recovering

I don't know about you, but somehow it's taking me longer than usual to bounce back after a weekend of traveling.

I recall how, a few years ago, I traveled from Cincinnati --> New Jersey --> Columbus --> Kent --> Cincinnati --> Asheville --> Cincinnati in maybe... um, a week and a half. It felt like the Amazing Race. I'm sure other people travel way more than I do (how they do it is beyond me), but to me that was a lot. And yet, back then, I recovered quickly and was at work the very next day back. Somehow it's not happening for me now anymore, even after just traveling for one weekend to Cincinnati and Lexington. I was sleepy all day. I was so tired I skipped yoga class (not a class that I teach, but attend). My Monday night yoga class is not withing walking distance, and I felt like I was in a daze. Which meant I should NOT be driving, even for yoga.

Yesterday I tried to spend some time away from the Internet and mobile devices in the hopes of gaining some clarity on some thoughts I've been having. I'm not quite there yet... it really takes a lot of practice and focus to be able to sit quietly with yourself.

Meanwhile, my mind is spinning. There are so many things I want to write about.

Barefoot Works yoga studio, Lexington, KY. A happy, light-filled place.

An amazing yoga workshop last weekend in Sharon's lovely yoga treehouse. Learning how to teach yoga in ways that are supportive and therapeutic for each person's individual anatomy. Observing students with curiosity and compassion.

Getting out of my head (and all the doubting talk) and back in my body through yoga.

Sensations of floating unsupported to feeling fully supported and grounded, physically and energetically. Amazed at how the body just knows what is true.

And how yoga brings me back to that truth. Something I'm re-learning after my yoga plateau phase a few years ago. (Contrary to popular belief that people who practice yoga are always so zen and blissed-out. But maybe I'm the exception to the norm.)

And other random things like thinking about this article that poses a question on the effects of our Internet use and another article on sacred space.

Great times being reunited with my old friends EB, ML, and this couple, and talking until 4:30 in the morning with this friend - about food and art and friendship and finding our voice as women in society. Pretty heavy stuff. Really good stuff. (Thanks, AS.)

Sunset views from EB's rooftop and an evening walk in a tree-lined street. 

Sky over Lexington

Cracking the code of awesome Ethiopian food. I know. It isn't really a code. But that's how I feel about my cooking moments of triumph. :) Will write more on that soon.

And the thought that has taken up much of my brain energy and taken over my emotions lately: how my realization that the kitchen is where I am fearless actually has me feeling... afraid. Afraid that I'm not doing the right thing in my life right now. Even the thought of finally putting that in words right here is scary. Because I'm scared that maybe this is my truth. Scared that I've invested so much in something else when I have been skirting around my truth all these years. And at the same time not quite being 100% sure what is my truth - because isn't there a reason that things happen? A reason that opportunities knock? And isn't graduate school the reason I came here in the first place?

Scared to give up when I'm actually pretty close to the finish. And yet also fearful because those last few miles in a marathon are the hardest (not that I've ever run one and would want to run one, but you know what I mean). Wondering whether I should keep plowing through knowing that this happens to everyone... right? ABD ("all but dissertation") folks out there?

Scared because of that old voice from my childhood/adolescence, that I'm not as good a "finisher" as I am a "starter". And how that's showing up as patterns in my life, as hard as that is to admit. Hmmm... another symptom of vata imbalance? But despite that, I've done and completed many other things I've set out to do.

Scared about the truth in A.'s observation and insight about me, when I had a little (?) meltdown last week. That it may not be the situation that is my true enemy, but my way of thinking. And worrying.

Scared about whether I can be at peace with my decision, whatever it is.

Ok, so that was more than what I intended to disclose today. I know it probably sounds a little cryptic. But I had to write it for me.

Over and out.