KATIE

“So what probably should only have ever been a summer fling turned into a full-blown, committed, adult relationship.
I think I realized earlier than I would like to admit that something just wasn’t quite right about the whole thing. But I was young and in love and my rose-colored glasses wouldn’t allow for me to listen to that instinct.
So after a year of exhausting and emotionally debilitating long-distance, I made the bold decision to move to Turkey, where he was living and teaching english.
If I were to get into the gory details of it all, this would probably take me much longer to finish writing.
I’ve only recently been able to identify what happened over the course of the next two years of vicious emotional abuse and even more recently have I truly felt comfortable speaking about it.
I was beaten into the ground. Made to feel useless, stupid, worthless, crazy, like there was something wrong with me.
He made me question my relationships with all of the people that I hold closest to my heart, like I should be ashamed for feeling alienated and homesick, like the loss of my sex drive was my fault, like I was a prude for not wanting to pose naked for the graphic pictures he wanted to take of me, oh the list goes on and on.
Six months in Turkey were followed by six weeks with his family in South Africa which were slightly more comfortable as we were surrounded with the love of a very close-knit family who were thrilled to have us visiting, but they were also fogged and blurred by copious pot-smoking and wine drinking.
Luckily, I did find a nearby yoga studio that I bought an unlimited monthly pass to and went to nearly every day. In this ritual, I found a bit of peace. An hour or two every day where I could just be myself. Be alone. Engage in a practice that, at that point in my life, felt like it was mine and only mine.
A time to retreat. To think.
To meditate on and ponder what I was doing with my life and, more importantly, who I was doing it with.”

EMILY

“These photos demonstrate the chaos, joy and surrender that is family life. When my son was little I used to do sun salutations while I held him between my
legs. Many mornings, I have stopped my formal meditation practice in order to clean up from a kiddo who didn't quite make it to the bathroom or to console a crying baby. I am no longer in control. It took me awhile to accept this but I am beginning to understand that letting go of my demands for others doesn't mean that I have to give up my self.“

MAGGIE

“Our teachers gift us tools, then it is our job to practice using them. Knowledge without application doesn’t do much. Learning what to do with these tools requires deep internal work and self-compassion. I’m still sifting through the dust and old stories that were stirred up by the learning process. Trying to slowly chip away at the illusions my ego has created while simultaneously reminding myself that this whole process doesn’t happen all at once. My teachers talk a lot about yoga being the practice that allows us to overcome the obstacle of the mind in order to awaken us to our true nature. As I am stumbling/walking this path I hope to link arms with others that are trying to do the same. After all, regardless of what self-actualization practice we choose, we’re all on this journey home together.”

ASHLEY

“I want to see more trauma informed classes in the area. Ones that feel normal and like that’s how it’s always been. No hands on. No unexpected teachers floating around the room. No triggering sad songs in the teachers playlist that send you into a crying spell in your pigeon pose (okay, sometimes it’s just the hip opener...). Yoga isn’t as accessible as it could be for the folks who really struggle getting out. Having something available online or an optional Zoom/FaceTime class would be really neat to see implemented as the norm in studio classes.”

STEPH

“The first day of YTT, we all introduced ourselves. Everyone said that they were doing this to share love and because they love life and love yoga. I said it was because I’m mentally ill and yoga is saving me from myself. My therapist told me it would be a bad idea to lie, but looking around at the shocked faces I kinda regretted that. YTT was hard and I would not say that I enjoyed it. Of course, I learned and gained so much from the experience, but it was not fun. I guess real growth is never fun, but other people seemed like they were having a great time so maybe I was doing it wrong. I don’t know.”

SARAH

“Teaching has changed my practice so much, in terms of my internal workings. I approach my own practice with so much more intention, curiosity and eagerness to learn, because I want my students to feel that. If I don’t practice with that kind of energy, they will never feel any of that from me. How we practice is how we teach.”

SHAWN

“It’s not enough to be kind or open or friendly. We need to pay for teacher trainings for trans people, fat people, people of color, people with disabilities. We need dedicated classes and studios.”

KAYLEE

“I had a series of injuries which resulted in many surgeries and recoveries over 7 years during my 20s. I define myself by my body. I AM flexible. I AM fit. I AM strong. I AM an athlete. My jobs were physical jobs and if was not able to move my body optimally I was not all the things I told myself I was. If I was not a skier, or a runner, or a hiker, or strong, or fit, who was I than.”

SARA

“When I first started I had a life partner. I was building a foundation for future with another human. This person would come to be my personal hero, and we loved one another. He provided an opportunity for me to allow myself to be loved, which perhaps was among my biggest triumphs as a woman with dwarfed confidence and self-esteem. When he passed away out of the blue, suddenly while I was out of town, my practice darted into the fray along with him. So did my identity, so did my spirit. I suppose I am trying to say, it was evolving, disappeared, now has returned, alas in a way I am still trying to acquaint myself with. What is different now, is that I am different. Grief is a profound animal. A lawless vociferous, and yet isolating, silent jailer.”

GABY

“ I moved to Burlington to begin teacher training and my inner judge crept back in. I struggled. I wasn’t at the same physical level as others in my training and I was overweight. At this point I had lived at both Kripalu and Integral Yoga Ashram where I don’t recall feeling so self conscious. Anyhow, I still kept showing up because that’s what the Swamis taught me to do - even if it’s only 15 minutes a day, do your practice. Even when you don’t want to, do your practice. I’ve been meditating on and off since I was 15 and that’s a whole other journey. Home practice is ideal. In my own space I’m able to explore more openly and deeply.”

CHRISSY

“Yoga can teach you to listen to your deepest self, but you’ll have to be willing to listen. I am immensely grateful for compassionate teachers, classical texts and supportive friends + family. With the help of this network of true knowledge, I believe my best self has a chance to shine bright if I just give it a chance. Not one chance, but an eternal chance. Evolution, change and failure are all guaranteed in life, yoga is not. Yoga is hard work and it’s a lifetime work; you have to want to be the light which at times means recognizing, dealing with and confronting the darkness.”

JESSICA

“I began to read. A lot. The first yoga book for me, “Fierce Medicine” by Ana Forest cut me open, Forest naming things I was unable to articulate and strengthened my desire to explore recovery and yoga. I was sexually assaulted at 13 and what followed was 22 years of drinking, cutting, and a vicious eating disorder. Poetry began to play an enormous role in my home practice. Rupi Kaur and Yung Pueblo have given me hope and the words to describe my healing. I would read and then flow. Everything about me had been compartmentalized and labeled. As my understanding of the practice grew I began to feel whole. Not until I was 36 years old had I ever
genuinely content with myself. I began to tap into my strength and see a woman who was putting herself together, finding beauty in my perfectly imperfect journey. I no longer thought that I was forever broken and damaged.”

KAYLEIGH

“When I first started practicing a lot of yoga, I otherwise existed completely apart from my body to the point of abuse. I was using drugs and alcohol, eating poorly, overworking myself. I used to leave yoga and smoke a cigarette as if I was leaving a particularly difficult therapy session. But that’s really what it was. Yoga is a mirror that shows me how I am – even when I don’t want to look. Yoga helped me stop abusing substances, it gave me the clarity to leave a negative relationship and it offered me a mental home within which to digest it all. Now yoga helps me deal with issues large and small – from the death of a family member to waiting in line at the grocery store. It’s brought me to a more clear, honest space from which I can experience it all.”

KELLY

“Yoga and meditation have taught me to meet whatever is arising in my life with a quality of gentleness, rooted in kindness. I am continuously learning how to fall completely in love with myself, and to believe to my core that there is nothing to judge, change, or fix. Alan Cohen says that “completeness is your birthright and the unshakable condition of your existence”. Yoga is a means to remember that we are perfect, whole, and complete just as we are and just as we are not.”

GRAHAM

“Early on yoga was a way to engage with my body. It became a way to feel safe in my body and to work through trauma, and now it’s a way that engage with the world. I hope to use my practice to bring some balance to this existence. I describe myself as striving to be a proton in the atom of humanity. A positive charge that is but a part of the whole.”

ANNIE

“During my YTT we had a couple of “free-flows” and it was such a humbling experience. I felt so out of place and lost without taking direction from someone. But after the first few times I found myself flowing through sequences I didn’t even know I had in me.”

KEMPER

“Yoga saved my life. I discovered it three years ago during a very low point. I just lost a relationship I had built up to be paramount to my existence. I was out of school and had no direction. I spent most of a year alone. Someone recommended yoga, and I couldn't stop. I wept like a baby for days in practice alone. I became enraged and had to leave the studio in public. Then the euphoria came as I'd practice for hours a day. I took 200 hr training. Then 500 hr training. I couldn't get enough. I travelled to India. That's when the yoga actually began. My heart opened to children there. Their need, their struggle, and how easy it was to help! That's what yoga is to me. What you can give, with heart.”

TAYLOR

“As a child I developed scoliosis, a condition causing curves in the spine and rotation through the hips, ribcage, and shoulders. My condition was serious enough that it needed to be addressed through surgery at the age of 12. This surgery fused the majority of the vertebrae in my spine together, permanently and severely restricting my range of motion. As much as I thought I understood that it didn’t really matter, I came to resent the fact that regardless of how many sun salutations I do, I will never have the most beautiful upward facing dog in the room. Despite the consistency and diligence of my practice, I’ll never be able to “master” shapes that require moderate spinal movement.”

JESSICA

“I was in the process of going through the 12 steps and yoga was my outlet to grieve and weep as I slowly began to connect to the parts unseen. I was broken and scared/ The future was unknown, but what I knew I could do was continue to work on my sobriety and show up on my mat and turn it all over, relinquishing control.”

NALINI

“I was 19 when I found yoga. Struggling deeply with my relationship to my body and food. All I knew was force, beating my PR, and counting calories.”