They say its my birthday!

Happy birthday to me!

I have to say that I NEVER thought I'd be managing a yoga studio and teaching yoga at 31.  If you had asked me 10 years ago where I'd be right now, I'd probably have said working for a major technology corporation.

Funny how things change.

But some things will never change.  I am still into sports at much as I was 10 years ago.  Except I coach more and play maybe a 'little' bit less.  I still love music and play my guitar ALL the time...but I also learned how to play the ukulele in the last 10 years...I plan on either learning banjo or harmonica this year to add to my musical skills.

I still love to garden and cook, still love to travel.  So all the things that I think really made me - me still exist in my life.

I had a wonderful birthday.  Went to 529 last night with my mom, brother, aunty and uncle for some steak, oysters, and wine.  Sooooo goooood!  Then today I picked up my baba and she took me out for wonderful quiche and tea.  It made her day to hang out with me for a few hours, which in turn makes my day cause I love seeing her happy.  She talked all about her 'yoga practice', playing cards with her lady friends, how her geraniums NEED to be put outside soon so she wishes it was warmer...all the fun things that I can't wait to talk about when I'm 87.

Only 56 more years.

Kids these days!

So I volunteered to help out at my moms school this week.  I was to come and teach yoga classes for all the grades of the entire school.  I said yes of course cause it would be good experience for me and I always will do things to help my mom out.

You know when you have a certain ideal of how a situation is going to be and then it doesn’t happen to turn out that way at all?  Well that was what my first day felt like.  I left and while driving home I was like “wow….that….was…terrible!”  The kids were not as attentive as I thought they would be, there were some kids who didn’t listen at all so its really disheartening when you are trying to show someone something that you love to do and they’re just like ‘this SUCKS!’  Kids are sometimes almost too honest!

The whole Monday experience left me with a bitter taste in my mouth.  I wasn’t in the best mood for the rest of the evening and in the morning I was totally dreading doing it all over again.  And I was stuck here for a whole WEEK! Sheesh! What did I get myself into?

So driving in my car on Tuesday I started to feel anxious about the whole experience again…then I stopped and thought to myself “stop.  Just stop and take a breath for a moment.”  If I was to even tolerate the rest of my experience this week I was going to have to let go of the negative thoughts I had developed from yesterday, acknowledge and accept that its not my ideal situation to be in, that its NOT on my list of 10 favorite things to do with my time and just approach Tuesday with an open mind.

So I did.  And you know what?  Tuesday wasn’t so bad.  Neither was Wednesday, or Thursday or Friday for that matter.  I mean, its not bringing total joy like other things do in life, it not like teaching people who want to be taught, but its not as terrible as I felt it was on Monday.  That’s a pretty good technique, to acknowledge and let go of things that bother you so that you can continue on with a neutral state of mind.  I’m going to try and do it more often when feelings of angst arise in me.

I also find that if I taught yoga for 5 hours a day (so like 5 classes) every day that I would loose my love for it as it becomes very systematic then.  So I will make sure to never do more than 3 classes in one day and never have them back to back to back in my schedule so that I have time for myself and my own practice.  That way I can give more when I teach to those who I am teaching.

The week ended actually really well!  I was surprised how my attitude changed from Monday to Friday.  STILL not something I’d do for a living, but once in a while doesn’t hurt.  The kids also really enjoyed it and can't wait for more yoga….oddly enough.  I don't think I'll ever understand kids.

Yoga, Gardening, and other things.

I finished my first project as part of my Moksha teacher certification on Sunday!  The project was to teach classes and get feedback from the students in your class.

I was very happy to see that all the feedback was very positive.  If there was criticism it was constructive and were meant to make me better which I willingly accept and appreciate.

I also had to give feedback on how I felt after each class, which was neat because looking back I could see my feelings change from the first class to the last class.  I am really beginning to feel more confident teaching but I know there are still some 'nerves' cause I am not completely myself in class.  I know that this will come though and in a few months I will look back at this post and remember the fond times of when I was still nervous. lol!

I'm officially on the teaching schedule, I teach Saturday mornings at 8am!  A little bit of an early start but I can't think of a better reason to get myself up out of bed in the morning.  I'm excited to establish connections with people who regularly take that class and get to know them!  Maybe there will be someone who likes gardening and tea as much as I do.

My next project is to rate my current priorities in life and then compare them to where I'd like those priorities to be.  When I complete the project, I will post it. I'm making it into an art project with glass so it should be cool.

I am also starting to collect wooden pallets.  With our beer orders at the bar, we get a few extra here and there so I'm going to make compost bins out of them for both at the bar and at home.  I am also making a pallet garden (an idea I saw on this neat blog: http://homesteadsurvival.blogspot.ca/) but for my design I will require something like 24 pallets.  I have until May long weekend to get them all though so there is still lots of time.

Wow, I am really excited to start gardening now!  REALLY excited!!

How Exciting!

I've been given an amazing opportunity!!  Starting on May 1st, I will be the desk manager at Moksha Yoga Tuxedo (on Waverly in Winnipeg).  I am so honored that they chose me for the job and I look forward to spending 35 hours a week at that wonderful studio!  I also look forward to teaching more and being there will make me more accessible and available for shifts!  YAY!

Another exciting moment was an idea I came up with when working wing night on Monday with my brother.  I was exclaiming that if any more patrons come in for wings, we will be completely eaten out!  Of course, my mind went in the gutter the minute I said that and it inspired an idea that we will be implementing this summer.

We will be having our FIRST annual "eat out The Pi" night.  Our bar (The Pioneer) will be selling 120 tickets to some VERY lucky (and better be very hungry) men and women for one night of sheer gluttony!  It will be a man vs buffet format, we will make a WHOLE lotta food and it will be up to these ticket holders to eat all of it!  If/when the buffet is completely done they will be given a piece of pie to celebrate having conquered the vast amount of food we prepared and they will receive their own "I ate out The Pi" t-shirt.

I think that's a pretty novel idea!  So excited to get it going.

My girls season came to an end on Sunday, we were in the finals and we lost the series 2-1 with both of our losses being by only one point!  Those are always hard losses to swallow cause its one of those games that could have gone either way.  All n all a GREAT season for them and they will ONLY get BETTER!!

Now to focus on Nationals, I have a squad going to junior nationals in Regina and a squad going to US Nationals in Minneapolis!  That will be such a crazy experience!!  Can't wait!

Sooooo, after having a staph infection, a bad cold, burning my feet with deep frier oil things are finally looking up!!!!

Social Networking

Large White Clock

Well, if one thing being stuck on my butt has given me its been the opportunity to explore social networking sites and connect them to myself as well as my business - Rock Candy Decor.

Rock Candy Decor is my home decor business that I derived from my jewelry line Rock Candy Creations.  Rock Candy Creations had a wonderful 10 year run from 1999 - 2009 but then 'homemade' jewelry became very mainstream.  With the ability to purchase jewelry making supplies becoming more accessible and more inexpensive a lot of people were now turning to making their own jewelry and starting their own businesses.

I went from being one of 3 jewelry vendors at a show, to being one of 30+ at some shows.  The market had become over saturated and people were getting sick and tired of seeing 'another jewelry booth'.

Recycled Wine bottle vase

I ended up reinventing myself.  Still using my techniques that I had developed when making jewelry, I now started to apply them creations for your home and office space.  The result were some really fun, funky and functional pieces such as clocks, post-it note holders, recycled wine bottle vases, and pen holders.  Rock Candy Decor was born in November 2010.

I still find it a hard market to go into, a lot of my items are of a higher price point which makes it harder to get those 'impulse buys' that I was so successful with when I had my jewelry line.  People also have an easier time purchasing something for themselves (as in a jewelry piece of reasonable price point) than they do to purchase something for their home that is of a higher price point.  So my sales have not been as high in shows and I find them to be not worth the time and effort anymore.

I decided to try something different so I put my items on ETSY last year:
http://www.etsy.com/shop/RockCandyDecor - .  Its been going well, but I haven't really been getting my wares out there...until today.

Today was the day that:

I updated my facebook site for Rock Candy Creations - http://www.facebook.com/pages/Rock-Candy-Creations/176711792373682
I created a twitter account for Rock Candy Decor - https://twitter.com/#!/RockCandyDecor
I created a personal account for twitter - https://twitter.com/#!/h_sender - which will go hand n hand with this blog.

And I tried to get a pinterest account, but apparently that takes a while.

Post-it note holder

So all n all a productive day even though it didn't involve the physical movement and labour that I enjoy.  I will keep you posted on my new found social networking!  I don't usually put myself 'out there' so to speak so this is something new to me and I'm curious to see what happens and if I meet any cool new people as a result.

Since I've been home...

My training was an amazing yet trying experience. I learnt so much about myself and felt like I had made some real progress in many of the 'issues' that I had been dealing with.  Not only did I leave with the confidence to teach the whole moksha sequence, I learned to like myself again.

Now I know that sounds kind of cliche', how does one learn to like or love themselves right?  Well, I realized that there were a lot of things that I was holding onto that were causing me pain.  Things like keeping exes as friends on facebook or blaming myself for things that I could not really control.  And these things were holding me back from enjoying the current moment cause I didn't think I deserved to be happy.

So I deleted and removed anyone and anything that I considered 'poisonous' to me, things that made me feel sad when I looked or thought about them.  It was kind of scary at first, I felt like I was being a bad person or a quitter for letting them go...but then once I did it was like a huge weight was lifted and I was free.  I continued to go through my training on what was almost like a high of happiness and empowerment... And I was hoping it would last.

Its been a month now since I have been home from training and this month has been anything but easy for me.  I have had a lot of physical ailments hit me since coming home, the first one was plantar fasciatus which kicked in during my last week of training and got worse when I got home.

I then found out that I had a staph infection in my left foot and lucky for me I got it treated before it spread into anything too serious.

I then developed a cold which I have had for the last 3 weeks, the darn thing won't go away!

And then the icing on the cake, I was cleaning the deep frier when all of a sudden the vessel carrying the grease suddenly burst pouring hot oil all over my feet. I tried to get out of the kitchen as fast as I could but I definitely got some burns.  2nd degree burns.  All over the toes of my left foot and hitting a couple toes and the arch of my right.  This pain was worse than the time I broke my leg or the time I blew my ACL.  Its been 4 days now and the pain is still significant in my left foot.

So hopefully when I am all healed up, I will be able to do all the things I've been wanting and dreaming of doing while I've been sidelined with all these illnesses and injuries.  In the meantime, all I can do is suck it up and carry on.

Firsts

I cannot believe all the things I have accomplished in the last two days.  I officially started my teacher training and there have been so many firsts for me.

I had my first double yoga class today, taught in the beautiful oca which faces the ocean.  You have not done yoga until your focal point has been the ocean.  The energy of 60 plus people is also amazing to share.

Yesterday I meditated for the first time.  I am SO happy I brought a meditation pillow! I have tight hips and one of the main posture tips is to have your knees lower than your hips. (as well as sit upright to keep the natural curvature of your spine). So sitting still isn't as painful as I thought it would be.

I kept focused on my breath for about 12 minutes before I got fidgety.  I figured if I counted 10 slow breaths 10 times that would get me really close to my 15 minute meditation limit. 

I also had a weird experience when I did this one activity.  We were to get a partner and cup their skull in our hands.  Then my focusing and breathing deeply we were to feel the bones in their skull.  Well, I felt poor Amber's brain waves (or something like that) it felt like electricity coursing through my fingertips and my fingers were tingling for about a hour after that. (her right side was really active)

I also had my first experience teaching today.  We partnered up and I partnered with a fellow yogi named Robbie.  I have to say that I wasn't as nerve wracked as I thought I would be but I really have to work on articulating my thoughts and knowing the postures....I've got some homework but I know I can do it now which is a relief.

Today I also scooted my first cockroach out of our cabin.  Our "penthouse suite" has no windows so we get all sorts of goodies in here!!