Over the past couple of years, I have read many beautifully written and inspiring entries about students and teachers' journey to yoga. I secretly hoped to be asked to write about my journey, thinking I could easily and elegantly tell my story. Well, the words flowed, but you’re reading the 17th (or so) iteration of My Story. Now I can sit with it, and as the yogis say, find “santosha.”
Since I have been teaching dance and yoga for more than 20 years, I knew I needed to reflect on the reasons I began in the first place and how my journey has brought me to today. My Love of Movement and My Love of Yoga come from a place where the movement and the structure of the movement gave me a voice; “A picture is worth a thousand words” sort of speech. A survivor of sexual abuse as a child and mental abuse as an adult, my body and my mind have been at war for a while.
Dance lead me to yoga…
I started dancing in college. It would be the start of a healing process I didn’t even know I needed. As movement became such an intrinsic part of my days, weeks, months and years, I discovered that buried deep down inside of me was a very scared little person. Through dancing and performance art I started to “feel” what had been hidden. As I created bodies of work, I was able to express my emotional pain through a physical release. I found the freedom of my voice without having to say a word. Through dance and performance art I could immerse myself in a character physically but did not have to tie myself to the character emotionally. It was not until I started practicing yoga that I was able to see how detached I had been living; trapped in my mind in order to not feel my body.
About 14 years ago I took my first yoga class. I was asked to go to a 90 minute “Power Yoga” class. It was 110 degrees in the room! I had no idea what to expect but I took a leap of faith and headed to the studio. It was there in Portland, Maine that a new journey and discovery would begin. Who would have thought that a small, flat, rectangle-shaped space would allow for so much expansion and growth within the human body...surely not me. It was on my mat that I had to really be...be there, be present, be content. In yoga class there was no music and no leaving your mat, even when you felt like all you wanted to do was leave. You were asked to find your “why” ...why do I feel the need to get out of this pose, why do I feel the need to drink water, why do I feel the need to formulate the same thought over and over again, why am I so sad, why do I want to fidget instead of really feel? Through my discovery of what it truly meant to be in my body, mind and spirit- I craved more and more. Yoga taught me about samskaras, which are energetic pathways of stored information in our bodies. Samskaras are subtle impressions of our past actions. While dance and movement allowed me to express these “past actions”, yoga was what opened my mind to allow myself to feel those “past actions”.
Eventually, my own experience was becoming contagious and people around me wanted to feel how I was feeling and experiencing life. Another shift began as I knew through teaching I could impact the larger community as a whole. It is my honor to share my passion. I have always adored movement in various forms. I appreciate seeing people experience that “aha” moment; the instant when connection happens between the mind and the body, the movement and the breath, or the trifecta of alignment of body, mind, and spirit. It has been through dance and yoga thatI have given my body freedom to feel and my mind to have ease and my spirit to freely speak to the world. I can’t wait to see you on your mat :)
