Santosha: The True Key to Abundance

December 21, 2016 By Ali Valdez

by Ali Valdez

We live in a complex world of increasing disillusionment, hopelessness, and pressures to achieve and consume. Somewhere between skipping stones on a glassy water surface with bare feet in the mud as a kid and the fancy car or big house whose empty rooms you try to fill by over-working on goals that you yourself did not define for yourself there is a gaping hole we are all seeking to fill. Personal achievement, fulfillment in life, and family gets us partially there, and yet, there is still something missing. The finish line remains elusive. What is it?

Santosha, or contentment, is one of the five niyamas of the eight-limb path. This is the art of being sweetly wedged between everything going the way you want and the daily disappointments and frustrations that come when everything is falling apart and not caring either way. This is not about pre-dispensation towards things going our way, it isn’t about our personal agendas. Santosha is less about the external oceans of life flowing in and out on our schedule; it is more about taming the raging waters within whereby our consciousness and spirits through yoga, breath, and meditation become that very glassy water surface that no stone of the outside world can skip and ripple.

Taking this lens, we don’t require a rose-hued glass, nor do we require any particular desired outcome. We just learn to maintain a symbiotic relationship with ourselves. The greatest abundance of all is not needing anything to feel happy and free.

We can use yoga as a platform and a tool to come into our own understanding of self. The philosophy provides a framework; the practice paves the road.

As you examine your year in retrospect, focus on the blessings, the times of gratitude, and the friends and family that bring you joy. Looking forward, continue your yoga, adopt a daily gratitude practice, anticipate that life will throw you the occasional curveball but stay resolved on finding the friend within to help you navigate the waters of life. Alter your mindset focusing more on what you can give, rather than what you expect to receive. Set goals that feed your spirit and benefit others. Set aside your valuable time to things that help you achieve your personal best. Less is more in 2017, a cycle of new beginnings. Happy Holidays and Happy New Year!

Want to learn ways to apply yoga philosophy and principles to support your goals and bring you increased contentment? Check out the Sattva Yoga Studios 40-Day-Challenge starting Tuesday, January 10th.

Picking up the Pieces: Learning to Love After Trust is Lost

December 7, 2016 By Ali Valdez

Opening up our hearts can be one of the scariest things we can do. Making ourselves available and fully invested in the connection with someone we love and care for brings us profound purpose and at times, our deepest despair. I have heard it said that on the yogic path of transformation, it you truly want to grow spiritually, be in a committed relationship. In this Petrie dish of affection, intimacy, trust and vulnerability all sorts of deeply-seeded samskara can make themselves visible under the microscope. The Seer and Seen seeking in real time full unification. To make this work, satya (truth) is a key ingredient.

Oftentimes we exalt the monk sitting in the tranquil mountains. Individuals that follow the prescriptive guidance of Swami Swatrama as ameliorated in the Hatha Yoga Pradipika get to nestle into their dried dung sanctuaries devoid of loud company and the cloying obligations of the householder. But the real work, the feet on the street, comes from just getting through everyday life with someone outside of yourself with whom there can be found deeper intimacy within.

No relationship is immune to the sobering if not, at times, brutal realities of our collective co-existence. For anyone who has endured trauma, death, infidelity, addiction or deceptions can attest, the true metrics and mettle of our yoga testimony and willingness to seek expansion through open-heartedness can turn those warm beating beauties into frozen steel cages. Has there ever been a point in a true relationship whereby we haven’t found ourselves shaken and rattled to our core?

For years I sought out the best teachers worldwide. I wanted to learn the siddhis, master meditation, test the limits of my physical body with thumos. Now I have come to realize that it’s not the master teachers from studios’ in far-flung places that will hone my skills, it’s the firmament beneath my feet at the studio I own and those that pass through its doors.

I realized it is my own students that make my best teachers. They are not the monks in the Himalayas but the mother of five, the waiter, and massage therapist that studies in my intensive programs that are amplifying my game.

Through this process and energy exchange, we still learn about yoga and also about one another. We get comfortable and begin not only to share but work through the layers we are peeling away together. Sometimes there are tears, always hugs. Elation and smiles continue on through their graduation and completion of studies and becomes mentorships, friendships and business partners. The yoga is not about the meditation or the asana, but about compassion for one another, our frail humanity. Sometimes we are met with the truth we all so desire, other times, our pursuit of honesty is shattered.

This past week I have personally experienced more sadness meted out with these caring souls than I have in many years. Admittedly, it has been daunting.

My heart is aching like a heavy stone.

This hurting feels like I’m losing my footing rolling that same stone up the side of a steep hill. At the heart of all these situations is lost trust and dishonesty. This is a sad place to be; a destination to which no one would ever want to arrive and yet once down its path, one cannot escape. There was a convergence in the ugliness of dishonesty that intersected and challenged my vantage points on what it means to truly trust, surrender, survive and then forgive. I literally probably have never loved more, or wanted to be more fully present than in these hours of need. I grew up emotionally; I felt a shift spiritually.

By Sunday, I was exhausted.

But I was also lucky. I feel that those of us who practice yoga in earnest have been gifted with yogic tools to cope with these disillusionments and so us yogis can take steps to process, heal and use these experiences to grow, not wither into the fray. Nonetheless, unwittingly living a lie and being lied to sucks. No amount of Om Shanti takes that away. Without disclosing things shared in confidence, I had two students dealing with spousal infidelity and dishonesty, leaving them uncertain of their futures. Another situation a student of mine spiraled out of control in their unrelenting battle against alcohol and drug addiction, months and months of accumulated lies through the acts of omission, manipulation and repression of feeling and trauma.

The most insidious types of lies are the ones that begin by lying to ourselves.

Not even the yoga teacher is immune. Recently I was personally if not gravely deceived by someone I cared for, invested deeply and believed in immensely, my first real foray into the concept of unconditionality, even though not in the shape of romantic love. It was more like unconditional acceptance. Hours spent in the warm presence of this eidolon and instantly I felt protected, safe to express myself freely and without judgment and to offer the same in return. It was a new level of trust, listening and reciprocity. I was grateful for the gift of our time together and believed this was a meaningful friendship with a higher level of authenticity. Well, for me anyway. Like my students, I was equally led astray and deceived. What I learned once the truth of months of misrepresentation and intentional deceit spilled forth, albeit humbly and with sincere remorse, left me bottomed out in my guts, pulled the rug out from under me, and left me acutely empathetic to what my beloved students were feeling in their own lives and sharing with me over the course of many years.

These shared journeys help fortify how we as yogis can utilize the practice and principles of the eight limbs to move past challenging situations where we are betrayed. It would seem impossible by conventional thinking to move past and forgive, to invest in all circumstances in life with equal possibility and beauty. Yet in yoga, it almost demands such rigor and change in mindset. Does this mean you run back to the abusive partner or invest time and heart with someone who is not honest with you, let alone to themselves? Not necessarily. What it does mean is that in dishonesty, at some point, satya will be illuminated and revealed and a greater truth that we all share will come to light. I have cried for seven days straight. I haven’t prayed with greater intent than in my years as a lay pastor at my church. Some of us don’t like the truth. Like digging the sun out from under the earth, the process won’t be easy, may even seem impossible to let go and move on. But if we can live life honestly to ourselves and to others we begin to see the greatest truth of all: we are all one and mere reflections of aspects of ourselves. May we be gracious to one another as we tread with uncertainty this path we call life.

Departure Gate: INDIA

December 7, 2016 By Ali Valdez

Arrived and rested, ready for the adventures that await.

So much of what we interpret as fact is woven into the fabric of our imaginations through the insights of others. When thinking about traveling to more exotic and far-afield parts of the world, first impressions are often distorted of tales of the impoverished and disadvantaged. We hear stories of the hopeless despair of those whose lives are not painted in the same strokes of our own. India sometimes falls into that category. For years, I listened to young yogis share their “view” of the mother country. The smells, the history, the poverty, the overcrowding, the sounds, the pollution – get ready.

I saw Eat, Pray, Love (preferred the book) and would have stayed cozied up in Italy eating vats of pasta any old day. So many impressions, a multitude of opinions, now was my time to form my own from first-hand experience. But would I be shocked, overwhelmed, incensed? Would I love or hate the place? There was no middle path for what a trip to India would be. As a yogi, it’s hard not to feel obligated to have a spiritual awakening amidst the ash-clad sadhus wandering around piles of burning garbage, sunken-bellied cows with the stunning mountains and gilded saris in the background.

The intention of this trip was to collaborate with an NGO with Bloom & Give. Last year I was invited to become one of their yogi Instagram ambassadors. I loved their products, beautifully hand crafted textiles and their social mission: to keep girls in school longer. Fifty percent of the Bloom and Give products’ profit goes to Educategirls.ngo (EG) which is a small grass-roots movement helping rural community villages learn the value of keeping their daughters in school. This trip would include all the yoga, travel and sightseeing and diversional bus rides one could imagine. But we also had a social agenda: to learn how young girls and women are treated in India. We visited primary schools, a boarding school, the village advocates, the girls’ mothers, and worked a day in a textile factory where women make $17 a month.

What we learned surprised us; what we learned about ourselves and our limited worldview was also illuminating.

We arrived under a sulfur colored sky and took in the indelible New Delhi air. After two days of flying and a lost layover in London, we were ready to start our journey to the land of impossible hyperbole. India is India after all. A few decades of yoga practice and several decades in technology too, I have felt India a near and dear place through the relationships I have developed with her people and with India’s gift of the yoga practice now blessing the West.

When we landed and made our way to the diplomatic enclave, I was struck first by the beautiful greenery sometimes forgotten in the biggest cities. We left the airport with minimal traffic. Delhi was a beautiful city. It is also the most polluted city, but that was the only commentary I had heard. I preferred focusing on the beautiful rows of flowering trees.

This should be a quick trip to the hotel, I opined. Then all that changed; the reality of real India took us by surprise.

Two girls in India, two different realities. The young woman on the left is a leader at her boarding school; the other is a child bride dressed in red wedding attire.

A tsunami of scooters, cars in this emerging BRIC economy dammed up around the bend with a curious configuration of side players peddling rusty old bikes, a few sandaled and speeding by on skateboards. Looking over to the right between the over packed buses with not a single square inch of space between the armpits of fellow men, women and children we saw the others choosing more domesticated approaches to their transportation as one man took to camel, another by elephant. It was not overwhelming as we sat in sub-standard air conditioning and heard the non-stop symphony of car horns barking at everyone and no one at the same time. It was nothing more than being greeted by Mother India herself as she opened the door with her excited children screaming and swirling about excited for their guests.

I never lost my calm in India and there were many challenging times. The opportunities, like its diverse population, offer an unlimited amount of stress triggers like guitar strings waiting to be played and plucked. Here is one example: the ill-directed driver who took us on a misguided nine hour detour through the shanties between Delhi and Rishikesh, stopping at road stop bathrooms one step up from Slumdog Millionaire.

What I quickly learned about India was she keeps her own schedule. In this way, she is obstinate, immovable like a mountain sheath. Try to get your coordinated taxis to meet you as discussed at a certain time or place betwixt the market stalls of Rishikesh, well, good luck. Need to get to the airport three hours early? As outlandish as it seems, yes, most likely.

She is also abundant and fecund, fluid and moving like the Ganges River. Everywhere you look, you are impressed by the richness of greenery and vastly dynamic landscapes, each region its own tableau for storytelling through cuisine, culture and aesthetics. I was starting to get for the first time in my life both the powerful life force of planet as woman, her body and the resources it offers, and the insatiable cruelty and greedy entitlement we force upon her like hungry dogs nipping at her teats. There is a beauty in her selflessness. Even if it seems a romanticized view of India, and worse yet one peering through the speckled lens of a Western yoga teacher, I still would hold tight to my feelings that India has everything of a land lost in time as it does a civilization coming to grips with finding its bearings in the modern world.

Mother India and her lion. So much to learn about Shakti force and the role of women on this planet from this special place on Earth.

As we drove through the deserts of Rajasthan, the mountains of Rishikesh and the cities of Agra and Delhi in between, I saw the many sides of the Mother, and I reflected on her resources. How much more does she have to give before she breaks? How many ways are we as a people around the world taxing her health? History and the sun shine down upon her, and show her favor. But like spoiled kids, do we show her the respect she deserves?

When does the young maiden evolve into the mother, raise her young and then like a setting sun fade into the crone?

The greatest learning for me about how girls and women are treated in India came through the meditations and considerations given to India and the Earth as mother more than interacting with the children.

Now, let’s get to those kids, shall we?

Nothing could have prepared me (and we had hours upon hours to prepare because the dusty roads out to these rural village shows were long) for walking into the schools. I started to cry immediately. These weren’t sympathy tears; I was moved by the beautiful spirit of these children and that I had the opportunity to be there with them for that day. I wished with my whole heart that my daughter could have been there with me.

The classroom floor for the Kindergartners was covered in sukhasana kids. They looked at us as we walked in with fascination. Their big eyes widened with nervous and bashful curiosity. Most of these children never leave their small rural village. Only a handful had even made it in for a field trip to Jaipur. Americans (oh and one Czech), blondes, women with cornrows, women with light skin, some with dark skin but different features, one Asian man, nine women without saris.

Who are these strange looking people, I imagined them thinking.

The conditions of the classroom were not horrible at all. Granted, they did not have computer labs (one of my first original ideas for the visit, but alas, the infrastructure and connectivity is not available out in these parts to connect or maintain such systems). We had translators ask them questions, and a few stood up and shared. With each classroom, the children got taller, opened up a bit more, but the size of the classrooms kept shrinking. This became undeniable for the number of girls in school after the third grade. It is the harvest time, we were told, and girls work in the fields. But for most of them, it means, they have completed their education.

Two of the mothers that broke from the tribal structure of their village and pulled their daughters out of the fields and into the classroom.

The reality for many young girls in these remote traditional places, some of which are not even registered via census for context, are committed in marriage at exceptionally young ages. As early as age eight, these girls have the rest of their lives laid out for them. There will not be opportunities for education or for careers. For some, there will be no real decision-making in the course their life will take. This is impalpable for the Westerner to comprehend, as we are afforded with so many liberties that it takes having conversations in these far reaches of the world to understand how different we view basic standards of living and moral imperatives like personal choice.

We did an art project with some of the girls and hung around taking selfies. For some of these young girls, they had never seen a picture of themselves before. We were able to show pictures of our kids, our pets and what it likes like where we live. They took to the phones with massive interest. Some things clearly are universal and transcend cultural barriers. We gave our phones to a couple of the older girls who got to shoot pictures and film our day.

At the end, we were asked to take a group photo with the school leaders and they asked us to sign their guest book. Something as simple as being asked to sign a paper record of our visit seemed so removed from our Seattle high-tech disposable lifestyles and impersonal ways of connecting.

From there, we traveled to a boarding school for older girls. Some are residing there as orphans and others have their mothers nearby in the village where the EG team discussed with them the importance of educating their children. Girls who receive longer education create more income, have less children and in general marry years later. This has great advantages for getting out of cycles of poverty and enables personal empowerment. We met a few of the EG advocates, young women with smiles that go from house to house in the village meeting parents. It only takes one family to make the choice to keep their daughter in school that create the groundswell and social influence for other families to follow suit.

Rajasthan now has more girls enrolled in school than other states within India and EG is expanding. At the boarding school, we met with the leadership counsel of young women who each take on certain roles and are given titles. Each stood up and shared their name, title and their role at the school. There is the girl who on-boards new arrivals, one that teaches the girls about hygiene. Other girls work to comfort the younger girls, another does sports, another games and birthdays. I was blown away by their confident smiles. We met with a few of the village mothers who shared why they sent their daughters to school there. This is a place that values girls and in a place like India, that is not always the case, at least in the ways that we understand or find it socially acceptable.

Young children sharing their stories and smiling larger than life at the primary school visit we made. A circle of sports for the girls at the boarding school, all playing, living and working together to empower and love one another.

We kept the day fun and in high spirits. I loved spending time with these future leaders. What I witnessed was a new future for the young women of India, a ground-swelling of women becoming empowered. I saw and felt hope. There was no need for pity whatsoever. You also don’t need to dip in the Ganges or hang out in an ashram to find yoga in India. It’s on every street, in the hand of every beggar, in the bright-eyes smile of its children and the warm hosts we met along the way. A garland of malas and balloon pants in Rishikesh was not where the insights are found. We found them on the streets and in the villages.

Yes, Mother India was raising her daughters. On that trip, she raised me up a little bit, too. Thank you, Mother India.

Obtaining Growth Through Perserverance

May 24, 2016 By Ali Valdez

Many of you have heard of the significance of 40 days. Jesus Christ, Buddha, Muhammad, Noah, and other spiritual leaders have as part of their life narrative a journey into the wilderness, the desert, or the heart of darkness. In this time, they face their demons and persevere by making a life-altering decision, the Bodhi tree moment, whereby they emerge triumphant, self-determined and enlightened.

Successful business women are known for their perseverance, and so are good mothers. We have all had to “dig deep” at one time or another, and many of us will admit that the trying times are the ones where we see the most growth. But, how do we know when to draw the line between beneficial perseverance and detrimental obsession? Success is not just about overcoming obstacles, but how you do it, and to what end.

Know How to Dig

One year I was on the Microsoft committee for volunteer events. We opted to remove blackberry bramble, a plant not indigenous to the Pacific Northwest. As we stood tarped in rainproof hoods and ankle deep in mud soaked wellies, the resident weed puller warned us that the sugary bulb at the base of the blackberry must be completely dug up to starve the plant; otherwise, it would continue to take over and smother all the other native plants.

So we dug, thorns and all. No superficial cutting back, no playing it safe with this horrible stuff. Blackberry bramble is stiff and sturdy like medieval spikes forged to chains that grow from an iron ball. Although the thickest garden glove is immune to its tacking, sticking and pricking, the bulb is always a bit deeper than you’d like. You cannot really extract it with your hands, even when the soil is moist. It takes time, tools and some elbow grease, and that applies to most goals in life.

The good news? Eventually, the plant comes out and the cloying, burdensome bramble recedes. This allows the native plant, the true self or “atman”, to access the sunlight, drink in the rain and have a chance to grow.

Adjust Your Breath

When I was younger, part of my San Francisco experience included falling in love with a man who I thought would be ‘the one’. I was in my youth and madly in love, with an incredible job, money flowing in, a ten-minute drive to my best friend, and daily yoga. It was all about the yoga and love, love, love.

Then the boyfriend and I split up. Enter the waterworks, the uncertainty, and the nights of laying like a wet stone in bed, with the room so silent you could hear the audible sound of my heart breaking in two. I just wanted to stay in bed with the blankets over my head. Would this sadness come to pass and could I ever hope to move on? Eventually, with perseverance, the answers were yes and yes.

As I mourned, I went to all the classes, did the poses, took the evenly-metered breath, and for one hour and twenty minutes forgot the Kleenex. Your mind cannot wander when you are holding a perfectly aligned triangle for four f***ing minutes, can it? You cannot help but feel more grounded and balanced in padmasana, trying to catch the toes behind your back, right?

My hard work filled up the coffers of my physical and energetic bodies, but my emotional state was still an absolute mess. Savasana and closing meditation became the longest ten minutes of my life. I learned pranayama, from the teachings of BKS Iyengar (one of a handful of Krishnamacharya lineage bearers, our pathway into modern yoga), and practiced eka grata (single pointed concentration) one inhale and exhale at a time. But as I lay on my back, staying wholly connected to the breath during corpse pose, I found that this was the one asana that could not outpace my heartache.

Until one day it did. Yes, the boy left and my girlish innocence did, too. But yoga stayed. I lived the gift of yoga through that experience and it was a cornerstone moment in my life. Yoga helped re-craft the trajectory of my life by expanding my perspective. It is the primary expression of my faith, service in the world and belief in God.

Yoga and I are still going strong. We haven’t broken up, and we never will.

Let Go of False Expectations

May of 2013 was an exciting month, as we hosted sixteen guests in mystical Peru. The trip absolutely lived up to the hype, but in ways that I had not anticipated. To make the trip successful, I had to let go of some expectations.

Preparing for over a year to go to Machu Picchu and the Sacred Valley leaves one’s imagination to dance in the realm of the Samyamas, to be gently kissed by angels of inspiration, and then return with the next big thing. I knew my retreat was going to be all about internal practices. How could it not, coming from the lineage of the maha siddhis, and being on such a potent piece of Earth? When I got to Machu Picchu, there was a shocking thud. Instead, the retreat was all about getting back to basics.

I tried to maintain my agenda during the retreat, but it just did not mesh with everything else that was happening. This retreat was not about flying off, but about getting grounded, and authentically connecting with this material plane of existence. When you spread your toes in tree pose, the analogy is often like roots grounding and securing you into the Earth. From there, you can draw energy up through the body. But before I could do that, I had to let go of my expectations for the trip, for the practitioners and for my own experience. Once I was able to do that, I blossomed and I am still feeling the effects of this powerful connection.

Remove the Obstacles Within You

May is my birth month and also Mothers’ Day. A lot of introspection goes into this time of year, as I get tremendously honest about my shortcomings, aspire to new goals, and of course, assess how I can improve as a mother. This svadhyaya is not an annual phenomenon, but tends to be the time when I lay it all out on the table. On the other hand, I don’t want to waste too much time and energy ‘evaluating’ my performance as a human being.

While in Peru, this work was not in vain. I had to do it off hours, in the early mornings and nights, and even skipped a few amazing side trips so I could just be seated, silent and breathe. I found that I had been operating in a more masculine way. This is not a wrong way, but I am not a man and the theme of the trip was about finding the proper balance, something I did not have at the time.

The trip to Peru revealed a lot of patterns that were so deeply rooted in my way of operating, they had blinded me to higher spiritual insights. I needed to do the Earth time and get some things right inside my heart. When I let go of traits that were more entanglements of principle than facilitators, I found myself able to grow as a human being.

How to Move Forward with Fear

May 21, 2016 By Ali Valdez

We often go through life catering to our fears and phobias. It is easier to avoid that surging internal conflict caused by facing things that entirely creep us out. For women in business, fear of failure is tantamount to falling off a high wire. In life, there is no safety net below us. Gravity is working against us; we won’t float like a balloon sliding out of its colorful bundle. This fear holds us back.

How do we overcome these conflicts, or at least get more comfortable with them so that we can move forward? Here are three steps you can take to overcome your fears:

Know Your Fears

Sometimes it’s hard to figure out what you fear and which fear is worst.

On my final day in Banos, Ecuador, I got a bad case of FOMO (Fear of Missing Out). A friend had planted a seed that the best thing to see when in Banos was the infamous Devil’s Cauldron, or Pailon del Diablo to the locals, and I started to seriously consider taking the hike. What held me back? Fear of heights (a long hike up treacherous pathways), confined spaces (you have to cave crawl under the waterfall at one point), and geological cataclysm (e.g. getting caught in a mudslide).

This isn’t a pull-up-and-go-see tourist trap, and I am not one to do hiking in general. I have marathoners’ knees and stone pathways are no bueno. I also read an article on the world’s most dangerous staircases, and the Diablo was prominently featured. Then my FOMO overruled my other fears. I didn’t want an empty check box on my trip. I decided that maybe it’s time to combine all the things that horrify me, take a chance, and test my adrenaline thresholds. After all, it is Trip Advisor’s #1 thing to do in Banos.

Let’s do this, I said. Sure, I might vomit, or bad vertigo could make me want to throw my body off the edge, but we will cross that (suspension) bridge later.

The self-doubt and regret really set in as we climbed the narrow pathway to the Devil’s Cauldron. A white dog leapt from the bushes, hounding us and nipping at my heels. Did I mention that I also have a fear of mongrel dogs? Also, I had just gotten bit on the tit by a horse during equine therapy (more fun times at: Equine Therapy blog), and now this dog was going nuts. Great. On the ravaged mudslide path, I worried that I would lose my footing and slide into the roaring river waters, taking perro blanco with me. But, I continued. And then, as the pathway narrowed and the exuberant jumping dog approached the brink of pushing me over the edge of a precipice, the tree canopy cast a shadow and a silvery mist of clouds slipped in. Hypnotically, like Salome’s veil, this lulled the dog, and he transformed into my loyal companion.

I became more confident as we continued, and I also realized that the attraction of the Devil’s Cauldron is not just the violently raging water clamoring down two separate rivers, converging like the embrace of a madman. There is also a chiseled rock; a sharply-etched side profile of an old man. The higher up you go, the clearer it becomes.

Take the First Step

Taking that first step with anything that truly matters to you is hard. Putting yourself out there, writing a book, starting a business, or sharing your feelings all seem like a high wire act on a metal cable in the sky. Sometimes crossing from one side to another is the hardest thing to do. You have an idea, make a plan, think through scenarios, and hope for the best. And then, there is that moment of truth. Like Philippe Petit’s epic le coup, a high wire balancing act between the World Trade Center buildings, all of the preparations ultimately lead to the defining “moment.” To get to that moment, you must take that first step and a leap of faith.

The story of Petit’s epic crossing was recently made into a film, The Walk. My favorite moment was when he took the first step out onto the cable, holding a 55 lbs. bar, with a bloody foot and the century’s most profound example of concentration. His greatest concern? His signature black turtleneck blew away when he was changing at the top of the towers. How is that for perspective?

After Petit takes his first step, he freezes when a bank of fog rolls in and obstructs his view of the opposite tower. He has made his move and there is no cowering or turning back, but the end point is now shrouded, unseen. As business women, we certainly arrive at that point, too. What we once so clearly saw in our imagination, the vikalpa of ideation, can suddenly become lost in the unknown reality. We have two choices in that moment: we can begin to doubt ourselves, or we can muster up the cajones to keep moving forward.

At 110 stories high, Petit didn’t have the luxury of self-doubt, nor could he afford to lose his focus. We have all been in a crisis situation that causes us to pause. When that happens, we must breathe, and allow moments to gather ourselves, assess, and possibly reassess. To move forward again, we inevitably must take another step; and when that step is done, we take another, and so on.

Find Your Peace

The Walk shows us that it isn’t enough to just cross once; the journey is a continuous cycle of deeper learning, acceptance and resolution.

Petit first walked just to prove he could pull off le coup. That would have been enough for many, but Petit saw the flaws in his design when he took that first walk. He turned because he felt the other tower calling him back. With each traverse, he gained ease, more confidence, and felt a greater trust in the process. He kneeled and acknowledged the wire, the sky, and the beauty of the towers. Although he was harassed by policemen on either side (the voices of reason and conformity, the bane to dreamers and artists), he kept walking, jumping and turning in direct defiance of authority.

Just kicking back. Every great endeavor requires a moment to pause and acknowledge the lessons and blessings around you, expressing your gratitude for being fully present in the moment and in who you are.

As a dreamer, Petit also knew surrender. He understood his sense of place. With each walk, he settled deeper into the uncertainty, or what he called ‘the void.’ When at last he laid down across the wire and stared up into the heavens, resigned and no longer scared, he began to simply marvel at it all. At that moment, like Buddha under the Bodhi tree, Petit found his peace.

Sometimes I feel like a woman on the wire, but without the high-wire and bloody foot. I have faced the void, and have seen clarity of vision become shrouded by the heavy clouds of doubt. But, I also know that the clouds are external and constantly moving, as all things are.

We can all find that feeling of being laid out peacefully on the wire, suspended impossibly high above the ground, knowing that change is the one thing we must acknowledge and cannot control. I hope we all have our moment on the wire, when we understand completely the energy that resides in each of us. This energy lures us out of our comfort zone, confronts us with our greatest fears or wildest fantasies, and keeps us walking one step at a time.

Yoga is for Every Body

May 12, 2016 By Ali Valdez

Yoga makes every woman appreciate the value of time to self-care, and helps one embrace the challenges of everyday life with grace.

Everybody needs yoga, and yoga is for every body

Every woman on Earth can do yoga.

Everyone seems to be doing yoga and is an expert on yoga, but our sisterhood is divided. Sadly, hype and spiritual materialization have consumed the practice of yoga, as simple downward dogs have blossomed into a multi-billion-dollar industry. It seems the only thing the yoga community is fostering is competition and the aggrandizement of the one thing it is supposed to be transcending: the ego.

At its core, yoga is a means to self-worth, inner peace, and integration of mind, body and spirit. On a grander scale, yoga enables great benefit to all. Yoga knows no boundaries, and makes no distinctions between what the world might label as advantaged or disadvantaged.

The practice of yoga starts with you, but you are not alone. How do we make ourselves feel confident enough in the power of yoga to change our world? At the end of the day, just getting on the mat is a step in the right direction.

Yoginis are Moms, Stockbrokers, and Bartenders

You need not stock up on hemp milk and chia seeds, or quit your job at Microsoft to become ‘legit’. I am a single mom in my mid-forties, who works 100 hours per week and eats the occasional brie or over-indulges one weekend on churrascaria and caipirinhas in Brazil. Yet, I wake up the next morning still a yogi, with the same opportunities to grow available to me on the mat as the day prior.

The real fruits of the practice are the qualities of yoga that you take with you when class is over. Yoga helps you manage mental and physical stress from the challenges and frustrations of balancing a demanding job, family, and any crisis that life throws at you. Yoga makes you feel better in spite of the strain and drain of everyday living. Real yoginis can exist successfully in our world, being all Namaste without having to flee to the monastery. They have found it within, and you can, too.

Yoga is for Every Body Type

You spend half your time in tight skirts and crippling heels, and the other half in sweats at home. The last thing you want to do is walk into a studio for the first time, surrounded by a sea of $400 athletic pants and fancy slingy slipper shoes. The way you feel about your look in that sea of yoga perfection can cause you to high-tail it out of the joint.

Keep in mind that studios are diversifying their class types and offering beginner series, so you will find the right one for you. Also, savvy apparel makers now offer a full range of clothes to accommodate all bodies comfortably and beautifully. Whether you are like me and gained 100 pounds during pregnancy, or have one of those quintessential yoga body types, we know how you feel. We do not condemn or hold grudges. The benefits of the practice far outweigh any emotional insecurity. Yoga benefits all of us, and is the ultimate learning ground for loving and appreciating our bodies and our humanity.

Sharing Deepens Relationships

Yoga operates and effects change on more than just your individual physical level. Encourage your friends to come with you without being pushy. They might be curious, but feel unable to ask to come along. Others, such as your stressed out executive friend, might feel isolated thinking that no one knows what she is going through.

Rather than lecture all your friends on how they should experience the benefits of yoga, focus on the practice of yoga. The simplest things can help them reclaim and reconnect with their bodies. The breath is like healing balm, and is shared

You can Find the Right Fit

Yoga is not a one size fits all proposition. You hear about yoga at the coffee shop: the super sweaty, ninety-minute torture chamber known as Bikram causes you to cower over your latte and scone. You walk down to the park with your dog, see people positively glowing after meditation, and you want to run in the other direction.

Yoga is an ancient tree with a very thick and deeply rooted trunk. You might feel overwhelmed by the swarm of fads around you (naked yoga, Doga with your furry friends, and so on), but know that strong branches radiate from the trunk and offshoots from these branches will embrace you. The practice of yoga is about balance in the body, a metaphor for elimination of dualistic thinking and moksha, a fancy word for liberation. You must enjoy the yoga you are doing to reap its benefits.

There are classes that are slow-moving, restorative, vigorous, free-style, or rote and serialized. Not sure where to start? Personally email me, and I will get you to the right kind of practice for your body, mind and spirit (see below). Every studio offers beginner series. Everyone has to start somewhere, so give yourself a break and grab those extra props. You can always change your mind and try something different later. Try a few styles, practice them more than once, and then stick with the one that works for you. The power of yoga is that over time, with any degree of devotion to the practice, more always comes of it.

amongst you. I have found that my yoga buddies are my spiritual soul sisters. Over time, our conversations and our friendships have increased in depth and meaning.

As a single working mom with an international travel schedule and sometimes up to a 100 hours per week client base, I feel that the benefits of yoga and a supportive community are vitally important to all mothers, especially those just like me.

Yoginis Are Changing the World

Yoga is healing the planet one downward dog at a time. The yoga movement of the West has been a showcase for women partnering in a non-male way to bring awareness and good to the world. Catty competitions aside, yoga is architecting global transformation, and women are at the forefront. Two great examples are Off the Mat and Into the World. My favorite is the Sattva Yoga Online-sponsored Yoga Gives Back, where I volunteer as a global ambassador. Here is a documentary about how our micro-lending is impacting mothers in the poorest parts of India by educating their daughters and helping them avoid human trafficking. (http://yogagivesback.org/ygbfilms).

Besides helping working moms and stressed out executives, yoga services are now expanding to help the elderly, survivors of abuse, the incarcerated, youth at risk, the homeless, and other underserved members of society. People everywhere are taking small steps to bring more joy into their lives and the lives of others. See I told you yoga is good for everyone.

Mother’s Day for Mukunda and Me

May 8, 2016 By Ali Valdez

In Autobiography of a Yogi, we read the story of little Mukunda, who is more famously known now as Paramahansa Yogananda, the founder of the Self-Realization Fellowship. If you have read the book, you learn that Mukunda’s mother was a simple but extremely powerful woman and loving mother.

His mother felt that from birth, her son had an anointing. She aligned her child-rearing to the guidance of her teacher and knew her son would go and do profound things for all of mankind. On her deathbed, she shared her story with him and planted the seed of faith through her sacred and most cherished amulet. I don’t want to give the story away, so will not retell the story here.

As Mukunda grieves the death of his beloved mother, he is reminded that his mother in this lifetime is just one face of many, many aspects of the perfected, universal love of the Divine Mother culminated in many mothers through the sum of his other lives. With one sentence, Mukunda was awakened to expanded consciousness, the laws of karma and reincarnation and swiftly taught the art of detachment. Although he loved his mother, and she embodied maternal perfection, there is even more to the full reality of the divine mother’s love. Idolized as much as she was, she was just one face of a multi-faceted diamond sparkling in the sun.

Last weekend, my daughter was in a bad biking accident resulting in a dramatic and painful night at the emergency room and a frustrating week at school, hobbling awkwardly and slowly about, traversing the school’s hallways and feeling defeated. I have missed several deadlines taking care of her, my low back throbbing from lifting and carrying more weight than I should to support her, and as her frustration and impatience continue to peak, I am finding myself losing mine in tandem. I feel the heavy sense of cabin fever as I look out the window at the beautiful weather, and dread the call to retrieve her when my phone rings. Meanwhile there are the screams, the tantrums, the resentment she exhibits when pain shoots through her leg or a crutch slips out from under her arm. I get that she’s pissed; she also yearns to run and play outside. I can sympathize; it really must suck for her. But honestly, it sort of sucks for me as well and I wish it didn’t. I wish I had the practiced patience of Mukunda’s mother.

I wish that in those more stressful moments when the meltdown is looming, I could be as focused on the higher meaning of my daughter’s life. But no, I am looking at the pile of dishes, and stressing about the deadlines I know I am about to miss. I do this while helping her in and out of the tub, and packing and repacking the ice trays. It seems like I am not loving and supportive enough because I cannot take the pain away, and am starting to lose my confidence in making it all feel better.

Where’s my magical amulet when despair has reached its peak? Even Ben & Jerry’s isn’t doing the trick.

I wish this week, I could have been less myself as a mother and more like Mukunda’s. I know her life was not easier, although it was probably more simple. As I see the beautiful Mother’s Day images, I cannot help but feel a lot of love for my daughter and gratitude to have this little eighty-pound teacher in my presence. Very real places get stirred up when I think about how lucky I am to have this child put into my life. When my focus wanders from this place, the small and irrelevant details of daily living creep out of scope and I just need to remind myself to take a breath and keep doing the best I can.

But I am a sloppy human, and my back is aching and I just want to go into my room, close the door and meditate. I want silence and to return back to more carefree days when she could walk around and self-care. It’s been a rough week and I probably have another one of two rough ones to go. I acknowledge it’s much harder on her, but I still feel a little selfish, too.

I know we will endure because I can call upon that bigger aspect of maternal love as exemplified through Yogananda’s story-telling. I can also be reminded that this is just one week of hundreds in the course of our lives together; just like one small facet of the many phases of life. We all have our moments; this week is just a less-clearer cut, and lacking clarity. But like Yogananda’s mother, there are many other faces of the mother for me to explore.

There’s the mommy that gets teary-eyed when singing a sentimental song while running my fingers through her hair. There is madre who gets into a giggle contest over some silly humored joke we share. There is mother who does something ‘shocking’ she doesn’t quite yet understand but one day will. There is mama when she falls a scrapes her knee.

I too take on many shapes and forms that collectively become reflections of maternal love, too. Just the very humble human version.

Happy Mother’s Day, for reals.

Is Yoga the New Church?

April 28, 2016 By Ali Valdez

For years, parallels between yoga studios and churches seems to be headed on an irreconcilable collision course. But is harmonic convergence possible or inevitable derision? The parlance of OM and the act of ecumenical devotion has increasingly crossed my mind as two shooting stars falling towards the earth in tandem.

Directionally, that’s where everything seemed to be heading to me, a good girl from American 20th century Christianity and also a devout yogi. Now, more recently, I see an emerging trend in yoga studios advertising their Sunday line up as Yoga Church and overall marketing tone shifting away from fitness in pursuit of deeper spiritual insight. I no longer felt alone in figuring this one out.

First the motivation of the teacher then that of the student. One, it has to do with the fact that as yoga becomes more mainstream and Yoga Alliance through the masterful art of clearing checks has almost single-handedly destroyed the quality of yoga teaching in this country, many teachers are eager to go deeper into their studies and provide a wider range of teachings. It is a key differentiator for a studio with relatively newer and inexperienced teachers and more senior leaders in the field. Second, as students mature in their practice, the effects of the practice naturally lend themselves to taking it further, deeper into the more, for lack of a better term, esoteric aspects of yoga.

From the church perspective, I am reminded of my own religious encounters. I share them to be transparent about the context in which I am shaping this discourse.

First, there was Sunday Catholic school because my diminutive Syrian grandmother insisted on it for fear of damnation. My only memory was sneaking into the large wooden chest of stuffed animals and taking a nap until my mother came to get me. Maybe at first I got chided for it. Eventually no one seemed to care either way. I always left church very rested and newly energized just in the wrong ways.

Back in high school, I attended Tucson Baptist Church (where I was baptized at age sixteen) three times per week. We tithed weekly, including when my grandfather slipped me a twenty. We were friends with the pastors. Although my family was involved, donated generously and were always there, I cannot remember making a single friend or remembering anyone’s name except the pastor and his wife Della. Lovely people but there was no traction with the community. Where there was traction was the instilling of conscientious giving and as a discipline of devotion. My baptism that evening is still one of my most treasured life moments.

In college, a small liberal arts Christian one, I had an extraordinary cadre of friends but that’s not to say I felt particularly in the fold of the school. Perhaps I accidentally courted controversy by the way I dressed, wrote and spoke. It was a community where bonds were strong, and opposite of my high school experience, I didn’t fit into the structure of the system but was embraced and loved by many of the people. Thirty years fast forwarded, and I still find the heart of community that resonates vitally in my life today. Some of my very best friends met me on the lawn, walked me back to the dorm, wrote me letters when I moved away.

It was a good education for how to be human and live in mindfulness and consideration of others. I am so grateful that I made the choice to attend school there as opposed to my Ivy League options. My daily yoga practice enforces those guiding principles.

After college, I joined what was truly my only community of fellowship. It was in Santa Barbara and to this day, there just has never been anything like it. But of late, the yoga studio seems like the only place that comes close.

Back in high school, my mother ran a set of executive suites and I had the pick of the litter for small businesses to work with on some exceptional projects. One of them was a marketing house. The owner put me on a marketing project when I was seventeen called “How to Market Your Ministry.” This seemed profane to a good church girl like me the idea of having a plan to pitch people into coming into a house of worship.

But churches, like yoga studios, are also businesses. They require licenses and are bound to a certain set of laws. Both rely on income to maintain brick and mortar relevance. Both are open in service to others and rely on their communities for sustenance. Yoga studios in the state of Washington are not required to pay sales tax because they are offering a spiritual service, not unlike tax benefits for the churches. Gyms and fitness centers do not have that same entitlement.

In How to Market Your Ministry there was a long questionnaire canvasing the mundane: are there potholes in your parking lot to the more pedagogic: is your message in line with the sacred teachings of your denomination and if not, why? What I began to see is that churches cannot stay relevant without this degree of consideration for the operations they are running.

As I moved to Seattle, I found myself trying to recreate that experience I had back in Santa Barbara and by and large always felt marginalized, even by like denominations. Similar to when you move yoga studios, there can be that same itching human desire to recreate what was so safe and familiar before. People want to connect in meaningful ways, both with one another but also in a community where they feel and appreciated, loved and accepted. Maybe without realizing it, people want to connect with a higher power, God. It’s ok for God to be Holy Spirit or Jesus Christ but in some circles connect might mean Ganesha, or Buddha or Lakshmi or (Glyph) the artist formerly known as Prince.

People have felt it is not only their place to choose, but to explore and if desired to be open to inclusion of other religious or spiritual traditions. In this scenario, there is no hierarchy of importance, dogma, isolation or feeling like an outcast. The place of worship, by definition, is open for business to everybody.

But I think it is also more than that. Admittedly not all churches nor yoga studios are equal. This is not about specifics but general trends.

MIND-BODY CONNECTION: Yoga offers something church does not: movement. Have you ever sat for two hours in a hard wooden pew and left feeling as good as a power Vinyasa class? In yoga, we actively engage with and do not eschew the body. The body is a temple is as Biblical as it is yogic. We work on the body, we connect in with the breath learning to harness the mind. We think in terms of proper diet, stewardship of the land and ethical treatment of animals. We practice principles like compassion and truth. At the end of a yoga class, there is the sound of OM, like amen. Vibrationally we conclude all on the same page. The reason I was electrified by yoga was how I saw it as a form of spiritual expression in physical form, a merging of the two things I loved most.

ACCEPTANCE: People today seek an environment where the quality of action is in alignment with the teaching. In that case, the otherwise highly marginalized should walk in feeling highly valued. Perhaps somewhere along the line, dogma got in the way or people of God went too people and dropped the God, but this has undeniably created a sort of vacuum in our society that yoga has on some level picked up with increasing momentum. For a long time certain groups of people were ostracized or held back at arms’ length within churches that are non-issues in the yoga community. There has been a plethora of backlash from traditional religious communities (and many of my college friends’ moms incidentally) about the evils of yoga, notably how it has crept into the quotidian of church-offered classes and the peculiar energetic manifestations of kundalini and warnings of their dangers.

What is concerning about this phenomenon is how yoga can give power to people that are immature, not ethically aligned to the teachings, ambiguous in virtue and relatively uneducated about the practice that are provided a stage for espousing wisdom without training, ongoing mentorship without accountability. When people align to those lacking viveka and still deeply mired by the vrittis and kleshas, they unwittingly embark and directionally wander rudderless and wearily sail the seas of disenfranchised enlightenment. Yoga Alliance is not, nor should it necessarily be the place to hash these things out ala the Nicene Creed. Yoga teachers are not preachers, pastors and not gurus and yet here we stand at the crossroads of spiritual guidance. The individual in their own pursuit of truth will make it their journey to finding an unbiased middle ground.

No teacher desires to do harm, but increasingly people are walking into yoga studios looking for more than a teacher training provides or how their teacher lives and transfers wisdom. With the good-hearted attempt to provide service and love, sometimes the well-intended veer into stormy waters or get swept up with the seduction of power and influence. A few of the trending lawsuits in the yoga community ameliorates these points.

Whether religion as we know it lasts or evolves into something new or remains the same, humans remain human, billions of longing seekers looking up to the stars and gazing at the world around them asking the same unanswerable thing:

“What does all of this mean and where do I belong?”

Whether they find it out in nature, under a steeple or in the studio remains to be seen. As servants to the people, let’s just say, we should all just keep our doors open and our welcome mats out.

Le Petit Prince: Dharma and His Beautiful Ones

April 25, 2016 By Ali Valdez

REUTERS/Kieran Doherty (BRITAIN) – RTR1ED6D

My father was a musician so I was fed a steady diet of artists that my father respected. One of them was a purple-clad androgynous young man wearing glittered platform boots reminiscent of KISS but the feminine erotica of Madonna. That man was Prince Roger Nelson.

Conservative and prim, as a young girl, Prince freaked me out. Millennials may not be so struck by Prince because they didn’t live in the time when he was making his mark on the world. He was the ultimate provocateur but there was no denying the talent and the brilliance. What he brought to the stage although yes, there was Sly and the Family paving the way, was something our society yearned for but felt could not express. Madonna wasn’t far off in dishing out the same: a new heightened level of sexual revolution. The difference? Prince was quite possibly the most brilliant musician of this generation. And now, he is dead.

Few people have lived truly transcendent lives such as Prince where there is a legacy to carry on after their departure. Few have tapped into those aspects that make a life rich with substance. No one will ever stop talking about Prince, his “controversy”, his musicianship, the way he advocated for artists against Warner Bros., his quirky Paisley Park eccentricities.

Kevork Djansezian | Associated Press

In an interview with Larry King around the time that Prince opted out of using his own name so he could evolve and reach the next plateau in his life, he says in a relaxed confidence that he always knew from a very young age what his life purpose was: to create music. He never veered off his path. That is how his legacy was built: talent, tenacity and alignment to his dharma.
You could fall on other side of this next statement, but Prince was an incredible feminist. I believe this too was part of this dharma. Put back your purple pitchforks for a moment and hear me out. Prince single-handedly made careers for dozens of female performers. Yes, several of them were in lingerie and also had fleeting love affairs with him as well. Prince never played down how sex fueled his creative fires. Apollonia 6, Vanity and Carmen Electra most likely would never have gotten their breaks without Prince writing some funky beats and producing music for them. Also just as he pushed sexual boundaries for his protégés, he had no problem doing the same for himself (think yellow lace ass-less jumpsuit for starters and enough white ruffled shirts in his bureau to make Jack Sparrow envious).

Cliché and duo entendre were his way of play in the universe of his explosive talent. It almost as if it was the tether that kept him human in the midst of his music. It is difficult not to draw parallels to David Bowie with Prince in this same way except Bowie seems more aligned lyrically to the Apollonian (no, not that one) and Prince to the Dionysian. The world needs both to stay in balance.

Prince also wrote songs for women who kept their clothes on: Sinead O’Connor, Stevie Nicks, the Bangles. Chaka, Chaka Khan, Chaka Khan, anyone feeling me? Prince’s band and opening acts also highlighted female musicians in traditional male dominated roles: Prince had women in all shapes and sizes blowing the saxophone, banging on percussion, making
sweet gospel with his lyrics. Prince dressed them down, dressed them up, but recognized their beauty and talent. This was a man in unabashed celebration of the goddess and her unlimited creative potential, even tapping into it directly via his androgyny.

Anyone who knows me knows how much the Beautiful One meant to me. When I lived in San Francisco, on a lark I flew my father up from San Diego and took him to see Prince nothing short of annihilate his guitar and bring the house down in Oakland. It is a great memory to share with my Dad who introduced me to an artist most fathers would have keep off the turntable.

VINCE BUCCI/GETTY IMAGES

Prince was true to himself to the very end, through a spiritual awakening, through profound loss as a father. His advocacy for artistic rights, female musicians, and his incredible music legacy is both admired, appreciated and he will be missed. Thank you for never compromising and inspiring the rest of us one funky track at a time.

Four Ways #SimpleGratitude Changed My Life

April 17, 2016 By Ali Valdez

We are all products of our society. It is nearly impossible to avoid. Facebook is a purveyor of unfiltered public opinion of the likes never before seen and whose implications not yet understood for our future.

When I first joined what some of my friends call the “crack”book, I loved being able to reconnect. I embraced all sides of my past-lives: different companies, different fields, extended family, high school, college, all the towns I’ve lived in, all the people I have met and friends I have made along the way my journey of life. Sigh. Over time, and multiple months spanning posts from the contemplative to indulgent to the downright mundane, I would tax my right thumb scrolling through posts and with friends’ babies and dogs, always clicking, commenting and liking

Then I saw the trend. There was “that guy” in the feed. The stereotypes began to stand out in the crowd. You all know him or her. The family member with the slightly cringe-worthy bully pulpit approach to expressing his uninformed politic perspectives; the old friend who always posts provocative and flirtatious selfies; Mr. and Mrs. #firstworldproblems; and most notably in my line of work, the bikini beach yogi quoting the oft-misquoted Rumi, Kabir or Gibran.

It is hard not to find cynicism in pockets of your heart when you have friends exploding over mis-made $9 lattes or the parking spot that was stolen from them. I quickly started feeling bad when I saw their posts. They often times made me bristle. Turning the tables, I started reviewing and reflecting on my own posts and comments, asking myself the following questions:

Am I being respectful and elevating the dialogue?
Am I high-jacking a thread and driving my own agenda?
Am I one-upping someone else’s experience?
Am I contributing to the angst and misery of society by commiserating with fellow erudites, assholes and scalawags?

What I needed to decide was how can I be my best self on Facebook and feel like my words are positively impacting my friends?

I also felt like this open forum would be a great place to challenge myself to try to be always positive, humorous and joyful instead of complaining about something. I tasked myself to do this each and every single damn day of my life. Thus, I created something called Simple Gratitude. In the culture of love and light, it seems everything published online needs to take on the tenor of massive universal impact. But for me, and typically on Mondays, just stepping out of my pajamas and washing my hair is all the impact I’m making. This task to create a daily habit required two ingredients: simplicity and commitment.

For all of us there are days where everything is going wrong. There is simply no glass half full scenario and yet, in spite of that, I still needed to think about something, one thing, to be my simple gratitude. Some days it was like extracting lint between my toes or having to ponder for lonely, long-drawn out windows of time my place of gratitude.

Then one day it happened: I accidentally became genuinely grateful.

Here are four ways I am now artfully practicing simple gratitude on the annals of Facebook and in my personal life.

I conscientiously formed a new and healthy habit: I realized that this exercise, at first rote and painful, became a healthy and joyful habit over time. This means not only am I more directed towards embodying gratitude, but I am less inclined to play the victim, martyr or be the first to criticize or complain. This also is a proven experiment that there may be other things in my life that I also have the ability to create new, equally productive behaviors.
Truly practicing non-attachment: If you follow my posts on Facebook or the woefully neglected Simple Gratitude group page, you will soon know that #simplegratitude is seldom simple. Gratitude at times took a lot of work. Intentionally long-winded one day, hopelessly tragic and borderline absurd the next, with each gratitude, I was forming new muscle in my being: the muscle of accepting things as they are without the will to try and make them different or better.
I define the reality of my daily existence, not the situations happening around me: My life experience as I am choosing to engage and participate more often than not now are clearly on my terms. Often times, I would write something that at paragraph start read like a bad dream but by the end showed how any situation can be a lesson, a worthy reflection or even a place of empowerment based on my perception of it.
Gratitude is contagious: you can either be influenced by others or be the influencer. As I was falling down the rabbit hole of rants in my early days of Facebook keeping in tempo with some of my connections (long since removed), I have noticed that my gratitude is inspiring others to focus on the good, or at best better things in life, too. My friends are doing it their own way, on their own terms just like I am. Some are embracing the #simplegratitude movement which makes me smile. There may be one person today that by reading one of my silly or insightful SG’s might have a better day or adopt a different perspective on a situation.

What are you grateful for in your life? Say it, express it, write it down, or shout it out. What the world needs are less cynics and more lovers of their own lives.