Introspection, Expansion & a Spot of Luck.

Hello All, it's Jennifer Ellen. Today is Nicole's last day here,  that means we've been here a month, and I just can't believe it! With sickness and delays in training, I feel as if I am just arriving, and yet I only have 13 days left, 10 of them treatment. What an difference from last year. 

This trip has been decidedly more introspective. More about expectation, motivation, and surrender. I am really learning to honor the art of being in this moment with this feeling right now. I know that time alone, with no email, blog or phone is essential to my mental and physical health, but here, I have had a chance to practice that. I have felt an underlying current of anxiety about being 'out of touch' and am uncovering layers of emotion related to that current that I haven't explored before. Who has these expectations? What are my motivations? What does it really mean to surrender? I am discovering that once again, it comes back to honoring the deep truth within, and practices that quiet and settle the mind to feel into that deep truth. Just now, it feels a bit like attempting to tame a tiger, but I know that this is the process, and that the tiger can also suddenly morph into a sweet cuddly kitty. I'll look forward to that time, for sure.

As far as practice, despite the starts and stops, and a bunch of setbacks, I have expanded into new forms, beautiful, fiery and powerful. It's tough work, but the transformation is undeniable. My mind and body are really shifting. It is hard to believe that at the ripe old age of 37, I still have my healthiest, strongest body ahead of me. This practice is incredibly vast, and watching the senior students practice gives me so much motivation. It seems that there will never be a time when I know all that there is to know about this art.

I often reflect on exactly how I got here, and it boggles my mind. The only real conclusion I can come to is Divine Intervention & a spot of luck.