Okay, with a title like that, I feel the need to cut right to the chase. Because for fuck’s sake, there’s nothing worse than being strung along while you’re waiting for someone to just. get. to. the. point.
(That was me yesterday watching one of those ridiculous free webinars and yelling at the lady on my screen to just tell me the motherflippin’ content already.)
So here it goes….
When my husband, my daughter and I go on outings that my daughter isn’t particularly excited about, I always tell her she can pack whatever will bring her joy in her backpack.
Sometimes she crams her backpack full of markers and paper and fidget spinners and random doodads. Other times she grabs a single book or some music and her headphones. Every now and then she brings nothing at all and decides to try giving life a go without outside entertainment.
The point is that each time she asks herself what she needs, takes the time to pack it up, and then pulls it out at just the right moment.
I am home from a month in the jungles of Costa Rica where I was vacationing with my sweet family and teaching back-to-back transformational meditation retreats with my older sister Lacy Young. For two weeks we watched beautiful souls soften and transform on meditation cushions right across from us, their lives utterly and totally changed. I left the experience completely renewed and deeply grateful for this incredible work she and I get to do together.
Retreating is near and dear to my heart, and it's something I prioritize in my own life. In the last five years I've attended at least one week-long meditation retreat a year (some years more than one) with many other workshop weekends peppered in for good measure.
I lead retreats because I believe in it. Fiercely. And because I've seen the powerful ripples faithfully attending them has created in my own life. In fact, if it weren't for that first meditation retreat all those years ago, I wouldn't be doing the work I'm doing now.
It happened again.
But this time I was 15 stories up peering out over miles and miles of shimmering blue waters in front of me. The morning sun was soft and gauzy, and the sounds of the ocean sang a soothing tune that echoed on my heart. I was flowing through yoga poses and carefully twisting my body when the sabotage began yet again.
"You fatass."
Today I sat in mediation with tears streaming down my face, and I saw the litany of ways flash before my eyes that I've been beating myself up lately. Big things. Tiny things. Strange little things you wouldn't even imagine.
Like the planter in my window. I tried to start cilantro from seed about a month or two ago, and while three little shoots popped up to say hello, they eventually fizzled and fell. Now the planter is sitting in the window with dried out soil and tiny little cilantro carcasses, and I didn't even realize it was making me feel bad.
My love affair with crystals started just two short years ago. While we flirted for almost a decade, it wasn't until I moved to Colorado in June 2015 that we began our deep, passionate romance. My husband, my daughter and I had just left our lifelong home state of Texas to travel the world (We made it as far as Colorado. But that's another story...), and I was craving a little piece of home.
In Texas I had a beloved metaphysical shop where I purchased delicate necklaces adorned with a single crystal for attuning my energy. Each necklace came with a card describing the crystal's energy, and I would wear one for months on end until it broke, when I would buy another and experiment with another energy. I didn't know much about crystals, but I knew that I loved how those necklaces made me feel.
I'm snuggled up in a hotel bed with the covers practically to my chin. (A good hotel bed is seriously one of my happy places.) My kiddo is snoozing soundly on the roll-away at my feet, and my husband is downstairs hopefully winning a million dollars in the casino. (A girl can dream.)
For the moment, all feels peaceful.
We are on an overnight stopover making our way back to the mountains after a week at the beach. And even though it was all sun-soaked and jammed with joy, I am feeling the call of my space and the gentle pull of my nourishing routines.
My heart is full, but my body is honestly drained.
It happens to us all. We're humming right along in life, things are a-okay, and then we wake up one day in an undeniable funk. We don't exactly remember why we feel so bad, but we know for sure that we don't feel good.
We find ourselves analyzing and judging it in our minds. We push against it, and before we know it we're owning it. We're talking about it on repeat with our friends and family, and it weaves itself right into the definition of who we are.
The foundation of any meditation practice is connection to the breath. Our breath not only nourishes our body through delivering vital oxygen to the blood, but it also acts as a current of energy that has the power to quickly and effectively calm our nervous system. Through slow, rhythmic breathing we can steady our heart rate, lower our blood pressure and soothe our nerves all at once.
But mindful breathing is not just reserved for meditation. It is an incredible tool that can help not only ourselves, but also the kiddos in our lives. Think about how much time children spend in the womb connected to the rhythm of the mother's heart and breath only to emerge into a world that can feel chaotic and discombobulating at times. The steady tide of the breath helps pull them back into the their natural flow and is an incredibly soothing way to re-center and reconnect.
