There is something about stepping away from your life for a bit that gives enough space to see a bit more clearly.  It may sound silly to talk about stepping away from my life since our Brizzy (Brisbane) life is so new and we still don’t have much of a rhythm yet but that life had the momentum of our Florida life and all it took to get here to Australia.  There is something especially powerful about immersing oneself in something you love.  Yoga has been this gift for many years now.  It has sustained me through some of the darkest days of loss and the ensuing grief,  through betrayal, moves and a multitude of other life changes.  It has been a navigational tool, along with my personal faith, that has kept the boat of my life from capsizing.  To spend a month immersed in it again after so long is both nurturing and challenging!

We often look at the decades of our life as these markers, placeholders.  We have been looking at the idea of concealment in our yoga training and when I look at my forties they were a period of deep concealment.  I started the decade with a toddler and aging parents. By the end of the decade I had lost my parents and had a teenager and a preteen.  My forties taught me that Alzheimer’s can take part of someone we love away from us but the disease itself cannot take their essence.  They are concealed in many ways but they are there.  We have to learn to sit with them in this new place.  While Alzheimer’s eventually took my sweet daddy, it did not take his essence from me.  He and my mom are with me always.  They are experiencing this Aussie adventure with us in spirit.  They are with me at this training!  What I am finding a bit challenging is coming out of this period of my own concealment and more fully into this decade of my life.  How do we move out of periods like this back into joy?  I am thinking baby steps.  This Aussie adventure we are on is a long held dream come true, a joyful adventure.  It has taken many baby steps to get here and many more baby steps are ahead for us.  This stepping out of being in the shadows personally to a more spacious place is going to take baby steps too!  Actually, I am thinking now at fifty three maybe baby steps with a few big steps and a few more tumbles.  Sometimes we need baby steps to get us to where we feel like we can take tumbles again!

I am getting to spend this month of training up on the Sunshine Coast (or Sunny Coast) which is about an hour and a half north of Brisbane.  It is beautiful!  While our whale swim was canceled due to rain and high winds,we have however had a couple of whale sightings from the beach which has been pretty amazing in itself.  Their majesty is something to behold!  It is pretty darn wonderful to be able to walk on the beach again too!  One of the things we miss most about Florida is, of course, the proximity we had to the beach!  Our Eve was jumping for joy to have her toes in the sand again as you can see in this pic!

Our 90 Monkeys yoga teacher training with Amy Ippoliti is being hosted by Bryan at his lovely studio Yoga Vida in Mooloolaba!  In just a little over one weeks time we have had amazing jam packed days with Amy and also Russ from Younga Yoga in Woolongong!  Today Claudine and Hanza who created AcroYinyasa join us and on Sunday my husband Lawson and our youngest Eve join me and lots of my classmates for an Acroyinyasa workshop hosted at Yoga Vida!

      
I am currently covered in Arnica gel…sore muscles abound!  However, there is nothing like time on your mat with inspiring people to help assist us as we take baby steps out of periods of deep concealment!  Yesterday this happened!  Lots of refinements are needed but a baby step forward!  Photo creds to my classmates Fiona Greer and Carly Ponter!
               

Thanks so much for joining us on this adventure!!  Happy Friday!