A nice reminder why I love Moksha. I can Be Accessible. I really can!

This summer has been the summer of challenges, change, and trying to find compassion with myself as the craziness life continued to unfold all around me. I know, you’re probably thinking… “Projects? More teacher training business? I thought this was long over?”… Long over due more like it.

While I finally rallied up the nerve here in Tokyo – yes a lot of time has passed this is true – to actually finish this project, I realized I have not been open to accessibility at all. And having been confronted about what’s really been bothering me, I felt like a terrible person. How can someone be traveling the world and be grumpy all the time?! I’m in a funk right now and I don’t like it. A fitness funk, a life funk, and a down right “why am I not happy and stop being uptight” funk. Thank goodness Cecilley put me in my place. Someone needed to. I would have punched me if I was her and I would have totally understood why. Yes, it was that bad.

So back to Being Accessible. This project was perfectly timed then, but possibly even more so now, and made for an excellent theme to my life. Learning to be accessible to change was the focus of this project. And it could not have been more spot on.

Way back when this project was first underway accessibility was me letting out of my job and what happened. I needed to find closure with this in a way that would give me a peace of mind. For my last day I always envisioned doing a grand gesture of some sort like baking cookies or writing little notes to everyone, but something had to be done in order for me to move past this. I believe it was Cecilley who suggested the idea of teaching a yoga class for my former colleagues. It would be completely unique, real, and a very authentic gesture of gratitude from me. What an excellent plan! But, regrettably, this did not happen. Why you ask. Because I chickened out. I pushed and pushed this project aside, avoiding the thought of planning the whole thing, and distracting myself with anything else. I think I was scared or truth be told I didn’t really what to do it. Being accessible at this sensitive time in my life was a lesson for me to be accessible to my heart and my true feelings. I don’t have to do things other people expect me to do or do things people want me to do. Or even doing things just because. Yes there is a time and a place when you do need to step out of your shell and maybe go out that one time when you really don’t want to, but you shouldn’t feel forced into anything. Life is too short to not enjoy one minute of it.

It took me a very long time to listen to what that actually meant. Back in August I was also in the very early planning phases of my year of travel and this was more important than anything else at the time. I was uprooting my life and leaving town. I needed out. I needed change and travel and a sense of connection to something more than the life I created in Toronto. I have a lot of things to figure out with myself before I can give back. My heart was in a heavy place, I needed to be true to it and not brush it aside anymore for the sake of others. But I also didn’t mind brushing it aside with distraction and activities. But now accessibility is coming back to haunt me as I travel. When certain things don’t go according to plan, or when I think Cecilley is upset with me because of something I said or a decision I made, I have to be aware of the “why” and let it go. I hate being a person on edge and rigid and I’ve been such a stick in the mud for way too long. I’m surprised Cecilley doesn’t hate me – or maybe she does? Man karma, it really can be a bitch.

In time I will reconnect with all of my colleagues, my mentors, and friends. And when I do I will be ready and in a much better place. But for right now I’m going to stop letting the stupid little things bother me that I can’t do anything about, other then figure it out and move on, I’m going to tackle the bigger issues in my life causing me stress – these are going to take a lot more work but I need to start somewhere – and I need to be a better friend and travel companion to Cecilley. I owe her so much, it’s the least I could do given she is all I’ve got!

Although the project didn’t go entirely as planned, I did find accessibility, in a much broader sense and in a much truer sense. Now it’s time to enjoy it. There’s a whole world to see and I’m not going to get in the way of myself anymore!