Live the questions and the answers will come...

"Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms or books that are written in a foreign tongue.  The point is to live everything.  Live the questions now.  Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live your way to some distant day into the answers."-Rainer Maria Rilke

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"I want it NOW!"

We've all been momentarily possessed by our inner-Veruca Salts at one point or another in our lives.  We find ourselves waiting for the next step in our careers or relationships, or wanting the fruits of seemingly endless efforts, or craving inspiration when we are feeling lost.

Rilke tells us that sometimes, you must put the end out of your mind and spend time experiencing that confusing and frustrating middle of the road.  The lessons that you learn in these moments almost always prove essential once you do achieve the answers and ends that you seek.

In yoga, students often look at the covers of Athleta catalogues or yoga magazines and want to be able to immediately do the beautiful poses that they see.  When they can't, they quit.  Worse, they force themselves into poses and get hurt.

Those models make the poses look effortless, but these poses are the end result of sometimes years of work, starting with merely a sliver of the full pose.  With few exceptions, advanced yogis were not born being able to fly up into crow pose or float effortlessly into forearm balance.




It required breaking poses down into manageable pieces, sometimes even after doing a version of the pose that may have looked good, but was not created on a strong foundation. Skipping any of those steps could result in accidents and injury.  It is only after fully mastering each component of a pose, can a yogi achieve the full expression of a beautiful pose.

By giving each of these broken down pieces our full attention and presence, we can learn lessons about our bodies and minds that will not only help us in the poses, but will also help us stay strong and healthy throughout our lives.

Yoga is about being where you are and being ok with that.  Sometimes we feel weak, small, and clueless, but we are never stronger, bigger, and wiser than when we are fully present.

Live the questions.  The answers will come, and you will be ready for them.