the truth hurts

i’m 47.

i know it’s generally not smiled upon for a woman to shout her age to the hilltops, but smile away. there are things i can control in this life–my attitude, my diet, my practice–and there are things i can’t. aging is way up there with the things i can’t.

honestly, i wear my age as a badge of pride. at 47, i have an intensive daily two-hour practice that few practitioners half my age could keep up with. very few.

that’s the point of pride. (i know pride is a deadly sin…but i’m not dead yet.)

and here’s the point that hurts: everything.

overall, i am someone with a tremendous pain threshold and i work through everything. i believe the power of the mind is stronger than the power of the body and i know i have a damn powerful mind.

but here’s my reality of the past year…

i tore my right meniscus, i have tendonitis in both elbows, both of my biceps are experiencing inexplicable pain from elbow to shoulder, my shoulders are painfully tight, as are my upper back and neck, my left thumb is constantly strained/sprained, my entire right leg–all muscles and joints–are out of whack compensating for my knee, and my vision seems to be suddenly waning.

besides that, i’m perfect!

how has all this affected my practice?

not much.

the main things i have cut out of my practice (ironically) are child’s pose and virasana, as i can’t do the deep knee bends. and i have given up on my relentless pursuit of passasana (for the time being) for the same reason. but, overall, i believe i can do whatever i believe i can do. so, every day i am pushing my edges and finding new ones. every day i challenge myself to just kill it. move past the pain and into the depth of the practice…the control of the mind.

if i can be brutally honest, there have been a number of times in the past year that i thought my entire career was over. it’s hard for me to write that out loud, but the struggle is real. i want to teach forever. i want to be young forever. but forever is a mighty long time.

i talked to my doctor about it, trying to find a reason why everything seems to be breaking down at once. maybe a nervous disorder? autoimmune? musculoskeletal dysfunction? worse?

diagnosis: i’m just 47.

how to love your job (even if you aren’t a yoga instructor)

does the acronym “tgif” mean anything to you? do you live for the weekend? hate mondays?

if so, i have some bad news for you. you’re wasting 5/7th’s of your life. and that sucks. life is short enough as it is.

let’s assume–like 98% of the world (according to my own very unscientific survey of no one)–you hate your job. you wake up early for it, trudge through your eight-hour-or-longer days, come home drained, top of your night, crawl into bed exhausted and restart the whole process.

for what???

what could possibly be worth this misery that plagues your mondays, infiltrates your tuesdays, overhangs your wednesdays, haunts your thursdays, and whiles away your fridays?

if you are a yoga instructor, chances are this is a foreign concept. you love what you do and what you do keeps you happy. all days are good days and weekends are just more wonderful days. life is a bowl of cherries! right?

maybe………….

but if that’s not you, i’ll let you in on a little secret. there’s a way to love your life. all of it. including the job part.

here it is: gratitude.

we talk a lot about gratitude, but usually save it for the things we really cherish. we are thankful for our health, we are thankful for our wealth, we are thankful for our relationships…

it’s time to be thankful for our jobs.

when you have way too much work and find yourself completely overwhelmed, be thankful that you are blessed to be in such high demand. there are people out there who are dying to find work…any work.

when you pay your taxes and that check is so painful to write, be thankful that you earn enough to pay taxes. you don’t owe it if you don’t earn it.

when your boss is a total ass and makes your days a living misery, be thankful s/he keeps you on board. that “shitty job” is a blessing.

when you pay your mortgage/rent, your car payment, buy yourself a cup of coffee or a yoga membership, be thankful that your job earns you the money that makes it all possible.

if you can make this one simple mental shift, any job becomes a really great job. and any week a week well spent. not to mention the money you got to spend as a result…