In Great Company

Today, I want to talk about some excellent yoga and mindfulness teachers, wellness coaching, as well as yoga mentorships and/or small business mentorships.

First, I hope you’ve had a great week and that you’re gearing up for a great weekend. 

PSA: 

Self care is not only not selfish, it’s also not optional. 

It’s imperative that you regularly do those things that help you feel ALIVE. Afterall, like the theologian and civil right activist Howard Thurman says:

“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”

— Howard Thurman

If yoga and mindfulness, Yoga Nidra, help you feel alive, I hope you’ll join me over the next few days for some classes. Check deets below. 

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Also, I want to let you know that I feel totally honored and humbled to be surrounded by truly gifted and wonderful yoga teachers, two of whom I’d like to introduce to you if you don’t already know them. 

Sasha Nelson

First, I’d like to introduce you to Sasha Nelson. 

Sasha grew up in California and then moved to NYC and taught and practiced yoga at some of my favorite New York yoga studios. We love and practice with many of the same teachers. 

Then Sasha moved to Paris and taught yoga at studios, businesses, and offered private sessions before moving to Nice, where I met her and where she is currently teaching. She also hosts yoga retreats and offers 1:1 wellness coaching that incorporates nutrition, yoga, sustainability for the planet, and mindfulness. 

We resonate on SO many levels.

Sasha is a really talented teacher with a mission to promote wellness for body, mind, and planet. I truly admire her passion to not only help individuals but also help the planet. 

To brag about Sasha briefly, she studied mindfulness with none other than Tara Brach and Jack Kornfield and has yoga certifications from Yoga Shanti and Yoga Works. She has a MFA in sustainable design. 

It's fascinating to see how she’s incorporating her knowledge of design, yoga, meditation, sustainability, nutrition into very comprehensive private and group offerings. To boot, she’s also a great writer. I subscribe to her substack to get her regular writings which include recipes and yoga/mindfulness insight. Very cool!

Even though I moved back to the US over a year ago, I still get requests to teach yoga in the Nice area and I never hesitate to send Sasha instead because she’s just such a solid teacher. 

I worked with Sasha personally and mentored her to help her expand her offerings and organize an already robust yoga business. I’m super proud of the work we did together and want to share her great work with you. 

I want to highlight 2 things she does really, really well. 

First, she has a fantastic online course called Mindful Mornings: Nourishing Rituals for Mind, Body & Planet. In this course you see her skill in design—It’s gorgeous—but it’s also really engaging, approachable and a fantastic day to create rituals for your morning and start your day off perfectly. 

Next, because wellness is not a 1-size-fits-all sorta deal, she offers 1:1 holistic health coaching to help a person meet their wellness needs whether through diet, yoga/meditation, and sustainability. You can book a free discovery call with her to discuss what she does and how it might be helpful for you.  

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JACOBY BALLARD

Next, I want to talk about Jacoby Ballard

Jacoby Ballard is a social justice educator and yoga a teacher with me at Mosaic Yoga. He leads workshops and trainings around the country on diversity, equity, and inclusion. He’s a seasoned yoga teacher of 24 years and leads workshops, retreats, teacher trainings, among other things. He’s also the author of A Queer Dharma: Yoga and Meditation for Liberation. 

Jacoby and I both teach Yoga for Stiffer Bodies at Mosaic Yoga—I teach on Saturdays at 7:30 am and he teaches Tuesday at the same time. 

This Saturday, November 16th, we’ll be co-teaching my Yoga for Stiff Bodies class for a power-packed experience that will allow you to be introduced or reintroduced to this incredible teacher. As always, class will be 60 minutes and will be offered by donation. 

I hope that your plans this weekend and early next week involve a little self care in the form of some yoga and Yoga Nidra. I hope to see you in class. Otherwise, please book a free no-pressure discovery call with me about the possibility of working together in the form of a mentorship. 

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Yoga and Small Business Mentor Programs

My mentor programs are organized systems that help you illuminate your unique gifts, who your ideal client is, and how to create an organic, massive, and positive impact on the world in a way that makes both you and your clients evolve into your highest potential. 

I’ll share with you the exact system that I use every day, one that has helped me launch my career from being a struggling yoga and meditation teacher into a global presence in my field, making over 6 figures a year, and enjoying being non location dependent—fulfilling my dream to live in the South of France.

Let me show you step-by-step exactly how this system can work for you and your business. 

These programs are organized, effective, and actionable. They are designed to give you the secrets and specific skills to harness your talents and build what I call your own Mechanism of Influence. 

In a mentorship, you will:

• Illuminate your special and unique gifts

• Clarify who your ideal client is and the unique ways that you can help them

• Plan, organize, and execute how to build or improve a clean, effective, and actionable website

• Communicate regularly with your ideal client with a regular, high-value message in the form of newsletters, blogs, and social media

• Offer products and services that helps your clients stretch and grow and helps you to get paid what you’re worth

• Maintain a high-level, trusting relationship with your clients

• Regularly review your business to remain relevant, fresh, inline with your and your clients highest values and needs

If this seems like a lot, know that with organization, everything is manageable and this system will be your step-by-step way of helping the world discover the gifts that you have to offer. 

These programs offer:

• Experienced Guidance 

• I’ll show you step-by-step my proven system that I use every day which has helped me break through career plateaus, enabled me to be non location dependent, and enabled me to make a great living doing what I love. I have shared with dozens of people who are also reaching new heights in their teaching and business. 

• Increased Revenue

• This system focuses on illuminating and maximizing your gifts, helping you to offer them to the world in a way that both you and your clients grow in energy, money, and love. 

• Accountability and Support

• I’ll be your accountability partner, a crucial element to helping you stay focused so you can accomplish your goals. When questions or problems arise, I’ll be right there to help you solve them and move forward. When you’ve completed your program you can join support sessions with other students to keep you learning and moving forward. 

• A focused Strategy 

• My system takes the guesswork out of what you need to do to make great leaps in your business and even gives you a schedule for what you can be doing to build your business every day. 

• Clarity and Direction

• I help you to refine the purpose and direction of your business which helps you save time and energy by knowing exactly where to put your attention. 

• Mindset for Success

• Your business is an extension of your thoughts and beliefs. That’s why I’ll help you stay in a growth and abundant mindset with encouragement, meditations, and helpful tools. These will help you to understand your growth potential, understand speed bumps for the lessons they are, all the while eliminating self-limiting beliefs. 

• Practical Tools 

• This program gives you loads of useful tools in the form of guides, supplementary videos, and templates that make easy work of seemingly difficult tasks. 

Sourcing Your Heart's Gift: You're a Rock Star

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Ever see someone do something really really well and think to yourself, “That dude was BORN to mow lawns!” or “that kid plays Rachmaninoff like it’s her JOB!” or that woman is the APOTHEOSIS of a math teacher”?

Something magical happens to us when we witness someone else do what they are meant to be doing in this world. Seeing them do their thing moves us because somehow it gives us permission and nudges us to find and/or do what we were meant to do.

Emily Dickinson’s gift to the world was poetry. Michael Jordan’s gift to the world is playing basketball. Oprah Winfrey’s gift for the world… is being Oprah Winfrey.

A heart’s gift for the world is what you were meant to do. It’s a gift because you give it to the world to make the world a better place and it’s a joy just to give it, regardless of reciprocity.

Everyone has a heart’s gift for the world. Some of us know it. Some don’t. Some people’s heart’s gifts are very public, others’ are private. Someone’s heart’s gift may or may not be how they make their living. Sometimes you get a job and then through that work, it reveals to you something you didn’t know about yourself, the gift that was hidden inside of you. That’s true for me and teaching yoga and meditation. Through many years of teaching it, I’ve discovered how much teaching yoga and meditation makes my heart sing. It’s taught me volumes about myself and I absolutely LOVE it. If I were stranded on a desert island I’d still practice yoga and meditation and probably teach the sea birds everything I know about the subjects.

To discover and express your heart’s gift to the world means you gotta be connected to Source, the portion of Source that’s inside of you. Source— you know, Creation, The Universe, God, the Great EVERYTHING, Krishna, Sarah The Magical Unicorn, whatever you want to call that thing that is at once inside of you while simultaneously inside of EVERYTHING else. After all, the Divine is waking up to know itself through and as YOU. The Divine is using your hands, your mouth, your talents to move this whole Universe along and to grow into discovering itself. So if Source is coming to know itself as you, don’t you think you ought to know a thing or two about Source so you can help yourself be what you were meant to be?

And think about it, if you were God and could express yourself in any way you chose, why wouldn’t you come to know yourself, at least in part, through playing the guitar like Joni Mitchell, or Eddie Van Halen, or Prince? Answer: there’s no way you WOULDN’T be Prince cuz Prince was badass and he made the world an incredible place with his music, God rest his soul.

Well according to Source, you’re just as much a rockstar as the artist formerly to this world as Prince was. Your gifts may not be as public as Prince’s but you gotta remember, to the gladiolas in that garden of the little white house on the corner— you know the one, it’s the one with nary a weed, the one where the most feral of cats wouldn’t even dare to trespass to do their business in there, the one where you make excuses to walk by it, socially distanced of course, just so you can be near its beauty— well, to the flowers in that garden, the little old lady that keeps that Eden is nothing short of a rockstar. The same Source exists within you as it did Prince and those stunning gladiolas.

Yes, you are a rockstar, though your venue for rocking might be raising kids, might be litigating corporate fat cats, or hosting peace rallies. Maybe your venue for rocking is simply the way you appreciate the world— it’s your style. Whatever it is, you are called on to rock and the world needs your heart’s song.

Philosopher and civil rights leader, Howard Thurman once said, “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” Giving your heart’s gift to the world means offering your love and the fruits of that love as a gift. You give it because it’s a joy to do so, whether or not there’s any reciprocity.

What’s your heart’s gift for the world? How do you begin to find it? What does it look like to follow it?

What if you don’t know in which arena you are meant to rock? What if you feel that you haven't found your “Raspberry Beret?” How do you find your heart’s gift for the world? One secret to finding your heart’s gift to the world is to simply follow what you love—discover what gives you joy, pleasure, and what vibrates your heart strings.

In searching for our heart’s gift for the world and how to share it, sometimes, we need to gain wisdom about ourselves, wisdom that may lie deeper than our conscious, rational thinking mind. Yoga Nidra is an excellent (and relaxing) practice to plumb these depths and hear the secret message of our heart. It does this by placing you into a state between waking and dreaming, one of relaxed alertness, which acts as a secret doorway to visit the Source that is within you. It’s like a doorway to your heart. This is why I’ve dedicated several sessions in my live online Yoga Nidra class (on Wednesdays and Sundays) to explore sourcing your heart’s gift and set the conditions necessary to hear the wise Oracle inside you whispering what your gifts are for the world and how to share them with the world.

Please consider joining me on Wednesdays at 6 pm MDT and Sundays 9 am MDT for my live, online Yoga Nidra classes. Each person who registers will receive a recording of the discussion and Yoga Nidra practice to continue the process of heart-discovery after our class.

In the meantime, enjoy this free Yoga Nidra practice which leads you progressively through relaxing into deeper Awareness and through a beautiful visualization where you hear the Oracle within you speaking your heart’s purpose for the world. I’d love to hear from you about your experience.

Stay tuned for more about sourcing your heart’s gift by learning to follow your heart…