To bear witness to suffering is a trust fall into our deep human resilience. To bear witness is to surrender into the not knowing how any individual’s path is meant to unfold. To bear witness is an explorer’s journey into soft heart and expanding eyes.

To bear witness is to let judgments loosen and to let love expand.

Last evening, I was given the gift of bearing witness to my daughter’s canvas in action. Many colors moving from palette to expression. A dynamic piece that was here for a moment before dissolving into the next.

At 6 years old, Ruthie was clearly heavy and thick and dense in her movement. I watched her from afar as her brother and younger sister wrestled her father on the living room floor. Meanwhile, I saw the sidelines of the match. The shadows around the edges of the main event in which dear Ruthie moved like a cat. Avoiding the doing. Parked in the middle of her Being.

I sat and waited for her approach. On her own time. And she came when that time was right.

I perched on an armchair, turquoise blue with raised floral patterning, and plenty of surface area for the both of us. She slunk up and onto me. Curled into comfort and connection with another human body. And then tucked her head into her forearm.

No melodrama was present. This was authentic and deep pain for her little body and mind. We sat. I waited. I laid a gentle hand upon her back and felt her aliveness pulsing. I thought she may have fallen asleep with her heavy head on her arm and body sinking into my bony frame of mother.

The others left the room. I felt her twitch with awakeness. And then she spoke ever so quietly. Ever so timidly of the truth at hand.

“I am excited – to go to the beach.
I am sad – that I am done with kindergarten. And I won’t see my teacher…”
Her breath caught and she choked over a lump in her delicate throat.
“And I am tired.”

I sat with chest open and full for this brave little girl. This girl who clearly knew that more than one thing was present in the given moment. This girl who was sitting into her discomfort with courage and support.

And then she said with a tad more fullness in her voice, “Actually, I think I am not just a little tired, I am REALLY tired.”

Silence. Space. Room for all of it in our chair.

Life can feel grippy and hard and impossible when it hits with a punch. And then there are moments of light and airy and bouncy.

And then there is a sneaky truth. That it is all present all of the time, dancing its way through light and across shadow.

No one presence in any given moment but instead a canvas of liberally radiant hues.

There is room for it all. Now. Then. Next.
Room for all of it.

Turn toward one another.
Turn within.
Cry and scream and laugh and blush.
Ride baby ride.
I’m over here waving at you. Blowing kisses to you. Smiling from heart to head. Crying from heart to belly. Loving you from this place of not knowing.

We ride. Oh yes, how we ride.

With gratitude,
Rachel

My arm continues to heal. And does not wish to type yet. Thus, another installment of Maui for you. It makes me smile as I see my ride on the round about of time. Back again in the moment of surrendering to less.

Time is a jolly jokester making us think she is linear.

Back to the islands we go.

—————–
Maui. Day 2.

I have done almost everything I can to avoid sitting down and writing this. From ground zero of inspiration, I first did email cleanup and made appointments. Then I figured I should get dressed. Then I renewed library books (on the phone since I’m in Hawaii). Then I decided I was definitely hungry and needed a snack. And now I’m out of distractions. Because I’m sitting in the middle of paradise with no kids, no to do list, and just me myself and I. I have an island full of things I could do.

And. I’m. Just. Sitting. Here.

Earlier, at least I was watching the chickens.

They are insane. You can see their incredibly airiness as they blow themselves and each other around the yard. And they don’t stop chattering. They disappear into the tall, thick, pokey sugar cane field yobble sqwabling at one another.

“WHERE ARE YOU!?”

“I DON’T KNOW!! WHERE ARE YOU?”

“I’M OVER HERE!!!!”

“WHERE IS OVER HERE?”

“BAH!”

“BAH!”

“ACKKKKK!!!”

And by some miracle they coalesce back in the green yard of my Air Bnb and they proceed to run around in circles.

At one point, I thought I was going to get to see a cock fight. But the two combed roosters just ran at each other and pretty much sideswiped one another with a forgetfulness of their surge of rage.

No excitement there. Lots of garble but circles. Circles. And they ran more circles.

My favorite part may have been when it started raining and they were all running around together in a pod – with a straggler or two behind – looking for a place to shelter. It’s Maui. These are wild chickens. And they are panicking over rain. I think. Maybe. Who knows? Maybe there was a dude looking for dinner in the cane field and I never saw him. Who am I to doubt the native chickens? Or at least the acclimated chickens. Because I am definitely not acclimated.

I can feel my heavy and my thick and my tired. Yesterday was a doing day of wandering, seeing, and settling. Today I need some stillness. I want to do it all. But I need to do very little.

I know that I am here to do very little. That’s a tad infuriating when you’re on a gorgeous island on which the weather changes every 30 seconds. Within the course of an hour, there is pouring rain, startling blue skies, coarsing winds, and thick cloud immersions. The weather is fickle here and now. I move from sweatshirt to t-shirt. From pants to capris. From no socks to socks. In every combination possible, I feel the elements of spring in the heavy humidity (my host says this is as humid as it gets), in the summer cleansing and clearing rains (everyone is saying this is way more rainfall than they’ve had recently), in the fallish dead and decaying leaves piled and browning beside the lanai (no one has tried to explain those away to me but I think the trick is that I haven’t asked about them), and in the wintery bite of the wind last evening which descended into my bones on the central part of the island. After a relaxing and settling somatic movement class, any released muscles contracted to guard my defenseless frame of a body against the cold whip. Brrr.

4 seasons. One day. Over and over again, they ride.

One full day. I have been here one full day. And the weather has me feeling like it is a full year. The seasons in their constant turn. Others may say island life doesn’t have four seasons like the mainland. No doubt that is true. But change here is unrelenting in a whole different way. Is that why the locals inherited a deep sense of nature? Because she is constantly shaping, shifting, and moving hour to hour and even minute to minute here? Because she always has a new secret to reveal? Because she doesn’t let you hold too tightly to one moment as you don’t know when that sunshine will obscure. When that blue sky will draw clouds in sleep. When the quiet of stillness will be smothered by the winds of smooth.

The chickens run in circles. I sit still.

What’s the difference really?

Cluck cluck,
Rachel

On April 5th, I broke the head of my humerus in three places. The subsequent days have involved copious amounts of humility, gratitude, anger, surrender, frustration, and surrender again in wave upon wave. As a reward for this riding of Is, my healing is going extraordinarily well. And I’ve been told to “Keep doing exactly what you’re doing.” Which is beautifully affirming by our western medicine that an integrative approach to feeling it all and responding – again and again – with compassion is not only therapeutic for the mind and soul but also a broken bone.

As well as super irritating. Because it means I get to lean in longer to feeling and riding serious (for me) physical restriction and ongoing VERY active mindfulness of how much I’m doing and how much I’m balancing the doing with stillness. It’s all fascinating always. And annoying sometimes as well.

As I embrace a new level of mastery in slowing down, I thought it could be interesting to share a different side of me. The piece below was never intended for public consumption but really, why not? Every one of you has felt all of what I have felt in the ride of my life. Some of you more, some of you less. But there is a current of like experience that we all share.

We ride the wave of our own individual moment and yet know another will pass by anytime on their own wave. And we know that another has caught this exact same wave of internal expression in the past. Or that another will very soon in the future.

So come on in for a visit… this is the first reflection in unedited form that I wrote when I was in Maui back in January. It comes from the same well spring of all that I write to you. Just a tad less polish than when I open with the intention of Being Seen.

—————–
Maui. Day 1.

I’m avoiding writing this morning on the computer. Because I feel as if I missed the magical moment. The moment earlier when the wind was in charge. When it was breeze that was the loudest voice. And she came with her strength and ebbed with her rest. Over and over.

Now, there is a freakin’ cacophony of doves overshadowing the wind. The breeze is behind them. I think. But the damn birds – and roosters – won’t shut up. They are so happy to see the sunshine. To wake. And the magical stillness of the night sky – of brushing palm leaves and faintly crashing waves and spattering raindrops – has faded into the background. I have to listen so much quieter to hear it. I watch a dove out my wind and he bows to me over and over again. Tuck and bow, up and straight, tuck and bow, up and straight. Tail pops up, head dives down, tail pops up, head dives down. He won’t stop moving.

Aw, crap. Now there are two doing the weaving and bobbing.

Framed by the silhouette of palm and against a backdrop of the softest blue sky. It is more white than blue in its morning filter. The damn birds want to sit on the same flimsy branch. Ack! One just gave up and flew straight toward my window. I heard it “thump” on the roof above. And now its coo is close. So close.

Red flowers dot the unknown gnarl of bush plant in front of me.
They are bright with life.

The other dove just took a dive to the ground. Can’t see it anymore. It’s hanging out where gravity assisted its landing.

The palm fronds continue to blow. Now that I don’t have the doves in my line of sight, I can see the fronds better. Less distraction.

They are sharp against the white blue sky. They look like blades – not something soft billowing. They are slicing moment by moment and breeze by breeze. Up close at least.

The tree further away does look more like a dancer. She looks light and free in her branches. Hard and compact in her nestling of coconuts at the heart of her trunk.

Dance morning. Dance. Where matter meets air. And wind meets space. And space meets time. And time meets the moment.

The moment will never die. This moment Is always. Whether we’re here or not. Whether this planet exists or is gone. This moment continues. Always. Infinite. A thread of all. Holding us.

So small. So small we are. And yet with such vastness of the universe in our very center. Holding both at once – these two extremes of infinity and micro me – it is, overwhelming. Heart crashing. It threatens my human existence.

It confirms my eternal realm.

—-
And that dear friends was an unfiltered freeze frame of my life. l’ll send a few more from Maui in the coming weeks. Please excuse any cursing to creative flow.

May you ride your wave as I ride mine.

Aloha,
Rachel

“John,” I say to my 8 year old who stands on the other side of our green like the sea waves of a counter top, “what word would you use to describe me?”

“What!?” the kid exclaims as he looks at me with saucer on-the-spot eyes.

My husband snickers beside me and freezes. He leans on the counter, chin in hand and ellbow resting with gravity. He tilts his head at John and I can almost hear his silent wonderment of, “How is this kid going to pull off an answer here???”

I ignore my husband and focus my curiosity on poor unsuspecting John.

He pauses with an “Oh no” face. Takes a deep breath. Closes his eyes and waits.

“Shake your head like you’re clearing an etch-a-sketch,” I counsel ever-so-helpfully.

His eyes pop open and glow with certainty, He connects light to light as he looks at me.

“And.” 

He says this word with clarity and conviction.

I smile. Joy explodes from inside out to be Seen by this wise Being in a little boy’s shell.

My husband meanwhile throws his hands up in the air and, again, I can almost hear him in his inner musing, “If ONLY he could feed ME this stuff!”

And.

Well, yes. And is Me. I Am All of It. Just as You are All of It. Just as this Earth is All of It. Just as the seasons are All of It. Just as 7.7 billion of us are each and every one, All of It.

It.
The achy and throbbing of loss.
The light and airy of happy.
The hot and prickly of mad.
The spacious and steady of joy.
More…. more… more…

I am – We are – All of It.

And.

Contentment is not static. It is dynamic as the years, the seasons, the days, the minutes. Contentment is joy regardless of the landscape we are passing through.

Contentment is letting It All in. No man left behind. Our wholeness expanding by each additional minute of this life experience.

If you are ready to explore your Wholeness, I would love to work with you. Whether it be by privates, an upcoming fall retreat, or pre-study for my 2020 teacher training, there is so much of you that awaits your attention.

And in that beautiful More of You awaits indescribable contentment, joy and gratitude regardless of the moment in play.

I would be honored to be one of your guides. Come along – let’s explore.

Be well,
Rachel

I have procrastinated until the 11th hour on this message to you all. Even as I write, I can feel the sinuses below my eyes pulsing, the left side of my jaw subtly aching, and my right temple alive with some kind of little sharp stabbing thing.

I feel exhausted. For a multitude of reasons known and ever more unknown, I am exhausted in this moment.

I say to 6 year old Ruthie standing beside me, “Can you tell me what I should write?”

“About what?” she asks.

“I don’t know,” I say.

Then I pause…

With that acknowledgment, I also know.

I’m in my not knowing space.

It is a space with which I am familiar. It is a gift of a space as it means I’m not limited by my likes or dislikes, my preferences or avoidances, or a plethora of other boxes that we tend to put around our contentment.

It can simultaneously (and not surprisingly) also be a scary space as not knowing is huge. It is vast. It is infinite.

I am grateful that it is a space where I have learned to ride the moment because the moment is ever changing and a mystery constantly in play. Unfolding. Unwinding. Revealing what Is in exchange for what we think should Be.

I don’t have words to share with you because I am a blank slate right now. I am riding through space at whatever crazy speed this earth flies (67,000 mph according to a Google search).

I am in the place where I’m riding some epic waves of feeling – many are towering and mighty in power. And I am getting sucked under some – thrown for a tumble or two before coming up for air. And as a breather at times, I am catching some smaller and sweeter waves – glimpses of simplicity of the Now in children, breeze, birds and sunshine.

And to support myself in the place of not knowing, I need Space and Rest. I need stillness and dear friends. I need sunshine and the mourning dove. I need trust and surrender.

I have faith that each will continue to meet me in the moment that I need it.

Now is the moment to serve me, to care for me, to love me deeply. I shall do so. And if closing your eyes for a moment and sending your compassion my way is an option, I accept it with open arms.

And, closing my eyes in this moment, I send the same to you.

I send my gratitude for any kindness you share with the world today,
I send my compassion for your pain and suffering,
and I send my deep trust in your skillful navigation of your own dear and beautiful life.

Be well,
Rachel

I considered not sending this note in this way. The doubts abound:
“What if they don’t understand the program?”
“What if I’m not explaining how it can benefit them?”
“What if I didn’t include enough about how I teach asana differently?”
What if… what if… what if….

But then, I received and read my teacher trainees’ weekly reflections. And for, oh, roughly the 24th time (because this was their 24th weekly reflection), I sat so very still in awe of these humans exploring Being.
I couldn’t hold them back from a world deeply in need of their innate gifts.

So, come along fear and doubt. I can hold your hands and we’ll go ahead together.

Some of you will read what follows and go, “Oh… how interesting. I want to know more.”

Some of you will slide over the words with scanning eyes and close the email and move quickly onward into your day of plenty.

Some of you will lodge it as a needling thought. But it will go to sleep in part of your brain. Waiting for another time. Perhaps a latter prod from me. Or from another part of your world.

Yet it will be there tucked away. Waiting for you. Once you are ready to return and to give it your loving attention.

Now it is time to share what I wish to share. And for you to receive as you need to receive.

Over four years of training to become a Yoga Therapist, I fell in love with my body and its quirks and blips. I fell in love with the handful of roots that grow my infinite thoughts. I fell in love with the upspring of emotions that color my Being.

All of them. Every single one is worth loving. Every single one is worth honoring.

Because each of them is part of Whole me.

Which is also why I was pulled to create my own 200 hour teacher training. I saw that most introductory teacher trainings were about the poses. And some are about the history and philosophy. And some are about both.

But very few – none that I knew of – were about the Being and the hard, hard, hard practical work of loving your whole self in yoga – a state of union – between the body’s objective sensations, the mind’s thoughts and emotions, and the weave that brings them all together.

In September, I launched my teacher training. Along with my dear friend and co-teacher, Susan Jackson, RYT500, we’ve watched four beautiful humans meet themselves in a Whole new way. I am immensely proud of these individuals for their dedicated work. They have the typical 180 in-person hours of training that are required by Yoga Alliance (and thus will all be certified 200 hour Registered Yoga Teachers at the completion of the program), but they also have over 140 additional non-contact hours of home based work that they are doing.

In this home work (and hopefully home play) of self-reflection, learning biomechanics (how joints are moving to create the poses), feeling what they feel on the mat and beyond, taking classes, observing classes, and teaching classes, they go WAY above and beyond what I’ve seen required in any other 200 hour program.

We have two individuals that were already certified as yoga teachers but wanted to learn more AND differently. As did our first time 200 hour trainees. The class spans three generations – an invaluable gift of varying insights and curiosities. They have current experience with grandchildren, empty nesters, and small children. They have work (and life) experience in corporate, public policy, education, and bodywork. They knit. They sew. They hike. They sit and drink chai.

And then there is the stuff that makes me pause right now and smile a knowing smile.

They are silly. They are introspective. They are scared. They are happy. They are sad. They are fearful. They are nervous. They are courageous. They are tough. They are resilient. They are smart. They are curious. They are compassionate. They are. They are. They are.

(Oh, did I mention that they are GREAT dancers?)

It is not a romantic ride of a teacher training. It is bumpy and curvy and even grinding at times because they are doing new work. And new work takes skill as well as attention in order to transform into familiarwork.

But man, the view can be spectacular from that drive. Spectacular when the landscape of the moment opens to your eye. When stillness meets you in the midst of loud. When understanding settles in beyond the chaos of your anger. When surrender greets you somewhere behind the darkness of your solitude.

My heart swells with the hard and beautiful work these individuals are doing to understand how their bodies move biomechanically, what is and what is not real within those bodies, and how their thoughts and emotions intertwine in that dance.

And the fact that they will get to share their wholeness with others as teachers afterward? Well, that was just an audible exhale of giddiness from the center of my chest. (To which my son sitting beside me questioned, “Are you okay?!”)

Only 6 months into their 12 month training, these yoga teachers already know how to see themselves and others with softer eyes, how to be with a class and not just stand in front of a class, how to think about poses and body movement in an analytical way, and how to feel what they feel and let it authentically infuse their teaching. And they still have 6 months to go.

They are amazing.

And more so, they are learning day by day how amazing they actually are.

I’d like to invite you to consider coming along for the scenic hike of our next class which will run from March 2020 – February 2021. If you’ve ever read the children’s book “Going on a Bear Hunt,” this year long program may feel most similar to that: swishy meadows, splashy rivers, thick mud, dark forests, swirling snowstorms… and sunshine. Such radiant sunshine.

My chosen way of training teachers is different than the “normal”, there is no doubt. My chosen way takes courage and fortitude. It takes persistence and curiosity. It takes a leap of faith straight into the center of you. And in doing so, you have the opportunity to arrive at a place where your impact of Being with your life and all those whom you touch – students and beyond – can be drastically different.

I do hope you’ll consider coming with us next year.

Please email me to request program information and to setup a phone chat to talk about next steps for you in the application process. Depending upon your experience with me, the steps of the process will look different. I’m looking forward to meeting this next group, to sharing what I have to offer, and to learning all they have to teach me.

I would love to talk with you if you are ready, Rachel@PureResilienceYoga.com

Take good care,
Rachel

“What did you learn in Hawaii!?”
“How was your trip?”
“What was it like with your teachers?”

hmm… how to use a limited supply of words to convey the infinite rainbow of feeling is ever the adventure. Let’s explore.

I am now back at my house. I am back with my husband and kiddos. I am back with my kitchen and familiar cooking supplies. I am back with my co-teacher and our teacher trainee group. I am back with my office and my dear clients. I am back with carpool and grocery shopping.

And it doesn’t feel that different from Hawaii.

Sure, it is cooler here than it was on Maui. It is louder in my house here than it was in my Air BnB. It is less sweet in the air here than it was in the botanical gardens that I visited.

But the stillness of the moment is in both places. The joy of life is in both places. The heartbreak of life is in both places. And the learning and watching is in both places.

It is in all places.

This morning, I picked up our dear neighbor’s son for carpool. My 5 year old, Ruthie, was sitting beside the open window inches away from my dear neighbor friend. As I began to say goodbye and to haul off our combined crew to school, Ruthie emerged from her quiet observing of our conversation to ask neighbor friend,
“May I show you something?”

This neighbor friend is wise beyond the task at hand. She does not rush. She does not rush others. She is curious. She is open. She is present.

‘Yes, I would love that,” she replied to Ruthie.

“Hold on just a minute, I have to find it…” said Ruthie as she dug into a bottomless zipper pouch of her backpack. I was a tad irritated with this delay. A tad curious. And a tad in awe of neighbor friend’s stunning patience.

Ru shuffled, pushing chapstick and pencils and wads of paper aside, ‘”It’s in here somewhere…” she murmured. “There!” she softly exclaimed. And she pulled out a toe sized, pink plastic teddy bear charm with a tiny blue rhinestone in the belly and a two inch broken beaded lanyard attached. She handed it to dear neighbor friend in silence.

“Oh,” said neighbor friend, “That is lovely, Ruthie.”

“I got it from the Woo-Hoo Wagon at school,” Ruthie said with her signature gentle demeanor yet proud and secure delivery. Then her face dropped, “But it broke already – so I can’t put it on my backpack.”

In my mind ran the rough edged voice, “Man, that sucks. Guess we’ll trash that.” Luckily I’ve learned to stay quiet (a bit more often) when it isn’t my moment.

Meanwhile, neighbor friend tilted her head and looked at Ruthie as she held the charm lightly, “You know what, Ruthie… I think I can fix this today if you’d like. I can get out my tiny drill and put a new hole in it. Would you like that?”

Ruthie lit up. I mean lit up. The sun rose in her face and she shone upon the world.

It was glorious to behold this freeze frame of life.

My neighbor friend saw Ruthie, offered her own authentic kindness and connected across space with my dear girl.

And that, my friends, was Hawaii.

It was freeze frame after freeze frame of the glorious connections between humans.

Across time and space, I found that there was support and love available everywhere I was willing to open my eyes and ears to it. In a place where I knew no one, I found full acceptance. I found an ever expanding family of humans Being. I found community and deep connection in our shared hard and the inevitable joy that can sprout within the hard when you allow both the rain and sun to infuse it. I found the grace that emerges when we can honor one another exactly as we are without fear, pity or the desire to fix each other.

Watch and listen.
Watch and listen here.
Watch and listen there.
Watch and listen, Be, and evolve.

When our eyes are open and attuned to it, family abounds and love penetrates deeply through the shadows of fear. Or the shadows of need. Or the shadows of doubt.

My Ruthie heard through the silence a person who could see her very real 5 year old disappointment. And that person had the skilled hands of a craftsman and the open heart of a healer. May each of us embrace our own skilled hands and open heart. And may we share those gifts copiously in our own self-compassion and in service of others.

That, my dear friends, is what I found in Hawaii.

Take good care,
Rachel

My New Year’s resolution is… to jump rope.

My 8 year old son and I are doing this together. We started yesterday and we did it again today. Right now, I want to do 50 jumps per day. But I recognize that some days, I may simply step through the rope a single time. Some days, I may leap through it alternating legs up and down my driveway like a jack rabbit on Pop Rocks. I have absolutely no idea where I’ll be each day or what life will throw at me. But my resolution and intention is to respond to that day with exactly what I have left in my tank. Whether the needle is at empty and I do the single step through or it is at a quarter tank full and I can do a little more, I will listen. And I will respond with love and compassion for where I’m at.

Day in and day out, I want to allow my feet to leave the ground and to meet it once more.

Day in and day out, I want to watch my story unfold beside my husband’s story. Beside each of my kids’ stories. Beside so many whom I love as they write their own stories.

Day in and day out, I want to see the joy within sorrow and the sorrow within joy.

Day in and day out, I want to help others and I want to let others help me.

Day in and day out, I want to feel what I feel and notice when I make myself wrong for it.

Day in and day out, I want to slow down even more. To do nothing even more. And to practice the ancient art of “hanging out” even more.

Day in and day out, I want to support others as they explore deeper meaning and impact in their lives and I want to be supported as I explore deeper meaning and impact in my life.

Day in and day out, I want to see when my fears stop me up and to see when my snowballish striving stops me up.

Day in and day out, I want to listen for more. Ever more. Beyond sight, beyond sound, beyond touch, beyond taste, beyond smell – the Ever More.

This will all unfold as the story ahead unfolds. As the pages turn they will show me the scenes, the characters and the plot lines that hold my intentions thick within their wonder. And in the space between the words, will rest the Feeling. The copious, indescribable, earth shattering, cosmos shaking Feeling of this whole thing called Life.

I don’t have to make it happen. It’s already happening. I just get to sit back, do my work, and watch it all unfold.

Yes, more than anything else. I want to watch it all unfold.

Oh, and for now, I’ll jump rope. John’s intention is to do 5 jumps in a row and he said he’ll see what comes next.

I’m in, kid. I’m in.

With love and admiration for each of you,
Rachel