The Basics of Yoga, Post #1

My first yoga post is now up on AltGlobe:

The Basics of Yoga

Enjoy!

Live the Life You’ve Imagined

Several weeks ago, I read this simple but incredibly thought-provoking idea in Mike Dooley’s book, Notes From the Universe:*

The secret to living the life of your dreams is to start living the life of your dreams, right now, to whatever degree possible.

That quote has really stayed with me. It is so simple, yet so profound. By taking whatever steps possible toward your goals, however small they may be, you will start moving in that direction. But more importantly, something else happens. A mind shift. A different way of thinking. It may be imperceptible at first, but your thoughts will start to change. And when your thoughts change, your actions and decisions are also affected. You will start behaving differently. You will start making decisions that will lead you further in the direction you want to go.

Continued Adventures in the Blogosphere

I am currently waiting for the founder of AltGlobe to approve my proposal for my next series of blogs. Rather than assign articles, he has decided he wants to create a library of basic information for all the areas of subject matter featured on the site, and has asked the bloggers to submit proposals for a 5-blog series discussing one of the featured topics. I submitted my proposal for 5 posts covering the basics of yoga: the definition and history of yoga, common misconceptions, overview of Patanjali’s 8 limbs of yoga, what to look for in a yoga studio, how to carry your yoga practice into other areas of your life, etc. I’m excited to get started on the articles so I hope I hear back from him soon. It will be great to focus on one topic for a while rather than researching something new every week. Even though I’m not a yoga “expert” — not as much as an actual instructor would be, anyway — I’ve studied up enough on the different limbs of yoga to feel comfortable covering the basics. My interest in yoga has always been about the spiritual growth and mind-body connection as much as — maybe even more than — the physical benefits, so it should be an interesting series of blogs to write.

Out with the Old

Moving always provides a good opportunity to rid your life of unnecessary clutter. Which is particularly good for someone like me, who has a tendency to hang on to everything. So as I’ve been packing and moving things into the new apartment that I’m sharing with Ryan, I’ve given careful consideration to what to keep, and what to get rid of. Another factor to consider is that we are combining two peoples’ stuff into one apartment, have minimal storage, and don’t want to pay for off-site storage if we can avoid it, as that would be counter to our goals of paying off our debt. So, any duplicates or extras are considered unnecessary and ruthlessly discarded.

Little Green Lies

Well, AltGlobe threw me to the fire with my second blog assignment, which was to write about eco-product scams with some keywords about technology thrown in. Not exactly my area of expertise, but as I dove into the research, I learned some pretty interesting stuff. I hope they like my post about greenwashing. By the way, I’ve been accepted as a paid blogger, and should be getting one assignment from them a week. I’m excited to see what else they throw my way! I feel very fortunate to not only have some paid writing assignments, but to have projects that are also interesting to me on a personal level.