Self-reflection is a humbling process. It’s essential to find out why you think, say, and do certain things…. then better yourself.
It’s been a little quiet on here since I have been swamped with teaching, gardening, and I also completed a 30 days of yoga series this month.
We are headed into the final quarter of the year and I find it’s a good time to reflect on your beginning of the year visions and see how they have evolved and what I can do in the final stretch to reach them.
I set out the year with a quest to be more vulnerable. Part of me starting an online yoga yea her forum group was to open my self up to not only questions and connection, but also to open myself up to criticism and accountability. My teaching style in assisted living settings, may be much different than what one might think of when we think of adaptive Yoga.
Just this week alone some of the time I spent in assisted living was holding hands with a lonely 92-year-old woman, and helping her take her hands down to her toes for a stretch. I also rubbed the feet of a 57-year-old man with a terminal disease.
Is that yoga? I believe with 100% certainty that it is.
This year I also opened to myself up to finding someone to partner with me and shadow me to learn how to apply the principles of yoga, without such a strong focus on asana, to those unique settings. As I wait for that person to arrive in my life, I continue to serve and love each day doing it.
What will you do in these final few months of 2023 to come closer to your vision?
Vulnerability is defined as uncertainty, risk, and emotional exposure.” It’s that unstable feeling we get when we step out of our comfort zone or do something that forces us to loosen control.
Brene Brown
When I began 2023 like every other year for the last nearly two decades, I chose a word as a theme or guiding direction that I wanted to bring into my life. It never fails that the word I choose for the year is perfectly suited for the path I take that year. Some years have been incredibly hard, like the year I chose the word peace. That was one of the most challenging years of my life. Go figure. I guess Spirit was asking me to find peace while enduring chaos.
Since we are nearly 3/4 the year through this year I thought I’d spend some time this afternoon thinking about where vulnerability has showed up in my journey this year. I chose the word vulnerability because I wanted to expose myself a bit more, let go of the controlled emotions and often staying in the comfort zone of life. I have a pretty ideal career and my life feels very well rounded and balanced, so rocking the boat a bit initially felt really daunting, but I knew I needed a nudge in the direction of being a little more open. My favorite teacher Brene Brown defines vulnerability as uncertainty, risk and emotional exposure. Oh boy. The big question is why if my life is going nearly perfect would I want to invite those three things in?
So far this year I have had the following experiences that required vulnerability:
I opted out of a needed hip replacement and had to advocate for my health despite the encouragement of doctors and family. I had to tap into my inner truth and openly admit that I was terrified and the uncertainty was too great. Admitting the emotion fear is not something I do easily or often. This was huge for me to openly expose an emotion.
Once the hip surgery was put on hold, I stepped into uncertainty by going forward with a knee surgery that was intended to bring some pain relief and hopefully stabilize the hip. Turns out the knee scope was brutal and required me to ask for much needed help and be willing to receive it. Not easy for me.
In early spring I did something wild and totally outside my comfort zone. I bought a Jeep that I had been working towards for many years. May seem like a no big deal for some , but for this frugal girl it was a huge deal.
The risk came when one day I emailed an agency about the adaptive yoga I have been offering in assisted living setting for years. I didn’t need the extra contract but as an entrepreneur you never become passive or assume the contracts you have will always want you. The risk turned into a surprisingly instant contract, but it meant I would give up my beloved Fridays off to add another commute day. I wrestled with it for a weekend and decided to give it a try. My mindset was if I felt overwhelmed I would simple be brave and say that it was more than I could handle. Also, something I don’t do easily. Just three weeks into the month, I got asked to add 16 more homes with this new agency, which took my monthly number up to 46 assisted living group homes a month. Gulp. I said yes.
With all the new contracts, I knew right away I would need to actively seek to mentor other yoga teachers. This meant stepping out of the shadows and exposing myself online as a teacher who thinks outside of the Western view of yoga and be actively open with my opinion and be a tad more outspoken than I tend to be when it comes to yoga. I created an online forum that I lead to educate other yoga teachers on the method I have carefully designed for adults with neurological conditions and other disabilities and be extremely exposed when it comes to my confidence. Hiding in the shadows of my work has been comfortable.
Once the knee healed and I was back to my normal activity, my body decided that my foot needed to fail me and I am now dealing with an extremely inflamed and severely arthritic foot. Again, I am faced with dealing with pain while running a business and a very full life. This means asking for help, taking life a little easier when I can and giving my body so much grace.
One day in July I got a hair brained idea to teach a virtual 30 days of yoga series, beginning August 1. That meant I needed to get myself on a yoga mat everyday and commit to showing up for myself and others. As August 1st approached I was feeling more and more pressure, but it has actually turned out to be amazing. The messages I receive on a daily basis from new students and long time students has been so fulfilling. Plus, getting on my yoga mat (or a chair) everyday has been so great. What I initially felt to be so much added stress has actually turned into so much goodness.
The year is not over and I hope that I continue to grow into my quest to be more vulnerable. I am open to allowing myself to feel more emotions and to living with uncertainty. I have learned that each day is a chance to be present in love, laugh a little more and appreciate the emotions that arise. There are moments every day that ask me to open myself up a tiny bit more to others and to life.
What’s your word of the year? Have you done a check in?
“We can measure how brave you are by how vulnerable you’re willing to be.”
Brené Brown
I mean how many times have I chosen a “word of the year” thinking it would be so fabulous to step into a new focus with all things glittery, sparkly, smoothing with ease and oh, so delightful? I think I have had this practice for nineteen years. You wold think by now I would understand how it works. Every single time I think it is going to be a fun and easy focus, I get my ass handed to me within a few months. This isn’t the first time I have sat myself down to work on something that I think is going to bereally enlightening only to end up to be surprised or even shocked that it is downright HARD.
As you may have recalled I chose the word vulnerability because I wanted to stretch myself to learn to be okay with asking for help, feeling emotionally exposed and stepping outside of my very comfortable comfort zone. I am really good at what may be hard for some like overcoming endless obstacles in my life; raising kids basically by myself, advocating for a special needs kid, overcoming poverty, dealing with chronic pain, building a successful business, and basically creating a damn good life. But, asking for help–hell no. Being a tad bit more open about my feelings? Not likely. Doing something that isn’t in my wheelhouse regardless of the potential for failure? Umm…not.
And then I decide to go and ask the Universe to show me some chances to step into vulnerability.
Ready?
January: I do not have many classes actually in my studio much.since I am more community based, however every single studio class except one this month was cancelled due to horrible snow storms. That means that my income (which in my world equates to safety), was down a bunch. Plus since we have had frequent snow storms commuting to my community based gigs has been really inconsistent. The end result meant I needed to be emotionally okay with not saving as much money as I usually do, AND having to loosen my self-subsrcibed standards that I put on myself. Feeling uncomfortable with myself is never an easy thing. But, in the end I was able to see logically that I am still okay despite a very slow month and that at the end of the day, I am more than okay regardless of how much money I save.
February: After having a total hip replacement scheduled for seven months as the days grew closer I was finding myself more and more apprehensive. My body was struggling to accept the impending surgery and I was nothing but stress. I did something I have never done in my life. I got multiple opinions on the same darn hip all with the same ambiguous answer. Uncertainty. Every doctor I saw was not too sure that replacing a perfectly health joint would in fact reduce my pain. Just a week before my surgery I did another thing I have never done before. I cancelled a medical procedure because I was tuning into my body because she was screaming alarms. The relief that overcame me when I finished the call with my super compassionate surgeon was sudden. Keeping my emotions in check and contained is how I tend to cope and overcome with my daily “stuff”, so adding this to the mix caused a slight crack in the seam. I leaked out an emotional response to the stress that shocked me. I actually cried. Yep, this stone cold faced girl shed a tear. Within an hour of cancelling the surgery, a friend of mine who I haven’t spoken to in over a year randomly texted me that she had two tickets to see Bruce Springsteen in Tulsa Oklahoma. Tulsa? Sure! He is after all the man of my dreams and so what if there would happen to be a few other people there? Bruce and I were going to connect once again. The weeks leading up to the show was a series of back and forth messages that might embarrass even the lamest of middle schoolgirls. And then, two days before the show she had a family emergency and had to cancel. This left me with two choices–not go, or go alone. Going alone meant a 24 hour period of solitude amongst crazy fellow fans in a strange city, plus a winter storm brewing that would cause me to have to make some quick adjustments to my travel plans late in the game. All while doing this alone. I will say that it was indeed the best 24 hours of my adult life and I truly had the time of my life. Alone. Sure, I had to overcome asking for help many many times, changing flights (twice), getting dropped off at the wrong Hyatt hotel, and sitting at the bar alone with many fun, yet strange people. Have I mentioned alone?
March: The days following when I was riding the Bruce concert waves of joy I got a text from my car dealer guy who has been on the hunt for a Jeep Wrangler for me. I was certain that I wanted one but I was also fairly certain that I wasn’t going to really be able to wrap my head around having two cars–one for function and one for fun. For this relatively simple girl the overconsumption of having two cars seemed so strange, and so unfamiliar. There was a time in my life where it was a struggle to pay for one car, let alone two. In fact, this gal was once one who would eat whatever the kids left on their plate because the grocery budget was so tight. To get to a place of being able to legitimately on my own have two cars seemed so scary. Somehow despite my apprehension I was ready. I walked in and bought the beauty. Then within a couple days of buying her I fall so brutally sick that I have to cancel the knee scope that I had scheduled and I wasn’t even able to drive it. Instead, I spent a couple days of relying on others to do the basic of things. Accepting packets of gatorade from neighbors and eyeballing the beautiful Jeep without any energy to go drive her was grueling. Probably accepting help was the hardest.
And yet here I am. All in one piece. The surgery is rescheduled, the Jeep is perfect, the next series of studio classes are scheduled, spring in Colorado is coming, I have fond memories of my time in Tulsa, and I have survived it all.
I have realized in the short nine weeks of 2023 that I can be vulnerable, and have a grand time doing it. I have realized that no matter what the Universe challenges me with, these little feats of courage are only building an even stronger and more resilient woman.
Now the biggest hurdle is…. what do I name my Jeep?
If you’ve been following me you may have seen that I have chosen to put a little effort into being vulnerable this year. Looking at me from the distance – or sometimes even for those close to me – I appear to be unstoppable, strong, creative, successful, determined, and without a doubt a true overcomer. That is all true.
You may have also seen that I also opted to explore vulnerability in my life this year and dip my toes into a little “emotional exposure” as Brené Brown so eloquently says. Well, emotional exposure was proving to begin with a big bang.
Fear and uncertainity started to show up in big ways as soon as I declared I was ready to look vulnerability in the eye. It is one thing to feel these things, but I have a tendency to keep those big emotions to myself so the exposing of them was almost was big as feeling them.
So to be really open and honest, I have been fighting my way from slipping down into the depths of huge feelings of fear like I have never been over the last few weeks. Seems that since the declarative statement of what I was willing to improve in my life, vulnerability said “let’s just see how you can handle real big feelings”.
Thinking I am in complete readiness for my upcoming major hip overhaul, suddenly I was overcome with fear. Big time terror day after day. Waking up in the night fear. Shaking fear. Pit of the stomach fear. Gripping fear.
I told myself over and over that people get hip replacements all the time and yes most people do fine. But that is not a blanket statement my mind easily accepted. Of course we also hear about the 82 year old grandma who gets a new hip and is at the social club within a week which can make for some serious unhealthy comparison.
The fear began to battle comparison and I was questioning myself more than I ever have. Would my body and dysfunctional immune system accept the new hip? How much would my life be changed? How much will I have to rely on others to help me? How much time would I be away from work? Would I still be in pain? Would I ever be able to practice yoga the way I do? Will I get another blood clot? Will I get an infection? What if…? What if …? But what if…..? Over and over and over and over.
You see this isn’t a classic case of having bone on bone joint issue or severe arthritis. My joint is in perfect health and every doctor who has looked at the images scratches their head and wonders if that will address the pain. I have had three grueling tissue repairs on this previous hip and I still have a tremendous amount of pain and inflammation so the theory with my beloved surgeon whom I trust with my life is to remove the joint and closely surrounding tissue and give my body a clean, new joint which may greatly reduce my constant pain. The word “may” started to feel really scary as the days for closer.
I begged for silent moments of clarity. I pleaded with my conscious to give me insights. I walked and screamed at the sky to help me.
Is living in pain an option? Absolutely. Is enduring torturous fear an option? Hell no.
As I navigated this very unusual emotion over the course of the last few weeks I was startled at the physical changes that were occurring in my body. I am an incredibly steady and stable woman so to feel such intensity in an unfamiliar emotion was taking a toll. I had a racing heart all hours of the day, eating was incredibly hard, I felt like I had adrenaline running 24/7 through my veins, and I was experiencing deep pain in my belly every time I thought about laying on that stainless steel table for the 4th time. Of course the turmoil in my solar plexus was my first indication that my gut was telling me to listen. As the days ticked off I had more and more gut instinct knowing.
In my yogic thinking world what I was experiencing was a complete mind/body interaction where my intuition, or gut instinct, which is essentially our solar plexus where decisions are made and our personal power is being stoked like a fire. Feeling my personal power escape my body while making a life altering decision was sending my body into real time horror.
What if I chose to not listen to the language my body was speaking? What if I opted to ignore the screaming inside my body to pause and ask more questions? Despite the four second opinions there was still so much uncertainty about if this was truly the right direction to take, and yet my instinct knew it was not.
The moment that I stepped into my personal power and reclaimed clarity, it all stopped. I felt lighter. I felt myself gather up all that I know and feel about myself and feel empowered with clarity and much needed hope. A conversation with my surgeon late in the day where he reassured me that it was indeed a good decision to wait validated for me what I already knew.
I think we all have the capacity to know what our bodies need. We may not know the details to a solution like a complex surgery or diagnosis, but we do know when something feels off. We do know when our personal power is being threatened. We do know when we are right.
Vulnerability knocked on my door hard these first thirteen days of the year. But I welcomed her as a messenger and proudly reached out to a handful of safe people to pour my heart out. I revealed my fears and uncertainties. I spoke my vulnerability.
And when I did, sure enough clarity overtook fear.
I learned so much over the last few weeks about the subtle and not so subtle ways our body speaks to us, and that when we don’t feel something is right, to listen and then talk about it. Our voice is powerful and like anything, the more we do it the easier it becomes.
The hip surgery is on hold. Maybe forever but for sure in the near future. I am going to focus on the needs of my body that are determined with certainty like a quick knee scope, addressing some back issues with natural options and getting even healthier and stronger than I am—mind, body and spirit. Maybe the ol’ hip will calm itself down and all will be well.
Among all this chatter about resolutions and goals, I also find that during the depths of the long winter darkness, it is also a wonderful time for us to investigate the deep shadows within. I do believe that it is only when we see the shadow or darkness we can see the brightness of our own light.
Some people say to not waste time looking at the darkness of ourselves, instead only see the light, but the wise ones know that without the shadow you could not see the light.
I am digging into this topic this month as we look at being in alignment with not only our word of the year and intention, but also in alignment, with showing up as a person bearing the most beautiful light, and that requires us to also look at the shadow and dark corners of ourselves. You know things like fear, judgment and shame.
In my own personal life, I am looking straight into the eye of fear. Some thing that I don’t typically experience or feel much of on a day-to-day basis. But the looming of something coming very soon is bringing up in me fear. But on the other side of fear, there is always courage and faith.
If we want to reclaim the essential emotional part of our lives and reignite our passion and purpose, we have to learn how to own and engage with our vulnerability and how to feel the emotions that come with it. – Brené Brown
It is not like I didn’t know this. I mean, I took a semester long course with Brené Brown and stepped into the world of Daring Greatly and succeeded on many levels. And it’s not like I have not practiced being vulnerable—I left a toxic relationship, quit my job to pursue my passion, bought a house knowing it is all on me and more. I nailed it and became super empowered in the process.
Vulnerability seemed to be a thing I thrive at. Give me a life altering challenge and I will without a doubt do well. But is that really all vulnerability is?
According to Brené vulnerability is uncertainty, risk and emotional exposure.
Huh.
For the last couple months I have been listening to these little soul taps to look under vulnerability. To take a closer look that isn’t about becoming a badass and destroying a challenge. There was a whispering of something softer and different.
And also incredibly scary. I denied those little whispers and wanted desperately to choose a word that was easier and likely something I am already good at.
Seems to me I am able to easily handle uncertainty and risk on some levels but emotional exposure—never.
Maybe it’s my tendency to lean towards Capricorn strength and tenacity while also being a fiery redhead that gives me an unstoppable approach to life’s challenges. I don’t think raising three kids successfully alone could have been achieved any other way, but this is deeper than action. This is way deeper.
Control has always been something that brings me safety. Controlling my environment and the people I let in. Controlling my business and finances with a sharp eye. Controlling my physical health despite lots of pain by working my body to its best health. Controlling my emotions by not putting myself into situations where I might cry (or laugh). Controlling what I need by never asking for help. Exhausting maybe?
Huh.
That all sounds like emotional exposure. Doing something anyway not knowing what the response or outcome might be. Sticking my neck out and hoping for the best.
Being seen.
This is about not just being seen for what I have overcome or what I do. It will require me to being willing to reveal parts of myself that are tucked safely deep down and to do what is uncomfortable and out of my comfort zone.
I did a little exercise in my journal over the last week and here is how I see it:
Vulnerability is —failing, making a mistake, exposing myself publicly, crying, screwing up, feeling scolded, asking for help, not perfecting something, feeling needy or dependent on others, asking for what I need or want and feeling out of control.
Vulnerability feels like—crushing sensation in chest, upset stomach, short breath, panic to flee, racing heart, avoidance.
Vulnerability lookslike— finishing and publishing the book that has been written, asking for help, receiving help, communicating openly with others, asking to be on more podcasts, letting go of some of my high self standards (not failing), finding resolution and peace with pain, being okay with my emotions and letting my emotions be seen.
For 2023 I give myself permission to fail or to succeed. I give myself permission to not do it all alone. I give myself permission to reveal and unfold in a way that stays in alignment with my soul but also welcomes risk. I give myself permission to be seen.
In these uncertain times I find myself longing for what I know and for what brings me a sense of feeling grounded. For many years I come back time and time again to this poem. I share it with those who I know are willing to meet me in the space of vulnerability and see me from the heart of compassion. For me this poem invites me into myself and reveals the truths of who I am, or who I strive to be.
The Invitation
By Oriah Mountain Dreamer
It doesn’t interest me what you do for a living. I want to know what you ache for and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart’s longing.
It doesn’t interest me how old you are. I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love for your dream for the adventure of being alive.
It doesn’t interest me what planets are squaring your moon… I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow if you have been opened by life’s betrayals or have become shriveled and closed from fear of further pain.
I want to know if you can sit with pain mine or your own without moving to hide it or fade it or fix it.
Iwant to know if you can be with joy mine or your own if you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful to be realistic to remember the limitations of being human.
It doesn’t interest me if the story you are telling me is true. I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself. If you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul. If you can be faithless and therefore trustworthy.
I want to know if you can see Beauty even when it is not pretty every day. And if you can source your own life from its presence.
I want to know if you can live with failure yours and mine and still stand at the edge of the lake and shout to the silver of the full moon, “Yes.”
It doesn’t interest me to know where you live or how much money you have. I want to know if you can get up after the night of grief and despair weary and bruised to the bone and do what needs to be done to feed the children.
It doesn’t interest me who you know or how you came to be here. I want to know if you will stand in the centre of the fire with me and not shrink back. It doesn’t interest me where or what or with whom you have studied. I want to know what sustains you from the inside when all else falls away.
I want to know if you can be alone with yourself and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.
