
Perspective is everything.
Perspective applies the lens, tells the story, creates the experience, leaves the memory, defines impressions and molds beliefs.
Is it time to change the lens?

Perspective is everything.
Perspective applies the lens, tells the story, creates the experience, leaves the memory, defines impressions and molds beliefs.
Is it time to change the lens?

Today I will soften into the power of me.
I will flow like a river on a determined path,
fully yielding to the unexpected turns and objects along the way,
not giving into them but using them to jettison me forward,
staying true to myself, even in the face of the unknown…
strong, serene, complete in who I am.
Knowing that my strength is in my peace.

Fill your cup and keep it full, not just of anything, but with what nourishes, strengthens, and completes you. Nothing bitter, nothing bland, nothing that blocks well-being. Simply delicious, comforting, fulfilling. Sip, smile, refill.

The other day as I lay in stillness at the end of my yoga practice a sensation came over me, one of equanimity, of wholeness -a rather unfamiliar but wonderfully delightful and nostalgic sense of seeing and experiencing pure peace, joy, and perfection. It washed over me and surrounded me as if I was marveling at something on the outside, someone else’s greatness. Then I realized…this was the feeling I often had as a very young child. Pure peace and joy in who I am.
To know that it was all still there – the peace, the joy, the perfection – despite the countless blemishes and scars of a well worn life gave me such resounding hope – hope for the child within me, hope for the child within you.
It is in there, always, forever, no matter what…that we are whole, perfect beings, each and every one of us, each and every moment of our existence.
We just need to remember that.
And, as long as we can remember we will know peace and joy.

How is it flowers know just what to do? How to sprout leaves and open themselves up so unconditionally to the world? Is it trust? Courage? Or the lack of interference from fear and doubt as they engage their inner guidance system? Imagine a world where everyone were as open and intuitive as a flower.

What if I were you and you were me?
Would we live in harmony?
Would you love me unconditionally?
Would you let my heart and mind be free
In love and light and truth and peace?
What if the I in you was the you in me?
What if there was just one place – could it be?
Where we are one, where we both just be,
Existing in the space of eternity,
As light, as love, as truth, as peace?
If there is but one place, would you go there with me?

There is a peace and beauty that comes with the icy cold stillness of winter, a space for slower breath and for watching.
The same space can be found in pain and suffering when we greet those moments with compassion and loving acceptance, knowing that this is simply where you are right now…and you are not alone.
The thaw of spring will come and with it a great renewal.

Know that your kindness, your happiness, and your goodness are what sparkles and shines in this world…and that IS enough.

Compassion, peace, and calm cannot be forced. One cannot demand that someone be compassionate. One cannot command peace and calm. Rather, one must model it, live it, and know that the path to peace in ourselves and others is a steady process of balancing ego and replacing envy and judgment with love and inspiration. And that is the hard work that we must individually choose to do.

No matter that anger laps at your feet,
No matter that fear and distrust appear to form walls around you,
No matter that hope feels smothered,
Spiral upwards, out of the ashes of perceived despair,
Fill the air with compassion.
As long as the flames of compassion dance,
We can know only peace and joy.