In 2015 I attended a yoga purification workshop on Bhuta Shuddhi, which serves to align and purify our chakras. If you had spoken to me about the chakras 13 years prior to then (I was playing competitive women’s club tennis and not practicing yoga much except to stretch my body before matches) I may have very well dismissed you, as I pretended to listen to your conversation. After the workshop, I became fascinated by the chakras, and even more likely to continue to explore their multifaceted and relevant nature.
I was first introduced to Vedanta yoga philosophy 13 years ago at my first official yoga retreat in beautiful Nosara, Costa Rica. Our philosophy teacher, a Harvard PhD and professor of religion in upstate New York, captivated me with his tales of Hindu Gods and Goddesses, woven into fascinating stories that parallel life lessons. It was there and then that I first got a taste for how yoga can truly serve us, apart from the physical practice, as a way of liberating our minds and hearts from emotions and traumas, preconceived ideas or learned behaviors that can hold us captive, rendering us unable to experience our highest expression in life or true joy.
The Hindu and tantric traditions are rich with insights into how to best navigate this embodied life. I have continued to study yoga philosophy, taking workshops whenever possible, as there is so much more I want to know and put into practice in my daily life.
I was drawn to the spiritual side of life at a young age and became enamored with those things that represented the sacred and Spirit to me. My ideas have evolved and expanded greatly since then, and even though I no longer cling to my Catholic upbringing and the traditions I grew up with, I long for a life of depth and substance, something I never found in secular life.
Each time I sit on my mat in yoga class, I am transported to another dimension of myself and of life.
Ever wonder why organized religions denounce yoga and meditation? Yoga and meditation are ancient practices for accessing higher states of consciousness, without an intermediary. They break through religion’s limiting beliefs and constructs meant to control, not liberate you.
Yoga means “to yoke” yourself to The Divine Source of life. What could be more sacred than that? Yoga prepares and polishes you to be a pure vessel for the Divine. It is a practice of devotion and surrender.
Yoga is the best somatic practice I have found for healing trauma and the heart. I became a yoga teacher in order to facilitate healing and self-love in others. The teacher is a guide, the student experiences their own healing through a Divine connection they often didn’t realize they had access to.
It is said that when you pray, you speak to God, and when you meditate, you get answers.
Originally published in my WordPress, May 2015. Edited for 2023.
I just happened to be reading this from Tao Te Ching ...
“What is strongly in place cannot be uprooted
What is firmly embraced cannot slip away
So, descendents continue in the path
of their ancestors.
Cultivate virtue in yourself, and you become it.
Cultivate virtue in the family, and it abides.
Cultivate virtue in the village, and it will grow.
Cultivate virtue in the country, and it becomes abundant.
Cultivate virtue everywhere, and it will be universal.
See another person as a person.
See another family as a family.
See another village as a village.
See another country as a country.
See everything as everything.
How do i know the nature of all things?
By what is within me”.
Lao Tzu
I believe meditation is a powerful way of finding what is within us 🙏
“It is said that when you pray, you speak to God, and when you meditate, you get answers.”...wonderful 🙏❤️