In the dark

Confession: having wonderful, inspiring conversations with fellow yoginis sometimes makes me blue. Sometimes I feel resentful, envious, ashamed -- or just dark. And I know all that just isn't yogic.

My daily yoga practice varies dramatically, and as a result, so do my abilities. My body isn't what I'd like it to be, my abdominal muscles still a weak mess from the blowout of having two babies in two years. My poses aren't pretty. I can't balance on either foot reliably -- and certainly never on my right. I wobble. A lot.

So I find myself in a dark place with my practice. I feel like a bit of a fraud, to tell you the truth. But I keep showing up on the mat. Fumbling. Trying to hear the teacher I am to others so I can be led. I bail out of poses too early and then go back in. I engage whatever I can. I release what I can't. I ground. I lift. I bend backwards to open my heart. I bend forwards to look inward. I make space. And breathe. I move my body so my mind will still. And you know what? It works:

Suddenly, it doesn't matter if I'm in the dark. I'm looking towards light.

Yoga and baseball

Those of you who know me know that I love baseball -- and my team is the Chicago Cubs. Don't groan. I know.

Yoga can be very helpful in rooting for a team like the Cubs. Think about it -- practicing contentment, practicing non-attachment, even practicing ahimsa -- all help me be an even better fan. All these practices can make a wait of over 100 years for a championship bearable -- even enjoyable. Just as this year's season gets underway, I am breathing and trying not to get too excited. I will enjoy every pitch I get to watch -- especially the ones thrown at Wrigley. Even if my baseball season ends in September, our team of yogis will have been brilliant just in their attempt.

Back to class

A lot of my yoga is home practice. I teach regularly, as well, but that is not practicing, even when I get to do some asanas with the group. Home practice can be a struggle -- squeezing it in during an ever-shrinking nap time, closing my eyes to the messes here and there that beg for my attention, and turning a deaf ear on the phone. Home practice is, in many ways, the real essence of yoga -- focusing, listening to your inner teacher, looking within.

But for me, it is sometimes hard to balance that soft-focused inner gaze with pushing myself. So today, I went back to class with one of my teachers. I'm not sure it was harder, per se, than one of my home practices, but I paid different, more attention to things. Hearing someone else's cues, working them through my body, was a treat. Never mind that I didn't hear a kid for 90+ minutes -- that in and of itself is a huge shift -- but today listening to an outer teacher gave me fresh perspective.

Where was my mind? Instead of thinking about the sequence, which I would do if I were practicing by myself, I was at the four corners of my feet, my thigh bones moving back and my shin bones moving forward ever so slightly -- heart center moving forward -- hips relaxing into alignment -- to so many places was my attention moved. It makes me look even more forward to my next home practice and finding those same places on my own.

Time flies...

when you're flying. From motherhood to yoga and back and around again. It is a wild ride sometimes, but a beautiful one. The views are awesome: my sleeping munchkins, my toes in uttanasana, my husband rocking out, or the view from upside down in sirsasana.

In the last year, my husband changed jobs, my older girl turned 3 and the younger, 2, and I completed my 200-hour yoga teacher training. I'm teaching classes at, Shakti, and carrying the yoga love into Newark Public Schools with Newark Yoga Movement, and practicing whenever I can.

Mothering is its own special kind of yoga: a mix of love, breath, balance, strength, surrender, boundaries and openness. I'm sure I'll come back to this idea a lot as my practice as a mom and a yogini continues.

The only good thing

about my family living far away is the excitement when they visit. Their plane just landed, and they're on the way! I wish I could keep the house clean for more than 37 seconds, but oh well --

Week in Review

Well, it might have been more fun to be in London this week -- though not at Michael's meetings -- but my four-night solo gig with the girls went just fine. Of course, I am very lucky to have had a couple hours of babysitting each day to allow me to run a few errands and get to yoga, but even the nighttimes weren't too bad. Of course I can do this. It's just that it's not nearly as much fun without my husband -- we sort of chose to get into this together, you know? Tonight marks his return, and I'm already tracking his flight on the Virgin Atlantic website. I hope he is resting and rocking out to some tunes on his new iPod shuffle. Just a couple more hours, and then we'll celebrate with a pizza, a couple of welcome-home gifts, and hopefully a good night's sleep all around.

The Sleeper

Lucy likes her sleep! Lately she has been sleeping in -- or sometimes taking jumbo naps -- and she looks like the happiest little clam doing it. It's funny, though, because she doesn't particularly like going to sleep. One difficult element of two kids, 13 months apart is sleeping -- especially since ours share a room. We bathe the girls together, but then they have their own separate go-to-sleep routines, Josephine in her toddler bed and Lucy in our arms. So Lucy hasn't learned to fall asleep on her own yet. And there's not a great way to do this, as far as I can tell. I'm not a believer in crying it out, and it wouldn't work anyway, since Josephine would be trying to go to sleep in the same room. What to do, what to do?

I'm thinking of this as my husband is getting ready for a 5-day trip abroad, and I'll be solo for bedtime routine. I would prefer for one of us to sleep in her own bed, but how will I make that happen with two babies, two bedtime routines, and only one me?