i am woman, hear me rawr!

I fell asleep in my savasana today and found myself in a pretty, pretty open field. It was lush green and beautiful. Somewhere off from the field was a waterfall, I couldn’t see it much, but I could hear it playing it’s music. Then I saw me in the middle of that field, sitting in a lotus pose under the radiant glow of the sun.

And then a quiet voice whispered to me

Through your practice you have learned to root like a tree
You have found how to bend like bamboo
You have allowed yourself to flow like the water
You have felt yourself float like a cloud and release to the earth
You have spread your wings like a bird and soared to the sky
You have even discovered that it is indeed possible to be still in the middle of the storm.

It’s about time, however, you learn to be like  a lotus.
Like a lotus you can radiantly bloom even in the muddiest of waters
so stop wishing that things were clearer, or that you be somewhere else
because you are exactly where you are supposed to be
and what you have is exactly enough.

Just before class I had posted a status in my Facebook wall that said “today I wish… ” I hadn’t written down what it was I was wishing for, because it felt too grand and so I thought I’d keep it to myself. But the Universe knew better, I suppose, and reminded me that I need not wish for more because I have what I need right here, right now.

In the words shared by my teacher, svaha…so be it.

Oh the wonderfully beautiful things that happen in yoga class, I tell ya

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Today I ran into the girl with the purple feather in her hair and when she saw me with my short hair for the first time, she did a double take and exclaimed, “miss, what happened???” (she was a former student of mine, hence the miss). She goes on to say “it’s nice, but, whhhyyyy?????”. I just smiled back at her and she says, “I see….happy accident?”

Again, I simply smiled and said nothing else.

That simple conversation (if I can call it that) stuck with me the rest of the day and I got to thinking, yes, perhaps this hair cut is one of those happy accidents I tend to have. As I told the girl with the purple feather once when she had asked me about life and why crappy things happen to people, it just happens. It just does. Just because.

It’s kinda like an accident….you don’t mean for it to happen, you don’t plan for it to occur, nor do you wish it comes. It just does. The thing is, no matter how random, difficult, painful, shameful, or negative the accident was, somewhere down the line, you’ll be able to find something of value in that accident.

They're funny things, Accidents. You never have them till you're having them. - Eeyore, Pooh's Little Instruction Book, inspired by A. A. Milne

She didn’t seem to believe me at first, but when I told her all the good things that have come my way — my teaching jobs (both in the preschool and college), my enrollment in the graduate school program, the course I ended up with in college, blogging, yoga, and even the people I have met — all came from accidents, she kinda got what I meant.

None of those things were in my life plan. They just happened. Admittedly these were the more happy accidents I had encountered, but even those accidents that hurt to bits, all brought something good somehow.  Yeah it may take some time to see the good, but eventually I did.

So yeah, maybe cutting my hair was an accident to begin with. It was a random whim I did without knowing why. Sometimes when I look at the mirror and see my reflection without the long curly locks I had, I feel a wee bit sad and nostalgic and wish I hadn’t done it. But then I realize there’s no use wishing that because it’s over. It’s done. There’s no taking it back. As the saying goes, there’s no use crying over spilled milk, right?

I do know, however, sometimes when you spill that proverbial glass of milk, it’s okay to cry a little bit the because it happened. After all, it still is a form of a loss, right? But yes, there really is no use crying over the milk that had spilled because there’s no way you can un-spill it.

However, there are three things you can do after you accidentally spill that milk.

One, you can pour another glass of milk and try again.

Two, you can sure as hell either mop it up and redeem yourself.

And three, you can look closely at the secret picture this little puddle can bring. If you look close enough, it may just surprise you.

Oh…perhaps there’s one more thing you can do…a bit of all three. Then, perhaps, you can understand that it was a happy accident after all.

Photo: “Don’t cry over spilled milk” by Eric Hart, c/o Flickr. Some Rights Reserved

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Sometime ago I wrote a post about this pair of stilettos I fell in love with. I wrote about how, despite the pain it would give me, I kept wearing it every chance I got. Then one day I told a friend of mine that maybe it was time to get rid of those shoes and replace them instead. They hurt too much already, I had said.

Nothing brings more pain than too much pleasure - Benjamin Franklin

She wisely replied that sometimes you just need to put it aside and give your feet a break from it and not really throw them away or discard them. Maybe after a recovery period, she goes, the shoes won’t hurt so much. That made sense, after all, stilettos do tend to be unkind to the feet. And so I took her advice and lovingly placed those favorite pair of stilettos in its box and set it aside for the meantime.

And then I forgot about it.

Last week, however, I was rummaging for something to wear and came across those stilettos again and decided to wear it once more. It felt a little funny at first, to have them on my feet, but after some time, it did bring that warm feeling back to me and it made me smile. I wore those shoes the whole day and noticed that they didn’t hurt as bad anymore.

But then I made the mistake of wearing it three days in a row and then remembered why I put it aside in the first place. Maybe my friend was right when she said sometimes, we have those shoes that we wear once in a while but must not overuse as the feet need a time out to recover a day or two from wearing it.

And so for now, I put aside those shoes again, but not inside the box this time, but just on my shoe rack. That way I won’t forget it is there for me to enjoy every once in a while. But yes, this time I will remember not to wear out the pleasure it brings by forcing it upon my feet way too often. In the wise words of Benjamin Franklin, nothing brings more pain than too much pleasure.

I guess I was reminded today today is that maybe I should wear different shoes more often. Sometimes the occasion calls for a new pair of shoes, sometimes it allows for a reunion with an old one that was once very much loved. Sometimes, too, there is a need to just wear flip flops or something that offers casual comfort, just like an old friend.

Much as those pretty stilettos brings my much pleasure (and yes, I do enjoy the attention it brings!), I set myself up for pain in the end. Maybe if I wore them less often and in the right time (yes, I used to wear my stilettos even for preschool teaching, obviously not very wise, right?), they wouldn’t break as easily or hurt my feet so badly.

And yes, maybe if I gave my feet a break from those shoes more often, then maybe, just maybe, I can find myself walking through the day better.

Photo credit: “if the shoe fits” by Steven Leggett, c/o Flickr. Some Rights Reserved

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Nothing brings more pain than too much pleasure - Benjamin Franklin

Sometime ago I wrote a post about this pair of stilettos I fell in love with. I wrote about how, despite the pain it would give me, I kept wearing it every chance I got. Then one day I told a friend of mine that maybe it was time to get rid of those shoes and replace them instead. They hurt too much already, I had said.

She wisely replied that sometimes you just need to put it aside and give your feet a break from it and not really throw them away or discard them. Maybe after a recovery period, she goes, the shoes won’t hurt so much.  That made sense, after all, stilettos do tend to be unkind to the feet. And so I took her advice and lovingly placed those favorite pair of stilettos in its box and set it aside for the meantime.

And then I forgot about it.

Last week, however, I was rummaging for something to wear and came across those stilettos again and decided to wear it once more. It felt a little funny at first, to have them on my feet, but after some time, it did bring that warm feeling back to me and it made me smile. I wore those shoes the whole day and noticed that they didn’t hurt as bad anymore.

But then I made the mistake of wearing it three days in a row and then remembered why I put it aside in the first place. Maybe my friend was right when she said sometimes, we have those shoes that we wear once in a while but must not overuse as the feet need a time out to recover a day or two from wearing it.

And so for now, I put aside those shoes again, but not inside the box this time, but just on my shoe rack. That way I won’t forget it is there for me to enjoy every once in a while. But yes, this time I will remember not to wear out the pleasure it brings by forcing it upon my feet way too often.  In the wise words of Benjamin Franklin, nothing brings more pain than too much pleasure.

I guess I was reminded today today is that maybe I should wear different shoes more often. Sometimes the occasion calls for a new pair of shoes, sometimes it allows for a reunion with an old one that was once very much loved. Sometimes, too, there is a need to just wear flip flops or something that offers casual comfort, just like an old friend.

Much as those pretty stilettos brings my much pleasure (and yes, I do enjoy the attention it brings!), I set myself up for pain in the end. Maybe if I wore them less often and in the right time (yes, I used to wear my stilettos even for preschool teaching, obviously not very wise, right?), they wouldn’t break as easily or hurt my feet so badly.

And yes, maybe if I gave my feet a break from those shoes more often, then maybe, just maybe, I can find myself walking through the day better.

Photo credit: “if the shoe fits” by Steven Leggett, c/o Flickr. Some Rights Reserved

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Throughout the month of September I had Green Day’s song in my head. I don’t know what it is about September, but it seems (looking back) that I often find myself in shifting sands at this time of the year. Maybe its the sudden shift to the chilly weather, or perhaps, as a friend of mine pointed out, the fact that there is no pause between first and second terms in the school I teach in so there’s no time to get my head above water before plunging in again. Anyway, this September was extra difficult too, as I had that monkey on my back (aka the thesis) to contend with right? And so I found myself caught in extra deep waters for quite some time and the only thing I knew was that if I made it through September, I’d be fine.

So finally, September did end and I was really glad I got to end it with a yin yoga session that allowed me to get my head on back straight.  The next day, I went back to yoga class and told my vinyasa teacher that finally, I found my sunshine. I went on to say that I did know that I was still in that deep water and that the troubles that plagued me and the difficulties around me were still the same, but that I finally knew better…that despite that I was able to get my head above water and take a looooong deep breath that allowed me to gain clarity.

And so to usher in a fresh start, I decided to cut off all the old and restart. Literally.

I walked into a salon yesterday hair like this.

I told the hairdresser to chop it all off. He gave me this “oh-my-gawd-what-are-you-thinking???” look and asked me thrice if I was sure. I said yes. He asked why. I said I didn’t know and that it was just time.

And so he chopped. And I walked out with this…

“Change is not pleasant, But change is constant. Only when we change and grow, We’ll see a world we never know.” ~From Wisdom of The Orange Woodpecker

As I left I told him, in the words of Meredith Grey, sometimes change is good. Oh, sometimes, change is…everything.

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