My Left Foot - Part 1: The Basics

Stability has been the mantra in my classes, on my yoga mat and in my life for over 5 years. You may have heard me say in class, “find physical stability before physical movement, seek mental stability before acting or reacting or sit in emotional stability before speaking.”

While I intend to practice stability in my life, I have been living with an unstable left foot for most of my adult years. Last Wednesday I had some repair work done on my shaky left foot. The procedure in layman’s terms is called a Corner Fusion. Simply put, my doctors screwed together a joint in the top of my foot that I had dislocated 25 years ago.

The injury occurred during a touch football game in high school. Juniors against the seniors I recall. As the running back, I cut right, grabbed the ball from the QB, cut left and ran for a touchdown! It was in the pivot that I dislocated the joint and experienced a common football injury called a Lisfranc Injury. Back then however, it was called a “bone bruise”. After a quick x-ray in the ER and I was sent on my merry way with a pair of crutches.

Over the past 24 years, however, I have injured and re-injured that left foot in different ways. There have been ligament tears, nerve issues and sprains. Balancing on that foot on my yoga mat has always presented a huge challenge and has helped me learn to be patient and compassionate.

In search for some answers to my stability issues, I found Dr. Nick Romansky of Healthmark Foot and Ankle Associates, a well known podiatrist to professional athletes including the US Soccer teams at the World Cup, Olympics and more. He and I went on a quest to find the reason behind the chronic pain in my foot.

Dr. Romansky told me that my yoga practice had kept me physically balanced to date but that as I age, I run the risk of knee and hip issues due to the misalignment and instability in the foundation of my body, my feet. Those words caught my attention.

After CT Scans, MRI’s, multiple x-rays and physical therapy, his team of doctors reached the diagnosis that I had dislocated a joint at the top of my left foot that day on the football field. Simply put, what should be the most stable joint in the foot, he said, was completely unstable. My “keystone” was unstable and was becoming increasingly unable to support my body in a balanced way.

That was all I needed to hear. I know from my own yoga experience and training that our stability begins in our feet, our foundation. If the foundation is weak there will be excess stress on the body and eventually, stuff will break down.

So on Wednesday, my foot became more stable with a lot of expertise and some screws. I will not be able to bear weight on my left foot for about two months. It will be one of the most challenging practices of my life. I look forward to this time being one of growth and evolution. I will share my challenges with you in this blog that I plan to update a few times per week.

So, be grateful for your healthy feet and for your stable foundation.

I hope to stay connected to you all thru this blog and with your comments. Please share. I’ll be back to teaching shortly after Thanksgiving.

Peace.

Cara

Fighting the Good Fight

I received my Quote of the Week yesterday from Andrew Cohen. He is a magnificent teacher and forward thinker. This quote gave me goose bumps and chills. Hope it does the same for you.

I highly recommend subscribing to his weekly email. www.andrewcohen.org

Cara


The Evolutionary Enlightenment Teachings of Andrew Cohen

I believe that any individual who has spiritually awakened in our time, to the degree that he or she finds a higher and deeper motive for living, is going to be driven to fight the good fight in one way or another. Whether it is through engaging with the struggle to evolve consciousness or fighting to save our world from climate change or nuclear war, the spiritual impulse cannot be separated from the moral compulsion to make the world a better place. And in order to fight the good fight, we have to engage, we have to get into the ring, not just stand outside it and be philosophers.

It takes guts and integrity of motive to fight the good fight. It takes a passionate interest in life itself. It's easy to stand on the sidelines, shaking your head and commenting on how tragic things are. But if you really care, you are going to be in the ring, trying to make the world a better place. And only from that position will your words and your thoughts and your insights have weight. When you live an engaged life, your sense of self gains depth and power and authority, and your philosophy is no longer abstract. You become a person who can really make a difference, because you are actively participating, you are digging deep, and you are pushing up against the edge of your own potential. ~Andrew Cohen

We Gathered Together

Yesterday was an extraordinary day for Philadelphians. Two million plus fans gathered together for a parade to honor the Phillie’s and their world championship. Another few million watched at home as a city gathered with a single intention and that was to CELEBRATE! And celebrate we did. We celebrated the long awaited championship of one of our professional sports teams. We celebrated the city of brotherly love. We celebrated being alive together on the most perfect October day.

I wasn’t at the parade but it didn’t matter. The celebration was everywhere and I felt the joy out in the suburbs. So did the many others that I encountered throughout the day. In the grocery store everyone was smiling. At the bank, we all seemed to be ready to strike up a conversation. Life was just easy and fun yesterday. In Philadelphia, for one day, we were more connected than we were separate. And that was a very good thing.

There were no incidents yesterday. There was no fighting. There was a beautiful sea of red and white joined together to gather and be grateful. I hope that the world was watching because yesterday we showed the world what is possible when we are more connected than we are separate. Yesterday there was pure joy in this city. And it was a very good thing.

Yesterday gave me a glimpse of our potential as a species when we unite for a common purpose. It is powerful and it is possible.

So I thank the Phillie’s for giving us a reason to unite and gather in a common intention. I thank the city for allowing us the space to gather. I thank all the fans for joining together regardless of race, religion or political affiliation. We were one Philadelphia yesterday and it was magic.

Peace.

Rest Your Mind

The concept of rest has been leading my practice and my teaching this past week. My intention has been to simply rest and to help my students find the space so that they can rest as well. There is something so comforting to me about the word rest. It seems to give me permission to slow down and shut down from the world even if just for an hour.

The need to rest our minds from overstimulation is now more important than ever. The media is in a frenzy barraging us with news of the financial markets and the election. On my mat last week I realized that I was feeling mentally and physically fatigued because I had been over dosing on news.

It was during that practice that I decided to just rest my mind. I felt an overwhelming desire to not do or think about anything. And so I did. During that practice, I let go of my need to perfectly execute each pose. I let go of having to go “deeper” in a pose. I let go of the alignment principles. I let go of everything and I rested. It was an incredible experience and is one that I have been able to duplicate over and over during the week.

After sensing my own overloaded mind, I then sensed this same syndrome in my classes. As a society, we have all been on an intense media high since early September and I think that we are all starting to feel the effects of the prolonged stimulation.

If you’ve been in one of my classes over the past week, you have probably heard me repeat the phrase, “Rest your mind on your breath”. It is such a relief to me to give myself permission to not think, not solve, not ponder anything at all!

There are so many decisions to make these days, that we truly exhaust ourselves by over-watching, over-listening and over-thinking. If you feel overloaded as I did a week ago, then I offer you this simple advice:

Try not to read or listen to the news more than once or twice per day.
Rest your minds in your cars by driving in silence.
Rest your minds at home by making a conscious decision as to when to watch the news
instead of having the buzz of the talking heads in your ears in a continuous steam.
Take 5 conscious breaths once every hour.
Get on your yoga mat and rest your minds while moving your bodies.

These practices have helped me get off the spinning wheel that I was on just a week ago. I hope that they will help you too.

I wish you a well deserved rest.

Peace.

Move Slowly, Move Peacefully. Go Far.

There is an Italian saying that goes, “Chi va piano, va sano, va lontano. Chi va forte, va alla morte”. Loosely translated, this means he who moves slowly, moves peacefully and moves far. He who moves too quickly and forcefully goes right to his death!

I was reminded of this wise saying this week as the news of our troubled financial institutions took over the headlines. The predictions have been out there for us to read. Everyone knew that we were headed for more troubled times. However, we, meaning individuals, corporations and banks, continued to overspend and over borrow. The rush for financial gain has blinded our vision and we now pay the price as some of our oldest financial institutions head towards their death.

My nonna (grandmother) would often quote that Italian saying emphasizing the morte or death part with her hands. “What is the big rush?”, she would ask me? “Piano, piano, piano”, (slow, slow, slow) she would mumble to herself as I raced in and out of the house.

Finally, 30 years later, I am beginning to understand my nonna and it all started on my yoga mat. By slowing down my practice I have begun to move through my poses in peace. I have also been able to move in deeper and further than ever before. By slowing down physically, I have started to slow down my mind. The mental chatter will now sometimes (not always) settle into a rhythm sometimes in the first 20 minutes of practice.

I truly believe that our yoga and meditation practices parallel the way that we are living our lives. My practice is always so harshly honest that I cannot stand it sometimes! My practice reveals if I am forcing or moving too quickly. My practice reveals if I am lazy or doubtful. And as I like to say, if it is happening on your mat, it is happening in your life too!

I wholeheartedly believe that what I do at the individual level will happen at the collective level too. So if I over consume or over borrow, I will add to our aggregate issues. But if I learn to move slowly in this world, perhaps I will move more peacefully. And if I move more peacefully I know that I evolve as an individual. Now that affects the aggregate in a whole new way!

If we all start moving and acting more slowly, I know that we will move and act more peacefully. And if we all move and act more peacefully, I know that collectively we will evolve as a species. That is something to cheer about.

Grazie Nonna for your wise Italian words and for being my first yoga teacher.

A Golden Summer

This summer my parents and my in-laws each celebrated their golden 50th wedding anniversaries. The happy couples got married two days apart in 1958. We celebrated this summer by honoring our parents and their amazing achievements. These two wonderful couples stayed together for fifty years while so much chaos and confusion occurred in the world. They were blessed to stay healthy and happy in spite of the risk of disease, accidents and premature death.

Both couples said that their recipe for success was their strong commitment to one another. They vowed to love and honor one another fifty years ago and were able to ride the storms of life on the foundation of those vows. Now, we all know that the story doesn’t always have such a happy ending but I do think that we can learn so much from people who have endured, persevered and achieved success from many, many years of hard work and commitment.

In our world of fad diets and fad fitness trends it seems that many of us jump into the newest and greatest fad feet first only to drop it like a hot potato in a month or less. Hollywood goes so far as to celebrate fad weddings only to see those fad marriages dissolve in a year or less.

What I have learned and continue to learn from my yoga and meditation practice is the necessity of a committing to a consistent practice. Practice can include prayer, meditation, yoga, walking, cooking, painting, etc. A practice can be five quiet minutes with your morning cup of coffee.
We will all be called to different practices.

I took some time the other day to write down my current practices. There are many in my life. A chose a few of the more important ones and committed myself to practicing them consistently for the next fifty years of my life. (That is if I am so blessed as to have fifty more years to live.) It was a powerful experience and has since charged me up in many ways.

So I thank my parents and my in-laws for demonstrating the powerful force of a committed practice. I am grateful to be a product of such commitment.

I share with you all below a terrific passage from the brilliant Buddhist teacher, Jack Kornfield. He further and more eloquently addresses what I’ve humbly tried to explain.

Peace.

If we do a little of one kind of practice and a little of another, the work we have done in one often doesn't continue to build as we change to the next. It is as if we were to dig many shallow wells instead of one deep one. In continually moving from one approach to another, we are never forced to face our own boredom, impatience, and fears. We are never brought face to face with ourselves. So we need to choose a way of practice that is deep and ancient and connected with our hearts, and then make a commitment to follow it as long as it takes to transform ourselves.

--Jack Kornfield in A Path with Heartfrom Everyday Mind, edited by Jean Smith, a Tricycle book

A Sharper Image

Yesterday I had my eyes checked. It had been a year and a half since my last exam. The doctor strengthened my prescription… by a lot! In the words of Emeril, she said, “we’re going to take it up a notch”. I stepped outside with my new vision and my world was magnified! The leaves on the trees were defined and clear, the signs on the road popped out right in front of me. The clouds seemed so close that I felt I could touch them.

I enjoyed my drive home and drank in these new sharper images. I felt awake and alive.

This feeling of clarity reminded me of how I often feel after a yoga or meditation practice. Often times when I step out of the doors of Verge Power Yoga my world seems clear and sharp. Everything around me seems closer and more accessible to my touch. After practice, I feel a sense of connectedness with everything. I feel awake and alive.

What I recognized yesterday was that our practice sharpens our vision on a daily basis. It is as if we receive a new set of eyes every time we step on our yoga mat or our meditation cushion. Every time we are able to stabilize thought and settle the nervous system, we wake up just a little bit more. We connect with our world just a bit more. Essentially, after every practice, we “take it up a notch”. We sharpen our vision. We become clearer. We become more awake and more alive.

My revelation from yesterday is that to practice yoga and meditation is to receive a new prescription for life… every day. What a blessing.

Peace.