As many of you know, I’ve been consciously practicing gratitude with the help of GratitudeLog.com. I have really grown to love this site. It’s been great support in this practice. If I don’t post for a couple of days, I get a reminder. The reminder I got today was especially thought-provoking, and I’d like to share it with you:

Did you know that there is an effective and
an ineffective way to express gratitude?

Unfortunately, the ineffective way is far more common.
It is sort of the default form of gratitude that most
people fall into.  I was stuck here for a really long
time until I found a far more powerful way to practice
gratitude, one that moved me into perfect alignment
with abundance and greatly accelerated the Law of
Attraction.

First, let me talk about the ineffective way to express
gratitude.  This is gratitude that you express that is
related to what is happening in your life right now. 

It is closely related to the gratitude and appreciation
we learn to express as children (i.e. to say thanks) and
that is probably why it is often the default and why
so many people get stuck here.

Ineffective gratitude includes things such as:
* your health
* your relationships
* your material posessions
* your friends and family
* a nice vacation

I am not saying that there is anything wrong with this
form of gratitude.  All I am saying is that it is not
nearly as powerful as what I am about to show you. 

Often the problem with the above form of gratitude is
that it comes from a place of lack.  If you have ever
expressed gratitude while thinking “at least… I am
healthy, or at least I have a great family” then you
know what I mean. 

This form of gratitude is extremely week because it is
based on the present circumstances.  In other words,
this form of gratitude is conditional.  It makes it
sound that you are grateful “only if you have good
health, a great relationship, etc.”

Unfortunately, conditional gratitude fails to activate
the law of attraction.  The universe does not respond
to conditional requests.

The second form of gratitude is complete in that it is
a celebration of life itself, for all the experiences
you are having. One other key difference is this. 
Effective gratitude comes from an underlying attitude
vs. a temporary focus on one item or thing to be
grateful for.

With practice, this holistic form of gratitude can
become second nature.  When it does, the law of
attraction will flow far more easily into your life.

The more powerful form of gratitude includes items
such as:

* your life
* this awesome planet
* for being who you are
* for future events
* for problems, challenges, and hardships
* for your mistakes
* for your mind
* for your freedom

In other words, you become grateful for this amazing
journey of your life regardless of what happens and
where it takes you because you know that it is just
right for you and that everything is happening for a
reason.

When you are expressing effective gratitude, fear and
loss disappear. There is no focus on any lack and when
you reach this state, that is when abundance can truly
start flowing into your life.

Being grateful for what you have in your life (your
health, relationships, etc.) has its place.  But when
you start feeling truly grateful for everything that is
happening in your life and open your heart, you will be
amazed at how quickly the universe will start to answer. 

So, start creating these feelings now, even in the most
unlikely or unpleasant circumstances and notice how you
begin to attract whatever you focus on into your life.

With love and passion,

Mike

Makes you think, doesn’t it? Made me think. About all the challenges I’m personally facing right now and how they’re part of the journey that’s taking me toward my enlightenment and my true self. It’s hard to find a way to be grateful for those challenges, isn’t it? But I guess it’s the same kind of gratitude you feel for a really good medicine that tastes awful.

I’m learning a lot from GratitudeLog.com. You can join me there, if you want.

Last week, I had the great pleasure of teaching a group of ladies at Girls Night Out, which is part of North Texas SNAP. We had a great time learning poses and talking about all the ways that practicing yoga can help us. I can’t wait to work with them again!

As we leave the old year behind and look ahead to the new one, it’s time to set intentions that will help make our new year joyful. I have four intentions for 2010: 

Season’s greetings, friends!

May you be well and live with ease this holiday season and beyond.

If you’re a long-time reader, you know about my special connection to ladybugs. If not, you can catch up here. Ladybugs find me in the most unexpected places. A couple of weeks ago, there were three days in a row that ladybugs stationed themselves on my office window 13 floors up! They show up in my car, on my car, at my door, in my house, on my shoulder. So imagine my surprise when I read this article in “Texas Parks and Wildlife” about the disappearance of native ladybugs in North America!

But there’s hope. The National Science Foundation is funding a project to help figure out why this is happening. And WE can help, too! By taking pictures of any ladybugs we find and uploading the images to www.lostladybug.org, we can contribute to the data used in the project. Everything you need to know about how to photograph the ladybugs is there on the website. You’ll also need to provide information about the date, time, and place you found your ladybug. 

So take photos of your ladybug visitors and be conscious of the good fortune they bring you. What a great family or classroom project, too!

I had accumulated quite a few sweet potatoes from our organic produce co-op and I wasn’t quite sure what to do with them. Sweet, marshmallowy casseroles don’t appeal to me, so I decided to roast them with olive oil, salt, and pepper. I threw in some other root vegetables I had lying around along with some whole garlic cloves, and topped it off with some fresh rosemary sprigs from the front yard. It was a big success at Thanksgiving dinner! Here’s what I did:

Ingredients:
A few sweet potatoes
A few red potatoes
A few carrots
Large onion
About 10 whole garlic cloves
Any other root vegetables that you like
Fresh rosemary sprigs, or your favorite herbs
Handful of toasted pine nuts

Wash vegetables well and cut into bite-size chunks.
Peel onion and cut into chunks.
Toss vegetables and onion in large roasting pan with olive oil, salt, and pepper (you can use a spoon, but using your hands is best).
Toss peeled garlic cloves on top.
Place rosemary springs on top.
Roast at 400 degrees about 50 minutes, or until vegetables are tender.
Discard rosemary sprigs and replace with fresh ones as garnish.
Sprinkle with toasted pine nuts as garnish.

I just spent a weekend in Austin taking 4 workshops with David “Yeah Dave” Romanelli. David is a fabulous yoga teacher from  California and he teaches us that ecstacy is no further away than a good glass of wine, a tasty bite of chocolate, or a great tune on our iPod. He reminds us that livin’ in the moment is as easy as noticing one beautiful moment, one delicious moment, and one funny moment each day. He’s funny and real and I really liked him as a teacher.

I was inspired by David’s classes in many ways.  I’m inspired to put away my cell phone and computer more often, to remember to slow life down and enjoy those little moments that might otherwise fly by while I have my head down over my laptop. And I will definitely enjoy a good bite of chocolate, if not each day, at least several times a week.  And more wine will flow in my life.

As a teacher, I learned lots of new ways to flow poses together, so my own students may notice some new things happening in class. One of the biggest things Dave has inspired me to do as a teacher is  to actually be myself while I teach, rather than put on a yoga teacher costume and read a yoga teacher script. I’m inspired to make more of my own playlists with my own favorite music.

Another thing I learned this weekend is that I need to shut up.

I traveled with a friend who began as my student, became my friend, and is now also a fellow yoga teacher. She said something incredibly profound to me this weekend. Saturday morning, after a day of driving with me and an evening in a hotel room together, we were having some conversation about something, or nothing, while we got ready for class. I kept getting words wrong or mispronouncing words as I spoke, and I acknowledged this to her. “Maybe today is your day to just listen,” she said.

She didn’t say it in a way that was mean, but it was just a suggestion, like, “Hey, consider this.” It really struck me. The subject of me talking came up again that same morning, in the context of my teaching. I tend to talk a lot during class, cueing poses, giving information about why we do things the way we do, what’s happening in our bodies, what chakras are being activated by certain poses, etc. It wasn’t brought up in a mean way, but it’s obviously a thing. And it’s something I have acknowledged. Maybe it’s time for me to consciously shut up and let my students consciously move and flow and  feel.

Looking back, I realize that I finish people’s sentences a lot. What’s that about? Trying to prove how smart I am? How in tune we are? How much they should like me? How insane is that? Something else happened during the weekend. I thought maybe I had said too much during a conversation with someone. I asked my friend if she thought I had, and she answered very honestly, “Yeah, you may have pushed that a little hard.”

After I told him the story, my husband, Weldon, who knows how I get and who is also a good, good man, told me, “You were just excited this weekend. It’s OK to be passionate.” And yes, he’s right. I was excited and passionate. I was spending a weekend in a city I love with a great friend doing my favorite thing in the world. And along the way got a wake up call and a lesson. Not the one I expected to get either. I guess that’s how they come, isn’t it?

So my challenge is to shut up. I’ll do my best this week to be aware of how I’m communicating. I’ll see if I can communicate effectively with fewer words, and when I’ve completed a thought, I’ll do my best to stop. Wish me luck.

Last night, I took my sister Meredith to the Miley Cyrus concert for her birthday. It was a HUGE show at the American Airlines Center in Dallas. We had a great time, in spite of the two hours we spent in the Problem Resolution line.

This was the first show the AA Center has done with paperless ticketing. There were lots of issues to get worked out and lots of problems to resolve, probably more than the Box Office was prepared for. Scanner equipment wasn’t working right, re-issued paper tickets were showing up on scanners as invalid, etc. Everything sending people back to the Problem Resolution line. We ended up there twice.  The staff was as helpful as they could be and was very apologetic about all the issues. I understood, even after our second 45 minutes in line, that everyone was doing the best job they could.

Many of the people around me were not as understanding. It was embarassing to me how rude and mean some of these people were: yelling at the Box Office staff through the closed blinds to open the windows, calling the Box Office from their cell phone while in line to complain about how long the lines were (and not nicely), and when not actively directing their negativity at the staff, grumbling to each other about how stupid this system is, and that they should let us go in a special door.

What a drain.

I thought I was going to witness an ugly concert mob during my first wait in the line when one lady walked up to the front of the line while we were waiting for the windows to open and announced that she was going to start a new line since there were 4 windows. All the ladies around me started yelling at her! One lady behind me even sidled up to me, I guess because I was being noticeably quiet, and said, “You’re with us, right? We’ll take her.”  Maybe that line-cutter was in the wrong, but was it worth all that? I just shook my head in amazement. I have never experienced adults acting in such a way. Maybe they were just doing the best job they knew how to do, too.

During my second time throug the line, I was behind a group with that same mindset of “they should treat me special because I have to wait,” but the lady behind me was much more easy-going. She kept telling her daughter, “We’re going to be fine.  We’ll be in our seats by 7. And even if we’re not, we’ll just miss a little of the opening band. We’ll be fine. No need to panic.” Some of my faith in humanity had been restored.  There were still people around that could go with the flow.

My sister and I also had some additional issues to creatively solve. She’s diabetic and had to do her insulin shot and eat by a certain time. Fortunately, she had packed a peanut butter sandwich in her purse in case of emergency (a smart diabetic move), so I knew we had that as a back-up plan. We just kept gently modifying our plan as the situation changed. Ultimately, we were in our seats by 6:40, she did her shot and ate her sandwich in her seat by the time the show started, and we had an awesome time being in a Miley State of Mind.

So here’s my hope. My hope is that next time you find yourself in what could be a stressful situation, you stop and think about the ones you might percieve as making it stressful. Are they doing the best job they can? Is it really worth throwing a fit? Maybe it’s the universe giving you the gift of an opportunity to practice patience and kindness. Maybe it’s an opportunity to learn that things really do work out, even when they seem impossible.  I was just glad to be there with my sister. And in the end, this is what it was really all about for me:

Meredith, after the show.

Got this from a friend today.  There is good information here.

Dr. Vinay Goyal is an MBBS,DRM,DNB (Intensivist and Thyroid specialist) having clinical experience of over 20 years. He has worked in institutions like Hinduja Hospital , Bombay Hospital , Saifee Hospital , Tata Memorial etc.

Presently, he is heading our Nuclear Medicine Department and Thyroid clinic at Riddhivinayak Cardiac and Critical Centre, Malad (W).

The following message given by him, I feel makes a lot of sense and is important for all of you to know

The only portals of entry are the nostrils and mouth/throat. In a global epidemic of this nature, it’s almost impossible not coming into contact with H1N1 in spite of all precautions. Contact with H1N1 is not so much of a problem as proliferation is.

While you are still healthy and not showing any symptoms of H1N1 infection, in order to prevent proliferation, aggravation of symptoms and development of secondary infections, some very simple steps, not fully highlighted in most official communications, can be practiced (instead of focusing on how to stock N95 or Tamiflu):

1. Frequent hand-washing (well highlighted in all official communications).

2. “Hands-off-the-face” approach. Resist all temptations to touch any part of face (unless you want to eat, bathe or slap).

3. Gargle twice a day with warm salt water (use Listerine if you don’t trust salt). H1N1 takes 2-3 days after initial infection in the throat/ nasal cavity to proliferate and show characteristic symptoms. Simple gargling prevents proliferation. In a way, gargling with salt water has the same effect on a healthy individual that Tamiflu has on an infected one. Don’t underestimate this simple, inexpensive and powerful preventative method.

4. Similar to 3 above, clean your nostrils at least once every day with warm salt water. Not everybody may be good at Jala Neti or Sutra Neti (very good Yoga asanas to clean nasal cavities), but blowing the nose hard once a day and swabbing both nostrils with cotton buds dipped in warm salt water is very effective in bringing down viral population.

5. Boost your natural immunity with foods that are rich in Vitamin C (Amla and other citrus fruits). If you have to supplement with Vitamin C tablets, make sure that it also has Zinc to boost absorption.

6. Drink as much of warm liquids as you can. Drinking warm liquids has the same effect as gargling, but in the reverse direction. They wash off proliferating viruses from the throat into the stomach where they cannot survive, proliferate or do any harm.