My Shiny Happy Life

imageMy life is all rainbows and unicorns. That’s right, every morning I wake up and little birds help me put on my yoga clothes. I meditate calmly with no monkey mind for a full hour, after which I drink pure lemon water from the stream before getting on my mat for a focused, intense yoga practice on my own. After that the day flows easily with the perfect healthy food, all of which I make myself. Abundant clients throw themselves at me willy nilly. I easily handle all personal interactions. If there is the rare time of stress, I handle it with equanimity, without being overly reactive. I NEVER go crazy and do something self destructive. I am totally at peace, regardless of what life throws at me.

Yeah, and if you believe that I have some ocean-front property in the Everglades you might like.

No, the truth is I am a work in progress, just like everyone else. And despite the beautiful veggie/smoothie/raw dessert shots I splash all over IG, I also eat out too often, just to get out of the house when being a solo-preneur makes me feel trapped. I am also more reactive than I’d like. In face, yesterday I was upset by a personal interaction and totally lost my cool, ate all my travel snacks in a row and then ended up beating myself up for an hour or two. But because of so much yoga practice and work on myself, these times are rarer and rarer. I have more ‘wins’, more grace and calm breathing through crisis as time goes on.

I think it’s easy in this digital world to see only one side of things. I have FOMO too by the way! SO much. I should definitely quit Facebook. Yeah, right. That’s gonna happen.

Even though I try to show some of the messiness and talk about the ‘hard parts’ of life too, I’m not sure it completely hits home. And it’s important to show the struggle. After all, how can someone help you out of the ditch if they haven’t experienced what it’s like to be stuck down there themselves?

Understand this: whatever emotional eating issue, body image crisis, lack of motivation, beating yourself up, perfectionist, pendulum swinging thing you are going through, I have been there. More than once. And after so many years of slogging around at the bottom of that ditch, I know how to help you climb out of it.

That doesn’t mean life will be all rainbows and unicorns and kale salads. Though today was a great day of meditation, yoga, healthy food, productivity and calm mind, tomorrow I may wake up, check facebook from my bed and haul off to the diner for a stack of pancakes slathered in syrup while stewing over all my faults. I really hope I don’t, but if I do, I won’t whip myself erotically after the fact. I will walk around the block, drink a green juice (or maybe a great glass of red wine) and get over it.

This is balance. Just like some of those crazy yoga inversions, it is not a static spot. You don’t land there and say “ah, balance, there you are.” And just stay stock still. You have to make constant micro-adjustments to stay there.

Can you get down with that? Then let’s get there! My 90-day bespoke program is designed to help you tune into your own needs, joys, likes and dislikes and tune up the vibration to help you find that place of balance that is delectable and sustainable for you.

Book your free consultation now and let’s get going>>

With love, lemon water and (raw) chocolate covered cookies.

-Laura

Getting “Real” with Yoga at Home

IMG_2215Today I got on my mat. Ok, I get on my mat most days, but today felt special. After a long week of holidays and family and travel, and ‘make do’ practices, I’m finally home and was expecting a friend to join me for an asana and breathing session chez moi. I thought “Now I will finally have a real practice!” But winter arrived unexpectedly today, and my yoga buddy wasn’t able to drive. I was back to facing the idea of a solo practice. In times past this might have spelled the end of my ‘get back in gear’ plans, but somehow today’s practice was amazing, focused and sweetly sweaty. It felt just as ‘real’ as any day in the shala. How’d that happen?

Well, partly after all these years I’ve finally grown up in my practice. I still LOVE being in the room with a lot of other devoted folks and all that energy, but my mat and my own breath are familiar to me, and the habit is ingrained. I can make the energy myself if I need to. And partly I’ve developed a few rituals over the past several months of mainly self practice that have really helped me make the most of my alone time and keep the yoga fires burning, even without community around me. Here are a few:

  1. Lemon water. I get up in the morning and drink it first thing. It makes me feel virtuous and begins the ritual of the morning. Ok, I drink my coffee after that too, but the lemon water is what makes it feel like I’m beginning my day in a healthy way and setting the tone for the practice.
  2. I set a time in my mind for getting on my mat and when the clock strikes that time, I “ekam inhale.” Practicing at the same time every day is even better, but though I don’t always manage to do that, I set a time in my mind the night before and keep it like an appointment.
  3. A little rebellion. I often practice to music, at least for the opening sun salutes and standing postures. There I said it, ashtanga police be damned. Sometimes a driving beat is helpful in getting me going or keeping me flowing. I respond deeply to rhythms. They draw my breath, heartbeat and mind all into one pointed focus.

Looking for inspiration to get on your mat, go to a class, or design your sustainable delectable life and practice? I’d love to help! I’m working on a free gift for you—a cheat sheet of my ten top tips for getting on the mat regularly. In the meantime, share your unique struggles with me via email or comments and let’s see if we can start your motivational tuneup!

And, coming in the New Year, I’m launching a new program for creating a healthy-yet-balanced life that includes a dedicated yoga practice AND room for mindful indulgence. In short, A Life Delectable. To get first dibs when the program launches and keep up to date on the latest tips and recipes, don’t forget to sign up for email updates and ‘like’ the A Life Delectable facebook page!

And now back to my New Year’s Eve healthy indulgent menu planning…

Wishing you happiness, health and lots of dark chocolate in the coming year,

Laura

The Pose I Wish Wasn’t

Eka Pada Bakasana A
A number of months ago my friends at the Ashtanga Dispatch hosted an Instagram Challenge, and one of the required poses was “the pose you wish…wasn’t.” So yeah, my immediate reaction was to avoid that challenge! But seriously folks, there are very few poses I wish didn’t exist. Though there are plenty of poses that challenge me, I find most of them enjoyable to work on. But there are one or two poses that feel more than challenging. They feel impossible. As if there is no finger hold. Nowhere to begin. Like they were designed just to show me my limits. There’s no work, just a feeling of inadequacy. READ MORE >

Crazy Pants, Body Image and Musings on an IG Challenge

baddha hasta sirsasana D“You know, there really is so much too much of you!”-A Tale of Two Cities.

This is sometimes how I feel about myself. Too many thoughts, too loud, too curly, too curvy, too many asanas, singing when I should chant, talking when I should be silent. Part of my journey of yoga: embracing it all. There is exactly as much of me as there should be. Yes, self-transformation can be good, but self-acceptance is even better. If it’s true as the Baghavad Gita says, that “yoga is the practice of tolerating the consequences of being who you are,” then I may be slowly, slowly almost practicing yoga. I see the growth and the stuck places too, everywhere in my life. And it’s evidenced in my yoga pants and my Instagram account. Say what??? READ MORE >

Happy New Year!

I’m a few days late. The New Year has already started, obviously. I was taking a couple of days to really be just where I was, rather than planning, thinking, scheming and marketing. And, it was pretty awesome. Practice. Hiking. Cooking. Eating. Fireworks. Books on tape. Bubble baths. Not a bad way to send out the old year and bring in the new. But I couldn’t let the week go by without saying a big HAPPY NEW YEAR!

I’m a little relieved the last year is over, to be honest. READ MORE >

Getting Comfortable in my Skin (or leotard, or dress…)

natarajasana tahoe modifiedIt took me way too long, but I finally embraced my perfectly quirky/pretty, wear a leotard for yoga style. We all want to look and feel our best, whatever that is. And when we find what makes each one of us feel most comfortable, it’s more likely to happen, with less pushing and pulling and sucking in of stomachs and discomfort and spackle… READ MORE >

The Power of Ritual

hands with tea and lemonWhen I was younger, my family was deeply steeped in Jewish ritual and family tradition. We were kosher. We went to temple on Fridays. We celebrated holidays with candles and Challah and Matzoh and prayer. And we went to my Grandmother’s house for a meal every Sunday. Sometimes these rituals felt like a pain. We were tired. There was too much to do. We had to get up early the next morning…There always seemed to be a reason to skip the ritual. But we didn’t.

As I got older and moved away from home and into my career, these rituals faded a little, leaving me feeling disconnected and forlorn. Recently, I began structuring my time around these gatherings again. READ MORE >

A Touch of the Rebel

confluence hanumanasana b

Photo: Tom Rosenthal

I am very traditional about my yoga. I’m an ashtangi after all. We do the poses in a specific order, on specific days, in specific ways, staying true to the lineage that has gone before us. I often liken ashtanga yoga to Bach, or scales in music. It’s classical, steeped in tradition. Orderly. But even though I deeply believe in the system, even though I honor all the little details of the ashtanga yoga, I find there needs to be a little wiggle room, just like with my diet, just a tiny bit of rebellion to keep me going. READ MORE >

Your Ivory Tower Has No Legs

In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not a big fan of rigid rules and restrictive protocols. Diets are never really sustainable. They’re endured…for a time. Cleanses can be useful resets or jumpstarts, tools that can help you tune in and find your hull speed, but they aren’t meant to be a lifestyle.  Rules and formulas can’t hold up forever because they’re not organic. You may have resolved to be healthier but you can’t fuel that resolve with will power and nothing else. At least, I’ve found I can’t. READ MORE >