First of all, my mouth was wide open in amazement! Not even two years ago that information would have needed to be transferred manually and it would have taken a bit of time. And that got me thinking about how much time is compressed now.

My journey from an empty bucket to one that overflows has taken 15 years and is still in process, as evidenced by my being enrolled in continuing Teacher Training.

I wonder how this speeded up version of life is affecting our understanding of time and transformation, especially for younger people. How many of us remember the time to took to dial a rotary phone? Or, recall the time before voice mail or even answering machines when if the person you were calling wasn’t home, you had to wait to speak with them. Hours. Or even days. And that was fine.

I wonder how this compression of time will affect our yoga practice. When I say to a student, “Give it some time” I’m concerned they think come back next week and it will all make sense or a pose will happen for them.

In a yoga and pole practice, when I say give it some time, I don’t mean a few days or a few weeks.

I mean t – i – m – e.

In a rare instance that may mean 6 to 12 months. But more often it means years. As in, let it take years for this or that thing to happen.

I thought I would give you a couple of examples from my own path, just of physical asana or pole move type things, that have taken years. I sometimes think when others see me do a move or a pose with precision and grace that they think I just sprang forth into the world with that capability. I didn’t, you just didn’t know me 15 years ago.

– Touch my toes in a seated or standing forward fold: 2 years, now I can do so in 6″ stilettos
– Bakasana: 2 years
– Parsva Bakasana: 4 years
– Sirsasana comfortably without the aid of a wall: 10 years

– Inverted Straddle: 5 years
– Fallback without a spot: 6 years
– Shoulder Mount: 6 years
– Cartwheel Mount: first attempt was when I had been practicing pole about 5 years, then 6 months of dedicated practice, 3 times a week

Years in the making!

Up next in the Empty Bucket story: Emotional intentions and time

If you enjoyed or were inspired by what you read, please Like, Share, and Tweet. With Gratitude, Cathy

Just a few hours after I posted that blog, that is exactly what happened! Here’s a quick synopsis:

Monday, 7pm: tired, frustrated, no place to stay Tuesday night. Decided to post on Facebook (for the third time) that I needed a room to stay in Tuesday night. Truly had no hope or expectation that someone would reply. Just figured that was the worst that could happen but something inside me said to post anyway.

Tuesday, 7:30am: see that former co-worker whom I haven’t spoken to in person for 4 1/2 years asks “Is Calabasas too far?”

7:31am: message her back, “No, I would love to stay with you, call me!” She’s a school teacher, so I’m thinking I probably won’t hear back from her in time.

mid-morning: spend at least an hour trying to find a room or hotel in my budget that is in a decent area and not too far from training

noon: reserve a room at Econo-Lodge, just in case

1:00: decided to let it all go and practice Yoga Flirt

1:16: phone call from former co-worker! (yes, she was at school and called anyway) invited me to stay the night

Tuesday, 7pm: arrive at my hostess’ home. We chat. Turns out her niece just moved out of the second bedroom, fully furnished with it’s own bath. I ask if she is going to get someone else. She doesn’t know but is frustrated at changes in the way her paycheck is done which leaves her short each month. I ask, “Do you want X amount of dollars for the next 6 months?” She says, “What?? That is exactly what my niece was paying and how much I’m short each month. YES!”

Less than 24 hours after releasing my intention into the Universe I had a better arrangement than I could have hoped for.

I have a furnished room, my own bathroom, no lease to worry about (almost impossible to find a place that will agree to only 6 months), someone I know and trust to stay with, a pool (JOY!), a darling pug to cuddle with, and a location that works with the 3 different training locations. It truly feels like home-away-from-home. Sooooo much more, sooooo much better, and it feels absolutely right and perfect.

I have the deepest gratitude for all the things that conspired to make it happen, which included a lot of closed doors!

This experience teaches me that surrender and trust really work. That sending out intentions and not forcing outcomes works. And that these are worthy things to practice. Give it a try yourself and see what happens….

If you enjoyed or were inspired by what you read, please Like, Share, and Tweet. With Gratitude, Cathy

Over the last 2 or so years, Happy Hubby and I have purchased annual passes to Disneyland. Since we both grew up in the LA area and he even worked at Disney for a while, we both have experienced the park plenty of times. When we go, we don’t go with a “have to do such-and-such” mentality. Rather, we have a general sense of things we might like to do but not force any decisions.

What I finally realized this last visit was that by not needing to do anything specific, our days there are full of ease and serendipity. For example, every time I had to choose the left or right side of a line, I just picked one without thinking and always ended up choosing the shorter line. By waiting until late in the evening one night to go on some of the more popular rides we ended up being able to go on 5 rides in an hour. We also discovered a new-to-us restaurant/bar in California Adventure that had amazing food and drinks and ended up there right as the sun set behind the roller coaster and the lights came on, so pretty.

None of these perfect, easy and enjoyable adventures were planned.

We just went with the flow, followed our hearts and everything worked out perfectly.

I realized, this happens every time we go. We just step into the flow and everything is great.

Last week I could see that Disneyland was providing me an opportunity to practice going with the flow of life and trusting that everything would be perfect without me needed to be forceful or exerting great amounts of effort in a safe environment. When I surrender the need to be in control of every outcome, what does manifest is so much better than what I might have pushed into being.

And that is a huge lesson for me right now. In my “real life” I am practicing learning how to go with the flow, to surrender to and trust that everything will work out perfectly without me needing to force a specific outcome.

Here’s how I’m practicing that lesson right now. My professional yoga teacher training starts this weekend and I still don’t have a definite place to stay. There are a couple of things that might happen, but even those choices are vague. Rather than pushing for one particular place to stay to happen, I’m trusting that the right thing is going to happen soon and that it will be so much better and more perfect than I can even imagine right now. I’m waiting for my heart to say, “Go left! (or right, for that matter)”

I”m not saying that it is easy for me to sit in the unknown, it actually makes me very nervous, tearful and my tummy aches sometimes. But I’m remembering I also didn’t know I would have an amazing sunset dinner with my hubby last week either.

Whatever lies ahead, I trust that serendipity and ease are available to me as long as I surrender into the flow of life.

Are there places in your life where you feel safe to practice going with the flow? When is it harder? Share your experiences with us so that we can all learn from and inspire each other!

If you enjoyed or were inspired by what you read, please Like, Share, and Tweet. With Gratitude, Cathy

In the late 90′s I began taking yoga classes in Pasadena, CA from Jeanne Heileman. I’ve taken classes with her off and over for 12 or 13 years and she is the one I call my teacher. She always seems to know when it’s time for a little more learning and when it’s time to just let the lessons settle in. I learned this next, big lesson from her very early on in taking her classes.

I’ve taken so many yoga classes over the years, they blend together a little bit so the exact when is a bit fuzzy, but the learning is bright.

Jeanne moved us into some asana/pose or another and then said, “Notice how this feels.”

Whoa! Hold on a second…how it feels??

At that point I had been practicing yoga for about 2 years and was just doing the poses as best I could so that they looked right on the outside. It was an external expression, full of desire to be the best in the room, to (hopefully) earn a little praise from whichever instructor I was taking class from. To do the asanas “right”.

And so for the first time I felt the pose. This was an unfamiliar new awareness for me. I was totally disconnected from my body because I didn’t like it. I felt so small, pudgy, and cute in a little girl way that it was easier to just not feel.

I began to feel the asanas physically. Some felt good, some felt hard and tremble-y, some felt stretchy and some felt like work, some felt comfortable – as in comfortable in my own skin (though then I’m not sure that’s what I would have said, I can, however, see that now.)

Something else happened when Jeanne would ask us to feel the pose. I was feeling feelings, you know, emotions.

That was SCARY.

While some poses just felt nice and made me want to smile, some poses brought up anger, sadness, frustration, tears. Some of them would bubble up laughter, giggles, pride, and joy. And those were scary, too. As a co-dependent, my whole M.O. was to make sure other people felt happy with what I did, not myself.

I was so sad and angry from making others happy that I was completely lost to myself and knowing what made me happy. I had denied my own truth and feelings for years. My emotional heart was dead, black. It took several years of time and effort to revive my heart and bring it back to full, abundant, joyous life. Years of dying = years of recovery.

So for quite some time, like another year or so, I chose to notice the physical feelings of the asanas, not the emotional ones. The emotional feelings were too big, too unexplored, and too unfamiliar for the time being. The great news about that is I began to become aware of my body outside of class, too.

What I began to notice was how certain foods made my body feel. I had never really paid attention before. I just sort of ate what was in front of me or what I thought sounded good or what my brain thought it wanted, rather than eating for my body.

Here’s an example: I knew I didn’t like birthday cakes bought from a grocery store bakery, but always ate some because I thought I “had to”, to make the birthday person feel happy, because it was there. I started to notice that eating those types of cakes, full of refined sugar, white flour, and chemical flavors and preservatives left me feeling just sort of icky. So I stopped eating them. And my body felt sooooo much better.

Wow! I was starting to make a connection to my physical self.

I can’t say this new behavior was well received by everyone, I was still surrounding myself with mostly unhealthy people and unhealthy relationships, so sometimes I didn’t express my choices very well. I still hadn’t learned how to feel my emotions in a healthy manner, but I was making small steps of progress toward wholeness.

I also noticed that, really, I pretty much hated Diet Coke. And yet I drank a lot of it, every day. I never slept well when I drank it, it made me irritable, and there wasn’t any joy or savoring it as I consumed it. One day I just stopped. 100%. No more diet or regular soda of any type. Another huge WOW! I started sleeping through the night. I felt less fussy in my body during the day and less like I need another caffeine hit.

And even though I drank diet soda, when I stopped I lost weight. Then I really started to feel better in my body. And, bonus!, my breasts were so much less tender during PMS which meant less irritability, phew. I just felt all around better. I wasn’t 100% confident in all areas of feeling and eating yet. Just better. A little lighter. In daily life it was like I had a little more room to breathe.

There was a glimmer of a puddle at the bottom of the bucket of my soul. A little visible shift in how I interacted with myself. Yoga was slowly, patiently and lovingly doing it’s work. My empty bucket wasn’t quite so empty anymore.

Try this today – Notice how it feels. Whether “it” is a yoga pose, a meal, a conversation, or something else. Just notice without judgement, for yourself to know yourself.

If you enjoyed or were inspired by what you read, please Like, Share, and Tweet. With Gratitude, Cathy

My bucket was empty, but about to soak up the healing powers locked within myself.

Once I became an adult I do believe it was my responsibility to choose healthier ways of being in relationships not just with boyfriends/men, but also with friends, family and co-workers. It would be a few years before I came to accept and then recover from co-dependency.

I began practicing yoga at the age of 25 to help reduce the stress of teaching first grade. I can confidently say I was thoroughly detached from myself. I did not love myself at all and if you asked me what I liked about myself I would have said my eyes and that’s it. I didn’t like my physical body for so many reasons and just about hated my internal self as well. I also had no idea what made me happy because the people I chose to spend time with back then were really good at criticizing the things I enjoyed. “You like the Cranberries? That band is lame.” Get it?

I also surrounded myself with people who were good at telling me all the things I couldn’t do. Like, you can’t cook, you can’t sing, you can’t earn any grade less than a B, you can’t be worth anything if you don’t earn all A’s, you can’t be a responsible adult if you like to go out with your friends at night, you can’t get a belly ring, etc, etc, etc. This was how I was raised and what I knew.

Yoga was the first place I felt free of this judgment and attack. It was the first thing in my adult life that felt like a success for me. There was no grading or evaluation. I just had to show up, breathe, and feel good. I would guess it was the first time in my adult life I actually breathed fully and freely.

And that was the first drop in my empty bucket. I imagine myself as an old wooden bucket. So empty and dry that these first few drops were merely absorbed into my being with no visible result. It would take lots and lots of drops of yoga before even the first little visible puddle of change would show up.

Here’s how that first little glimmer of transformation happened. I had been practicing yoga sort of off and on for about a year when I was in a class and the instruction was to go from low push up (Chaturanga Dandasana) to high push up (Plank/Ardha Chaturanga Dandasana). I put my knees down to make the transition and the instructor asked me why.

I said, “I can’t do that”. Of course I did, it was all I knew of myself. She told me that when I was at yoga I wasn’t allowed to say I can’t. I had to choose my words, which was almost a shock to me.

I had no idea I could choose my words and therefore create my reality!

Some choices were, “That is difficult for me. I may do it slowly. I haven’t learned that yet. I’m working on it. I’m practicing that move. That is challenging me today and I am visualizing myself doing it.”

Huh.

From that point on, I took baby steps to try taking “I can’t” out of my life both on and off the mat. The first thing I did that I can recall applying this lesson to is getting a belly ring. I really wanted one for a long time but so many people in my life were telling me I couldn’t do that. In the mid-90′s belly rings were still pretty shocking – akin to men getting their ears pierced in the 80′s.

When I finally had it done, it was the first time I felt like me. I loved it! It was cute, sassy and playful. It didn’t make me less or a bad school teacher. In fact it made me more. More confident to trust my own heart. More able to express and fulfill my own desires. More able to like myself.

My belly ring was the first, tiny step on my journey toward self-healing, self-love, and radical self-acceptance. I am still on that path today, but thankfully have come miles and miles from where I started.

Over the last 15 years releasing “I can’t” abundantly changed me and my life for the better. I can cook and I’m good at it, too. I can sing with joy and laugh at myself when my voices waivers. I can be a responsible adult and enjoy nights out with my friends, have a belly ring and tattoos. I can be a full expression of the soul that inhabits this body and the Universe will only be better for it.

Had I held on to “I can’t” my story would not include Yoga Flirt, which has been an indescribable gift in my life. The opportunity to pass along the treasures of yoga and it’s wisdom to other women each week fills my heart and soul with such gratitude for the struggles I have had, for the lessons I’ve learned, and the chance to inspire you in ways that will bring this same joy to your life.

If I had continued to use ‘”I can’t” in my life, my recent path in life would have gone something like this:

I can’t move hundreds of miles away from the only place I’ve ever lived. I can’t quit my job without having a new job. I can’t open a yoga studio. I can’t change directions and switch from traditional yoga to Yoga Flirt. Etc, etc.

Instead, I said I can do these things. They are challenging and difficult. And I am still learning a lot about running my own business and sometimes it scares me. A LOT. AND I can do it.

I offer you this little gem. Take the words “I can’t” out of your vocabulary. Choose a new reality for yourself and bask in the glorious amazement of how much you can do as it unfolds before you.

One of my intentions for 2012 is to release fear and holding back. So even though it feels a bit daunting and scary to tell you about some aspects of my life story, I’m doing so with the intention that by sharing my experiences with you, you too may be inspired to live courageously, fully, and fearlessly.

The title of my book is Empty Buckets Overflow: One woman’s transformation from fearful to Flirt-astic.

I am completely capable of writing the book, but at this point am choosing to focus my energies on other aspects of my career. So for now what I have decided to do is use my blog to give you pieces of my story. I have so much to tell you! I’ll be doing it in bits and pieces and will certainly write about other things that cross my mind like I normally do.
But for today, let’s begin here…

Over the holiday break this year I was thinking a bit about my youth and something struck a chord with me. I was ruminating on the fact that I came from an uncommunicative family. We didn’t talk about “it”. The less than pretty parts of anyone’s past were an enigma – sort of, kind of mentioned but not really. There was a lot of “Oh, I don’t remember what happened.” And I always felt like it was a disservice to me. I still can’t tell you for sure certain things about my grandparents and even my parents or my sister.

There were probably plenty of life lessons I could have learned from hearing those stories, about how to overcome adversity, to be courageous, to trust and love myself, etc.
I realized that I was following that same pattern when I tell you how yoga completely changed and even saved my life, but not telling you how. I’ve been glossing over some of the not-so-pretty parts of my past and realized I was doing you a disservice by not sharing with you where I’ve come from and how practicing yoga brought me to where I am today.

Today I’m just going to paint a picture of how I was when I first encountered yoga at the age of 25 and then over the next few weeks and months show you how by practicing yoga over a long time, without break, and in all earnestness helped make me who I choose to be now.

You see, I was raised to be co-dependent. I didn’t know at that time and wouldn’t know for a few more years that I was co-dependent. Co dependency is a behavioral disorder in the realm of relationships.

Co-dependency is a learned behavior that can be passed down from one generation to another. It is an emotional and behavioral condition that affects an individual’s ability to have a healthy, mutually satisfying relationship. It is also known as “relationship addiction” because people with codependency often form or maintain relationships that are one-sided, emotionally destructive and/or abusive. ..Co-dependent behavior is learned by watching and imitating other family members who display this type of behavior.

Often the trait of someone who is living with an alcoholic or other type of addict, for me it was a result of my upbringing. As stated above, it was a learned trait. There was a deep lack of honest communication in my family, so the roots of this trait are not fully clear to me. I feel it is possible that both of my grandfathers were alcoholics. I only surmise this from bits of stories I have been told. I didn’t know my paternal grandfather, he died when I was an infant and I didn’t know my maternal grandfather very well. If this is the case, then both of my parents are adult children of alcoholics and thus co-dependent. I don’t blame or hold a grudge about this fact. It is just a fact of my childhood and upbringing that resulted in who and how I was as a young adult.

In my late teens and early 20′s, being in college was the only thing I had going for me. Earning good grades was the only positive re-enforcement I received and I craved so deeply to feel validated in any way that I continued with school for the grades and the financial reward my parents placed upon those grades. As long as I was doing well in school they paid for tuition, books, rent, food, gas, insurance. You name it, it was paid for. I even received a weekly paycheck from their business. At that point in my life if it weren’t for the conditions of school I’m sure my life would have headed in a direction of quiet desperation that would have been so profound and consuming I’m not sure I would have been able to crawl my way out.

I was dedicated to school and good grades, but in all other areas of my life I was just trying to make others happy and make them like me. I occasionally smoked marijuana so that my boyfriend and his friends would think I was cool, that I fit in. I never liked it, faked it a lot, and always wished I had never done it. I would say this is my biggest regret in life. I knew in my core being that I was not interested in drugs, I knew the effect they have on the physical body and I completely blew it and let myself down in order to please someone else. There is nothing in my life I have done that I feel worse about than that.

I also lied a lot. When I did have a part time job I called in sick a lot, I would hand my background pay voucher to another extra to turn in and would leave the set mid way through the day. I had no work ethic, no appreciation or consideration for others. All of these traits only compounded how terrible I felt on the inside. I knew what I was doing was wrong but yet didn’t really have access to or role models of right living.

With no role model or guide, no idea or clue about how to be spiritual, how to love and trust myself, how to have a healthy relationship with anyone, I gave up. It was lurking there in my heart and soul, right inside me, but I had no access to it. I had a great big hole inside.

I was empty.

Tomorrow I’ll tell you about how yoga became the first few refreshing and hydrating drops in the empty bucket of my soul and the first glimmers of my transformation from fearful to Flirt-astic.

If you are interested in learning more about co-dependency, this web site is a great place to start: http://www.nmha.org/go/codependency

The assignment said, “Describe who you are (or who you want to be) as a yoga teacher. Include but do not limit this to the style of teaching, style of yoga, unique areas of emphasis and your mission as a yoga teacher. Think about what is important to you. Make this a creative and inspired piece as opposed to a dry list of points.”

Here’s what I turned in to my teacher…

“I am pure freedom. I courageously teach, learn, inspire, and love.”
~Me, my Dharma Code

My main focus is to live my life’s purpose, as is stated above.
I strive to remember the ultimate goal of yoga:

Yogas citta vrtti nirodhah.
Teaching yoga is an extension of my yoga practice and helps me
practice having a calm, focused mind.

I am most successful at teaching as an extension of my practice when I teach more active styles of yoga such as Vinyasa and Yoga Flirt, these styles challenge me and force me to be present. I am more successful at teaching the wisdom of yoga, such as the Yamas and Niyamas, to women as I can share my experiences as a woman and how these concepts helped me transform the way I see myself and life.

My mission is to share what I have learned and experienced through yoga with other women, so that they too can transform the way they see themselves, and get a killer work-out at the same time. ( I think of it as a work-out that sneaks in the work-in)

I believe that Yoga Flirt, which combines the wisdom of yoga with the free-flying experience of pole fitness, is a Divine gift given to the world to introduce yogic wisdom to women who would otherwise not practice traditional yoga.

One of my strengths as a teacher is that I can easily see what a student needs on a physical level and know what guidance to give them to move them further, deeper or more skillfully in their physical practice.

I would like to improve my ability to guide students deeper in the internal practice.

No matter what I think or feel about my teaching, what is most important to me is how it lands on my students, so I have surrounded myself with their loving words.

When life sends you things that are not what you planned – surrender. Again and again and again. And again. The difficulty is your gift and teacher. Joy is through the difficulty, not around it. – just saying, and practicing.

Me, too. Life has sent me not what I wanted, but what I needed over and over. And over again. She is so very right, the joy has been in the difficulty. So has fulfillment, wonder, surprise, excitement, and a sense of “I can’t believe I just did that!”.

I’m going to back track just for a moment to help you understand the present “I didn’t get what I wanted” situation and why I am thrilled, relieved, and excited about what is going to happen in 2012.

2007: Want – to obtain an elementary school teaching job on the Central Coast. Needed and got – to open my own yoga studio in Atascadero!

2009: Want – to have a thriving, vibrant one room traditional yoga studio modeled after what I was used to and comfortable with from my experiences in Southern California. Needed and got – to create a completely new form of yoga experience, Yoga Flirt!

Yoga Flirt has been an incredible experience, I have done things I never expected both physically and emotionally. And this blog would go waaaaaay off topic if I got into that here, but trust me I agree more than 100% with Jeanne, the joy has been through the difficulty.

2011: Want – to expand Yoga Flirt into Southern California. We were so delighted that one of our staff members agreed to move and help us open and run a location in Pasadena. We (Happy Hubby and I) began in earnest to find a fabulous studio in August. And we did! And then that spot fell through. We weren’t worried, we knew that it just meant we were being guided to the perfect location. Which we found shortly thereafter. Our intention was to be open in late October or early November for the Fall Session.

And then, life sent us not what we wanted as we couldn’t reach an agreement on the lease. So, we knew that meant we were going to open for the New Year session and found an amazing space that would be built out exactly how we wanted.

And again.

We met road blocks and couldn’t agree on the lease.

By mid-Novemeber I was completely a mess. Frustrated. Unsure what to do next. Crying. Lost. And being given the opportunity to practice surrender.

Not that I wanted to even a little bit.

My above mentioned awesome yoga teacher was in Europe at the time and she was teaching a really fabulous workshop for yoga teachers there. It sounded like something I wanted to learn, so I asked if she would be offering the same classes when she returned to Los Angeles. Her response was that she teaches those concepts during the Yoga Works 300 Hour Professional Yoga Teacher Training* and that she was taking apprentices beginning in Feb. 2012.

It was a Monday afternoon when I read that. Immediately my heart cried out, “Pick me! Pick me!”

Really?

That was not the soup I ordered. I didn’t even know I wanted that kind of soup. I wanted more of what I know I like, a Yoga Flirt studio. Didn’t I?

When Hubby got home around 6 that night, we had a long, thoughtful conversation. And really, the decision had been made the moment my heart sang.

On Tuesday I filled out the application and on Wednesday I was accepted into the program!

2011/2012: Need and get – to put opening Yoga Flirt in Southern California on hold while I complete my 300 hour training, which lasts 6 months.

Surprisingly, I feel relieved. Life has given me not what I wanted, but what I need. Again.

I absolutely know without any doubt what so ever that this training is exactly what I’m supposed to be doing and that excites and thrills me to no end. And yes, there will be difficulty. The training is in Los Angeles, 4 hours away, several days a week. I still have no idea where I’m going to stay. I know there will be plenty of work and study added to my already full schedule of running Yoga Flirt. And I’m a little bit scared, right now so much of what is actually going to happen is unknown. Which gives me the opportunity to practice surrender. Slowly, I’m getting better at it.

I also know that by surrendering to not what I want but what I need will only have glorious results. If Yoga Flirt is the result of me surrendering to not getting a school teaching job, what even more amazing, incredible, life changing goodies will come in 2012 and beyond??

*The minimum training required to teach yoga is 200 hours, which I completed in 2006. The 300 hour program is the next “level” of training, for those who are pursing teaching yoga as a career. Which, by the way, I never planned on. Again with life sending me what I need!

In any form of yoga, the asanas or postures, the physical stuff we do with our bodies, isn’t what yoga is all about.

Let me explain.

The word yoga comes from the Sanskrit word yuj, which means to yoke or create union. So with yoga we are creating a union with our mind, body, breath and spirit. Yoga Sutra 1.2 offers this definition, “The restraint of the modifications of the mind-stuff is Yoga.” What this means is that the goal of yoga is to have a calm, still mind. Not empty or blank, just one-pointed focus.

Back to the pole and other asanas. Part of the purpose of the asana practice is to have a healthy, physically fit body. When your body is well, you create the conditions for your mind to be calmer and more focused. It’s very challenging to be focused on any task if your mind keeps jumping to your achy back, chronic migraines, or those “extra few pounds.” In that respect, Yoga Flirt is about the exercise that comes from flying around the pole.

However, the real point of the pole moves and any other asana, is that they are a tool used to train the mind to concentrate on just one thing. In the case of pole fitness, you are training your mind to focus fully on each aspect of a move to execute it with grace, precision and ease. In that respect the pole is just a tool we use to teach our minds to be present and pay attention to what we are doing right now.

B.K.S. Iyengar phrased this concept perfectly in Light on Yoga,

“(Asana) secure a fine physique, which is strong and elastic without being muscle-bound and they keep the body free from disease. They reduce fatigue and soothe the nerves. But their real importance lies in the way they train and discipline the mind.”

It makes no difference if you are practicing a simple move such as a Chair Slide or more challenging ones like handstands and aerial combinations. What matters is the quality of your mind and attention. If you are fully present in both mind and body, you are practicing yoga.

Yoga Flirt isn’t about mastering pole moves, checking them off a list and moving on to the next one. It is about taking care of your physical body in such a way that you train your mind to focus, so that off the mat and off the pole in rest of your day you know how to create and maintain a calm, still mind.

And not put the frozen peas in the cupboard…

And it was completely fake. It was about 2 am, I was lying awake in bed, having this imagined conversation with someone I haven’t spoken to in about 5 years and don’t foresee speaking to her anytime soon.

We’ve all done something like this. It is different than mentally rehearsing for a difficult conversation. It is completely unreal and we aren’t ever going to have this particular conversation. Especially the ones like mine, that in my mind was occurring years ago!

The problem as I see it is this, our thoughts are energy and they consume energy. Have you ever been exhausted after have to exert a lot of mental energy? So why would we choose to use our energy engaging in conversations that aren’t real and won’t ever occur? I guess it’s part of the human condition. However, these fake conversations can also be a blessing, they can teach how to be aware of our thoughts and give us the opportunity to learn to choose our thoughts purposefully.

Before you can put the brakes on fake, you need to be aware that something like this is going on in your mind. It does require some practice to be able to watch your own thoughts. Meditation is a simple and easy practice anyone can do to help you begin to be aware of your thought patterns.

Once you notice the “fakeness” going on in your mind, you can use one or more of these three simple tools to bring your mind back to the present moment.

1. Choose a new thought. The simplest way to do this is to begin to label in your mind where you are, what you are doing, how you feel. For example, once I realized I was keeping myself awake I changed my thoughts to something like this, “I am in bed. I’m lying on my back. My body feels a little fussy. There is a cat near my feet.” The shift in thoughts to the present moment helped me relax and find my way back to sleep.

2. Change your environment. Go to another room in the house, go out for a walk, head to the beach and watch the waves roll in and out. Similar to #1, label in your mind what you see, hear or feel in the new environment. For example, if you go for a walk you might notice the beautiful fall leaves, a cool breeze or the warmth of the sun, feel the rhythm your pace creates, and hear birds chattering in the trees.

3. Get busy. Simply engaging an activity can also bring your mind back to the present moment. Do the dishes, read a book, knit or quilt, prepare a meal. Like the above suggestions, bring your mind fully to the task at hand and enjoy being involved with it.

As you practice putting the brakes on fake, you’ll discover a calmer and more peaceful internal landscape. Enjoy it!