Yoga, Health, and Wellness Articles + Recipes

For a long time it was a running joke in my family that no matter your ailment yoga could help with that. Over time everyone understood so it was no longer necessary to say it out loud. Unfortunately yoga doesn’t help with everything. In fact, practicing asana doesn’t in and of itself make anything go away. And, the point isn’t to make things go away. The point is to be with whatever is.

What is it about being ambitious by nature? I am always playing with the prospect of somewhere else, or something else, something new. Seeking it has always been my mindset, for as long as I can remember. Until now. Finding balance between my self-determination and so much my brain space can handle? I have to work on getting my life sorted, get a health check, or my goal of drinking more water in this moment, and I can write a list of 20-something things I want to do, or I can try to schedule (more like squeeze in) back-to-back yoga classes into my daily schedule, and I can try to become a better photographer or writer or whatever it is yet all I’d like to do is sit still.

Since I sold my Yoga One studios in California back in 2015, I've been focusing more on my personal studies, especially in Dharma, meditation and Ayurveda. In fact, I have not offered a single Tantravaya 200 Hour training in all of 2016, after directing at least a couple each year for nearly a decade. So during this time I have been asked the same question from students around the world: which training should I pick?

I recently graduated from my 500-hour advanced teacher training. The experience was an intense and deep study not just of yoga but also of myself and my relationship with yoga. As I’ve shared with some of you in my classes, it seems that we are always just beginning our journey – the moment we identify an end-goal is the moment we stray from the very path that will help us achieve it. Some of you have encouraged me to share some of what I wrote in my lengthy 7,600+ word final exam essays. As I went back and reviewed what I wrote, I found the perfect piece to share with you today. There are so many times I reference the Yoga Sutras in my blog posts, but I’ve never really talked through them in a full dedicated post, so now is the time!