how are you?
How are you?
I’m okay.
A conversation that happens all too often in my life - more often than I would like, in fact. People will ask me how I’m doing, or how my day is going, or how my yoga class went, and I’ll always respond with fine, or okay, or maybe even good if they’re really lucky, but rarely (if ever) will I say that I’m doing great, or that my day is amazing, or that my class was really wonderful.
Why do I do this? Why do we do this? We’ve become so accustomed to being okay that we forget that there is so much more. We settle for mediocrity, and then we suffer from a lack of fulfillment. We resign ourselves to feeling fine when there is greatness, and fantastic-ness, and amazing-ness, all out there just waiting to be had.
All of the things that we say and do have an effect on our state of mind and our attitude. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: we define our very existence through the way we choose to see our experiences. Are you a victim, or are you a survivor? Are you going to focus on what is good, or are you going to hone in on all the small things that could destroy your day if you let them?
So here, I offer a bold affirmation: I will consciously make choices that move me away from being just okay to really being and feeling great. And that means actively getting out and doing things that make me happy, surrounding myself with people who are inspirational and luminous, and truly living from the center of my being. It means figuring out and letting go of all the blocks that are keeping me stuck at “just fine”. I’m smacking myself in the face with the reminder that greatness is a choice. And right now, I’m feeling pretty amazing.
learning from a coconut.
A cold and dreary Monday evening. I had just finished teaching my second class of the day and was roaming the aisles of the grocery store when my eye fell upon a gorgeous young coconut - on sale, no less! I immediately felt nostalgic for California, for the memory of sucking on a straw sticking out of a fresh coconut and sporting sun-kissed skin, practicing yoga outside and feeling so free. Just what I need today, I thought to myself. Cradling a coconut in my arms, I trundled home and immediately found myself faced with the immense challenge of actually getting the coconut open.
I selected a small knife and attempted to pierce the coconut from above. No luck. I grabbed a bigger knife and tried a vicious hacking motion instead, which not only failed miserably but also proved, without a doubt, that I am no coconut-opening ninja. A cursory Google search (“how to open a young coconut”) rendered itself entirely unhelpful (what would a vegetarian be doing with a meat cleaver?), but I was determined not to let my precious coconut go to waste like the great avocado incident of 2010, and I finally managed to poke the tiniest hole through the coconut’s hard outer shell. Turning it upside-down over a cup, I watched sadly as one small drop emerged - just a drop! Yet, one drop turned into two, which quickly turned into three, and within five minutes my glass was nearly full of sweet, delicious coconut water.
Alas, the Universe had conspired to teach me another lesson. Patience really is a virtue. Slow and steady really does win the race. But how often do we forget this fact? Rather than doing strong core work every day and taking time to open our hamstrings, we want to be able to jump into handstand and do full splits as soon as we start practicing yoga (guilty as charged). We want our families, our friends, our partners to be perfect for us, without having the dedication to cheer even the smallest victories in our quest toward cultivating honest, harmonious relationships. In yoga, as in life, we slowly but surely accumulate all the benefits of our practice and our commitment. We put in our effort, and then we let go. And sometimes, the best thing we can do for ourselves is to tap in and simply watch how - single drop by single drop - our hard work is rewarded.
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