to Myself

I am not sure if Yoga found me or I found Yoga, I began my journey in a baggy shirt and sweatpants at the local community center in Santa Clara, CA. A dear friend of mine invited me to go. I remember vaguely hearing the word yoga here and there growing up. I remember it was a dark room. The teacher was kind. We did some movements, but mostly what stood out to me was the first time I ever tried meditation at the end of her class. At 16 years old I had never even heard of psychedelics and had no idea that the mind was capable of going anywhere but in the small corners where I felt confined and trapped. I remember that without any effort, I was on my first journey that involved colors, lights, space, and freedom from the mind of a teenager who had developed an eating disorder as a way to cope with stress in my family life. It tasted like something that I knew I needed, like nourishment, like an open field to run free in filled with soft corners and light. 

I immediately became obsessed with the health and wellness section at Barnes and Noble and was on my quest to find that sacred space that I journeyed to that one time in the dark community center room. I bought the book Creative Visualizations that had a candle on the cover of it, and it mentioned that yoga was the first step to mediation. Over the years I would drop in here and there at other community college yoga courses, one in fact had us making animal noises and rolling around on the ground. This was the time before yoga pants were invented and it was ok and also encouraged to wear your pjs. I remember walking across the quad of the community college in Santa Cruz, CA having another moment in time that everything felt open, spacious and connected. I was taking a course on Eastern Philosophy trying to find my way towards what I was so desperately wanting to know. My self, healing. This was my first taste of what an awakening felt like. My eyes widened, I saw the person sitting by the water fountain the same as me, the person that they were speaking to, as one. Suddenly what felt like I was stuck in my own little world showed me that no, we are all here together. From the ME to the WE. 

I started practicing on VHS tapes, I had a Rodney Yee AM/PM yoga class that I would play and practice in my room on the carpeted floor amongst my Red Hot Chili Peppers posters and cluttered walls of other alternative/grunge musicians at the time… until either the tape or the VCR broke down, not sure which one happened first. Yoga always seemed to make its way back to me in one way or another. I remember Rodney’s calming demeanor, amazing long black hair, and how effortless it felt for him to move with such grace. 

The next time I really fell into the hands of the practice of yoga was hovering above a rice paddy field in Ubud, Indonesia. After finishing a holistic nutrition school in Berkley, CA I started to work at an Integrative Hospital called the Institute for Health and Healing. My boss at the time was an intuitive medium and shared with me in a reading on my last week that in my travels I would find something that would direct me onto my path, and she was so sure that she said if I returned back to my job she wouldn’t hire me because I needed to find what was out there… my calling.

After traveling to Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, and the Philippines, the last part of the trip was in Bali. After landing in Ubud, I decided to take a yoga class as a way to compliment my fire dancing (the reason I was traveling in southeast asia, and also was my spiritual practice at the time). The first class the teacher told me to meditate while hundreds of mosquitos managed to nibble every inch of my legs, and said that if I was enlightened I could stop them from biting me… this wasn’t my teacher. 

So I didn’t give up, and went to the amazing sanctuary, the Yoga Barn where I found her. The teacher was authentic, funny, fun, and almost instantly what went from taking one class a day turned into two, what went from wanting to be in Bali a week turned into a month. I knew that my yearning to find out the answers to questions I hadn’t even known to ask was in this practice. My way home was through. Widya was the teacher and she was radiating light that I knew I also had within myself that was so far covered with disconnection from my body after years and years of not knowing how to heal myself, shame, guilt and just being so far away from hearing its many cries for healing. I started to learn little subtle details like what feels good, what feels challenging, where my mind goes in forward folds, and how I can meet the edge of discomfort and stay in it without getting distracted. And more than anything I began to hear and sense my own voice that was trying to make it’s way through for years. 

On returning back to San Francisco, which was home at the time, I immediately went on the search for my first 200 hour training. This was the way through. 

Through this journey I've come to believe in the magic of creating sacred containers—whether that’s a retreat in the mountains, a ceremony with intention, or a breath-led practice in the quiet of your living room. I’m here to hold space, ask questions, and move with you toward truth, beauty, and liberation.

Grateful to my wonderful teachers: Keith Borden, Jasmine Tarkeshi, Joy Ravelli, Katie Silcox, Jane Austin, Annie Carpenter, Hannah McLane MD

my journey home