Illumination

What my yoga students don’t know is that as I stand before them to teach, I bow my head and become THE student. I am, and forever will be, the perennial beginner and I love this about what I do. My students inform my teaching, similar perhaps to an insight or a sensation that arises while holding a pose. I am informed by my students, through the stories they hold in their body, of how easy it is to be swept away by the frenetic energy of our lives and the personification of this as our shared experience. And I am reminded that as we hold tight to that still place within, where we cannot be moved, we offer it to those who stand beside us.

When we set foot onto our yoga mat we ARE stepping onto sacred ground; silently vowing to show up for ourselves. We are given pause to ceremoniously unplug from all of the ways we have allowed ourselves to become fragmented. We make a choice to call our Spirit back; to be with the ever present now and to be with and welcome everything that arises. And sometimes we cannot or will not welcome everything, and this too is our practice.

When we set foot onto our mat we can freely choose companionship with the raw places, to be with the heart openings, to be with the places in our body where we feel ease and where we do not, and to be with all of our Shadow and all of our Light. We become the healer. Our awareness, so beautifully and patiently illuminating our wounds, and this same awareness becoming the salve that heals us. We pause not only to give love to the raw places- we give love to and celebrate all that is good and holy in us. This salve softens the body and our Spirit returns to rest. We complete ourselves.

– Chrissy Leake