Gwen

The woman seated beside me on the edge of the bench - the one sitting ladylike with her hands clasped, spine straight and wearing a demure smile, is Gwen. She passed away last Sunday from cancer at the age of 57.

This picture was taken a couple of years ago, when we had a professional photo shoot done at the yoga studio. Here, we were hanging out waiting for the photographer to finish taking shots in the classroom. I love this photo for so many reasons - because it shows us enjoying each other's company and because it shows our personalities outside of being teachers at the front of the classroom. I am trying to mimic Margit's classic photo pose, Margit and Pat are cracking up, Anna is wearing her beautiful photogenic smile, Heleen and Sharon in the back are just trying to behave, and Gwen is trying not to laugh.

Gwen was - is - one of my favorite people of all time. She is a devotional yogi, meaning that she studied in depth the philosophy and wisdom and spirituality of yoga, and lived and practiced it daily in her life. She is learned and wise and funny and really, really down-to-earth. I loved taking her workshops and I learned so much from her. There was so much more I wanted to ask, so much more I hoped to learn.

When I arrived in Punta Gorda in 2012, we were at the end of our time living and traveling in our RV. It was a tough time for us, because we had planned to continue that journey, but I wasn't doing well living without roots, and we were making the decision to stop and settle here. We were grieving the letting go of our dream.

I found The Yoga Sanctuary and hoped that I would be able to join the teaching staff, but it wasn't a certainty. It was December of 2012; the studio was decorated for Christmas, with stockings hung across the mantel and down the stair railing. Each stocking bore the name of one of the teachers or staff, and one of those names was Gwen. Gwen - Gwendolyn - was my mother's name. There are not so very many Gwens in the world, and when I saw that name on a stocking, it instantly comforted me and I began to think that perhaps this place would be a safe haven. Gwen was not on the regular teaching staff, so I probably didn't even meet her for some months after I joined the studio. But in those early months, it was the remembered comfort of seeing that name on a Christmas stocking that helped me start to feel at home.

For a time, long before I met her, Gwen lived at the Himalayan Institute and studied with her guru, Sri Swami Rama. In one of her workshops, Gwen talked about how her teacher became ill and she could no longer talk to him. She said, "I was so glad when he finally passed away, because then I could talk to him all the time!"

That resonated so much with me because of my experience with my mom. She had Alzheimer's, and for a long time, she was still physically here but mentally gone. When she passed away in 2011, I'd  had that same thought that Gwen expressed, "Thank goodness! Now I can talk to her again."

In yoga, we believe that death is like stepping into a different room. The physical person is no longer here for us to see and touch, but their essence, their spirit is here, there, everywhere. I am sad that I cannot see Gwen and hear her voice and her laugh, but she would not want any of us to be sad (though, to be clear, she did NOT want to leave us!). She would want me to think of it as she did when her guru passed - that now I can talk to her all the time. She may be sorry on that score - I plan to talk her ear off.

Gwen, I love you and am grateful for the privilege of having known you on this earthly plane.

On Becoming Whole

I'm teaching a workshop called, "Yoga and the Creative Heart," in which we use yoga practices (yoga poses, meditation, breath, affirmations, chant and self-exploration) to identify and remove obstacles to manifesting our creative dreams and open ourselves to creative inspiration.

During our guided meditation this past week, I invited the students to offer up the open ended question/statement, "I am..." and allow for inner or divine guidance to respond. When the meditation ended, I asked them to write down anything that came up during the meditation that was interesting, helpful or surprising.

One woman, a widow in her 70's, told us that only one word had come to her in response to "I am...", and that word was "whole."

I am whole.

She talked about how, for most of her life, she was always a "part" of something - a couple, a family and so on, that made her whole. But most of those things she was a part of are in the past, and she realized that she now feels whole in herself.

We all thought this was a beautiful and interesting insight, and I found myself thinking about it later on.

Throughout our lives, we are part of many things: a family, a school, a club, a church, a community, a workplace, a partnership, a relationship and so on. So to a large degree, we tend to define ourselves in that way - a mother, a wife, an accountant, a writer, an Episcopalian, an American, a yoga teacher...a player among other players in the movies of our lives, collectively forming a whole made from separate parts.

But then, at some point, all of the things we have been a part of become incorporated into the totality of who we are, until, rather than we being a part of them, they become a part of us. The separation between ourselves and our experiences and relationships and roles is erased, and they are forever in us and part of us, fully and completely integrated.

We are whole.

Then, even if a situation changes or ends, all of what we are and were and experienced and felt and loved is in us, part of us, and we remain whole.

It's a Sign

Last weekend, I attended a silent meditation retreat with two of my teacher friends. On the way there, one of them asked, "If you wake up with a song playing over and over in your head, does it mean something?" We had an active discussion about this, in which I shared a story about a time when that happened to me, and very soon after, it became clear to me that the song really was a sort of "sign" - that it was part of a message that was being sent to me from spirit or the universe or God or however you like to think of a higher power.

My friend's song was Funky Side by Donna the Buffalo and she had heard it recently at a live concert. She played a little of it on her ipod in the car. It had a great beat, but none of us could make out the words, so we couldn't say what the message for her might be, if there was one.

At the retreat, the leader shared with us the story of a sequence of terrible events that she had experienced some time back. Her house was lost in a flood, her father-in-law died and then her mother died, all in quick succession. During this time of heartbreak and loss and confusion, she came across the book, A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle. She said that as soon as she started reading it, she knew that it held a message for her that would change her life. It was that book that led her to take the training to become a meditation leader.

I tried reading that book many years ago when it first came out, but I had no idea then what Tolle was talking about! In the intervening years, I became interested in spiritual self-help and then pursued becoming a yoga teacher. I was exposed to the teachings of Buddha and deepened my understanding of spirituality. When our meditation leader read to us from A New Earth at the retreat, I understood everything Tolle was saying. Not only did I realize how far I had come in my understanding of so many things, I felt that this was a sign that I was now ready to re-read that book to find out what messages it might hold for me in the present - messages that perhaps I just wasn't ready for back when I first tried reading it.

My teacher-friend with the song in her head told us that she really needed that meditation retreat because her mind was on overload. She felt disconnected and stressed out. The retreat helped her reconnect to herself and reminded her to take time for meditation on a regular basis. She said that our outdoor walking meditation was especially powerful for helping her feel her connection to nature and the earth and all living things.

Yesterday, she texted me the lyrics to Funky Side, saying, "I'm pretty sure now that there WAS a message for me and that's why this kept playing in my head." Here are the words:

Funky Side by Donna the Buffalo

In the rain that falls
On jive street
In the truth that forms
On the rising steam
I'm here cleaning my connection
To the forces that be

In a trance of god
On the funky side
In a trance of love
On the funky side

In the shape I'm in
You can see for miles
Shooting through the cloud
On a magic sound
I'm here cleaning my connection
To everything around

The groove is getting deeper
My heart's open wide
So good of you to come along
We'll focus on the main beam
And we'll go to a world in which we belong.


I don't know about you, but I'm pretty sure she was right about there being a message for her.  So often in my life, I've asked God for "a sign" to help me know what to do or to let me know I am on the right track. And often, I would get what I thought was a sign but I wasn't sure, so I'd ask for another one - a sign that the first sign was a sign. I guess I'm not the only one who does that kind of thing, because I came across this and it made me laugh out loud:




If only things would always be that clear!