Have you ever found yourself starting a project, then getting distracted? Maybe it was a new hobby. Maybe it was a home improvement project. Maybe it was an online course that you started but never finished… (looking in the mirror here…lol)

Life brings us lessons in many forms, and often one of those ways is learning to observe and understand how we learn to manifest…how we learn to create the things we want in life. Distractions are one of those forms of lessons.

Sometimes the distractions are related to our values, with something else taking priority over something that ranks lower on the hierarchy of our values and needs. Other times, distractions are related to our shadow work…those unobserved and subconscious patterns that are so deeply embedded they can be hard to recognize or hold space for.

Those deep patterns, or samskaras, can sometimes feel like they are just a part of our personality and something we cannot change, which can be a place we sometimes judge ourselves. I know for myself, when I have started something and then got distracted, I often hear that voice in my head criticizing and shaming me for the lack of follow through. This internal voice makes me feel like I have let myself down, which is heavily tied to how I learned to gain love and approval. If I was not manifesting the way I was “supposed to”...in all the ways I was expected to, by other people’s standards…I was failing and not valid (and as a child, sometimes even shamed and punished). This created patterns in me that undulate between periods of high performance and overfunctioning, to burnout and abandoning projects. While each thing I chose to do, not do, and abandon all are lessons intended for me, I have often been distracted from learning those lessons because of being too busy judging myself for what I didn’t finish, or didn’t do “right”. This inner criticism, as many of you know, does not feel good, and does not really support getting remotivated to pick something back up. To the contrary, when we beat ourselves up, we often retreat even further into the shadows…and if our patterns are long standing samskaras, we may even be desensitized to how awful this really feels, and how difficult it can be to pull ourselves out of that feeling in order to Begin Again.

But to Begin Again is also one of the lessons we are given and shown in life. If we step back to observe the course of our lives, or look at anyone else’s life, we can see that growth is never linear… It has starts and stops…has ups and downs… There are periods of flow and sometimes longer periods of stagnation… When we look at nature, we see these cycles modeled to us in the change of seasons, or the cycles of the moon…the shifting of the tides…how vegetation dies and gets composted into the earth to help create new life…

The cycles and circles of life are filled with many opportunities to Begin Again, and often each time we do, we come with new information, or deeper roots, that allows the next cycle to be different in some way. The more conscious and intentional we are with the process, and the more we learn to become an observer/investigator of our patterns, the more our lessons become illuminated. The more compassion we learn to hold for ourselves in this process, and the more *safety* we create for ourselves internally, the more we are able to see and work with these lessons directly.

Please pause here and take that last part in… For us to open, to ANYTHING, we must feel safe to do so. Safety means also understanding what we need as boundaries, to support our sense of safety. Each of our boundaries will look different, and can change over time, and in different settings. Holding awareness for these needs and how to intentionally shift them as needed is a skill that sometimes needs to be developed before we can do other things that feel more challenging or difficult.

One of the many places we may struggle to maintain consistency is with our yoga practice, or any regular physical exercise. It may feel like it should be easy to just prioritize moving and connecting into our bodies for 30-60 minutes a day, but given the rise of chronic disease, and the morbidity rates of those diseases in our country that are directly related to lack of physical activity, we see this is a common struggle for MANY. How many have started a routine to strengthen physical health and then stopped? How many routinely make New Year’s resolutions that feel energized, but quickly fizzle? The reason we let these things drop is often because of samskaras that pull us away from these goals…

And let’s face it, being in our bodies is HARD… We often prioritize our thinking mind, which is a mash up of logic, reasoning and ego, as being the most important part of our being. Our thinking mind can dominate our lives as we strategize how to move through the world. We (falsely) think our mind is where “consciousness” lies, not realizing there are deeper and much more profound layers of consciousness available to explore along with our mind. In yoga, we learn to join all of these parts of ourselves to operate together, allowing for fuller understanding and utilization of the wisdom that each part of us contains, as well as the POWER that comes from yoking this wisdom in union. Power that does not require domination over everything else, and therefore is a constant struggle to maintain… This is power that is more grounded and sustainable because it incorporates and makes space for all parts of ourselves.

Please pause here again to hold space for how important ALL parts or layers of us are to cultivating deep wisdom and understanding. Even when we take time to prioritize the body, we are not rejecting our ego or thinking mind as being less important… We are simply asking it to maybe take a break or a back seat for a set amount of time so that our full potential can be developed, and to allow the wisdom in the body to join in the conversation and contribute to the choices we make.

Learning to develop a relationship with our body that feels safe, makes space for vulnerability, and allows patience and compassion for a process will *never* be linear, and will ALWAYS be shifting, and will sometimes be challenging… And when things get tough, we can sometimes abandon them. THAT’S OK. You are not a bad person because you abandoned something that you were not ready to do. Those moments are opportunities for softening…for care…for nurturing…that will hopefully allow you to see those challenges more fully, develop curiosity for them, seek their lessons, and perhaps learn new and different ways you might want to approach something in the future. It is rare that those illuminations or openings will happen when we are beating ourselves up, so compassion and ahimsa (non-violence) is important to apply here. <3

The next time you find yourself revisiting something you have put down, if you find yourself turning to judgement and being self-critical, I invite you to see it as an opportunity to invite in compassion and investigation… I invite you to see it as an opportunity to utilize that experience to gather knowledge and information. I invite you to see it as an opportunity to follow the natural cycles of life, hold space for all parts of yourself, and Begin Again. It is the opportunity to work on creating new samskaras you choose, and to replace the ones that no longer serve.

But then the day unfolded... The material we were going to use was buffalo rawhide. During the workshop, we talked about how the buffalo were so revered because of how every part of the animal provided for something important to the indigenous ancestors of this land. This is why buffalo is often a symbol of abundance...it gave everything needed to survive.

This past year, my exploration around the concept of abundance has deepened, in part due to work in my walking labyrinth. A big part of my exploration has been the inquiry of how much I have closed myself off from when my nervous system gets stuck in activation, and therefore protection and defense. When we are in this mode, we are not just shutting out the thing we are rejecting or protecting ourselves from, but also a million other opportunities and possibilities... Because that is how protection and walls often work if we are caught in cycles of reactivity. We may let through some things we recognize as being safe, while other things that are unfamiliar are more easily shut down when the brain is in a defense pattern.

So I have been challenging myself to pay more attention to what I am choosing to reject (honoring my boundaries) while staying open and curious about life as it unfolds. It feels different in my body to operate this way...to no longer tighten and contract thinking I need to prepare for battle.

I don’t always think of these moments as being battles, but I think my brain and body has learned to misunderstand some messages, and has not always taken the time to think through how it wants to hold the balance of honoring boundaries while also staying open to mystery, magic and possibilities... This comes through in even simple things, like overthinking a project I am working on, or needing to have things turn out a certain way and meet my expectations in order to feel successful or content. This weekend, as we made our drums, one of the others spoke to this similar pattern...and how she has learned to let go of the preplanning and expecations... The things that block flow, creativity, and being in the moment. The things that block us being fully present to everything that is being offered to us in any given moment.

After my drum was complete, after I shared a feast with my new friends, then on my drive home, it struck me how this drum’s true energy is one for abundance. Being manifested in the time of the fall equinox, when we are gathering the bounty of the work we have done over the past year, with the hide of a sacred animal that brings the message and medicine of abundance, it was clear that what I thought (and planned...) was not what was truly meant to be.And letting go of that plan to let in what is truly meant to be is what allows abundance to flow.

My deepest and most humble gratitude for this past weekend, this past year, the course of my life, the teachers and guides that continue to show up on my path at exactly the right time...the animal that gave it’s hide...our teacher this weekend, and the elders that passed down their wisdom to him...the energy of the community that came together to create instruments that will beat the sacred heartbeat that connects us all...to each other and to the Great Mystery.

Steps for Creating Embodiment (in anything we do)

Step 1: Practice paying attention to body sensations. Learn how to hold space for those sensations without judgment or requiring change. Just be with the sensations, and notice as many characteristics as possible. Learn how to hold attention to specific/localized sensations, but also how to hold awareness for those sensations in the full body (awareness face to feet).

Step 2: Create dialogue with your body. Ask your body what it needs today, and right now. Understand that the brain (and ego) will try to answer first, so to hear the body we must often be more patient for those answers. The mind and ego answer fast and loud. The body answers more slowly and softly. Give those answers time to surface… Don’t use the answers it gave you yesterday, last week or last month. Create space for new answers to come forth.

Step 3: Reply to what the body has asked for. If you are unsure how to respond, use your best judgment, then ask the body: “how does that feel?” Check in and get more feedback (call and response). Let the body know you are listening, and paying attention. The more we cultivate those conversations, the easier it is to engage the inner dialogue.

Step 4: Always listen (feel) for feedback along the way, as well as upon completion. The body often speaks in a language of sensations, so different from the language of ego and brain. Move with intention, and watch for the body to give you messages along the way. Hold the result and ask: “how does this feel?” If something doesn’t feel quite right, ask “what else could I do here?” Respect messages of pain or discomfort: when we ignore them, we tell the body we are ignoring its messages, and abandoning it. Trust the messages the body gives you, to deepen as well as to retreat. Remember that we often learn and expand more when the edge is softer than when we push to our limit, but there is always a time and place to expand our limits as well.

Step 5: Hold gratitude…for the deepened connection…for the conversation and the dance between mind, body and soul…for the health and abilities we have in our body currently (to whatever degree that might be)…for making time to connect to ourselves in this meaningful way.

Every time we practice embodiment, we strengthen holding alignment between all parts of ourselves. This improves all aspects of how we move through the world. May we all find ways to connect to those messages within, and may this alignment help create better connections with the world around us. <3