the yoga of small business

mettle

2011-12-08T13:16:00.000-08:00

A couple of weeks ago I picked up a memoir written by a woman who is brutally raped and beaten by a stranger when she is a freshman in college.* A certain professor comes with her when she testifies before the grand jury. The professor is the only person she wants to be there. Not her mother, not her friends, not her sister. She wants her professor to be there because her professor has mettle.

Google says:

met·tle (mtl)

1. Courage and fortitude; spirit: troops who showed their mettle in combat.

2. Inherent quality of character and temperament.

I was completely fascinated by the word. And still am. It describes exactly what I want. Perhaps the only thing I truly, deeply long for. Mettle. The ability to show up.

On some level, I knew, although I couldn't put my finger on why at first, that yoga gives me mettle.

So it's been slinking around in the back of my mind. And then yesterday, I did biofeedback for the first time in physical therapy. The therapist got me all set up on her table with lots of pillows and told me to relax. She attached electrical sensors to my ankles, a CO2 detector into my nose and a heart rate monitor to my ear.

What I saw was astonishing. At first, my muscles were not completely relaxed even though they felt like they were. My breath was not as deep as is considered optimal for health. My heart rate was good, but not in sync with my breath. The CO2 levels detected on the exhalation were lower than ideal.

And then I started breathing. The breath that we learn in yoga. I elongated my exhalation. That's all I did, and everything changed. My breath and heart rate became synchronized. The levels of CO2 increased so that I was letting out, literally, all the old air. My muscles relaxed. Not only did they feel relaxed, they actually were. It was quantifiable and I could see it on the computer screen. It completely amazed me, although now I'm not sure why I was surprised. Intuitively, I already knew it.

What happened was that I became stable, steady.

Asana: Steady pose.

Krishna tells Arjuna over and over again in the Bagavhad Gita, show up! Show up for this incredibly difficult war. Show up despite your fear and worry and grief. Show up. That's all there is. The result of the war is inconsequential; there is no other duty, nothing else of import in this life, than showing up for it.

Showing up is steadiness. Steadiness is mettle. So mettle is, very simply, showing up.

The body becomes stable when we really breathe. So go to yoga. If it takes 50 chaturangas to breathe, do it. If it takes three bolsters and six blankets to breathe, do it. Whatever it takes, do it. We get steadiness of the body, and we get steadiness of heart and mind. We become able to show up.

Show up for yourself: Deal with your abuse and your neglect and your anger and your fear and your grief. If you need to, go to therapy. Show up for your difficulties and your wild emotional rides. Do not run away. Do not check out. Do not claim ignorance. Do not hide behind willfullness and pride. Be awake, be vulnerable.

Show up for others: Be there when your friend is sick, when his mother dies, when he loses his partner or his job. Do not shy away. Do not cower. Go with your fear and your insecurity and your doubt. Go anyway.

Krishna is right. There really is nothing else.

*The book was Lucky by Alice Sebold. Very intense, but well worth reading.

I like it, but I don't want it.

2011-11-14T15:59:00.000-08:00

Last Friday, I went with a friend to a Buddhist meditation class. The topic was the Five Hindrances, one of which is sensual desire. The teacher told a story about a young, ascetic monk. A group of young nurses came for a course at the monastery, and the young monk's teacher asked him to attend. So imagine, please, this young, ascetic monk in a room full of hot Thai nurses.

When they were done with the class, the teacher asked the young monk, "So how was it being with all the hot Thai nurses?" (Or something to that effect.) The young monk replied, "I like it, but I do not want it."

On the car ride to the class, my friend and I were discussing our partying days, when a night out was thrilling and exciting, and we never knew what chaos was about to descend. We loved it. Neither of us drinks anymore, and we were pondering the lack of thrill in our lives. Fulfillment, sometimes; thrill, almost never. Even though I still love the idea of chaos and parties and not knowing what might happen next, I no longer desire it. I like it, but I don't want it.

You may remember reading about all my intentions post-break up. I was going to practice everyday, eat only non-processed food, write in the morning, and ride my bike instead of drive. I have gotten to my mat just about everyday since then, but the other things, not so much.

I spend a lot of time berating myself for lacking discipline. I was the smart kid in class who never did her homework. I'm the person who can't say no to another cookie. I buy stuff I don't need, and sometimes don't particularly want, and then find myself broke and stressed about money a week later. My entire life I have given in to what feels good in the moment, not what is healthy and sustainable in the long run. I have always given into sensual desire.

But this might not be entirely true. I quit drinking (and alcohol was my best friend). I quit nicotine after a fifteen-year, pack-a-day smoking habit. And it's been years. I quit cocaine and weed and one night stands and driving without insurance. To some degree, I have grown up.

When people point this out, I usually shrug. Taking credit for it seems inappropriate. Not smoking and not drinking, in particular, are big deals in my life, yet paradoxically they're not big deals. It's not that quitting was easy. It wasn't. It was painful and messy and it took a long, long time. It wasn't easy, but it became, at some point, perfectly clear that those things had to go.

I have to say that sometimes I still enjoy the smell of a freshly lit cigarette. The idea of a cold beer and a shot of tequila at the end of a stressful day can be appealing. I like them, but I do not want them.

The clarity that enabled me to break those addictions is a direct result of my yoga practice. There is real causation. One followed the other. And again, it's not that yoga made it easy (although it did relieve some of the discomfort), it's that the practice of yoga brought clarity. I simply knew what I had to do, and I did it. Willpower was unnecessary.

But there's fine tuning to be done, for sure. There are the cookies and the shopping and the love of the comfort of my car. Discipline based solely on willpower doesn't work for me. It's not sustainable. According to the research, we have a limited amount of willpower and it gets diminished all the time. We may be able to say no to the cookie, but later in the day, we will not be able to say no to the new yoga pants. Or vice versa. (If this is a topic that interests you, definitely read the book, Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength. NYT review here.)

What I'm learning (and forgetting and relearning) is that 100% of my willpower has to be dedicated to getting my body on the mat. When I do that, I get clarity. I'm able to say more often, "I like it, but I do not want it."

So I'll get to my mat, today at least, and have faith in what Pattabhi Jois told us, "Practice and all is coming."

Yoga for the 99%

2011-11-03T13:49:00.000-07:00

Some people are magically gifted with discipline. They wake up early, floss twice a day, enjoy a long morning practice, write novels, run marathons and are vegans. They do it seemingly efforlessly. It's just who they are.

But it's not me.

I've been back on the mat everyday, or at least most days. If you read it you know that I made a lot of other goals for myself in the last post. As it turns out, it wasn't so easy. I'm not perfect yet. But I have faith, and my experience tells me, that if I do my yoga first, everything else will follow. Eventually.

There's a saying from Twelve Step programs: "Keep Coming Back." Of course, they mean keep coming back to meetings even if they don't make sense or you keep drinking or whatever.

In meditation practice, it's given that the mind wonders, that we get distracted. The instruction is the same: keep coming back.

In my yoga practice, I know that I can keep coming back. I get distracted by relationships and world events (happening at the moment right down the street) and other goals and work and travel and family.

But I'm back and it feels right.

I really want to write about Square One, the little yoga studio in the little town of Emeryville that I started almost three years ago. It was such a dream then. Originally it was called "East Bay Yoga Cooperative" or some other mouthful, but the idea was the same. Yoga for the 99%.

I forget. Sometimes it just feels like a business, a job. I say yes and no and make mistakes and fix toilets and write emails and hope for the best. I lose sight of what it is I hoped for and dreamed about before we had a real location or yoga mats or instructors.

I wanted a yoga studio that had no barriers to entrance. Everyone could come, either by paying what they could or by volunteering, and when they came, they would feel welcome. They would not be put off because their clothes weren't right or because their bodies weren't ideal or because they were old or uncool or whatever it is that we think we are when we enter spaces and feel different and uncomfortable.

And so, once again, I'm coming back to that idea. Back to that story I held when I started, that we're not just another yoga studio. The Bay Area does not and did not need another yoga studio. We're providing a real and necessary service that no one else is providing. We really are. Absolutely anyone who wants to can practice at square one. We will make it happen.

At times I feel something close to guilt because I am not participating in the demonstrations downtown. I've always wanted a movement, something revolutionary, something populist, something that I really believe in. It's come to my city, and I'm not there. Am I a coward? Am I complacent?

Gandhi said, "Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it." So maybe it's okay that I haven't been arrested or tear gassed or spent the night in a tent downtown.

I get distracted and lost and discouraged. A lot. Over and over again. I guess we all do. It's nice to remember that I can keep coming back again and again and again, to whatever it is that is necessary and right to me. To my work and to my practice, which are, at their hearts, indistinguishable. No matter how far away I go.

Day Zero

2011-10-07T23:09:00.000-07:00

It's been just about a year since I've written anything here. Or written anything at all, other than Square One newsletters and solutions to math problems. I guess the good news is that Square One is still with us (we all had our doubts, didn't we?), and I've found a (much needed) way to supplement my income.

Where have I been? Well, I fell in love. Just the act of writing that makes me want to cry. And I've cried a lot. It's all great what they say about feeling your feelings and not running away and all that, but eventually I just have to keep moving.

Anyway, falling in love like that was a first for me. He was family. He was also my best friend and my lover. I'd never had all three in the same person. What an experience! I wouldn't trade it for anything.

But there's always a but. I gained a lot, but I lost a lot too. Eventually, at the end of a year, more or less, I found myself without a yoga practice, without a blog, and without a room where I could just go and be, a place to put my legs up the wall or kick into a handstand. I was always bumping into him and his things and his furniture and his life when I tried to spread. Through no fault of his. I really, really, really loved him, and I still do.

But I had to go.

So here I am, in a new apartment, sitting at my table, surrounded by boxes filled with coffee cups and sardines and paper plates, a little worried that I might see a roach, but really happy to be typing. Really happy to be making words out of the chaos and change that has been my life lately. (Sometimes it seems like my life is always chaos and change. I guess why not write about it?)

I want to eat home-cooked, vegetarian meals everyday, and I want to write (why not a novel?), and I want to practice, practice, practice. I also want to ditch the car.

Something tells me if I try to do it all at once, I will fail, so why try? I should try one thing and stick to that one thing and see what happens. (Actually, everyone should read Willpower by Roy F. Baumeiste and John Tierney. It seems the research would agree.)

But another part of me says, this is what I want, so why not just do it? I thought about those 40 day yoga challenges at some of the other yoga studios. So maybe I could do my own 40 day challenge.

This is what I want to do everyday for forty days:

1. Wake up and sit for ten minutes, then write.
2. Go to a yoga class or practice for at least one half hour. Preferably class. I just need that structure right now.
3. Eat unprocessed, whole foods.
4. Drive my car only when absolutely necessary.

Those are four very simple things that a lot of people do regularly without any thought at all. That's the thing with habits. As every human being on the planet knows, new habits, or coming back to old ones, takes enormous will. The habits that I already have are the easiest things in the world to do.

Of course, now it's published, so I will have to deal with you when you ask how it's going. If I shrug my shoulders and say something like, "Well, you know... It was a lot to do all at once, don't you think?" you will know what happened.

But if you keep seeing posts about how it's going, that means it's going. Tomorrow is Day One.

Does anybody want to do it with me?

back to the mat?

2010-09-15T10:01:00.000-07:00

This impermanence stuff sucks. The resolve and clarity of last week are basically gone. I want to text him 50,000 times a day and say, "No! Wait! Come back! I don't need anything. I'm sad and lonely and discouraged, and I can't sleep, and I liked it much better before when we were together." I haven't sent that text yet, thank God. Or not exactly that text. A lot of the time, I do want him back. I am quite sad and confused and not sure why we can't make it work. But I haven't heard from him, so somehow or another I just need to navigate impermanence, which is, along with suffering and egolessness, one of the marks, or truths, of life in Buddhism. According to Pema, fighting impermanence is the same as fighting life.

Spiritual truths can sure be irritating when we're in pain. I'm sick of the bright side. What I think I may be coming to though is that hanging out in pain is a big waste of time. I may have some choice in the matter. I keep telling myself how sad I am, and sometimes I am quite sad. But right now I don't feel sad. I'm just telling myself how sad I am. And how tired. And how it's unlikely I will ever meet anyone again. And what a shitty writer I am. And that no one wants to read this. And that I might as well cancel all my appointments and go back to bed.

But really, Katy? Let's check the facts. I'm not with this man because he stated clearly that he doesn't want to be in a relationship. That's the only way we know how to relate to each other, so there's not any reason (that I can think of) to hang out. People like and read my blog. You are reading my blog and every now and then I hear from you that you like it. I'm thirty-four and a catch; the odds are nil that my dating life is over. I have moments of real unhappiness, some of which I'm turning into art. I painted last night for the first time in years. I'm not wallowing. I'm getting out and doing what I have to do. I have friends who call me and care about me and want to see me. Those are, actually, the facts.

So what's the problem? What's the cause of my despair? These stupid fucking stories that I tell myself.

Isn't that why we do yoga? Yoga citta vrtti nirodah. "Yoga is the cessation of the fluctuations of the mind stuff." (That is the translation that has always stuck in my mind, although I'm not sure anymore who to attribute it to.)

My suffering right now is largely because of my thoughts, the stories I keep telling myself. I know yoga will help clear that shit away. The truth is that it's been really hard to get on the mat even though I know there's solace there. My thoughts will slow and a lot of the damaging, extraneous, untrue ones will go away for awhile. So I've managed to do a few minutes here and there. Mostly down dogs and inversions, for a change of perspective. A little is okay right now. I'm coming back home.

single again

2010-09-09T08:54:00.000-07:00

I know I've been gone awhile. There are a few reasons why, but the big one lately is that I got all caught up in a fast and, as it seemed to me at the time, intense romance. It ended last night, so I'm back to my friend the blog for some processing and solace. Like a good friend, you are always ready to take me back when I'm ready.

It was a very sad night for me. Over dinner, a conversation was started (by me, I suppose) about the relationship and it became obvious that although we were both having a lot of fun, we had completely different ideas about what the relationship meant and where it was going. I was consciously working hard to open up to him, to be available, and it was real work. I needed ground to feel safe, and it became clear in that conversation he was unable to give it. The only thing I knew to do was to leave, so I gathered my things and went home.

In my practice, I keep coming back to all the different ways we get our hearts open. We get flexible in the spine. We release tension from the shoulders, but most of all we find ground. The common instruction is "root down through your legs." We engage our quadriceps and make sure our feet are lined up with the shin bones which are lined up with our knees and our femurs which come right out of the hip socket exactly parallel with each other. From that foundation, with all that support, we lift up, we allow ourselves to open. Without that, we can still bend our backs, but the quality and integrity of the backbend are compromised. We injure ourselves. It's not safe to really open unless we're fully grounded.

That's my experience, anyway. I was looking for ground, and I didn't get it, so I walked away.

Now how do I deal with the pain in a way that opens me up instead of shutting me down?

I'm trying really, really hard not to slip into blame. Blame feels like an avoidance technique. Did he do something wrong? He was never dishonest. He never intentionally hurt me. He's just not available in the way that I need a partner to be available. Is that his fault? No matter how I turn it in my mind, I can't see him as being wrong. He's not right either. He just is who he is, and I am who I am, and we don't seem to be able to meet each other on this one.

So I get to own my pain. It's mine. That's really good news. I'm not a victim, and I get to choose differently next time. I know now a little more what I need and what I'm looking for. I'm better at talking about it and asking and finding out if the person I'm with is willing and able to give it to me. And I got to practice saying no and making clear boundaries when I realized my needs weren't going to get met. I got to practice leaving because it was the right thing to do even though it made me so, so sad.

And now I get to practice being sad. I get to care for myself and experience it. The fruits of that will be that I will understand you when you are sad. I will be able to be compassionate to people who are disappointed and heart broken because I let myself go through that too. I will know more what it's like.

Last night I came home and in the midst of a storm, in the midst of strong emotional pain and tears and disappointment, I got to experience being exquisitely okay. I was okay last night, and I still am today. Where did that come from? When did I learn that I can live with my emotions and my disappointments without running away? When did I get to feel this center of me that knew I was safe, that new loves would come (or not), but that either way I was okay? Not I will be okay, or it will work out, as we love to tell each other when we're hurt, but that right there in that very instant, I was doing just fine. Where did that come from? It's brand fucking new, I tell you. I'm so happy I got to see it. I'm glad to know it's there because things do get harder than this. Much, much harder. I know now that it will be there for me then, too.

So that's it. I'm single again. It was a fun month with this man, who I continue to adore. Mostly. I do have pangs of anger and self-righteousness because I'm human and hurt and that's what we do. But I don't regret spending the time with him. And I definitely don't regret leaving. Now it's time to care for myself and my business and my dog and cat and garden, all of which have gotten a little taste of neglect over the last couple of weeks. Back to real life.

no longer cozy

2010-08-09T15:15:00.000-07:00

I've been getting a little too cozy in my life, I have to admit. I work relatively few hours, even by the more civilized standards of countries like France and Sweden. I have all the food and shelter and clothing and organic bath products that I need. People show up for my birthday party. I make people happy just by walking in the room with my dog, although it doesn't work so well when I'm alone.

I keep reading Pema Chodron, and she keeps saying run into the fear, get comfortable with the grief, know your nervous habits. Basically, make friends with yourself, not just the happy, day-at-the-park self eating veggie burgers and basking in a warm Saturday afternoon. Those moments happen, of course, but if all moments are those types, I'm missing out on all my hidden nooks and dusty corners. I actually have been wanting a little angst, and of course, I haven't had to wait long.

This isn't a dating blog. I'm not going to write about dating. Except that actually I am. Sorry. I haven't been in a romantic relationship for the better part of a decade. Yes, you read it right. The smaller side of the better part of a decade, but just that I'm using the word "decade" to describe my lack of love life is saying something.

I've been asked why a few times in the last couple of weeks. My therapist asked, of course, and so has a man that I've been on a couple dates with. One answer is that I have been magnificently successful at avoiding certain types of pain. But Pema says run toward what you fear. Get to know your neuroses. Make friends with your discomfort. Maitri. Know that you are not alone. What better way than to face what I have been avoiding? Thanks, Pema. Thanks, Universe.

I often find myself doing one of two things. I spend a lot of time either fantasizing about the future or dreading the fact that I've already ruined my chances with someone I'm sort of into. (Maybe a little more than sort of.) I've already fucked it all up. I'm living, in other words, in what isn't happening.

What is happening is kind of interesting. I can see myself, for the first time, doing this, and I know now that it's not real. What is real are all of the emotions that I get to experience. Fear. Dread. Excitement. Curiousity. Nervousness. A little wariness. They're really, really interesting, and I get to just sit in my body and feel them. They're not killing me, y'all. Seriously. It's okay. I feel them AND I get asked out again. Weird.

And I get to play around with living in the unknown. Groundlessness. I don't know what will happen. I can experience this knowing that no matter what I think or fear or fantasize about, life is actually happening right now. Life is the uncertainity, the not knowing. The fantasies and the fears are still around, but they've lost a little of their edge. They're kind of cute. They're not unique to me. It's just part of being human and looking for ground. It's part of hope, which I'm learning to abandon.

So the coziness of the last several weeks didn't last long. Good. The business start-up is over, and I need some more excitement in my life. Until I find my silent, angel investor and start again, maybe I can just enjoy this for a little while and not freak out too much about all the different ways it can go wrong. It's not wrong yet, and I'm actually having a little fun.

Plus, as you all know, more pain means more blog entries. You'll be hearing from me.

abandon hope!

2010-08-04T10:59:00.000-07:00

If you still haven't read or listened to Pema Chodron, go right now and order something or reserve it at the library or visit your local independent bookstore. Do what you have to do. Everyone should be reading and listening to this woman.

I was sitting in the bathtub this morning with her book, When Things Fall Apart. She's really into getting friendly with being uncomfortable, with being fearful, nervous, angry, agitated, whatever it is. It was in yoga that I first learned to be uncomfortable in my body. I went to these Iyengar classes at the Buddhist Center in Mexico City. I won't go into a lot of detail right here, but is was probably the most collapsed, defeated time of my life. I was lost. I had no bearing. Looking back, I realize that was the best possible state for me to be in, but at the time it just felt overwhelmingly difficult and hopeless.

The teacher was really strict and direct, but in an amused, slightly smiling way. She was always pushing us to be even more uncomfortable than we already were. It was fun for me, for whatever masochistic reason, and I realized in her class that I could be very uncomfortable in my body without fidgeting or running away. I had never done that before. Really, never. Then what began to happen, again and again, is that she would put us in savasana, and I would also feel enormous amounts of emotional pain. She would chant "Om mani padme hum" in this incredibly strong, ethereal voice. I was just there, still, with tears and snot running down my face. For the first time ever, I just felt it, whatever it was, and it was revolutionary in my life.

So I have learned a little about being present and awake in my discomfort. But I read something different this morning, something that takes it even one step further. Pema Chodron instructs us to "abandon hope." She says that hope and fear are two sides of the same coin, that hope is yet another way of wanting things to be different. We are going to feel lots of pain and groundlessness and insecurity. We are even going to die. She says we have to give up hope that it will ever be any different. The word in Tibetan is ye tang che. Absolutely exhausted. Complete surrender. That is the beginning.

I just read it and laughed. Of course. It's hopeless, y'all. We're on a speedboat that is definitely going to sink. We might as well get used to the idea. Pema says don't practice because you're looking for ground or for security or for a safe haven. The practice is realizing that none of that exists.

It's my birthday today. More evidence that indeed the speedboat is sinking. It's also Barack Obama's birthday, and I'm a little worried that it's not fashionable to say this anymore, but I still love Barack Obama. He provided hope in a political landscape that felt completely hopeless. So there's some dissonance there. Maybe we have to have a little hope to keep making progress. If I hadn't hoped that the studio would work, I never would have built it. If I hadn't hoped that Obama would be our president, I never would have campaigned for him, which I loved doing, and because so many of us did it, he won.

Maybe Pema will address that apparent contradiction. I'm not sure I want to be so Buddhist that I never do anything. But in my personal life, I'm becoming a little friendlier with my edginess all the time. I still have addictions, things that I grasp and cling and turn to for solace. One is shopping for clothes. I'm going to do that today. But I'm going to do it knowing that it won't help. I'm still nearer to my death than I ever have been before. I'm still nervous that my business might fail, scared that I will end up old and alone and broke, uncertain about the future of my relationships and concerned about what people think of me. It's a good thing. I need things to practice with. Enlightenment might end up being kind of boring.

if you think you're enlightened...

2010-07-21T00:33:00.000-07:00

Here's why blogging can be so difficult: being honest is hard. Right now all I want to do it hit my cat because he won't quit howling and jumping on the computer. It's been a long night. Lots of little irritating shit keeps happening. All my computers, both at home and the studio are going at 1995 speeds. Even though there was a lot of traffic through the studio today, we didn't come close to sales goals. Then there's the pesky cat, and a conversation with someone that made me realize that I'm angrier than I thought at an important person in my life. I realize that if you read this blog at all, you're well aware that I'm not perfect, but it's still hard to admit publicly, even if I've done it a bunch of times before. I really care what you think. Yes, you.

I didn't hit the cat. I did hit the chair near the cat, which scared him away for a few blissfully quiet seconds, but he came right back. I'm sure all he wanted was food and love, but shooing him away felt like the solution to the immediate problem, which was an annoying cat. I was in a hurry. He could wait.

So as all of this was happening, I was typing away that my amazing job as a small business owner consists mostly of being nice to people, data entry and trips to Ikea. And here's the corollary to the "being honest is hard" problem with blogging: being surface-y is boring. What's really happening is I want to kill my cat for being a cat, and I'm pounding away at the keyboard thinking that will somehow make the computer go faster. I feel knotted and weird and angry. I'd rather write about my awesome yoga practice and how great the business is going. But that is definitely not what is happening for me right this second.

There is a Buddhist saying that if you think you're enlightened, look at how you behave in relationships. To be honest, I don't know if I'm behaving well or not. Definitely not doing that great with George, the cat. I do know that there are hurt feelings and confusion and anger in a couple of my human relationships, some of which I am probably responsible for.

Part of what happened tonight was that I looked at teacher stats, and there are a handful of teachers that I have been worried about, and the stats confirm my fears. They're not retaining students. Originally, part of the concept of the Collective was that the teachers would be totally autonomous and teach however they wanted. Looking at it squarely, I think that was my way of ducking the fact that at a certain point I need to offer unsolicited feedback, which I hate and dread. In the early stages of the business, I was constantly scrambling and trying new things to keep the studio afloat, so I would just take teachers off the schedule when their classes weren't doing well. I didn't offer feedback or give them a chance to improve. There are lots of problems with that. What I know now that I didn't understand then is that the primary reason a class is successful is that the same teacher has been teaching it for a long time. That's just been my experience. So I haven't fired a teacher in a long, long time. I keep them around, but I don't say anything either, even when there are simple, clear things I see that they could do to be more effective. I want to be liked too much, so I actively avoid conflict and confrontation. This particular pattern is as old as I am. Changing it won't be easy.

One of the problems with saying nothing is that I get resentful because they don't understand something that I haven't told them yet, and the relationship suffers anyway. Then I go home and want to kill my cat.

(Note credit where due. There's a Bob Dylan line that I'm sort of poaching: "You keep expecting me to remember something you forgot to say." That's what I'm doing. Like some crazy woman Bob Dylan slept with for awhile.)

There has to be a better way. My job is more than data entry and trips to Ikea. There's toilet cleaning and screwing together the Ikea crap I buy. And I have to do a certain amount of work to make sure the quality of instruction at the studio is high, which will mean having a few difficult conversations.

I haven't opened the Bhagavad Gita since the last time I blogged, which was like a million years ago. (I guess I'm not as spiritual as I was in early July.) But as Krishna tells Arjuna, we have to show up and do what we're supposed to do. That's yoga. So here's my plan: I'm going to take at least one class from every teacher on the schedule and offer everyone some feedback as well as a look at their stats. Most of what I have to say is actually really positive, so a lot of the conversations will be fun.

As far as my other relationships, all I can say is I don't feel particularly enlightened when I'm alone, but in certain difficult relationships, I can feel particularly un-enlightened. The Buddhists, as usual, have it right. I usually feel like most of us are just bumbling along doing the best we can, but mostly thinking of ourselves and mostly blind to how all of our old habits and fears are directing us. That's me, anyway. As I get older and work at it, I get slightly more skilled at bumbling with some direction. I know better what I want now, and I'm more apt to vocalize it than I used to be. I guess the modern psych term for that is boundaries. I've set some boundaries in my personal life that not everyone involved is comfortable with. I think I'm offering enough, but it's less than what they're used to.

But at least I got clear and said it. At work, it's time to do a better job of getting clear about what the studio and its students need and vocalizing that to my teachers. I've done it, however ungracefully, in my personal life, in really weighty, important relationships, so I should be able to do it here. One would think.

After that, I will clean the toilet. Or maybe before. I'm sure it needs it.

fear

2010-07-07T23:56:00.000-07:00

I'm on vacation, and for whatever reason, I decided to use my time away from work to go around looking for ghosts. Ghost towns, actually, but it seems like I what I found is my own ghost, irritated without cause, unable to sit still for any period of time. I have an antsy, agitated ghost living in my brain, and it may be causing more neurosis than I realized.

I also seem to have stumbled upon a haunted hotel, where I booked a room for the night. I'm in the lobby now, and I think the night clerk has just left for the evening. The lobby is one of the supposedly haunted spots, where another desk clerk, long ago, was killed after hitting on the wrong woman. I am in room 205, right next to the elevator that they say goes up and down with no passengers all night. Room 212, down the hall, is said to be haunted by a couple who died there. Buddy refuses to walk to that end of the hall. I tried to drag him, but he leaned back on his haunches and let me tug hard at his leash. He just won't do it.

Am I scared? Yes, a little creeped out, I have to admit. It's an old hotel, very quiet, and I am very alone.

I've been scared a few times on this trip. The first ghost town I found was beautiful. Just off the road, shuttered up, unmolested by historians, not made into a state park, completely overgrown. The town, Chinese Camp, still has a population of 150, and there are houses nearby that are occupied. Run down, with too many old cars and junk in the yard, but occupied.

Main Street, where the ruins are, was quiet. It was just me and the dog peaking in between boards while trying to be mindful of "Posted. NO Trespassing" signs. I heard every creak, every animal scurrying, every branch swaying, every noise, especially the ones I couldn't quite identify. It was quiet though. Too quiet, too empty, too still for noon just off a main highway into a National Park the day after the Fourth. And then someone started yelling. Incoherently. All I could understand was "fuck" and "Goddamn." Whoever it was was angry and crazy and no one was yelling back, so he was either yelling at me or he was yelling at himself. Either way, I was getting the fuck out of there.

I got back in the car and drove through Yosemite. All of the drives this whole trip have been way longer than I anticipated. All the good ghost towns are on long, winding mountain roads off a long, winding mountain highways. Ten miles takes many songs on the iPod, a whole chapter of This American Life, and meanwhile it's just me. Me and the dog and the road and my thoughts and this rising, low-key irritation with life.

The next day, I went looking for Old Mammoth City, which is just outside the recreation mecca of Mammoth Lakes. I found the road, but it was closed for whatever reason, so I parked the car and started walking. My Ghost Town book said that the ruins were behind some thickets, off in the pines, so I took the dog and headed off the road a bit, looking for a way through the brush. We walked around for awhile, and then I looked down. We had been walking for several minutes through lots and lots of plants with three jagged leaves. Poison oak. My dog, with his low belly and thick fur. Me, with my ankle socks and shorts. We were fucked.

Back to the road where I saw the sign: "Point of Historical Interest. Mammoth City." The State of California says it's so. It must be, even though there's nothing but the marker and a few logs from the foundation of an old cabin. I knew there was more. I just had to walk south a bit. I found a path, and I started down it, but I stopped.

Bears. I'm in bear country. Everywhere I go, there are signs, "Don't feed our bears." My pulse rose and I felt sort of clammy. Did I want to be some bear's lunch? And Buddy, his afternoon snack? I thought about it for a minute. I really wanted to see those ruins. I'd come a long way. But there was no one, nothing around. One bicyclist had come tearing down the road in the whole hour that I had been walking. That was it. I knew that eventually someone would find my car parked on the highway, and they would start piecing it all together. Again, I got the fuck out of there.

Later that day, I asked a local about poison oak. "There's no poison oak around here. Too damn cold." Ok. What about bears? Should I be worried? "They don't care a thing about you. Just yell. They'll walk away. They don't want you. Not if you don't have any food." I didn't have any food. Other than me and the dog.

Hmmm. I had a long drive ahead of me, and when I wasn't getting irritated by myself and my lateness (late for what?) or my dog who was restless and squirming and insistent on being in my lap, I was thinking about fear. I've had some experiences with fear lately. Real fear. I was very, very scared that I had cancer. I wrote about that here. I was really sure that I was almost certainly going to die. Turns out, half the women I know have had the same tests, the same procedure, the same thing exactly. It's really, really common. No one dies, or statistically very, very few die. It's really not that big of a big deal.

I never really knew this before now, but what I'm learning is not to believe anything that I tell myself when I'm scared. I will always eventually end up believing, and then living in, the absolute worst case scenario. When I thought I was going to be eaten by a bear, when I thought I was going to be hospitalized because of an internal poison oak infestation (brought on by drinking water from a bottle I had touched after touching my dog, who clearly had lethal poison oak oil all over his fur), when I was sure I was going to die or -- very best case scenario -- get extremely sick and debilitated by cervical cancer, I was absolutely unable to see any of the infinite other possibilities that could occur. There are so many ways that life can go. Infinitely many ways, but in fear, I only see one, and because of that, I think I know what's going to happen. Sometimes I even call it intuition. It's not intuition. It's narrow, fear-based thinking.

It is biological. I mean, when we were cave women or whatever, I'm sure it served us really well to think about, and then to prepare for, the worst things that could happen, the biggest threats. But now, it's not so useful. It keeps me blind. I miss opportunities. It keeps me from doing things that I really want to do.

So I'm still in the lobby of this creepy hotel, but I feel less scared. It's me that I'm scared of.

As it turns out, I happened to bring along a new Pema Chodron talk I downloaded about fear. She speaks about "ubiquitous nervousness." She says we are always, constantly, in low grade fear. It is so constant that we don't even notice it. It's me getting irritated at the dog. It's me flipping through songs after two notes, sometimes before even the first chord. "Next. Next. Next. Next." It's me, unsatisfied, in a hurry, busy. Even on vacation, I'm busy. Even on vacation I'm late. I traveled two days to get to Bodie, which many people say is the best ghost town in the whole country. I arrive at the gate at 5:50, and the park closes at 6:00. Late. Again. I am always five or ten minutes late everywhere I go. Ask my chiropractor. Ask my friends. The reason is that I'm terrified of having to wait for you. Waiting means sitting. By myself. With my thoughts and nothing to do. Emptiness. Vast emptiness and boredom and ME, ME, ME. There's too much unchartered territory. I'm not prepared to show up. I'm not ready. I'm scared.

It's still spooky here in the lobby. Every time the door opens, I jump. A few couples have come back to the hotel from dinner or drinks or whatever. They smile at me and go right to their rooms. The desk clerk is still gone. It's just me. Me and my dog, who's antsy again. And there's the quiet and the old photos and the mismatched antiques.

I'll take these ghosts, and the horror movie distraction of being in a haunted hotel, over my personal ghosts anytime. My ghosts are crazier, harder to identify, more persistent, more pervasive. I understand now why most people are paired away, insistent on being in relationships. I've been very successful avoiding that because I like to drive, if you know what I mean. I am not a negotiator. I don't know how to compromise. I go my way, so being single has always suited me. I'm not so sure anymore. Here's what's true of cancer, ghosts, screaming violent crazy people, bears, what's true of all my fears: I face them alone. It's just me. And God knows I have a hard time with that.

I need to take the dog out for a last pee before bed. We're going out on a dark street in a town I don't know. But the street is so much less scary than the hotel. And the hotel is so much less scary than me alone with my self. I hope the elevator ghost rests tonight. I'm going to need to sleep.

writing (or not)

2010-07-04T09:42:00.000-07:00

Success is not what it seems.

Think about getting a yoga pose. I mean really getting it. Getting it so that (barring unusual circumstances like injury and illness) you do the pose 100% of the time that you try. When I started doing yoga, I couldn't get into crow. I just wasn't strong enough to support my weight on my arms. I used to practice it at home. I would practice and fall, practice and fall, practice and fall. I'm glad no one was watching. The first time I got both feet off the floor, I was thrilled. It was so exciting. But it took a long time after that to be able to do it consistently. Now I can always do crow, but I didn't notice the shift from sometimes (gleefully) getting into the pose to always bringing my feet off the ground with no fuss and no excitement and certainly no hopping. The first time is exciting, but really getting it isn't. It just happens.

Success is that way. The first few times we had freakishly good days or large classes, I was so excited. Now we have good days and large classes all the time, but I'm still the same person. Nothing's changed. It didn't make me happier in a lasting way, and I didn't notice the day that it all changed. (Some of you might wonder if it was the day the Groupon ran. Although our classes got really big then, at this point that promotion has little to do with the financial growth of the business. That might change as the Groupon people convert to regular, paying customers.)

So let's not get too attached to success. That's a reminder to ME, because I do. I think being happy and secure rests on whether the business is successful and profitable and supporting me and writing checks to teachers that actually mean something. I'm not going to lie. It helps. But then other things crop up to make me insecure. Security is an inside job.

Sloka 53, Chapter Two of the Gita is: "When your mind, which has been tossed all about by conflicting opinions, becomes still and centered in equilibrium, then you experience Yoga."

It's the same thing I've been talking about for months in this blog, but in different contexts. Judith Lasater's "May you be like the Lotus Flower, at home in the muddy waters." Pema Chodron's focus on equanimity. It's not about the peak experiences, nor is it about the God-awful ones. It's about how we navigate. Getting a yoga pose requires focus and attention and discipline, and we need those qualities in our life, so they're worth pursuing. But for me, looking back on it, it's the process that's useful. Actually being able to do crow pose is almost completely useless in my life. If I weren't a yoga teacher, it would serve absolutely no purpose whatsoever.

I was going to write about writing. As often happens, I got side tracked.

Writing will, no doubt, be like that too. I just keep writing and it will all fall into place. I don't need to worry that the book isn't written (or even started) or that I haven't kept up with the blog as well as I would like. I'm still writing. It's a process. The blog continues to be fun. I can sit down to write about one thing, and end up somewhere else entirely. No one has ever complained. Eventually, I want to add some structure to my writing. I do have goals around it, but I don't need to worry too much about it.

I just have to keep doing it. Like trying to get crow pose. Alone, falling, imperfect. One day I'll look back and realize that at some point along the way, I got it. I won't be thrilled or excited or filled with bliss. But I will smile. Because the process was so enjoyable.

Duty

2010-06-29T14:17:00.000-07:00

The last blog entry I wrote never got published. I wrote about being very, very tired. It was kind of whiny, maybe, and by the time I made it into the studio to upload it, while still tired, I didn’t feel much like whining to the world about it. Now, readers, you'll be happy to know, I have internet, so I'll just post. No thinking or second guessing. You'll read every last whine.

I’m tired because things are going well. The studio is packed, which is great. I’ve also been teaching a lot. I took on three regular classes and lately I've been subbing at least one class everyday. There was the extra administrative work associated with the Groupon promotion. I really couldn’t take a day off. Sometimes it was fun, but sometimes, I just didn’t want to do it. At times while teaching, I felt like a machine, saying the same things over and over. It almost began to feel rote. I also said the same things over and over to our new Groupon customers. "Bring your Groupon. Mat rental is $1. See you in class!" My communications became a series of cut-and-paste operations. I was over-worked.

I taught Saturday morning, but then took the rest of the day and Sunday totally off. I didn’t go in at all. I hung out with friends who were in town from Texas. I went out dancing. I went sailing all around the Bay. It was great.

Of course, some balls got dropped. I didn’t go in to do a reception shift for a teacher who needs the help. I didn’t return phone calls or emails.

Monday came around, as it always does, and I had an emergency sub request from a teacher during the exact time I had another obligation, unrelated to the studio, that I needed to show up for. I sent out an email requesting a sub, but there was no one available.

It was a tough decision. What do I show up for?

I started reading the Bhagavad Gita. It’s the story of Arjuna, who was to fight a righteous war against his cousins. He is clearly in the right, and Krishna is his charioteer, guiding him through the war.

The translation that I am reading makes clear the metaphor that the war is the battle between good and evil, Krishna is our inner-consciousness, or Atman. He is our teacher.

Before the battle, Arjuna goes to the front lines to see who he is fighting. Among those on the other side are his teachers, cousins, friends and grandparents. He loses heart. He doesn't feel he can fight these people; they are his family. He rationalizes leaving the battles, surrendering before it begins, and Krishna tells him he need not grieve because Self is eternal. Dying is like changing clothes: we shed an old, worn out body for a new one. The Self does not die. So kill away, Arjuna!

Basically, what it boils down to is that Arjuna has to fight the war because it is his God-given Duty. While Arjuna is whining, Krishna says: “Yield not to weakness. It does not suit you. Shake off this petty faint heartedness. Stand up, Scorcher of foes, wake up!”

God, how often have I wanted to tell that to other people?

Arjuna replies later, “I am weighted down with weak mindedness; I am confused and cannot understand my duty. I beg of you to say for sure what is right for me to do. I am your disciple. Please teach me, for I have taken refuge in you.”

Later in the Gita, Krishna talks about doing one’s own duty and not anyone else’s. To paraphrase, it is better to do your duty poorly than someone else’s perfectly. All of this has to do with karma and escaping the wheel of death and rebirth, but we'll save that for some other time.

Ultimately, the decision I made was to cancel the class and keep my other commitment, mostly because it was my commitment to keep. My duty to the studio was to try to find a sub for the class, which I did. My duty is not to drop everything and cover someone else's class. It's taken me a long time to realize that.

Nothing is worse for business, in my opinion, that not having a class when we say we're having class, but as Krishna would say, “Seeing the same in pleasure and pain, gain and loss, victory and defeat, in battle-just for the sake of the battle-then you will be sinless.”

That’s the path of Karma Yoga. It doesn’t matter whether what I do is good for business or bad for business. Am I doing the right thing, am I doing what I am called to do? Krishna is consciousness. Am I seeking the guidance of “Krishna,” or am I seeking the guidance of other, sensory things, like pleasure and success?

Eventually, at the last minute, someone came through to cover for me, and I was able to teach the yoga class. As I write this though, I wish that I hadn’t even asked. I wish I had just shown up for what I was supposed to show up for and let everything fall out as it will, and that's how I'll do it from now on. I’m not killing my grandfather here. The worst that can happen is a few people don’t get their yoga class.

I like the Bhagavad Gita. I like the story of the war between good and evil. I like the emphasis on showing up for life and pushing through fear and doubt and doing it solely for the sake of doing it, not for the rewards of victory or to avoid the discomforts of loss. It’s about being engrossed in life, and constantly asking to be guided to do the right thing.

So I’m going to try to show up. For all things, not just the yoga studio. That is the hard part, because for the last 18 months, my life's primary purpose has been to get the studio going and successful. I've been very outcome-motivated, which actually may have been appropriate and necessary for the beginning of the business. But that's not all there is. Showing up for myself and getting rest and time off is part of what I’m supposed to be doing. Sometimes time off feels like not showing up. Occassionally it is, but more often for me, it's a much needed break that leaves me with the energy to keep showing up later.

Arjuna was able to ask Krishna point blank for guidance. We sort of have to ask and then wait and reflect and hope that we're doing the right thing. There is also the promise in yoga of acting decisively because our vision is clear. We know what's right. It's obvious. I'm not there yet, but I think I'm getting better.

In the meantime, I am sure enjoying my internet right here at my easy chair, and the fact that I will publish this right now. Even if it sucks.

I heart yoga part 2

2010-06-23T14:26:00.000-07:00

Blog, oh blog, I have missed you. I've had that writer's block that I get when I'm content. I write best about drama and pain, so when there's none of that, I just eat dinner and go to bed. But I'm back, content and writing anyway.

I was reading the current issue of Yoga Journal today, and so much of what I read smacked of self-satisfaction and the joy of being right. Here’s how my diet is so great. Here’s how I’m a giving, self-sacrificing karma yogi. Here’s how I meditate everyday and practice asana and gratitude and how I’m so, so happy. It’s not that fucking easy, y’all. Yoga is for real. I do not go into this holy and self-sacrificing and altruistic. If I do something that makes you happy, I don't mind, but believe me, it wasn't my first intention. I want to be happy and me first.

And I am happy. The studio is packed. I feel like I’m being of service in a real way. I often make decisions I’m content with and that lead to positive results. I planted a flower garden. I had a friend come visit me from far away, and it was just me she came to visit. I didn’t have to show her the Golden Gate Bridge or any museums and take her to Napa. She was happy just to sit in my tiny living room and eat tofu and couscous cooked in my very own kitchen with week old cauliflower.

How blessed I am.

I’ve been meaning to write for awhile about a second way that Desikachar defines yoga. He writes: “yoga is to attain what was previously unattainable…. In fact, every change is yoga.”

Wow. Really? It’s easy to notice this in our asana practice. I can do poses now that I thought I would probably never get. My body has changed profoundly. I used to daydream about owning a business and being self employed and that seemed totally unattainable. I thought I had to be rich first, and I didn’t know how I would do it. But it came. I didn’t get rich first. I just pieced it together because I wanted it very, very badly, and it seemed like the time was right.

On a deeper level, I’m happy and content and satisfied way more often than not. There was a time when unhappy was a way of life. I knew excitement, and I knew high and drunk, but I didn’t know how to be at ease. I was suicidal, crazy angry, victimized, and eaten up by fear most of the time. I still have my moments, as you all hear about here, but it’s just not like that anymore. The stretches of being okay get longer and the phases of freaking out become shorter. They are moments, not states of being.

In yoga, I learned to be uncomfortable and still at the same time. I started to pay attention off the mat. I began to notice what wasn’t working. I was drawn to things that seemed likely to work better. Self-employment. Less stuff. Simpler life. Noticing people. And then slowly, slowly, the non-functional stuff has been dropping away. It didn’t happen on my timeline, and it wasn’t about effort or struggle or setting rules for myself. It was about showing up, day after day, doing the best I could, and letting it all take shape. Some days were (and still can be) pretty shitty, but I’ve come a long way. Contentment was unattainable for me. Seriously. It’s not anymore. What happened in between is called yoga.

Have I become the annoyingly self-satisfied yoga writer? Never to worry. I wrote this last night and already today, irritating things are popping into my consciousness that I'm sure will provide some material for edgier entries. More to come...

muddy water

2010-06-18T12:14:00.000-07:00

The studio got busy. Really busy and very suddenly. We ran the Groupon, 653 of them were sold, and all the sudden people are calling and spending money and buying yoga mats and attending class. It’s great. It’s what I’ve wanted and worked hard for since I opened the place. Even without the Groupon, we had begun making sales goals more days than not, and it looks like Square One is here to stay. I’ve sort of known that for while, but now there’s no question. The thoughts of getting a job that used to float around in the back of my head are gone. I have a job. I have health insurance and working hours and people who rely on me. I just need to start paying taxes.

So why am I not elated?

I have to admit that there is some residue in my emotional body from spending two weeks sure I was dying. That’s a little bit of an exaggeration. Two weeks that I spent full of intense fear and grief and bewilderment. There were those moments in those two weeks that I’ve written about here, when I was very, very centered in the present moment. In many ways, I felt more alive then than I ever have, even though a lot of it was really hard.

So now it’s over. I’ve been thrown back into my life and all its busy-ness and activity, but there is a part of me that is very, very tired. I don’t think it’s life as usual, but I haven’t had a moment to think about what has changed. Am I stopping to smell the flowers? Am I spending more time with loved ones? Am I returning the important calls and letting the ones that can wait wait? Have I stopped texting and driving? No, no, no, and no.

But there is a shift. I don’t want to open another studio. Not right now. I thought that’s what I would do this summer, but it doesn’t sound at all appealing. It’s so much work. I want to take a vacation. I would like to take a whole week. What would two weeks feel like? For years, I took two months every summer. Now piecing together two days feels out of reach. Why in the world would I want another yoga studio?

Judith Lasater ends her classes (or she used to, anyway) by saying, “May you be like the lotus flower, at home in the muddy water.” I think some of the seize-the-day lessons from my two weeks of worry may be lost or too subtle to recognize. What is clear to me though is that when it was happening, I was in the moment, but I was also really, really uncomfortable most of the time. I was not at home in the muddy water. I was insane with anxiety and future tripping and fear. It was difficult to even be awake, and at the same time I was having a nasty battle with insomnia.

More activity is not a long-term antidote to anxiety. I am not looking for more businesses, more jobs, more money or more commitments. They will find me anyway, I’m sure. Right now, I want time to myself. Time to go on retreat, time for vacation, time to take walks and naps and time to chill out at home and write my blog.

Thank you, Life, for giving me a successful business. That’s what I said I wanted and here it is. Help me just to be okay with that, to acclimate to that, to not need to have the biggest, best yoga empire in the whole world. Let me just stop here for awhile and get my bearings.

May I be like the lotus flower, at home in the muddy water.

back to ambition!

2010-06-15T10:08:00.000-07:00

Thanks to all my well wishers... Results are back, and I don't have cancer! Woohoo! I was really sure that I did and halfway convinced that I was already almost dead. Goes to show that I feel fear much more acutely than intuition. Nothing weird about that.

Yesterday we sold 653 packages of 25 classes for $25 through Groupon to brand new Square One students. That's a lot of new students. I was not even excited at all yesterday because I just kept thinking, "I have cancer. I have cancer. I have cancer." I'm excited now!

So I've got a lot of work to do. I have plans to make, and I'm feeling ambitious. Like maybe a second space? Maybe a vacation to a hot, sunny beach somewhere? Maybe a yoga training? Yay! Life!

That's all for now. I know there were a few of you out there wondering...

back to the blog

2010-06-13T14:00:00.000-07:00

I've missed my blog. I've been writing, but to myself and to God, waiting for dust to settle.

About two weeks ago, I got a call back from the ob/gyn nurse telling me that I need to come in for more tests after a pap. I'm not going to go into a lot of detail here, but at the more in-depth exam, spots were found, biopsies were taken, and I got really scared.

I'm still waiting on results, and the odds are really good that it is completely treatable. It may even just be a "let's keep an eye on it" kind of thing. But it is really, really scary. I have been completely consumed by the fear and the not knowing, and I wasn't ready to write about it here. It was too much. It also took me awhile to tell the major players in my life, and I didn't want someone in my family to find out by reading the blog. But now I can write, which I'm really happy about.

I think everyday of this little picture I cut out of a magazine once that had the Five Remembrances from Buddhism. (I just googled it and found the very image. I'm so lucky! Here it is. Thanks, Thich Nhat Hanh and plumvillage.com.)

I carried that little piece of paper around with me for years, pinning it on various refrigerators and office bulletin boards, but it's taken this experience to really get it.

I had a moment alone in my morning practice (which is really, really not a big deal. I sit for like 2 minutes and write a little. On a good day.) Anyway, I had this moment when I realized that I would die, and I felt totally supported, totally calm, totally without fear. Wow. I have, a few times while feeling young and healthy, tried to visualize my death as suggested by the Remembrances. The experience was frightening and dark and lonely, and I haven't ever been able to stay with it for more than a second. For the first time, I had a moment with death and with God that wasn't at all scary. It was like, "yeah, this is what happens. It's going to be okay."

I'm a little worried that this sounds morbid, but it's not. I'm not at all saying that I'm going to die from this, or that it's going to happen soon. That's very, very unlikely. Really.

Don't worry, the holy, peaceful feeling didn't stick. It never does. I became neurotic again. But something big has shifted. I'm going to die; you are going to die. Your mom and your children and your siblings and your best friend are all going to die. So there's nothing left but this one instant right now. This time with this person, this flower, this night sky, this scent of cut grass. This is all we've got. And it's really, really amazing. I swear, the Bay has never been more beautiful, my friends more sweet (even the ones who don't know yet), passers-by more fascinating, flowers more colorful, sun shinier, etc., etc., than it has been the last couple of weeks. As my mom, who is a survivor of both breast cancer and a brain aneurysm said this morning, "you get the moment."

Maybe that little slip of paper has been preparing me for this, whatever this is. Definitely, I had moments in the beginning when I just kept saying to myself, "I'm not ready for this. I'm not ready for this. I'm not ready for this." Whatever this is, which is totally unknown, and what I'm realizing with this stuff is that knowing more doesn't make me any more sure. Every time there is new information, there are more questions. There is no certainty, and even though I really want those results, I know that it won't necessarily set my mind at ease, even if the news is "good." There may just be more questions. And it doesn't change the central fact that life is impermanent. We just don't ever know.

Here are some other, more mundane lessons I'm learning that I need to share with fellow health slackers:
1. Quit smoking. (Okay, I already did that, but if the news is bad, it's certain that my 15 years smoking were not helping the situation any.)
2. Get your paps as recommended by your doctor. Don't blow it off.
3. Keep your health insurance, even if you're healthy, broke and self-employed. Don't worry. I kept mine. I won't have to sell the farm.

Ok, that's it. I'm back to the blog, so you'll be getting updates.

doubt

2010-06-02T11:25:00.000-07:00

Managing people is an oxymoron. Or at least that’s how it seems to me right now. People do what they want. I’ve been lucky; 99% of the time what I want and what the people I supervise want are close enough that I don’t have to do anything drastic. Like say no.

Occasionally, teachers and receptionists (God forbid) have higher priorities than the well being of my little yoga studio. They have families and bodies that sometimes get sick and need attention. Obviously. And then there are situations that are a little more ambiguous, and it feels to me like the needs of the studio aren’t getting met in some way and they should be. By someone other than me. In these cases, I view it as my responsibility as a manager to draw a line, to say no, to be clear, to set rules.

And I find this incredibly, incredibly uncomfortable. I am filled with doubt no matter what I do. If I say yes when I kinda want to say no, I feel weak and ever so slightly resentful. If I say no, I feel like an unyielding bitch that everyone hates working for. I’m supposed to be flexible, right? I’m supposed to go with the flow. On the other hand, my job is to keep the place afloat and sometimes that means drawing lines and having personal boundaries around time.

A lot of what this boils down to is being unsure of myself. Desikachar writes: “We often determine we have seen a situation ‘correctly’ and act according to that perception. In reality, however, we have deceived ourselves, and our actions may thus bring misfortune to ourselves or others. Just as difficult is the situation in which we doubt our understanding of a situation when it is actually correct, and for that reason we take no action, even though doing so would be beneficial. The Yoga Sutra uses the term avidya to describe these two ends of the spectrum of experience.”

The problem is that I don’t really know. Being right feels great, so it’s super easy to put myself squarely in the righteous camp and hang out there for awhile. But then comes that nagging feeling. Avidya is sneaky because it could be that my perception is correct and appropriate and the doubt is avidya. Or it could be that my perception is harmful and incorrect and the doubt is a crack in the veil of avidya.

Who the hell knows? This is when a teacher would come in handy. My only teacher right now is my breath, which frankly could use some help with enunciation.

“The goal of yoga is to reduce the film of avidya in order to act correctly,” says Desikachar. I’m working on it, T.K.V.

I just have to hold both things. I have to live with some amount of doubt about my actions, but I have to act. I’m the business’s primary steward. Saying no to intelligent, reasonable adults is sometimes my job. Sometimes it’s also my responsibility to tell reasonable adults that their actions are harmful to me or to the studio. Sometimes what I decide interferes with what others had hoped for themselves, and they don’t like it. Luckily, I’m not Barack Obama or anything. I can make mistakes without killing all the life in the Gulf of Mexico or endangering lives in faraway (and nearby) lands.

I’m just someone who’s particularly uncomfortable being uncomfortable. So it all seems like a big deal. My sane guess is that no one involved is currently thinking about me at all right now, which is really the biggest relief of all.

(Written in Word last night with no internet connection. Proven possible.)

intentional upheaval #496

2010-06-01T11:18:00.000-07:00

Moving's a bitch, and I do it more than most people. There was one eight-year period in my life when I moved 22 times. It started when I was eighteen, and I moved from Tallahassee, FL diagonally across the country to Portland, OR. This current move is my fourth in three years, so my record is improving with age.

I think when I was younger, my life was inherently chaotic so the extra chaos of moving didn't sway me too much. This time, I'm a little more swayed. I love the new little house, and I REALLY love the washer/dryer, but last week just went on forever. Everytime I went back to the old apartment, it seemed like there was more junk to deal with and that everything was way filthier than it was the last time I checked. It just never ended.

Until now. It's over. I'm not completely settled in, but the old place is gone forever. The keys are turned in. Actually, they're not because I forgot to do that, but the point is I'm never going back inside that apartment. It's time to reground. I'm not eighteen anymore.

As most of you know, there's no internet at the new space. I really cannot work there, which is not so bad, although last night some work emails came in, and I couldn't help but wish that I could just take care of them right then. And, as you may have noticed, the blog hasn't been happening. My plan for blogging was that I would write in Word, and then go to the studio, connect and post. But that hasn't proved to be very satisfying. In fact, I haven't been tempted to do it at all. Part of the blogging is the instant gratification of instant publishing. I can look at my stats and see the numbers go up. I know people are reading. It's part of the experience for me.

So I'm at the coffee shop trying to decide if my resolution about not having internet was such a great idea after all or if it's another example of all-or-nothing thinking. Something in my life becomes a little dysfuncitonal or hard to deal with, so I get rid of it all completely. I toss the baby, the bath water and whole damn tub. Sometimes kind of aggressively.

That probably is related to the fact that I move so often.

There is something that is really great about constantly reinventing and reflecting and making things better. Some people call that growth. Now, I'm not a botanist or anything, but let's play around with the plant analogy for a second. Even the fastest growing plants, say bamboo, grow so slowly that you only see the growth in retrospect. Like, "Wow! Remember when that plant was so tiny? Now look at it! It's only been a week." But watching bamboo grow would be boring as hell.

So is what I do growth? Yes, I grow, but the frequent, intentional change of external circumstances is not itself growth. The growth is internal, not controlled by me, not immediately visible. The constant reinvention is great because when I do it with direction and purpose,which I'm starting to learn to do, my life keeps getting better. I'm trading up. On the other hand, it's exhausting and disorienting. My energy is unpredictable, and right now, I feel very, very ungrounded. I don't know where the flea meds are or where I will fit all my rolls of duct tape. I don't know what the routine of my life is at this new place with no internet. It's all in upheaval. It's chaos that I invited in.

Not bad, not good, just change. I'm ready for the change to settle a bit. I'm ready for my back to quit hurting from moving heavy shit and not finding time to practice yoga. I'm ready to have a habit around blogging and writing again, whether it's at the coffee shop or at home on Word or plugged into my very own wireless connection. I'm ready for it all to take shape. And then I think I'll stay for awhile.

I heart yoga part 2 coming soon. It's linked..

i heart yoga part 1

2010-05-22T10:25:00.000-07:00

Ok, so the consensus is that I write about yoga. That's the consensus of one (me) because I didn't hear from anyone. I guess as the writer it is my job to figure out what to write about.

Luckily, I started reading The Heart of Yoga by T.K.V. Desikachar recently, and it's giving me lots of things that I want to think and write about. Desikachar is the son and student of Krishnamacharya, who was both Pattabhi Jois and Iyengar's teacher. But enough name dropping. It's a great book, very simply and clearly written, and I think it may be the perfect book for a new yoga student to start with. It took me five years of practicing to pick it up, but you guys don't have to be as slow as me. (Oh, and, by the way, we sell it in the shop.)

Anyway, he lists a bunch of different definitions of yoga. I'm just going to talk about one, which is from Patanjali, who in the Yoga Sutras, famously writes "yoga chitta vritti nirodah." I've seen this spelled and translated a million different ways. I like Desikachar's translation, which is "yoga is the ability to direct the mind exclusively toward an object and sustain that direction without any distractions."

So how am I doing with my yoga? God, you know, the more I read about it, the more I see ways I can grow. That's the purpose of self-study, which is actually one of the niyamas, or "dos" in yoga. Study yourself, study the scriptures. It is also possible to use a spiritual practice as a whip. "I'm not good enough. I'm not good enough," becomes the mantra. What I'm doing here is self-study. One day I'll write a blog entry about the difference. It's sort of hard to articulate, and I think I confuse the two a lot. Right now I know by the way it feels. This is self study.

Anyway, back to the topic. I am so often distracted. The only times I can think of that I am consistently not distracted are when I am teaching yoga or when I'm writing. But all the other moments of my life are ripe with multi-tasking and a viciously short attention span. I constantly need to move on to the next thing. Now. And then the next thing. And the next thing, and then, oh wait! I was doing that original thing which is still incomplete, so back to task A.

Desikachar puts it this way: "yoga means acting in such a way that all of our attention is directed toward the activity in which we are currently engaged." This makes me think of my current decisions around getting rid of things. The pruning. Too much stuff is a distraction. That's why monks live in tiny rooms with cold floors and worn, hard mattresses. In the West. In the East, I guess they live in caves.

I'm not a monk, and I'm not interested in renouncing the material world. But getting rid of what I'm not using means I will have more opportunities to focus on what is present and useful in my life. Right now, as I've written about here, I'm considering letting go of the internet at my new house. That would be huge for me. The TV went away long ago, but the TV shows didn't. I'm laptop-addicted. I may have to just sit with myself. Maybe I won't let five years go by before I read another really important book. Maybe I'll write and reflect more. Maybe my yoga will get a little deeper.

It's amazing to me how yoga happens. How it unfolds. Practice and everything falls away. Everything. It's not immediate, but when I look back and I see how much simpler and fuller and happier my life is now compared to when I started doing yoga, I'm in awe. If you had told me then to quit smoking, quit drinking, quit eating meat and give away half of my possessions, I would have told you to go fuck yourself. Seriously. But giving up those things just became so obviously the correct action when the time was right. There was no gruelling decision to make. I didn't have to try. I just kept practicing. This shit works, man. It just does.

My new BFF Desikachar says, "we begin where we are and whatever happens happens." How lovely. I don't have to be perfect. You don't have to be perfect. We start practicing yoga while we are still smoking and drinking and sleeping around or whatever it is for us. We don't start practicing after we got all that figured out. It will never happen. I love yoga. Start where you are.

Dear readers,

2010-05-21T08:32:00.000-07:00

OK, I'm kind of sick of this blog right now. I want to keep writing, but really. Is this all I've got going on? A few Joe-joes and a cheap trip to Target? I didn't even eat the whole box. Not even a full row. Where's the angst? Where's the drama?

There is none right now. My biggest problem right this second is that between the cat napping on my right thigh and the dog's head on my left thigh, there is nowhere on my lap to put my laptop. So it's perched precariously on one knee, held up by the heels of my hands while I type. Cozy little life.

My personal finances are still a wreck, but I've gotten really used to that. The more I hear, the more I understand that that's just what happens to new entrepreneurs. It's a hump that I hope I get over on the sooner side, but I'm not alone. The business is solid and profitable, and if I just ignore a couple bills every now and then, I have enough money to get by. There's nothing else to say about that.

So, readers. What do you want to hear about? I can write about running a business. I can write about marketing and management, and maybe it will be sort of fresh and different from the rest of what's out there. But really what seems to resonate is writing about being crazy. Because we're all crazy, so y'all get it. But I'm feeling sane right now, and I want to keep writing anyway. Do you want me to write about how I used to be crazy? Or maybe I should just wait until I'm crazy again. Shouldn't take too long.

Anyway. I may give the blog a little break. I hate to do that because I have some readers, and I really enjoy it. I'm just feeling kind of stumped. Like I need a little direction. Suggestions, please!

checking out

2010-05-19T22:05:00.000-07:00

Today I was feeling kind of down. I busted into the emergency earthquake Joe Joes and made a retail therapy trip to Target. It had to be budget retail therapy, so all I got were cheap plastic sunglasses and fake gold hoop earrings. But it kind of took my mind off things for a minute, and the truth is I like my sunglasses and I like my earrings. I see the beginnings of a summer uniform. Unfortunately, neither the cookies nor the buying helped for long. I'm not working much right now. No new projects, nothing to distract me from what ails me.

So what ails me? A few things, but I'm not sure they're really the point. There are always, simultaneously, lots of upsetting things happening and absolutely nothing upsetting happening. It's just my perception at the moment that changes. Unfortunately for me, I haven't yet figured out how to quickly change my perception, if such a thing is even possible. Also unfortunately for me, at some point in this life, I decided that being happy all the time was owed me, and when the discontent or the melancholy starts to settle in, I have to do something quick. Go somewhere. Buy something. Eat something. Drink something. I have not learned yet just to sit with it.

Sort of. Sometimes friends who read this blog tell me I don't give myself enough credit. I sit with it way better than I used to. An old friend told me yesterday that I am the healthiest person she knows. Weird, because I feel like the least healthy person I know. But let's face it. Five years ago I smoked a pack a day, drank like a fish, could inhale an eight ball of coke in one night with no help, and didn't think twice about running through the drive-thru after a long night drinking. Drunk. So compared to the vast majority of friends from that era, I'm an Olympic athlete. Compared to the San Francisco Bay Area yoga community, I eat way too many Joe Joes.

What if I didn't compare? What if I just said, hey, I've come along way, but I'm not done yet. I'm still growing. I still have work to do.

This is self-reflection, not self-flagellation. I wasn't very happy today. I have some ideas why, chief among them that I'm human, and humans have a wide range of emotions, many of which don't feel that great. What's more interesting is that my inclination continues to be to check out.

I'm not exactly sure what the solution is. I think that's why diets fail. I can tell myself that I will never, ever eat Joe Joes again, but unless I face whatever it is that Joe Joes seem to be the answer to (it's rarely hunger), I will eventually go back to eating them.

I don't know why I need busy-ness or chaos or cookies or trips to Target. I don't know why I can't just sit with myself. I'm just noticing now how that plays out, and I'm curious. Just like I'm curious about the rage. I still like myself. Really.

blog about blogging

2010-05-16T08:48:00.000-07:00

I'm a little worried about this blog.

The business is doing fine. We are not exactly doubling attendance this week, but we're plugging along. I like the new pricing structure. Some people have paid a little more. It's not much money now, but I think as people get used to it, it will bring in a fair amount of extra revenue. Along with the new pricing structure came a really clear decision to quit using low price in our branding. It's not really the point. Do we want people to be able to come, and have we priced it in a way to facilitate that? Yes, absolutely. Is it the best, most important thing about us? No, I definitely don't think so.

So why am I worried about the blog? I'm worried about the blog because I want to keep writing, but sometimes what I do here starts to feel repetitive and without direction or structure.

I'm worried about the blog because sometimes I write things that are innocuous to everyone except the person who I'm writing about. I don't insult people here, but if you're the friend that I'm pruning, you know that, and in retrospect, writing it in a public place feels unkind. But can I write in a way that only involves myself and people who I am absolutely sure will never read this? Do I even want to do that?

I'm worried about the blog because I'm a little sick of thinking about the business, and the two sometimes go hand in hand. I'm going to take a mental break from Square One for a couple of weeks. I have to show up for some classes and certain administrative duties, but I'm not going to worry about changing or fixing anything or trying anything new. I'm feeling a little burned out. It's not that I work too hard, exactly. It's just that I think too much about work.

I'm moving this month anyway, as my readers and friends know. It's a lot of work, and I can take this time to do it slowly, thoughtfully, carefully. In the process, I'm getting rid of what's not serving me anymore. I'm thinking now I might put the internet connection on that list. No TV, no internet. My obsessing usually centers around the laptop screen. Who's signed into class? Have sales grown in the last fifteen minutes? I have an office five blocks away from my new house. I can go in and look at reasonable intervals. What if my home were a really oasis from all that? What if my home were a place where I cook and read and rest and maybe do a little gardening in my 20 square foot yard? What would that be like? Does that sound kind of boring?

Anyway, this brings us to the end of yet another chapter in the Yoga of Small Business. Life is life. Sometimes it feels a little aimless and scattered, kind of like this entry. Hang with me, y'all! I'll get thematic again soon, or maybe I'll start working with a different medium. Maybe I'll pull out the old art supplies, which are the only unused things I'm saving in the Great Purge.

Until then, keep reading. It may be that I'm not writing about the business, which I think just needs to sit on the cooker for awhile, but I plan to keep writing. Maybe I'll turn this into the Yoga of Small Living. Just for a couple weeks. That will wear off too.

pruning

2010-05-11T21:25:00.000-07:00

A friend who's a little older and probably a hell of a lot wiser than me told me recently that at a certain point in her life, she asked God to take anything that wasn't necessary. That way, as she put it, she could be miserable for awhile and then get on with her life.

I loved that. It made so much sense to me. I've spent so much of the last year worried about losing stuff, losing face, losing money. Now I have the same prayer. God, take it! Whatever isn't useful. Let's get it over with! Let's rip that bandage right off.

God got busy pretty quick. Within a day, I found a little cottage that had exactly the things that I've been wanting since I moved into the apartment where I live now, washer/dryer, outdoor space, big kitchen. So I took it. Doesn't sound much like pruning, does it? Except that I'm going from 1000 square feet of fully furnished living space to 450. Every stick of furniture that isn't essential has to go. I love it! I'm so tired of accumulating shit I don't need. I want it gone.

Later in the week, I had a huge blowout with a friend. It sounds very callous to say I'm pruning friends, but I am having a long, hard look at relationships. Some of my relationships are dysfunctional and kick me in the ass time after time after time. And I always go back for more. My fear, I'm sure, is of being alone. I don't have a million friends. Honestly, I'm kind of shy, and it's not that easy to get to know me. Don't I need all the friends I can get? No. Even some of the friends I love I have to let go of. They're not working. I don't have to keep trying. I'll be okay. They'll be okay, and if they're not, I probably couldn't help them much anyway.

And then today, my car got broken into. They took my little GPS. I really like that GPS. It has a lovely male British voice who tells me to "take the motorway" when I need to take the motorway. I let it guide me even when I know where I'm going. There's something soothing about never being lost. I've grown to love it. But it is an unnecessary possession. My phone has GPS. It doesn't talk to me, but it will get me from A to B. That's all I need, and really even that is a luxury I've done without 31 of the last 33 years.

I don't mind that my car got broken into. I just don't care. It makes me a tiny bit sad to think of my British friend Tom Tom being traded for a hit of crack, but I can bear it. Easily.

There are things that I am terrified of losing. My dog. My business. My family. My health. I hope God doesn't try to teach me any REALLY important lessons right now. But there is a lot that I am ready to see go. The idea with pruning of course is that what comes back is better, healthier, more vibrant. It's hurts at first, maybe, but it paves the way for better things. I'm ready! Bring it on.

Meanwhile, the business is growing. I have all my big plans, a new pricing structure, new marketing ideas, enormous new goals. But not because there's something wrong. I just like change, and I love growth. I want to keep making it better, more useful and more effective for more people. That's my job. Pruning helps.

operation double attendance

2010-05-08T22:12:00.000-07:00

Ok, I have an ambitious goal. And a really bad name for it. I want to see twice as many people come into Square One in June than in April. Is that too much, too high of a goal? June is when the yoga business goes into the summer slumps. Thirty days is not very long. What in the world am I going to do to make it happen?

I don't know, but I have a few ideas. Postcards. Press releases. Smartly placed google and facebook ads.

But I reallly need your help too. We still have referral cards you can give to everyone you know that will get them into their first class for free. If I get ten back with your name on it, you'll get something nice. I don't know what. I think one time I said a free class. Maybe a tee shirt too? But do it because getting more people to square one is a win-win-win. You (in your new tee shirt) and your friends are happy because you do yoga together at the absolute friendliest, best priced yoga space in the whole Bay Area. Square One gets strong and healthy and fiscally strong and keeps growing so more people get to do yoga. Simple, huh? Cards are in the hall. Take a lot, and let me if we run out. I have more!!

So the challenge is to double attendance in two months. It's a big puzzle how to do it, but I think we can. Do you have any good guerrilla marketing ideas to pass along? Let me know! Share them on this blog. Let's make this happen!

Update: I am changing the pricing structure in June to sliding scale 10/12/14. There will be a $12 minimum if you use plastic. Unlimited memberships will be 75/85/95. Five class packs 47//56//65. Eleven class packs will be 100/115/130. We'll have names for the levels on the scale like low, mid and supporter.

Update #2: I'm tired, but no longer angry. I don't hate myself for blowing up. It's something to watch about myself, but just more evidence that I'm part of the human race, which is perfectly fine by me.

rage

2010-05-07T22:13:00.000-07:00

Today presented lots of evidence that I am definitely not perfect yet. Even with all the yoga, I am still human, y'all. I lost my shit, once again, on another human being. I punched a wall and used the word "fuck" in several very personal, very loud and very angry insults.

(When I told the story later to a friend, she laughed at me because I used the side of my hand. Punching drywall is painful. She promised me that next time she's on this coast, she'll teach me the joy of a real fist. I hope maybe I won't need to know that by then.)

Anyway, this time it wasn't a landlord or a telephone customer service rep or a gas station attendant. Nope. It was a friend. I'm not going to get into whether she was wrong or not. I mean, really, does it matter? The point is that in many ways, my life and my behavior still feel totally out of control.

Self restraint is a complete mystery to me. I'm baffled by it. I've been trying to find the point in my interaction today when I could have walked away and gone to find my center again. I don't know when that point was. I was driven, like a crazy person, to keep myself in the argument until the time came when I was absolutely overcome by rage. Once the rage hit, it was a little bit like being out of my body. I knew as it was happening that I was acting insane. I could also see it in her face. I crossed the line from regular old everyday anger to something much closer to violence. But my body kept yelling and screaming and punching shit and there was absolutely nothing I could do about it. I was incapable in that moment of practicing self restraint.

A lot of you who know me or read my blog will point out that I quit drinking and smoking and snorting coke, but all I can tell you is that didn't happen because of self restraint. I think that if we're lucky, with the big stuff, the addictions, we get a little grace. If we've really had enough, it just falls away.

With the more subtle stuff, there's some work to do. The truth is, I have no idea how to go about it. Go back to therapy? Okay, maybe. But I can't really afford to do that right now, so get your butts to Square One. Your yoga teacher needs to pay her therapist.

Which actually brings me back to what I intended to write about when I sat down tonight: getting more butts into square one. Stay tuned...

a little dispassion

2010-05-05T22:56:00.000-07:00

May is looking good. So far, we have made sales goals everyday. If we keep this up, I might be able to rub a few dollars together and do something extravagant. Or, God forbid, save a little.

Here's the really good news. I'm not excited about it. I don't feel any joy directly attributable to the fact that the yoga studio is pulling in enough money to support me and all my small animals. I'm happy enough. I'm working hard and really enjoying my work, but for once, my mood is not directly determined by how well the business is doing.

When things aren't going well, and I'm depressed and worried about it, I particularly want to change my mood by telling myself to be dispassionate, to let go of results, etc., etc., but the high times are fun! I don't usually want to be dispassionate when things are going great. Seeing the business succeed is a rush. There's nothing like it.

But I like this. Maybe if I don't let myself get too high with the highs, the lows won't be so devastating. I know now that it always changes. Five days of high attendance and sales can be followed my fifteen days of mediocre sales and low attendance. Five great days can also be followed by more and more great days. Both things can be true simultaneously. It really doesn't matter much. There's not too much need to get excited.

pricing

2010-05-03T08:38:00.000-07:00

So the studio is starting to fill up. Sort of. Most of the evening classes most of the time feel busy and thriving and full.

But they're not. Low cost yoga is a volume business. We have to get about 30% more bodies through the door before I start breathing easy, and we could easily double our current numbers, which would make me really, really happy.

So that's the goal, y'all. Start squishing your mats together, because we're about to have a new definition of full.

But the truth is we don't need 30% more bodies; we need 30% more revenue. Bodies are just one way to do it. Changing pricing is another way. I've been trying to get more bodies in for fifteen months, and while we've had amazing growth, we seem to be at a plateau. I'm still working hard at it, but it would be unwise not to at least consider my pricing structure.

But a lot of people (in fact everyone I've spoken to except the Harvard MBA who first brought the idea to me that my pricing is too low) say that if Square One raises its prices, it will be a complete shift in the core values of the studio. We are a low cost yoga studio, whose mission is to make yoga accessible to everyone. There must be 10,000 postcards out in the world that proclaim in black and white: "we heart $10 yoga."

I have no interest becoming another expensive yoga studio. But as my friend with the MBA pointed out, if the business isn't sustainable, I will not be bringing yoga, low cost or not, to anyone. If the business isn't profitable, we can't grow.

The other thing she pointed out that I know without doubt to be true is that price is a psychological indicator of quality. How many of you buy Aveda or Bumble and Bumble and Bumble or whatever it is instead of the all natural brand at Trader Joe's? Or Tide instead of the generic? I don't anymore, but I certainly have, and I know that even though I could never tell the difference in how my hair looked or felt, I kept buying the expensive products. Maybe square one customers are smarter than that, but could that have something to do with why we're not filled to capacity? I mean, don't you think we should be blowing up? We have awesome teachers and a beautiful space and we're friendly and all the elements are there.

I'm not going to take away "we heart $10 yoga." I heart $10 yoga. But I know that many square one students are coming because they love the teachers and the space and the feeling, not because it's cheap. That may have brought you in, but it's just one reason among many why you stay.

I am thinking creatively about pricing structures that keep drop ins low, but help the business stabilize financially and eventually grow so that we're reaching many, many more people. What I'm leaning toward is a sliding scale structure that starts at Square One's current prices, but that goes up from there. I am also really interested in adding more classes at unusual times that have an even lower price structure. The late night classes now are only $6. I would like to add more classes at off times at prices that make it really, really easy for everyone, even the fashionably broke, to come to yoga.

Here's your homework if you're a loyal square one customer: Help us overcome the fact that price is an indicator of quality by telling everyone you know how great the classes are and what a lovely space it is. Keep spreading the word about yoga with a mission. I know classes are looking fuller these days, but remember that low cost yoga is a volume business. We need numbers. And be patient as our mats start to slide closer and closer together.

ambitionless

2010-04-27T22:41:00.000-07:00

I'm feeling a refreshing lack of ambition.

I taught tonight. It was a late night class, and there were two regulars there. I love teaching yoga. I'm not the best teacher out there. I'm not the wisest. I don't have the strongest asana practice, but I love doing it. It's fun. It gets me completely out of my head. And I get to do it whenever I want.

I love square one students. We have the best group of people taking classes at the studio that I can possibly imagine. They are all, every single one of them, smart and friendly and generous. They smile a lot, and they are super forgiving. I used to know all the regulars. I don't know all the regulars anymore. I'm a little bummed about that, but it's a sign of really good things.

I enjoy my job. I like looking at numbers and growth and planning schedules and hiring teachers and talking to students. I love it. I even like the really mundane stuff like stickering postcards with the new address. If put on music, I can do it for hours.

What more do I want? I could easily have more money, but even that isn't really bothering me right now. I ordered organic produce home delivery, and I'm looking forward to cooking more and eating out less. I have clothes, more than I need, and I always like what I wear. Even my dog has nice clothes. I have a house full of furniture and dishes and pots and pans and towels and sheets and all that. There's absolutely nothing to buy.

I set my own schedule and I don't have to work more than about thirty hours a week if I don't want to. I usually want to, but it's not necessary. If there's not much happening in real estate and I'm not moving the studio or starting a business, I have lots of free time. I wake up without an alarm. Today I walked the dog and then I did my morning pages as suggested by The Artist Way. I had time this afternoon to take the Sutras to the coffee shop and read and write a little. I ran into a friend and chatted for awhile. I was never in a hurry. I was never stressed. It was lovely.

To think I could live like this all the time if I just stayed ambitionless.

It's nice, but it won't happen. I have always thrived on excitement and newness and change. (Some in the professions call it chaos.) I already have plans and ideas and new ways to busy myself and achieve more. Soon I'll be overwhelmed and freaking out again.

Until then, let's just enjoy the calm.

writing

2010-04-26T21:20:00.000-07:00

Was yesterday's entry a little intense? Should I put some distance in between me and it? In between you and it? In between you and me?

I can do that. I can write about my day today. I itemized all of my business expenses from 2010. I could tell you all about it. That's what a real business blogger would do. But I don't want to. It's just not that interesting.

I want to write about my life. It's too much for this blog, which is in present tense and has a narrow scope. I need to learn to write. I guess I kind of already know how to write. I do it a lot. I have half an MFA in creative writing. (I got the feeling that not too much else was happening in the second half.) My grammar's not bad. But I don't know how to start a big project. Weird. I started the yoga studio. That was a damn big project.

I don't know how to structure my day to make time for it. I don't know how to begin. I don't think anyone will read it. I'm terrified.

Someone told me once that procrastination is a fancier word for fear. He's right, you know. I procrastinated itemizing my expenses because I was scared of my financial situation, scared that I was spending too much money. I was, but so what? I can make progress because I've seen it. I know where I am. Avoiding doesn't help. The work is inevitable.

Can I start? Don't I need a place to write and a time of day and a window I can look out of and a more comfortable chair? Or can I just start? What would happen if I just woke up tomorrow and began? What would that be like? What if I started right now?

I'll let you know if I try.

Good night.

where God dwells

2010-04-25T21:47:00.000-07:00

I have some readers out there now, and being honest is getting harder and harder. Some of what I want to write about feels too heavy, too dark, too real. You will come into the yoga studio tomorrow and you will know me better than I really want to be known.

I started talking to a friend tonight about my life. It wasn't a conversation; it was a monologue. My life has gotten really good. Really clean, I should say. I have a dog that loves me and is really cute. I have a nice car and a graduate degree and a cool business that's doing pretty well.

But that's only the recent story, and I started telling her the rest, the first thirty or so years that were so painful and destructive, when I felt so lost. I talked about high school, and the friends that died in car accidents and drug overdoses and knife fights. I told her about spending half of adolescence locked in institutions, and about the nights alone in Mexico, drinking, playing the same songs over and over, longing for a different place, a different time, a different outcome, wondering if it was time yet to drive my car off the cliff on the toll road from Cuernavaca.

There are no more big deals. I want to shout that and write it in all caps and scream it and hope that you'll remember too. Once we're not living like that, it doesn't matter much what happens. If I can remember what I can be like (I forget all the time), I take nothing for granted. It's all a gift.

When I did my yoga teacher training, we had a two hour Advanced Pranayama session. The teacher told us some of us would not be able to handle it. I didn't for a second think that I might be one of them. I'm strong. I've been through shit. I've gone to therapy, and I've worked twelve steps. A few times. I can handle it.

But I lost it. Somewhere in the bhastrika and the seed mantras, I was overcome by grief. There was no end to it. I cried and cried with only the vaguest understanding what the grief was about. A few months before I had lost an old friend suddenly and under questionable circumstances. It started there, but it went way beyond that. It was the grief of lifetimes, and I knew then that everything, absolutely everything, they were teaching me about karma and past lives and enlightenment was true.

Later that evening, the teacher said, essentially, "Hey, you don't have to do this. You don't have to renounce everything or become a swami or spend your life studying the scriptures. You can have a nice little life, maybe a couple kids, do some asana and enjoy yourself."

At that moment, I loved him for that. It may all be true, but the reality of it is absolutely overwhelming. It's too much. It's heavier and more intense than the best acid you ever took and just as unpredictable. I got a taste, and I didn't want it. Not then, probably not now either.

So I got busy creating that lovely little life in the material world I thought he was talking about. Very busy, and I'm afraid tonight that it's turned into running. I've forgotten where I come from, so lately I've been taking everything for granted. I've become entitled to more than I have. Even my asana practice lately has been more about sweaty rooms and endorphin highs than getting quiet. Do, do, do. Go, go, go. Get, get, get.

Does owning a yoga studio bring me closer to God? What if I own two? Is knowing God too much to ask for in this life? Can I know God and live in the material world and eat lots of cheese and chocolate chip cookies and text while I drive? All of those things keep me from my grief, keep me floating above the grittiness, keep me focused on the next task instead of something else, some place where all the fear dwells.

But the problem is that is also the place where God dwells.

Slow down. Slow down. Slow down, Miss Katy Mae. What's the hurry anyway?

fear of failing

2010-04-19T12:50:00.000-07:00

Something happened and my mood changed. Nothing external, just a little shift on the inside. I'm less worried about being broke. Everybody's broke right now, or acting broke. It's very chic. The numbers at the studio are still low compared to a month ago, but I'm just not as concerned. It changes. It always changes. When I'm sane, I know not to get too excited about the highs or too depressed by the lows. It's the long term that's interesting, and in the long term, square one is experiencing steady growth. We're doing okay. Better than okay.

The last entry was about letting go of things that weren't serving me. At that moment all that I could let go of were some towels and a pile of old clothes. I also tried to be a little more generous with my time and my attention, which is harder and requires more sustained attention. I did okay for a couple of days.

But trying got the ball rolling. It got me out of my obsessive little me-thinking just a tiny bit, and I started to relax a little.

I've had a couple of really interesting conversations recently with different entrepreneur friends who are either giving up businesses right now or have in the past. I have to say it's making me a lot less scared of failing. Each of their stories involves so many complexities. Difficult partners, new families, working harder than they could realistically work. I've always thought that if I had to give up square one it would be an enormous failure, but when I look at these friends, what they chose seems very, very far from what I would call a failure.

I feel like maybe I've let go of that fear just a little bit. It can fail. I'll still be okay. My friends and family will still love me. I'll pick up and try something else. I've learned so much in the last year or so, way more than any other year of my life. I'm stronger physically and mentally, and I'm really beginning to get to know myself, what I can do and what I'm not so good at. No matter what happens, I get to take all that with me.

I have work to do at the studio. I have new classes to market and I'm planning some stuff to get us through the dry months of summer. I have my eye on a new, really big project that I'm super excited about. I'm swimming in warm water. I'm having fun. Still broke in the traditional sense, but feeling better about it. I'm engaged in the process and somewhat more relaxed about the bank balances and class attendance.

Owning a business is like being in a wonderfully complicated relationship. It's messy and unpredictable. Sometimes you stayed married for a lifetime, and sometimes you decide it was exciting for awhile, but it needs to end. Either way, there's no such thing as failure, and there's no wrong way to do it. As long as you dive in and try. I've done that. Now it's time to stop whining about what I don't have and dive back in. That fear wasn't serving me.

stingy

2010-04-14T22:43:00.001-07:00

I'm not that complicated. I'm still in the dumps a bit, and if I'm not angry, which I'm not, it has to be fear.

I heard on the radio yesterday morning that children whose parents lost jobs in recessions when they were growing up were three times more likely than other children to live in poverty as adults. It just cemented the idea I've been toying with for a long time that wealth and poverty are states of mind, and I mean that in more ways than one.

I grew up with a single mom who would cash checks at the grocery store two days before payday in order to keep things afloat. I have a poverty mindset. I can be really stingy, although I try hard to hide it. I hoard certain objects, particularly clothes and shoes. I was traumatized by my lack of Guess jeans growing up. Seriously. It was really painful. Hoarding is the action of a poverty mindset. Hoarding is a way of acting out the belief that there will never be enough. Hoarding is an an act of fear.

I'm sorry, but here I go again with Pema Chodron. She says practicing generosity is a practice in letting go. What I need now more than anything is to be able to let go.

So I'm consciously practicing generosity as much as my feeble little generosity muscles will let me. But I have this hunch that what I really need to give away is exactly what I am most scared of losing, which means that I have to figure out what it is that I'm most scared of losing.

Here's what I've come up with so far: I am most scared of losing the vision of myself as successful in this business. It's an ego thing.

Perfect, because that's exactly what I want to give away! There is nothing I want more than to talk to people about their businesses and help them figure out ways to be more successful. It gets better because in the next few days I have a bunch of meetings with people who need exactly that kind of help. Know anyone else? Send 'em my way.

There's also that old fear of being materially poor, that poverty mindset. So I'm going to give away some stuff. Old clothes, mostly, which doesn't sound that generous even to stingy old me, but it's something. I have to start somewhere. I'll try to give away a few things that hurt just a little. Not my Lululemon leggings. I'm not a saint or anything, but I'll push myself a little.

I already feel better. I have a plan. My poverty mindset may not go anywhere fast. It's a lifelong way of thinking. But we start somewhere. We build it. We practice, like our practice. Today, for maybe 1.5 seconds if you counted really fast, I did bakasana with straight arms. It took me a year of practicing really regularly to get my feet off the ground in bakasana at all. We get stronger, a lot stronger, if we work at it.

And by the way, it may be a good time to ask me for stuff.

broke

2010-04-12T21:04:00.000-07:00

Be careful what you wish for.

We've had a slow few days at the studio. For most of March and the first week or so of April, I was completely optimistic about where the studio was going. We were making sales goals day after day after day. I felt great. But we've had these slow days (how quickly I forget that we're still doing much better than we ever were in 2009), and I feel dull and unmotivated and fearful. Broke. This is what broke feels like.

I get into this flow sometimes and I'm having fun in life, working enough, helping people out, taking care of my body. Business goes well without me trying too hard or worrying too much about it. I have energy to finish projects and inspiration to start new ones. And then I get out of flow. Like now. Instead of work that accomplishes tasks and gets me closer to my goals, I stare at numbers. And then I check them again just to be sure. And then I look at the bank balance and run it all through again. I did that all day today. It really was a downer.

What comes first: the optimism and flow or the success of the business? It feels right now like the success comes first, but when I'm in flow, I believe the flow, and the thinking that causes flow, comes first.

Barbara Ehrenreich has a new book out called Bright Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking has Undermined America. I really don't want to read it. I'm actually kind of mad at her for writing it. In a world where almost everything is unpredictable and out of my control, it's really comforting to think that I have some power over outcomes by my strong belief that things will work out well.

Then I have days like today, when I completely understand what Ehrenreich is talking about. My optimism seems foolish, and I tell myself that I have not been living in reality for a long, long time. I get kind of panicky, and I start to believe that it was all a mistake, and the absolute best thing I can do right now is run, run, run and find someone, anyone, who will employ me.

What's the truth? In my saner, more level moments, I know that both are true. I don't have very much money right now. It's really pretty tight. On the other hand, I have a business that is growing. I just need to hang in there awhile longer. It's not happening as quickly as I would have chosen, but it's definitely happening.

The truth is that on paper, I have never had enough money. It was never a sane idea to start a yoga studio and to quit my job. Never. The other truth is that there has always been enough money. The cash has always been there when I needed it. Today, even, there is enough money. The fear is all about the future. Right now I'm full from dinner. I'm wearing new shoes, my pets are fed, and I'm living in a warm apartment that I can afford. And I do this all on what Square One pays me. I shouldn't buy anymore shoes, but I'm okay.

It's the same lesson for me over and over. I'm so attached to the success of the business that you can track my mood by square one's numbers and vice versa. It has become a little less extreme in the last year, but the business is a lot more secure now than it was a year ago, so you would think I could let go of a not-so-stellar week every now and then. You would think.

I'm not there yet. In the meantime, I'll just keep showing up, even when I'm not so productive. I'll keep doing yoga, even if it's just a little 'cause the truth is I don't really feel like it. The numbers will change. My mood will change. I'm not sure which will happen first, but both will happen. Maybe even soon.

peak experiences

2010-04-09T22:14:00.000-07:00

I’m on a mini-vacation. I take them every couple of months. I go away, just me and my dog, to the coast for two or three days. I take it really easy. I do exactly what I want to do. I eat sweets and shellfish, even though I’m a vegetarian the rest of my life and supposedly I’ve sworn off the sugar.

It’s wonderful. The northern and central California coast has to be one of the most stunning and dramatic landscapes in the world. We're so lucky. I just drive. Every hour or so, I’ll pull over and walk on the beach, or check out a view, or get a coffee and take a little detour down a road I’m curious about.

I usually have one or two peak experiences on these trips, moments when I know, really know, that life is this incredible adventure and that I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be, doing exactly what I’m supposed to be doing. I understand in these moments that I’m being exquisitely cared for every second of the way. I lose absolutely all worry and fear and feel profound joy and ease and comfort.

Sounds nice, huh? That’s why I go. I generally only have these experiences in places that are inordinately beautiful, and I have only ever had them alone. If I recreate those circumstances, which is really the purpose of these trips, the odds are pretty good that I’m going to get that little moment alone with God. It's something I'm really grateful for. When I remember to be.

But here’s the catch. As wonderful as they are, I don’t think having peak experiences is the point. I have always thought that the point of practice, and of life really, is to have more and more peak experiences that are closer and closer together until eventually it’s just pure bliss. Again, credit where it’s due, Pema Chodron says I’ve got it all wrong, and I think I believe her.

She tells the story of a Zen master who, whenever asked how he is doing, always says, “okay.”

One of his students eventually asks him, “Roshi, don’t you ever have bad days?”

“Yes,” he answers, “I often have bad days, and I have great days, and I am always okay.”

Equanimity. That’s the point. That’s what the work is about.

I haven’t written in the blog in over a week. I realize it’s sort of bad timing, because I finally did the e-blast and announced to the world that I’m blogging. Then I quit blogging. But every night I come home, and at the usual time when I would sit down to write, I feel okay. I’m not angry or worried or elated, and if I'm not sort of fucked up in some way, what's there to write about? I hope to learn soon that there is still plenty to write about.

So is this equanimity?

I’m not a Zen master. Believe me, that’s not what I’m saying. This will pass, and I will go back to my usual fluctuations between excitement and fear. I will. And in the meantime, I better figure out how to keep writing. I think I have a few readers now.

self promotion

2010-03-31T22:47:00.000-07:00

I'm going to do it, y'all. I'm going to send out an e-newsletter all about me. Is that totally gross? Is everyone going to hate me? I put this task off for a long, long time. I do not want to market myself. I do not want to end up in your spam folder.

Most self-employed people that I talk to agree that self promotion is really, really hard. I guess there are some people who share one of my professions (the real estate one) for whom this comes naturally, but for most of us, it's awkward and uncomfortable and we really, really don't want to bother you.

I clearly care a lot what you think about me. I do not want to be your cheesy ex-co-worker or high school friend who sends you junk mail all the time. On the other hand, I'm self employed. I create my own work, and I'm my own marketing team. I just have to do it.

I really don't like the word market. How about inform? I'm doing stuff and I want people to know about it. I'm teaching a class outside of square one. I have a workshop coming up. I'm writing this blog. I'm selling houses. If I don't tell people what I'm doing, I have no business, no work, no reason to blog, or to show up for my classes, or to plan workshops, etc., etc. I'll have to go get a real job.

So that's what I've been doing the last couple of days. Organizing contacts. Finding emails. Of course, gmail stores every single email address I've ever communicated with, so my list could be enormous. Then there's facebook and all these people I haven't spoken to in years. It's really hard to decide who to put on the list. I was braver than I thought I would be. If I know you, and I could find your email, you're probably on my list.

Why is it so hard to promote ourselves? I don't have any problem promoting square one. The studio is a few steps removed from me and my own little, fragile ego. If you don't like square one or you remove yourself from the list, there's nothing to take personally. Well, actually, I take it a little personally. But I try to remember that there are a lot of things I don't know. Maybe you moved away. Maybe you're just a little grumpy. Maybe you're getting the email at two addresses. Overall, very few people unsubscribe but a lot of people (way more than half) just don't open the email.

But it will be really different if you don't like me and you unsubscribe from my personal list. If you're not that interested, will you just open the email for one second so it shows it was opened and then delete it? Please? It's really the kind thing to do.

So look for it. You'll probably get it by Friday if you're on the list. If you're not on my list and you want to be, email me. There's nothing I'd love more than to have your permission to send you impersonal emails about my professional life. Well, except maybe getting a personal email in response.

Please be kind. I'll try really hard to make the emails entertaining, and I'll send them infrequently. I promise. And if you write me back, I'll write you back. I want to know what you're doing too. Put me on your list.

data

2010-03-27T11:31:00.001-07:00

So the intent of this blog really is to talk about running and opening a small business. Sometimes I get a little off track...

Since the beginning of March, I've had this new software that keeps track of students and classes and revenue. It will turn the data all different kinds of ways, and for the first time, I have a really clear picture of how the business is doing. This is a blessing and a curse.

If there is one big emotional lesson that small business owners get, it is a lesson in letting go. When I have really big days and people are buying all kinds of stuff, class packs and mats and tee shirts, I get really happy and excited and feel successful. Then there are other days, where nobody buys anything, very little revenue comes in, and I get fearful and worried and think that it will always be like that.

Looking at data on a day-by-day basis is impossible not to do, but really not that useful. What's really important are the trends. The good news for square one is that our numbers are up. From December to January, we grew 30%. This is totally normal for the yoga business as people are home from the holidays full of New Year's resolutions. The really great news is that March is shaping up to be 40% bigger than February, and now is the time when we should be seeing a drop from the New Year's boom. The move was very good for us.

I have goals for the studio. I have always had goals for the studio, but it was really hard to know how I was doing because I didn't have easy access to the numbers. If we have 40% growth again next month, we will just about reach these initial goals. We will still have room to grow. According to my software, we are only operating at about 16% capacity right now. But once the initial goals are met, the studio will be completely healthy (and so will my personal finances). It may not happen in one month, but there's nothing wrong with setting the bar high. The tricky part is that then I have to let go of it. I have to keep doing my job in the best way I can all the while understanding that the results are completely out of my hands. It's really hard and I'm not that good at it.

But I do love having all of this data at my fingertips. It's so much fun to look at, especially since we're growing so quickly. The trick is to also be okay when the growth slows. That's when I will definitely need the yoga.

do what's hard

2010-03-25T16:10:00.000-07:00

I had a weird day today. It started off strong. I went to my favorite yoga class in the city and had brunch with friends afterwards. Then I went home and got into bed. I stayed there until late in the afternoon. I was exhausted.

I went to a chiropractor yesterday. (Dr. Kacie Flegal at her new business Elements of Being, just to make the plug. She's great.) We talked about how I get lightheaded really easily. It happens a lot in my asana practice. I've come close to fainting a few times. I'm also a complete sugar junkie. I have intense cravings for sweets, and I almost always give in. She put it all together for me. After the sugar spikes come the falls. It doesn't help that I don't drink enough water. The result is that my blood sugar is low and my blood volume is low, so I come out of prasarita worried that I might fall over. It's been like that so long, it doesn't even seem unusual anymore.

There have been these moments since I began practicing yoga when I have had flashes that what I consider normal and okay is actually completely contrary to what I believe in. I realized at a certain point, at the end of a certain summer after a certain number of years of daily drinking and lots of coke snorting, that I was not okay unless I was ingesting chemicals. I went to a yoga class the next day, and it became clear by the end of the class that I just had to stop, that I wouldn't be free until I did. So I stopped. (The stopping wasn't quite as easy as I make it sound here, but the realization was sharp and clear.) It happened again around eating meat. I was having chicken at some chain restaurant after a hike and all I could think about was how that very chicken that I was eating suffered immensely so that I could eat it. I could not stop picturing this living, feeling creature in a tiny cage where it could not move and where it had to wait its whole life, painfully, to die. Why would I eat that? Why would I go anywhere near having anything to do with that? In both cases, I just could not hide from the truth anymore. Yoga brings clarity.

Today was the first day in a long time that I didn't have any chocolate. No pastries, no cookies, no cake. Most people probably have lots of days like that, but I really can't remember the last time I have. No refined sugar in my blood (or very little), and I feel really, really tired. And I have a headache. I've been kind of sad and grumpy most of the day. But I don't want to see stars when I do yoga. I want my body to have a steady stream of the nutrients that it needs. And I don't want to be beholden to sweets. It's a health thing. It's also a freedom thing.

I had a conversation with a student tonight about headstand. He really likes tripod, and I feel pretty strongly that tripod's okay in certain circumstances, like coming into from crow or prasarita, but that good old, simple, steady sirsasana is the headstand of choice for our regular practice. Tripod is flashy and for fun, not for the serious focus work of headstand. He clearly disagreed, and we went back and forth about it for awhile. He finally said that traditional headstand is much harder for him, so he should be practicing that more.

Bravo, I thought. Exactly. We do what's easy and we get into these grooves, these mindsets, these habits, these samskaras. In my experience, they are nearly impossible to break by sheer will. If we are even so lucky as to notice them. Something has to open. Yoga has provided me with all of those openings. And then once it's open, the choice is so clear, so obvious. I only have to decide once. There's no struggle, even when it's uncomfortable.

No more daily (or twice daily) pastry. It's fucking with my practice. So obvious.

dukkha

2010-03-21T19:22:00.000-07:00

After I wrote the last post about being angry, a few interesting things happened. One person who's angry at me used the blog as an opportunity to express his anger at me publicly. He did it on Facebook. He deleted the comment really quickly, but I got to see it and maybe a few other people did too. When you are vulnerable in public, some people will use it as an opportunity to attack you. My mother warned me that would happen.

Another thing that happened is that several people told me I hadn't done anything wrong. Possibly. I do give myself a hard time and I analyze my behavior to death. I'll resist the urge to quote Rumi (such a cliched yoga teacher thing to do), but to paraphrase: there is no right or wrong, dummy. What it's about for me is that I don't want my life to be a reaction. What I did with the landlady, evil bitch that she is, was a reaction. If I had noticed that anger arise in me, mulled it over and decided to tell her that she was crazy and a liar, it would have been different. I want to decide, but what happened was that I was overcome with an emotion that I reacted to. I did not decide.

The last interesting thing that happened after the blog entry is that people told me about how they're frustrated and angry and about how they have acted in ways (usually when no one's looking) that they regret and that are harmful. And I was reminded. We are all like that. We are all like that. We are all like that. The person who lashed out at me, me, the landlord, my friends, probably you.

I listen to Pema Chodron CDs when I drive sometimes. Six discs later, and this is basically what she says: we are all suffering. It's the first of the Four Noble Truths in Buddhism. Dukkha. It's frustration, irritation, dissatisfaction, resentment, and we all feel it. When I'm feeling it, I think I'm the only one. I feel very alone. What Pema Chodron says though is that actually, lots and lots of people are feeling it at that very moment that I am experiencing it. She suggests breathing in the feeling. Breathe it in for you and for all the people in the world who are suffering as you are. Acknowledge them. Acknowledge that you are not alone. Then breathe out the antidote. Breathe it out for you and breathe it out for everyone who is suffering as you are.

I've been doing this for a little while (at least a week). What's been really interesting to me is that no matter what it is that I'm breathing in, whether it's frustration or anger or fear or anxiety, the antidote on the out breath always feels exactly the same. It's calm and ease in the knowledge that everything is exactly how it is supposed to be.

Exactly how it is supposed to be. The Buddhists had it right. We are all suffering. When I realize that, I have the exquisite experience of finding it impossible to be angry. Like the person who lashed out at me after the last blog. I admit that I had a flash of anger and of hurt feelings, but then I realized how perfect it is, really. He was doing exactly what I had done. We are exactly alike. What's there to be mad about?

That's rare. In fact, it's only happened once. I can't even recapture the feeling now, but there was this moment when I saw us all as hurt and vulnerable and imperfect and it was the most beautiful thing. I think most, maybe even all, of us are trying to be better and act better and do better. There's this sweetness there, even when we do it so imperfectly. Especially because we do it imperfectly. It's so human, so frail, so real, so perfect, actually. It is exactly how it is supposed to be.

angry!

2010-03-15T21:04:00.000-07:00

Today I ended my relationship with the owner of the old space. It was not civil. I accepted a check for less than is legally owed to me from the deposit. I almost didn't do it. I handed the check back to her at one point when she asked me to sign away my rights to the money.

We were standing on the street outside the old space. I saw that she had taken down the sign on the door that told customers we had moved. The place is still vacant, so there is no reason for that action other than pure meanness. I knew, for my own sanity, that I had to be done with her. The few hundred dollars were not worth fighting for. I took the check, signed the paper and said, "I'm only doing this so that I never have to deal with you again. You're a lying, crazy...." I threw the paper and her pen on the ground, turned and walked away.

I'm fairly certain that's not what Buddha would do. I'm going to reveal just how unspiritual I really am. I was so overcome with anger that the words came out of my mouth with absolutely no thought, no pause, no consideration. It was as though I had no choice.

I've heard that meditation will give us that pause, but I'm not meditating regularly right now. It gets worse, because even in hindsight I can't think of a better way to handle it. Doesn't she need to know what a crazy, lying bitch she is? Wasn't it my job to tell her?

Can someone tell me some better, calmer, more centered way to handle it?

I suffered a lot over that woman. She lied many times in attempts (sometimes successful) to get more money out of me. She refused to turn down the music in the restaurant she owned next door and the walls between us were very, very thin. Sometimes I couldn't help but notice that it would actually get loud when class started and quiet when class ended. I wondered (insanely, I hope) if she was intentionally trying to ruin my business.

I had two conversations with two different friends today who are having call-the-lawyer type disputes with their business partners. I considered taking on a partner for about a week once. We were completely incompatible, and I'm grateful that I saw that early. But sometimes it's not so obvious.

Who we do business with matters. A lot. Business partners especially. It's a marriage. But landlords too. I never liked her, and I should have let that be a warning. My current landlord is a big corporation. As bad as that sounds to our left-leaning ears, our interactions are always professional, civil, legal.

I also clearly have some work to do with anger. I am self-righteous, and I am a know-it-all. I saw it in all its glory this morning. Can yoga soften that? Will yoga soften that? I sense that asana helps, but that the real antidote is found in sitting practice. Or maybe I'll just hold onto it for a little while longer. Telling that woman off was the most satisfying thing I've done in a long, long time.

don't force it

2010-03-14T21:06:00.000-07:00

My friend, Matthew, is teaching himself to jump forward from down dog into crow. It's a really, really difficult thing to do that requires having control of your body in handstand enough to bring your knees into your armpits and balance there on your hands.

I'm trying to learn to jump from crow to chaturanga, a much more basic move. I've had enough yoga teachers tell me, and I can feel in my own body, that I am strong enough to do it. I'm just scared. When I'm in crow, my legs are glued to my upper arms and no matter how much I think about shooting my legs back, I can 't get my brain to command the movement.

So I found a video online where a teacher goes through the steps for both jumping out of and into crow. I sent it along to Matthew. The teacher said several times, "don't force it," which I love because it means I can hang out in the comfort and safety of my little crow pose. There's nothing wrong with that, but am I maybe, just a little, postponing my growth?

Matthew pointed out that there is a fine line between forcing (which most of us agree we don't want to do) and trying really hard.

I'll give my crow a break here because arm balances and inversions are really difficult poses for me (it took me three years of trying really hard just to kick into handstand), and whether I jump back to chaturanga is ultimately not that important. It will come.

But what about off the mat?

I'm going to talk about real estate. From the time I got my license in early December until a couple weeks ago, I was working really, really hard at it. I wrote a couple of offers that didn't get accepted. I spent many, many hours working for clients who decided not to buy. I'm not complaining. That's the job, but I'm feeling like it would be just a tad easier if I were really meant to be doing that work.

When I'm working on the studio, things fall into place magically. My days pass, and I feel useful and rewarded. I work hard and put in long hours, but the work never feels hard. It's engaging and fun, and I get immediate feedback both when I do things well and when I fuck things up.

I'm not giving up my real estate license, but I am taking it easy. Maybe a burst of energy will come that will shoot my legs back into chaturanga. Maybe a burst of energy will come and I'll start marketing myself and finding new clients. In both cases, I'm just going to wait for it.

That's probably not in the real estate success manuals. I don't care. If I'm supposed to be doing it, there's no forcing. Legwork, yes. Pushing, striving, grasping, no. It's not worth the mental effort and energy, even if I do get the client or deal or whatever it is. Even if I jump back to chaturanga in the middle of class with everyone watching. I will not have enjoyed the process. I will have wasted my time, because we all know (I hope) that earning more money or getting a new yoga pose only makes us happy for fleeting, quick little moment. Enjoying what we do keeps us happy in the long term.

So how does one know if she's forcing or just working hard? That's the tricky part. God knows I've had a lot of bad ideas that seemed inspired at the time. I'm starting to be able to discern, just a tiny little bit, the difference in how they feel. Forcing feels tight and constricted and results-oriented. Strong effort feels engaging and expansive and is process-oriented.

May I stay in the latter.

self-supporting

2010-03-11T09:19:00.000-08:00

It's been too long since writing. A lot has happened. We had the opening party, which everyone seems to agree was a success. The class was at absolute capacity. We were mat-to-mat and there was not even room for any teachers to take class. The party afterwards went well. Jennifer Meek danced (amazing), Sarah Jenness and her husband, David, fire danced (beautiful, ethereal) and Katie Colver's band Winnie Byrd played a set. They were great. I can't wait to have them back in the studio for another show.

Meanwhile, my bank account has dwindled to the triple digits. With no real estate clients anywhere near closing, much less in contract, there is no income in sight for me other than what square one can pay me.

Which isn't much. Square One has only recently even been able to pay me for the classes that I teach. I have never been compensated for running the place. The reality is that the money goes into, not out of, most businesses for at least the first year. It's doing better now. I was able to open the second location without incurring any more debt, and none of my personal money has gone into the studio for several months, which is obviously a good thing since I don't have any.

It's wonderful that so many people love square one and that we had a great party, but ultimately for it to work I've got to be able to pay my rent and the debit card has to go through when I buy the dog food. So I've been really busy. I need to do more thorough numbers-running, but at a glance, it seems that if we can get 50% more paying people through the door, square one can start paying me a living wage.

That feels doable. With the move, we've gotten rid of a lot of the problems that meant people didn't return. We have a good heater now. The studio is quiet and spacious. It's not on State Highway 123. The passers-by don't gawk at students through the window as though yoga were the most foreign and bizarre thing they'd ever seen. (It happened. A lot.) There were always good reasons to come back to square one, but there were also lots of reasons not to come back. I don't think that's the case anymore.

With all my heart and time and energy, I'm making sure that the experience for the students is ideal. I've bought new software that helps me keep track of the money a little better. We were losing money because our record keeping system wasn't accurate. That's not going to happen anymore. The software also makes it easier for people to spend money online, and we're seeing more revenue come from the website now. The software is expensive, but I think using it is one of the best decisions I've made about the business. Second, of course, to the move.

And I'm marketing. Like crazy. Along with getting the website professionally done, I'm putting postcards out like I did in the early days. I'm giving away lots of free class cards for new students. I'm urging my teachers to help me with this. We've got to get them in the door. I'm pretty sure once we do our retention rates will be really good. For the first time ever, all of the elements are in place.

50% more? It's happening. Our numbers are up slightly and people are investing in class cards and memberships. But will it happen quickly enough that I can pay all my personal bills on time and easily? I don't know, but it's definitely possible.

I often wonder why everyone doesn't quit their day jobs and start businesses. Then everyone can be like me and bring their dogs to work and roll in at ten and report to no one. But I realize today that it's not for everyone. The biggest question I would ask someone considering self-employment is: how comfortable are you with financial insecurity? One day you'll be like me, looking at an very low bank balance knowing that it's only you and your hard work and good intentions and good luck that are going make it comfortable again. Jobs = security. Sort of. The reality is that life is uncertain, but we all have different tolerances for how much we can take. I don't want a job, but I can see why one might.

faith

2010-02-28T21:54:00.000-08:00

We opened the new location today.

I just can't believe how well everything turned out. From running into a student at the Fedex who was dying to lend me her truck (which I really needed right then), to the crew of people who showed up to help yesterday (always just enough people, more would have gotten awkward), to the way the furniture from the old space fit right in like it was made for the new location. It makes me think it was made for the new location. Time, after all, is not what we think it is.

But that's off topic. I took the 11 am class this morning, and it was packed. Alexandra, who teaches that class, was not expecting me to be there, but she talked about the faith required to open the studio, about the faith required for all transformation.

I got all teary because I didn't know before that moment that I had faith. I knew the studio would open on the date that was set. I always knew that. A couple of times yesterday people gave me odd looks when I told them that, yes, we were opening tomorrow. There was a lot of work to do, but I never doubted that it would get done. And then people showed up. Lots of them. They painted the baseboards, framed the signs, scraped the paint off the kitchen floor. Some of them risked tetanus and bodily harm by doing real construction demo and rebuilding. All of them worked really hard and selflessly to make it happen.

I do have faith. I don't have to worry. I know that I am on the right track with square one. I know because everything that I need always comes to me just when I need it.

The rest of my life isn't usually like that, of course. And sometimes square one doesn't feel like that either. What would it be like to understand that everything is always being taken care of? Always. That, I'm learning, is faith.

I want everyone to take the plunge. Quit your job. Do what you love. Dive. You can worry, and you will worry, but do it anyway. You never know. It might just work. In fact, it will always work. The only danger is that you'll have to change your perspective on what it means to be working.

underwhelmed?

2010-02-24T22:45:00.001-08:00

I have wanted to write about Monday since Monday. Monday was one of those god-awful days where I went around being bitchy to everyone, especially people who were tyring to help me. I felt like my to-do list was insurmountable, and I hated myself for not being a calmer and sweeter, more centered human being.

Today my to-do list is longer. My business account became overdrawn when I had money sitting at home waiting to be deposited. My real estate deal has fallen through. And I'm happy. I'm content, and I know that I'm doing as good a job as I can do. I know that the yoga studio will open at the new location on Sunday even if I haven't finished. I almost certainly will not have finished.

My friend Matthew (who's doing all the work) mentioned today that maybe I could feel a little more overwhelmed. A little stress response would help get the fitting rooms in and the baseboards installed. A little stress response might get me down to the city and into the bank on time. But I don't want it. I don't want to feel frantic and spent out and spun out and like I'm coming up short all the time. I'm fine. The studio is fine. It will all be okay.

The interesting thing is that I am noticing now that how I feel usually has absolutely nothing to do with my circumstances. Today I feel great even though everything is uncertain, and honestly, not tending toward the outcome I would most like to see. Monday I was miserable even though my circumstances were much more optimistic. What's up with that?

So my emotional state is basically independent of my circumstances, but I still try really, really hard to control the circumstances of my life, most of which are completely out of my hands. Grasping at the illusion of being in control brings me and everyone around me pain and unhappiness. Like on Monday, I had to make the customer service guy at Comcast understand that he had to send me another modem, and no! I absolutely would not pay $15 for shipping. I yelled and screamed and cursed in a wasted effort to gain control over that situation. I don't know how he felt about it or if I brought him suffering. Probably. I definitely made myself unhappy. Unhappier. I was already unhappy or I wouldn't have behaved that way.

It gets tricky here though, because I can also grasp at this feeling of ease that I have in my life today. It might not be like that tomorrow. Tomorrow I may be yelling into my phone again at some live human being who has the misfortune to get me on the other side of the line. I may be worried and stressed out and panicked about how I will get everything done. I may be surly and quiet and weird with the people in my life who I love and who are trying to help me.

Is it a choice? Do I get to decide how I will be? I have never successfully just changed my mood because I willed it (without chemicals). But I do know the actions that tend to give me the result of joy and ease in my life. Basically, I need to go to yoga. Especially when I'm busy and I don't think there's time. I also need to eat. On Monday I skipped breakfast and ate very little until dinner. It may sound silly and basic, but it's something I forget when I get too busy: eat.

Eat and do yoga? Is that really all I have to do? Not exactly, but I would love to remember that it's a great place to start.

fun

2010-02-15T22:17:00.001-08:00

Something was bothering me a lot about yesterday's entry. Is watching Dexter really the only thing I can think of that I do that isn't work? Really? Don't I go to movies or take hikes or go out dancing? Truthfully? Maybe I saw three movies in 2009. Maybe. I probably went on a dozen hikes, which isn't bad, but only four or five with friends. Dancing? Once? Maybe?

Am I that serious? One of the niyamas (observances) of yoga is self-study or Svadhyaya. So I'm learning. I guess I'm pretty damn serious. (I wonder if everybody knew that but me.) But another of the niyamas is Santhosha, or contentment. It is literally my yogic obligation to be content. I think that having fun and letting go and being frivolous more often will help me with that. Right? Any normal, fun-loving people out there to confirm it?

So what do I think is fun? Other than work? It took me some time to come up with much, but I decided today that I'm joining the rock climbing gym. I think I will really love it. I've done it a couple of times, although never in a gym, and it's always been great. They even have a bouldering area, and I just know I'm going to dig that.

Plus, they have great yoga. I know, what do I need yoga classes for? The truth is that I love going to class at square one. We have amazing teachers, but it's work for me. I'm on. I have to be friendly and fix heaters and find toilet paper. I really, really don't mind doing that stuff. I love meeting the students and catching up with teachers, but it's work. So I'll do yoga at the rock climbing gym. I'll have options, and square one will of course still be one of them.

As soon as I join. I might be able to go check it out tomorrow. In between meeting number one (yoga studio) and meeting number two (real estate). Or maybe after meeting number two and before checking in at the studio. But before doing the late night sample class. Okay, maybe Wednesday. But it's happening. This week.

work

2010-02-14T20:52:00.000-08:00

Now that I am self-employed, the line between work and the rest of my life is becoming very, very hazy. What is work anyway?

Writing this blog: work or not work?

Work. Work that I love, but work. Selling real estate? Definitely work. Walking on the beach with my dog? Not work. Or is it? Isn't it personal work? Yoga: work or not work? Work. It's work on my own growth, and it's work to make me a better teacher.

What isn't work? I guess watching Dexter isn't work (I've been spending a lot of time doing that lately), but basically aren't we always growing and learning and wouldn't most of us agree that growing and learning are work?

I've spent a lot of time this weekend working on the new space. My hands are kind of raw from installing click-and-lock laminate flooring. My knees started to hurt. But a lot of that time was spent talking to our new neighbors or to people who came by to help or see the new space. All of this was definitely work, but it never felt like work. Not even for a second.

My professional goal is to work a lot, but never feel like I'm working.

Two and a half months into self-employment, and this is one big experiment. What are the things that I do that are producing results--whether it's making the yoga studio better for everyone or getting my clients into houses--that are the most enjoyable, that feel the least like work?

I'm learning that I need to delegate the activities that are painful for me. That pain and dread are good indications that I'm probably not great at those things anyway. I have finally given the square one website over to a studio volunteer who does it for a living. She's great. In an hour she made the website look way better than I ever could, even if I slaved over it for weeks. And she enjoyed it.

So far, I know I love starting things. I am dying to open more yoga studios. That means I need more capital, so my work now is to find that capital and do what I can to keep the ideas flowing. A lot of the detail-oriented implementaion of the ideas can be delegated. Someone will love doing it. Like the website. I'm learning. Lots of people can do lots of things way better than I can and be happy doing them.

But there are one or two things that I do really, really well. The experiment now is to be very clear about what those things are and figure out how to do more of those things and less of everything else. It's an obligation, in fact. Ultimately, the goal is to be of maximum service to humanity, right? Isn't that your goal? If that's the case, we better be doing what we love. I've spent enough time in jobs I really dislike to know that it is very difficult to be of maximum service if I hate my work.

Oh, and I haven't forgotten that I have to make a living. I have this crazy, naive hunch that if my goal is to be of maximum service and if I focus on doing the things I love, the makin-a-living part will just fall into place. I'd love to hear people tell me their experience with this. In any case, it's just another experiment.

community

2010-02-07T21:14:00.000-08:00

The best thing about square one is and has always been the community that builds it.

Today was the first official work day at the new location. Here is my public thanks to Matthew Flanagan (boss), Judy Huang (assistant boss and photographer), Michelle Mitchell, Alexandra Teague, Carlos Pena Garrido, Yael Martinez, Dylan, Wendy, Mike. I really hope I didn't forget anyone! Buddy.

It was a great day. It reminded me of the first square one and how all these people came together to make it happen, most of whom had never done yoga and never intended to do yoga. It was spectacular. Sometimes when I'm at home alone on Saturday nights feeling like I don't have enough friends, I have to remember those days. Not only do I have plenty of friends, I have outstanding friends. Friends who will drop everything to help out. Friends who want nothing more than for me to succeed.

If you want to read the story of the first opening, please read it at http://www.squareoneyoga.com/thanks.html, but now back to today. What's happening now is different because it's not personal. The people who came today are coming for square one, not for me. They want square one to be successful. They believe in the vision of the studio and they're willing to give up their time and their money to see it through.

So many people are a part of this now. Last weekend we had the Haiti benefit concert and bakesale. People spent their entire day baking for us (thanks Carleen and Caitlin!). Other people brought bottles of wine and lots and lots of people came and spent lots of money. We raised way more than I expected.

I could never do that on my own. I didn't have any money to send to Haiti. What I have now is a long list of contacts that I use very, very carefully. I have a lease on a space that can be used for events. I have a little time to send emails and ask people to come. I do a couple very simple, easy things, and all these people come together and accomplish really amazing things.

I could not have opened square one on my own and I could not complete this move on my own.

I was teaching restorative tonight after the big work day, and I felt all this gratitude that I get to be a part of this. I don't own square one. On paper, maybe, but from day one, square one has been a collaboration. I am entrusted to make decisions, but that's it. It's not mine.

I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to talk about God for one minute. As you understand God. It has all fallen into my lap. The very best things have all happened with no effort on my part. I make way better decisions for square one than I can possibly take credit for. Someone's watching out for us. I know it.

Anyway. This is a blog about business. Business means providing a service for a community. Building a business is building a community. That's it. I get all worked up about stuff like how much the underlayment costs and whether or not to hire a particular teacher and how the schedule should be structured and why no one came to a particular class. I guess it's my responsibility to worry about those things, but the truth is that that stuff works itself out when I focus on the who I'm serving, the people in the community. And then the amazing thing is that those people turn around and literally build my business. They install the floors and refer their friends, and they keep coming back for yoga again and again and again.

As my new favorite teacher, Rusty Wells, always says at the end of class, "how blessed we are." Indeed. How blessed we are.

here are the pictures Judy took of the space. the before shots.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/judyoski/sets/72157623250398153/show/

slowing down

2010-02-05T20:26:00.000-08:00

I said yesterday in the blog that I was going to slow down. I didn't slow down, I collapsed. (And I'm feeling okay about it.)

In ayurveda, there are the three doshas: sattva, rajas and tamas. This is an overgeneralization, but basically, sattva is pure and clean, rajas is hectic and frantic and tamas is collapsed and decaying.

In my life, I am beginning to see how I move from rajas to tamas and back again. There are these wonderful moments of sattva that sometimes happen in between. I think the older I get and the more I practice, the sattva moments happen more often and last a little longer. But it's all cyclical. It's normal, natural. I've been in a long period of a lot of frantic activity. Of course I collapse.

The goal is sattva: quiet and alert and calm. That means slowing down. I've just overshot the mark a bit. I'm working on it.

Now back to Dexter.

distracted

2010-02-04T21:56:00.000-08:00

This blog is going to be a little personal. Sorry. If you just want to read about signing leases and yoga asana, read a different entry.

The heat in my life has been turned up the last few weeks. (Kind of funny that this perfectly coincides with starting to take yoga in a heated room, something I swore once I would never do.) I've been floating around unaware for a long time and now all the sudden something is making me look. It's awkward and inconvenient and messy.

I went back to therapy a few weeks ago. It got really intense really fast. And then I decided to quit. The therapist annoyed me. She seemed smug. I decided if I just kept going to yoga and focusing on the good things, the right things, then that stuff that's getting stirred up would work itself out.

But I run away. That's my nature. It won't work itself out because I'll find a way to distract myself. I used to distract myself with drinking and smoking and lines. I don't recommend it. It's a deeply destructive way to feel okay.

When I started doing yoga, I settled down a lot, but I got distracted again when I started the business. I became an obsessive multitasker. I email and drive. A lot. Just like when I drank and drove, I feel manically above the law, above reason, super human. It's completely insane, and a symptom of me not being able to sit with myself, despite all my yoga and meditation and holiness. I'm as crazy as ever.

In some ways this activity is wonderful and creative and I'm blessed to be able to do it. In other ways, it's still a distraction, and one that is leading me away from myself rather than closer. I get the sense somehow that I'm missing the point.

When I quit drinking, I was scared that I wouldn't be creative without booze. I have the same fear now. If I slow down, I'll run out of good ideas and the business will fail. I'll quit creating.

But when I stopped drinking, I didn't become any less creative. What I found was that drinking had actually hampered my creativity, and what I did create was small and not very useful. A few paintings. A couple short stories. That's all great, but it came in fits and starts. I never put enough energy into it. I didn't have much energy left over to give to it. I was never able to be consistent enough to create a body of work that I could share. Now I create useful stuff. I created a business, a new career. I created this blog that's really growing on me. And I'm sticking with it. It's way better than a few drunken paintings.

I wonder if slowing down will actually focus my creativity in a new way, like giving up drinking did. Interesting. I think I have to try.

I can't stop the therapy now, even though it's gotten so uncomfortable. In fact, I have to keep at it because it's gotten so uncomfortable. It's hard, that's all. When it gets hard in yoga class, I don't hate the teacher. So maybe it's not the therapist, smug or not. I think I'll give her one more shot.

profit: is it a bad word?

2010-01-31T22:21:00.000-08:00

I spent the day in the heart of the yoga business world, at the Yoga Journal San Francisco Conference. I was there volunteering for a non-profit yoga group. Honestly, I was uncomfortable all day. I was uncomfortable with the unabashed commercialism of the main conference, but I was also (to my surprise) uncomfortable with what I saw as a bit of martyrdom on the part of the non-profit group.

It cost several hundred dollars to attend the three day Yoga Journal conference. I couldn't afford to go, which is part of the reason I volunteered. They offered a few free classes for the community, but the classes were short (one hour, while the regular events were all at least two) and they had corporate sponsors. I was excluded from the majority of the conference because I couldn't pay. It was an exclusive event, and that fact made me feel, well, excluded. It was uncomfortable and reminded me a bit of not being able to sit at the cool table in middle school.

The problem of people being priced out of yoga altogether is a bigger issue, and one that the both I (in my for-profit business) and the founder of the nonprofit are trying to address.

The founder of the nonprofit was being interviewed for a book at the table we were working, and I got to listen in on the conversation. She talked about always having a second job, in addition to running three nonprofit yoga centers and a separate nonprofit outreach group. She seemed to take pride in that and mentioned that working the second job kept her teaching real. She knew what it meant for wrists to hurt from typing, what it felt like to be on her feet all day.

I get that, but isn't yoga about getting quiet and still and finding time for our selves? It is incredibly difficult to be centered and focused and clear when I am working 100 hours a week. I know; I've done it plenty! But I would never, ever advise my students to try it, and I know it's inadvisable for me too.

My business has a mission statement, and in the mission statement is the word viable. If the business is not supporting the people who work hard to keep it running, it is not viable.

The founder of the nonprofit asked me why I wasn't a nonprofit yet. I think she assumed that I just hadn't dealt with the paperwork or hired an attorney, but the real reason is that I don't want to be a nonprofit. I run a for-profit business, and I feel pretty good about that.

I believe we can have the best of both worlds, for-profit enterprises that are inclusive and mission-driven. Square One is a for-profit social enterprise and there are many more of them popping up. To me, it's the ideal business model. Stating that I am a for-profit enterprise is honest and real. Searching for ways my organization can bring more health and wellness and happiness to my community and the world is the mission, the right thing to do, and good business sense. Making money and doing good are not mutually exclusive.

I'm not a altruist. I'm not a saint. I need to be supported financially for the work I do. I'm not going to pretend that isn't true or feel guilty about it. But I'm also going to keep looking for ways to include more people, ways for the studio to be friendlier and more accessible and ways to make sure that the classes are consistently good. That's it.

I'm glad I went to the conference. There were a lot of sessions that looked really interesting. Maybe next year I'm plunk down the cash and go. Maybe I'll apply for a scholarship if money is still tight. To their credit, they do offer some scholarships. Or maybe next year, I'll find a really great teacher to offer a fun workshop that weekend at my studio. He doesn't have to be famous or have expensive shorts. He just has to be good. I think that's my plan. Maybe we'll make a little money.

practice, practice, practice!

2010-01-28T19:33:00.000-08:00

Update: I have set my alarm every morning this week and gotten up more or less when I intended to. I've also made it to Rusty's class as planned on both Tuesday and today. That's the best, most important thing happening in my life right now.

As I've mentioned many times here, starting a business really did a number on my asana practice. What I've been doing for the last year really is just maintenance. I haven't gotten stronger or much more flexible or learned any new poses. (Of course, purists could easily argue that this has nothing to do with yoga, but let's face it. I want to get stronger and more flexible and learn new poses. Starting the studio is also yoga, but right now I'm talking about being on the mat.)

It's ironic that someone who lives next door to a yoga studio where she can go to class for free all day long should have a hard time getting to yoga. But I have. And when I do go, it's usually because it's my job. I need to do sample classes and be at the studio and greet students and be a presence. I really love doing all that, but it's not the inward, quiet, private practice of yoga, and that's what I've been missing.

I also need to be challenged. I need to really work my body. I need to be invited to try poses I've never done before. I need to be encouraged to push myself. When this happens in yoga, everything changes.

The most obvious thing that happens is that I get high. Being in Rusty's class reminds me a lot of being at a club in the 90's high on ecstasy. There's good, loud music and lots and lots of people with these gorgeous, enormous smiles that make me feel like I've arrived, that I'm home. And there's sweat. Lots and lots of sweat.

But something else happens that's a little more subtle. I touch parts of my body that are very, very difficult to get at. I get deep and dirty in my hip sockets. I use my core from the bottom of my pelvis to the pit of my belly and all along the sides of my stomach. I use it all. My hamstrings don't just stretch. That's easy. The tendons at the edge of my sit bones loosen and release and my spine falls cleanly to my legs. The balls of my feet ground down, and all the little muscles in feet activate to lift my arches. My legs shake with effort from deep down, right next to the bone.

Sometimes this is all happening at the same time, and I get to watch. I get watch my mind tell me it's too hard, tell me I can't do it, I shouldn't do it, it's too much. Then there's the breath, the breath that keeps flowing deeply, right into those spaces. The breath that tells me that it's hard, but that I'm okay. I'm steady. I'm there. I'm safe.

And what's in there? What is it that I'm touching? I don't have words for it exactly, but I'll tell you what happens. I leave cleaner. I lie back in savasana and what was buried deep in my flesh has been loosened, is brought to the surface. Sometimes I cry. Tears roll down my cheeks and puddle in my ears. Just like when I was a beginner, and I was crazy and depressed and sick. I'm not a beginner anymore, and I'm not depressed or sick. But I still have work to do. I'm not there yet. It's a relief to know that. It's a relief to cry in savasana again and know that the work has restarted.

"Practice, and all is coming." -Sri K. Pattabhi Jois

Two things:

1. Everybody, of course, should come to square one yoga. But I'm going to plug Urban Flow pretty heavily too. It's a really friendly and welcoming space, and Rusty's class is amazing. I think Square One and Urban Flow are basically after the same thing. Go check it out! Better yet, come with us. Send me an email, and I'll tell you the details.

2. Are you reading this? I know there are a few of you. Will you please follow me? I only have one follower, and as much as I'm trying not to care, I want to see your pretty faces and names up there. Thanks!!

consistency

2010-01-24T20:56:00.000-08:00

I am not very consistent. I forget things. I've found myself saying to a lot of people lately, "I'm sorry. I dropped the ball." A lot.

It was easier to be consistent and to have good habits when I worked a regular job. There were things that had to get done in the morning before work and things that had to get done in the evening. I set an alarm and woke up early. I went to bed at basically the same time every night. I woke up and did it all over again. I had deadlines imposed by institutions and bosses and groups of people who needed me to accomplish certain tasks by certain times. For the most part, I followed them. I met deadlines. I showed up.

Six weeks into self employment and I have shut off the alarm. It's kinda nice, lying in bed. I have a dog and a cat, one on each side, and they're warm and they love me, and I'm not late to anything but my own to-do list. But while I don't have deadlines or bosses, I still have groups of people who need me to accomplish things by certain times in order to be able to do their jobs effectively. And like I said, I've been dropping the ball.

There are other important things don't happen that basically no one cares about but me, but that I care about a lot. The blog doesn't get written. I don't take as many long walks with the dog. I skip yoga.

It's not that I'm not working. I'm working long days, but without a rhythm, without habits and without structure. Now the structure has to be internally motivated, internally moderated, and I have a hard time with that. Self control essentially, right? If I can't put down the pint of Ben and Jerry's, can I impose a healthy schedule on myself?

I'm going to try. I'm going to start easy. I'm just going to set the alarm. That's it. I don't even have to set it really early. I just have to set it, and then I have to get up.

I think I'll add two more things. Tuesday and Thursday mornings at 9 am, you will find me at Rusty Well's all levels class at his lovely new studio in the city. (Urban Flow. Go!) I want to get stronger, and I know it will happen in his class. And Tuesday is my day off. I don't work on Tuesdays.

Of course, then there's the question: what's work? The best thing about my life right now is that my work is my hobby, and my friends are my clients. So what's a day off? I'm not exactly sure, but I have a hunch it's important. All the best things that have happened in my professional life have happened effortlessly, in times of rest and relaxation, when I wasn't thinking about work. But this is a whole new topic for a new entry, and it's pushing ten. I guess I have an early day tomorrow.

Haiti

2010-01-15T20:56:00.000-08:00

Haiti.

I live my life in a very pleasant bubble. I listen to NPR, but I like the happy stories, the touching stories about families and the distant, dispassionate stories about politics. I like stories about our president, whom I adore. I do not like this story about Haiti. I cannot fathom what is happening on that little island so close to us.

I have lost friends, but always one at a time. There is this palatable sense when the loss is fresh that the world has changed, that a hole has been created, a void. I always know, can feel it in my arms and legs and belly, that the world will never the same, that the universe has changed in some real and significant way, that we have all lost something incredibly important that we will never get back. What would that feel like if I lost many, many friends and family members, not to mention my schools and my home and my business and my pets all at the same time?

Incomprehensible. Unbearable.

Square One is hosting a benefit concert for disaster relief on January 30th at 7 pm. Making Dinner (the band) is confirmed, and I'm waiting to hear from a couple others. All of the proceeds will go to aid organizations working now in Haiti. If you are a musician and would like to play (it's a volunteer gig), please email me katy@katycryer.com. We're requesting $20 donation. It'll be an anonymous, toss-in-the-pot kind of thing, so no worries if cash is tight. Wine, beer and a fine selection of NABs will also be available, by donation. Please come.

Be well, everyone!

Getting up, Katy + Organic Cotton (by K.B. Teo)

2010-01-08T11:00:00.000-08:00

8:41am. It was a struggle to get up this morning. I was awake from 4:45am and I fell asleep at 6am. I was NOT chirpy at 7am when I woke up once more. Its kinda ironic because I read Katy's response to my blog yesterday!

What I love about Katy's blog is she's authentic. She's present in her full glory. I kinda hide behind facts, figures, and optimism. In other words, so far, I've only blogged on days where the SUN blesses me with her bright Rays, when I've had my Steaming English Breakfast Tea, and NEVER when I have a backache, a headache OR when I'm not feeling as sweet as a cupcake. This was what struck me when we interviewed Katy about how she set up her yoga studio in Emeryville. She was raw, and open.

And because beautiful Katy was raw and open, how could I not like her. How could I not feel that when I speak to Katy, she forces me to be authentic and real. Now that's emotional yoga. [Note: Andy and I are almost done with Katy's movie ... and it'll be posted here when we launch.]

But I (again) digress. Today is actually about organic cotton.

Organic cotton, per Rachel, can be bought in Egypt, Turkey and India. According to thehindubusinessline.com, India is the LARGEST producer of organic cotton. Turkey is #3 and Egypt - which brings to mind the soft Egyptian cotton I remember as a child - is not actually a top five producer.

Speeseees makes organic baby clothes. Ingredients are
* certified organic cotton
* fair trade
* low impact dyes
* pvc-free plastisols
* lots of love

When Rachel first started, she wrote this poem about chiks. I thought I would share it because Betsy and I always find it so interesting to hear how small business owners start : how was the idea germinated?

Chicks was the first animal Rachel put on baby clothes. She put it on her first baby onesy, for her best friend who loved chickens.

Love. It seems to come up, and sometimes it seems cheesy and sometimes, it's the engine that runs the train. I met Ike the other day. Ike - from the ever-popular Ike's Sandwich Place, which is going to open soon at the Stanford University campus. Ike talks alot about love. Unabashedly. He signed off in his email to me: Lots of love, Ike. Which would make any girl blush. Alright ... I blushed.

What has love got to do with business? Well, Betsy and I are determined to find out. And we'll let you know once Ike tells us.

As always, GOOD MORNING! It's 9:00, 8 days into the new decade.

Lots of love (I had to try this out once ... tell me if you blush),
K.B.
www.mymightybiz.com

Work and Life

2010-01-07T11:38:00.001-08:00

I just read K.B.'s most recent entry, and I want to respond.

It's just back to this blogging = whining trap that I think I fall into. K.B. doesn't do that; I do that.

I love working!! When she says she was up and working at 6 am and loving it, and I just want to say that when I was up at 6 am working, I was loving it too! There has been absolutely nothing in my life more exciting and stimulating and interesting that starting a business. Right now in my life, there's not a lot of reason for me to be up at 6 working, which I'm really, really grateful for. But when there was, I was happy doing it.

I just can't be in the start-up stage forever, and I think my psychology wants me to do that, so I have to be careful. It comes back to the concept of dharma. If I'm in dharma, there's no difference between work and love and life. It's all the same. There is no workaholism and no exhaustion, there's just living and doing what I'm called to do.

That's what I'm after, and usually when I'm working really long hours, it feels like dharma. It's just life, and I love it. Work and friends and relationships and fun all weave together.

I was walking the dog this morning at the Marina and I walked past the line of cars waiting to pick up car poolers. I used to wait in that line, and picking people up marked the beginning of my work day, the beginning of a long commute. My work life was completely separate and distinct from the rest of my life.

It's not so now. Now I'm walking the dog in my pajamas, enjoying a beautiful morning on the Bay, sipping Peet's coffee. I have my phone, and as I walk, I shoot off a couple emails, maybe I make a phone call or two. Is that multitasking (tsk, tsk), or is that enjoying life while I get a couple things done?

I'll take it this way and sorry if I sometimes slip into whiny moments!

Going to see Rachel of speesees.com (By K.B. Teo)

2010-01-07T11:37:00.000-08:00

Going to see Rachel of speesees.com, a SF-based organic baby clothes manufacturer

Posted

less than a minute ago

by k.teo@mymightyb...

It's 7:40am and I've been up since 6am. It's been like this for two weeks. You'd think I hate it but actually, I don't! I love the fresh morning air - it's so crisp. I love the feeling of getting ahead. And it's been good to be so busy as we chug along with our very own small business.

This morning, I'm excited to announce that I'm filming WITH Betsy Flanagan of Startup Studio for the first time! We'll be interviewing Rachel of www.speesees.com, a design shop that makes organic baby clothes based right here in San Francisco!

Betsy is PassioNate (yes, capital P and N) about small business stories like me. How did they start? Where did they get the idea? Did anyone help them? How did they find the money to do it? Are they happy?

She has actually interviewed Herby of Southwest, Steve Smith of Tazo Tea and Grace Welch of Patemm (www.patemm.com), founder of a ROUND baby changing pad (!) featured on The Oprah Winfrey Show. Betsy's podcasts can be found on allbusiness.com, and hopefully, soon on our site as well.

This morning, we're going to film (we moved from podcasts to videos) Rachel. Rachel is a powerhouse. She started speesees.com back in 2003 and at her first trade show, Rachel tells me she was one out of just three people selling organic baby clothes. Rachel strikes me as visionary. She thinks big. And she's succeeded in such a competitive area. You'll get to watch her own story in her own words, shortly, on our site, www.mymightybiz.com.

I also have fantastic news! Our very own, Katy Cryer, is going to be on radio! Watch out for her on Monday, January 11th at 5pm on 91.7!!

Good morning everyone! It's 7:54!

K.B.
www.mymightybiz.com

Balancing

2010-01-06T20:39:00.000-08:00

The best, strongest poses in my asana practice are balances. The most difficult thing in my life right now is finding balance.

It's been about a year since I first found the space that is now Square One and started thinking about whether to open a yoga studio. I worked from 6 am until 11 or 12 at night for the next three months. There was a certain point after the studio opened when I went on a daylong meditation retreat and realized that I had not taken a day off of work in over four months. It's good that I went on a retreat, but at the same time, if a friend or student had not taken a day off in four months, I would tell her not to go anywhere, to curl up with a book or a bunch of DVDs, to sleep, to do whatever required the least mental and physical effort possible. But even my day off was about improvement.

It was right around New Year's Eve this year (which I spent alone for the first time ever) that I found myself sitting in the car on the phone, in between appointments, sobbing, with a potential new therapist. What happened to my relationships? Where were they? Why wasn't I in one?

I had paused long enough to feel lonely.

Starting a business is really hard work. Starting a business and working another job at the same time is simply insane. I love what I've created. I just wonder if I have created it at the expense of something else. Or maybe what's more accurate is that I busied myself with its creation as a way to distract myself from the loneliness and disconnection that were already there.

I distract myself and check out in so many ways. At this point in my life, it seems to be with work, but at other moments in my life it is with eating or drinking or shopping. I even (gasp!) have done a lot of drugs! These are all strategies that have worked for varying amounts of time. But if what I'm distracting myself from is loneliness, maybe it would be a hell of a lot easier just to address the loneliness.

This week, I'm saying yes to every social invitation that comes my way. I'm going out to dinner tomorrow. I'm going sailing and I'm going on a nighttime cruise to Alcatraz on Friday. Saturday I'm going to Bodega Bay where I'll spend the night at a house a friend has rented for the weekend. There will be a whole bunch of people there, many of whom I won't even know. I'm going anyway. I don't know when I will do the payroll, or find houses for my clients. I do know that I will show up to teach my yoga classes, and I do know that my teachers will have checks on the day they are supposed to have checks. Past that, there's nothing else that I really have to do. Except have fun, dammit!

Leases

2010-01-04T12:24:00.000-08:00

My mother alerted me that I haven't updated my readers (her?) about what's going on with the space.

I am not getting either of the two spaces I mentioned earlier. The one I liked so much with the patio was just too expensive to get into. The other one is not zoned properly, and while we may have been able to work around that, it was the holidays and the right people didn't return my phone calls.

(Note to self: Always answer the phone and return phone calls! When I need something done and someone doesn't answer the phone or call me back right away, I just move on to the next person. Often that means someone lost some business.)

So I found a space in Emeryville that I will probably sign a lease on this week. There is a little bit of an art to negotiating leases, and I'm learning a lot about that right now. I think I lost the last deal because I was cash poor and I let everyone know it. Landlords don't like that. They need to believe you can come up with cash if you need to. It's not about the cash necessarily, it's about the ability to come up with cash.

I don't have to come up with much cash for this space in Emeryville, although I never made a big deal about not having it. I just told them what I needed. I learned to be firm and clear without appearing needy or without resources.

When I signed my first lease on the current space, people told me to negotiate, but I didn't do a very good job. I actually didn't negotiate at all, although I thought I did. I didn't ask for any decrease in the rent that she was asking. The market was better for landlords then, but I'm shocked at myself for not even asking. I ended up paying way, way too much, and I didn't even know it because I hadn't really done my research. Yes, I looked at listings online, but I never bothered to find out what landlords would actually take, which is can be quite different from listed prices. This time, I got the rent knocked down considerably. I am paying about $1.12 per square foot, and I've definitely done my research this time, so I can say with certainty that I am getting a bargain.

My advice to anyone negotiating a commercial lease is to ask for what you want. Shoot low. In this market, they will counter and they might even say yes. Never, in any market, assume that you have to pay what they're asking. Never assume that you have to put up all of the cash they request. Always get free rent for your build out. Ask for the landlord to make improvements.

I thought I was negotiating my first lease, but I never asked for anything. I only asked for things that, looking back, I know are very, very small and would probably have been included in the lease anyway. Like the ability to sublet. That was my big coup. Turns out, you can always sublet unless it specifically says you can't in the lease. My second piece of advice is to be prepared to walk away. If you don't get what you need, let it go. There are other spaces, and your ability to walk away is your best friend in the negotiation. If you do walk, you will have gained a lot of negotiation experience, and you'll know more about what the market can handle. You'll know how low you can go and what's reasonable to expect next time.

I've always hated negotiating. I live in Mexico City for five years, and would still pay full price for trotskys on the street (just like a tourist, fresh off the boat) because I just didn't want to deal with it. It's all fear, right? I'm fearful that people won't like me or will recognize me as being inexperienced and naive. I'll feel silly if I ask for the wrong things. But we have to ask for what we want, in business negotiations and in life. We have to trust our desires to be real and God-given and legitimate in the same way that we are real and God-given and legitimate. There's not that much difference. So ask. Go for it.

My First Post (by K.B. Teo)

2010-01-04T11:44:00.000-08:00

Happy 2010!

This is my first blog post and I have to thank Katy for keeping me board with this! Katy and I decided to co-blog a few weeks back ... because we simply wanted to try something different! But I also secretly hoped, her enthusiasm and propensity to write might rub off on me!

Writing is tough for me and it seems to come easier to Katy, as she told me yesterday at my Welcome to 2010 low-stress, low-commitment, lazy brunch. I feel (oddly) guilty about not being able to tweet or maintain a daily blog. So if you're like me, it helps to know that 90% of tweets come from 10% of twitters.

I'm not kidding. That nugget of an information is actually true. From a Harvard study no less. Also, among "Twitter users, the median number of lifetime tweets per user is one". One! Ha ha ha - so much for the "trend cloud" that Twitter supposedly generates.

While this is SURPRISING to say the least, according to the same study, it's a common trend among social networks. Fore example, 15% of Wikipedia users account for 90% of edits and you can even anecdotally verify this by looking at the review count of reviewers on yelp.com.

In the words of the same study, this makes Twitter more of a "one way" publishing service. In the last few months, I met a few small business owners who asked me if they should Twitter. Urgh, at first I thought it's a tough decision … but reviewing it again …

Yes, I CAN (CAN is probably as important as SHOULD)

it's really alot easier to write 140 characters than a whole blog
i have a lot more soundbites in me than I have prose
I can tweet by texting from my iphone (talk about easy!)
why not! It's a one-way publishing service! Like FREE PRESS!

No, I can’t

i despise soundbites
if I have a “soundbite” in me, it’s usually an expletive (!)
texting from my phone costs me 10c

My take? Yes, tweet if you can! It’s a one-way publishing service anyway! And there are ways to link your blog to your tweets! Subraya, a friend who owns two small technology services companies, recommends this service: http://www.ping.fm/.

Gosh, that was fun and MyFirstPost is much longer than I expected. A sign of good things to come! More later! Happy New Year, dear friends!

K.B.

12:10 2010

2010-01-01T01:08:00.000-08:00

It's ten minutes into 2010. What did I do tonight? I cleaned and rearranged every room in my apartment. I skipped dinner (poor me) and ate Godiva chocolate that a friend gave me at lunch. I gave myself an enormous present: a clean, safe, beautiful place to live in 2010.

The truth is that I never really moved into this apartment, and it's been a little over a year. I've hated living here form the beginning. It's a weird space and poorly built, with linoleum in the living room and a tiny kitchen. But the bedrooms are enormous and the rent is cheap. I spread out tonight. I made everything exactly as I wanted it. I mopped the floors three times to make up for 13 months of no mop. I shook out the rugs and hung pictures that have been lying on the floor for a year. I moved in, and I love it. They will have to evict me from this apartment. I will never leave.

I spent 2009 feeling like I didn't have enough, like there would never be enough, like all of my possessions were dirty and crappy and I needed new ones. Lots of new ones, but all of my money went to the studio. I felt deprived. Tonight I feel blessed. Tonight I realize how much I have. Materially, I have lots and lots and lots of pretty things, art and antiques and gifts from around the world. I have enough clothes and shoes for five people, and we could all wear something different everyday of the week. I have an enormous, beautiful apartment with the darlingest little dog snuggled up next to me and a gorgeous, loving cat who will be by later. I have food for now and I have food for emergencies. The cat and the dog also have food for now and food for emergencies.

What was that feeling of lack that so characterized 2009 for me?

2009 was my hardest, most uncertain year. I think I just thought that stuff and money meant security. I would never have admitted believing that, but I did. Subconsciously, I did.

I was looking for a reprieve from uncertainty, but there is no reprieve from uncertainty. Life is uncertain. I hope that in 2010 I am able to remember that certainty and security are not the same thing, that I can be completely secure in the most uncertain situations. Uncertainty is wonderful; it's where all the opportunity is. Insecurity is awful, but right now I feel safe. I'm safe even though I'm broke, even though I don't know when I will sell a house or when the studio will be profitable. I have always had enough, despite the fear and worry. Why would I think that would suddenly not be true?

Is this the itty-bitty beginning of a little faith? Please? Maybe, just maybe? I've been waiting for a long, long time.

Happy New Year everyone!!!

the secret?

2009-12-28T14:19:00.000-08:00

I have to admit that I’ve read a little of the success literature. I read a Jack Canfield book, I started Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich. I didn’t finish, but I got the idea. I read a book called Creative Visualization that claims to be a classic.

Last night I watched a Frontline documentary that told stories of how people in one Upper East Side hair salon have been affected by this economy. There were two stories in particular that really got to me. One was a man in his fifties who had been a HR exec and was laid off. It showed him going to networking meetings, sending off hundreds of resumes, driving around, going to interviews, seeing a coach. I’m sure his coach has heard of the Secret. Then there was a couple that owned a coffee shop that failed. They were $200,000 in debt and completely dejected.

It is silly and presumptuous to say that if only these people had visualized a little more clearly, had understood the Law of Attraction, had relaxed deeper, meditated more, etc., then they would not have these problems. That’s my big issue with the (very public) Secret. It’s not better than the churches that are popping up that claim if you love Jesus enough, he will give you money. What about all of the devout people in poor countries who don’t have enough to eat? Should we just all give them a Secret DVD and call it a day? Oh wait, what will they watch it on?

It’s absurd, but I do think there is a kernel of truth in there somewhere. Years before I owned a yoga studio, I imagined myself owning a yoga studio. If I hadn’t, when the opportunity arose, I wouldn’t have even recognized it as an opportunity. What I want definitely won’t manifest if I don’t first have a picture of what it is that I want. Of course, there are plenty of things that I have imagined happening that never did. It requires sustained attention and real desire or else I just won’t do the work. There’s nothing magic or secret about that.

The idea though that getting what I want will make me happy is absurd. Things, even big, amazing, wonderful things, will never make me happy. That’s the heart of yoga, really. That’s the truth of non-duality.

The one author I held onto from the canon of success literature is Deepak Chopra. He basically says what the Secret people say, but he acknowledges that we are going to have obstacles, sometimes really big ones, and that getting what we want materially has nothing to do with how satisfied we are in our lives.

And then there’s the letting go, which Deepak insists we must do. I have found that having an intention and then grasping on to it, obsessing over it, examining how close or far I am from it, fantasizing about what life will be like once I have achieved it, has not worked well for me. Somehow I have to release the desire to the universe, and Chopra claims that the universe will handle all of the details. I can’t orchestrate it, which is the tough part for me. God knows I try.

When I first envisioned owning a yoga studio, I imagined how it would feel to come to work in yoga pants and sit at reception in my very own yoga studio. I had no idea how that would happen. I envisioned it a few times and then I let go of it. It was easy to let go of, because while there was a weird little tentative faith that it would happen, for the most part, I thought it was highly unlikely at best. I had no money and I lived in a city saturated with yoga studios. But the universe did handle the details, and a couple of years later gave me a yoga studio. As all my readers know, I have found that there is a lot more to that gift than coming to work in my pjs.

Overall, I’m definitely a grasper. That’s the problem with the success literature. It seems so simple that it’s very easy for me to get greedy. Then I fantasize and grasp and cling and struggle, and that’s not it at all. Not it at all. The other problem I have with most of the success literature is that it never mentions that once we get it, we will almost certainly find that it presents way more challenges that we realized. Just because it comes doesn’t mean that it will be easy or successful or feel right or make us happy. In all likelihood, what it will do is challenge us, raise the bar, heighten the uncertainty, give us more to lose.

Who knows? That might in fact be just what we need.

new spaces

2009-12-21T14:19:00.000-08:00

I was talking to a fellow blogger (Devon Kelley-Yurdin, http://www.moodhair.blogspot.com/, http://www.devonkelley-yurdin.com/ really pretty art), and she said, “that’s the thing with bogging. At some point in every entry, you always regress to how overwhelmed you are with life.”

Yes, Devon, that’s what I’ve been doing. I’m going to stop now. The vast majority of the time, I do not feel overwhelmed by life. It’s just when I feel like writing, it’s usually because I feel overwhelmed by life.

Not tonight! Tonight I feel optimistic and in control. Until I look around at all of the untended-to papers scattered on my desk. Or until the dog starts barking and chasing the cat who is hissing and running over the keyboard, which is happening right now. I am completely in control of life! Nothing overwhelming happening here!

Anyway, Square One needs a new place to live. My current landlord has told me more lies that I can continue to count. The space is cold; we share a nasty men’s restroom with the restaurant next door, which thumps Baliwood bass no matter how many times I ask, “please, please, for the love of Krishna, will you turn that music down?” We need more space for more yoga mats, or will soon. And the biggest sin of all: I pay too much. I won’t sign another lease. I just won’t do it. That means I need to be out by March 1.

I found a place I really liked in Oakland. It was perfect in so many ways. High ceilings, good location, patio, owner willing to do a lot of the work, very, very cheap rent. But the city of Oakland is going to require me to get a conditional use permit, which costs $2500. I just don’t have it. Not with first month, last month, security. Not with a new commission-based career and absolutely no idea when I’ll see my next paycheck.

That’s why you all need to buy a house now and buy it from me! Square One is about to be homeless! Tell your friends, damn it!

Right now though, I am really not overwhelmed. Truthfully. I’ll find something. I’m just not sure how ideal it will be. Emeryville doesn’t have the same permit problems as Oakland, although my idea of putting us in a really cheap warehouse simply isn’t permitted, even in business-friendly Emeryville. I’m just not hip enough to be illegal. What’s next?

The space right next door is available, but I don’t like it. It has low, asbestos-tile ceilings. I’m going to go in there and see what’s above them, but it doesn’t seem promising. I will keep looking. Calmly. And when I’m not calm, I’ll try not to blog about it. Too much.

saturday night

2009-12-19T14:18:00.000-08:00

It’s 8 pm on Saturday night and I’m wondering if it’s too early to go to bed.

There are a few things that I have to tell my dear readers (both of you):

I could be at a fabulous party. I was invited to one. I really wanted to go. There will be interesting people there that I want to know better. But I taught yoga for six solid hours today. I am exhausted. I got into the snuggie that I won at the real estate office party and looked for movies to download. I ended up starting a documentary about girls hospitalized for anorexia. I turned it off and took the dog out.

My mother insists that I tell everyone that my business is not failing. It’s true. My business is not failing. It’s doing well by most traditional measures of new businesses. It’s just not doing well by my standards, which include providing me with a decent paycheck each month and paying off some of the debt from the start up. In time, I’m sure it will.

Everyone who is a small business owner should read this: http://boss.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/11/10/the-dusenberry-diary-living-the-dream-or-just-living/?emc=eta1 Everyone who romanticizes entrepreneurship and thinks that being a small business owner is wonderful and liberating should also read it.

Here are what I see as the pre-requisites of owning a small business:

An acute case of workaholism.
Willingness to learn to live with being disliked.
Ability to change light bulbs promptly, submit paperwork, negotiate leases, build bookcases, paint walls, take out the trash, make copies, hire people, fire people, make wrong decisions, fuck up, apologize, demand what you need, live with anger, be disappointed, stomach extreme ups and downs, live with financial insecurity and high levels of debt. (Or be loaded, but I don’t know what that’s like.)

Do I sound bitter? I’m just tired. I don’t want to whine, because I wouldn’t trade the life I have for the life I was living before opening my business for anything! I love square one. I love my customers! I love my teachers and my work trade receptionists, and I love my job. I love that I created it, and I love the work that I do.

I work for myself because I’m a control freak. I love to drive, and I hate being driven. I like to multitask and I need for my brain to be engaged in new, changing things. I thrive, in many ways, on chaos. But, at the end of the day, sometimes I’m just tired, so I don’t make the party. Hopefully they’ll invite me again.

starting to blog

2009-12-16T14:16:00.000-08:00

Writing is hard. Before I started a business, before I did yoga, before I became a real estate agent, I wrote. It seems like I can do anything in the world I want. Travel, earn degrees, start businesses, but writing is the hardest.

There is just so much at stake.

But don’t worry. I’m not going to take this blog too seriously. Seriously enough to sit down and write of course, but not seriously enough to care a lot about how much everyone loves me.

Yeah, right! I care, a lot!

Anyway, back to yoga and business. I haven’t been to a yoga class in a few days. I practice for a few minutes every day, often just one restorative pose, and I teach several times a week. But you know how sweet it is when you have a teacher you really like and you go all the time? You know how great it is when you’re in class, doing 90 minutes of yoga five times a week? I want that. I feel like I should be at a point in my practice where I just wake up and practice by myself for 90 minutes. I keep waiting for that to evolve naturally into my way of being. It hasn’t happened yet.

The idea in my life right now is just to keep doing the things I know I need to do. Keep writing, keep doing yoga, keep tending to the business and answering emails. Just, day after day, do it regardless of whether people like it or are coming or are paying me enough. Somewhere is the faith that my needs will be taken care of if I just keep doing what I’m put on the earth to do. I just haven’t been able to sustain the faith. It comes in flashes and then disappears, which makes me think it’s more of a hunch than faith. I’d like something a little more sustaining.