstances.  "It depends", says I am open to evolving circumstances. "it depends" says I may have some information, but I don't have all the information. "It depends" leaves spaciousness for change and growth. Your answer today may not work for you tomorrow. "It depends" allows us to surf the currents of life unencumbered with the certainty of our rightness massaging the ego. Buoyant with curiosity and humility ironically we are made stronger in embracing our vulnerability.

     Recently I choose to take a break in my pursuit of happiness to just be happy. Well, now I am taking a break in my relentless pursuit of answers to be present in the moment to let the answers unfold. To let knowledge whisper to my soul rather than allow certainty to crush the tender flower growing in my heart. The answers presenting themselves as I stop pretending I know all the options. The path to our best self is anchored by curiosity and humbleness. The more you think you know the less you know. The ironies of life bursting open with a sweet richness. Shedding the fear of not knowing and embracing the truth of "it depends" we open to the lessons of the moment. And ironically in perceived weakness there is found enduring strength.

My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness

2 Cor 12:9