Looking back…

At previous journal entries, emails that I had written to friends, letters written to boyfriends that I never sent has made me realise how far I’ve come in this lifetime.

I know that sounds arrogant but I don’t mean it that way. This entry isn’t about me, it’s about all of us.

Reading through all these things, allowed me to see how immature I was before, how much my emotions mattered and how much I mattered above everyone else. Especially in the past eight years, it’s evident to me that growth happened in leaps and bounds. My secret? Yoga. Specifically, a yoga program called Inner Engineering. I’ll leave you to check it out for yourselves if you want: innerengineering.com/online.

For me, even though I was raised in a Christian home that was against anything else spiritual, yoga some how always called out to me and I knew I had to explore it. Inner Engineering was my way into yoga and it worked wonders for me. I’d recommend it to anyone but I don’t think it’s the only way. I wouldn’t say that because while Inner Engineering is incredible, there are so many other paths to Yoga.

For most of us, yoga means going to a gym in a cute outfit and twisting ourselves into all kinds of postures. But that’s not the Yoga I learned. I learned, that Yoga ultimately means Union. Being one with the universe and all of creation. Experientially knowing that just as we are a part of the universe, that the universe is also a part of us.

By this definition, would it be safe to say that perhaps, all spiritual paths ultimately lead to Yoga? Because after all, aren’t all paths leading towards some form of inner wellbeing, of experiencing life beyond what we know of life and experiencing something bigger than ourselves?

My experience of Christianity wasn’t in going to church every Sunday, listening to a sermon and going for Bible study classes. I might have been at a Youth Camp in church where we had tons of activities, praise and worship and learning about God’s Word. But what impacted me the most were the early mornings when we were given some quiet time to reflect on something we had learned in the day before during sermon, or on a Bible verse from The Daily Bread.

Whatever it is, all I know is that in those quiet times I sat in contemplation, I was in communion with something bigger than myself. At that time, I identified that as God. Today, I experience it as Life; as Creation.

Having recently experienced a glimpse of the Shamanic world, I feel deeply that there are so many paths leading to the same thing — experiencing something more than what our five senses perceive of this life. Oh how I wish I knew this as a teenager writing angrily in my journal about how my ex-boyfriend wronged me!

If I had just a little bit more guidance to find that center within where everything becomes just a little bit clearer, I might’ve saved myself a hell of a lot of heartache. But then again, without that heartache, I might not be who I am today.

I have a nephew and a niece who are 10 and 8 respectively. I see how they’re slowly being shaped by society and I want so much for them to know that no matter what happens in their lives, that their experience of Life, is within them. I want for them to know, that in their cloudiest moments, all they really need to do, is close their eyes and find that stillness within to gain clarity. I want them to know that the control they so desperately seek to achieve on the outside, really actually lies within them.