Lead with your heart

I am currently taking my yoga teacher training & last wknd I put together my first class sequence. Its a lot harder than it seems bcos so many things have to go into ur planning. I love it tho bcos it allows me to be creative in a lot of diff ways. The underlying theme I tied into the 30 min lesson plan was learning to lead with your heart. I was inspired by Valentines day since it was right around the corner.

Photo: Robert Sturman / Pose: Camatkarasana - Wild thing

Valentines is one of my favorite "holidays." Even tho the reasons for why its my favorite holiday have changed thru-out the years, for me its always been a celebration of love. I used to give it a romantic meaning in my teens & that slowly shifted to a sense of gratitude for my family & friends.

Then I started practicing yoga & THAT became my focus for a few years & THAT became my love. The more I practiced, the more my heart opened & naturally, that led me on a path to self love. When you are in that heart space you start to see the world differently. Instead of finding myself falling in love with Prince Charming, I found myself falling in love with life.

When you lead with your heart, you automatically become more in tune with the world around you & that's when you can create beautiful things. So in today's practice let's lead with our hearts. Each pose expresses love in a different way. This short sequence will taking you into Camatkarasana aka Wild Thing.

Turning inward

Sorry to keep some of you hanging with my lack of updates but honestly I havent felt like updating and bcos I havent, its creating a conflict within myself. When I dont update I feel like Im neglecting an aspect of myself and neglecting an aspect of my creativity and on top of that disappointing ppl who actually take interest in the things I write and the things I want to express(im so appreciate of that. so, thank you).

I started blogging on xanga in 2004 and i found it to be one of the most enjoyable things in the world. It was an uncensored outlet for me to express myself. If you go back to my old blog you would see what i mean lol* but now my perfectionism gets in the way. Each photo has to be re-sized so it looks in harmony with the layout of my blog, everything I write I need to re-read over and over again to makes sure I accurately convey what I want to say, everything needs to be neat and tidy. That kind of mentality takes away from the joy of purely creating. Lately my procrastination takes over my enthusiasm to maintain my blog. Props to the ppl that can do it rain or shine.

I guess a huge part of my life was dedicated to expressing myself... working on my garment designs, creating ideas for my blog, expressing my passion. My theme word for the past 8 yrs has been PASSION & EXPRESSION. These words are dynamic...a little bit opposite of how I have been feeling. The theme word of my life has been slowly evolving into: HEALING & GROWING. Defintely a lot more inward focused. So if you've been wondering where I've been, I've been in deep yoga postures OM-ing and trying to come to a deeper understanding of my true self.

I've been practicing yoga for 10 yrs but it wasnt until recently that I started to deepen my practice. I found that in deepening my practice I deepen the relationship I have with myself. I cannot put into words the experience that yoga has opened in me. It's as if you've never eaten a banana before and me trying to explain to you what it tastes like. Its thru your own experience that you will truly know. Just like life. Life is an experience. You can read as many self help books as you want but if you cant apply it into your own life and see what life means to YOU then what's really the point? Live your own experiences. Make your own paths.

♥ Yoga is about revealing happiness
♥ Yoga is about connecting your mind and body
♥ The aim of yoga is not attention to the body; the aim is to pierce the mystery of what's beyond it
♥ yogajournal.com
♥ yogabasics.com
♥ Tara Stiles Yoga on Youtube