Right Now is All We've Got

I spent the last week at a Yoga Leadership Training.

It's a year long program turned into two, thanks to the pandemic, and we finally got to meet in person after a year of online work. Yoga trainings are always impactful for me.

There's something about being in the same space as people who are up to big things and are looking to level up. I can't help but be elevated in their presence.

When I share with these people, move alongside on my mat, listen to them share their dreams and goals, something within me comes alive. I start to get and feel clearer. There's less mental brain fog. There's more understanding of what I'm up to and want to be up to in the world. It always seems, during these trainings or right after, challenging news comes my way. An old boss diagnosed with cancer. My husband struggling with his traumatic brain injury and handling having just moved while I'm away. A pregnant friend whose baby will go into surgery just days after being born. Another black man murdered. Any of these on their own might have shook me, knocked me off balance, and yet, as I sat with each of these scenarios, I felt a peace and a calmness. A clarity. I could hold space to be sad, to grieve, to not understand, and also to know that I was right where I was supposed to be.

I can't change diagnoses. I can't change the fact that we've moved and it's hard on my husband. I can't fix my friend's pain. I can't bring Daunte Wright back from his grave. I can, though, choose who I want to be in spite of all those things, and how I want to show up.

I could show up as angry, disgruntled, and feeling like life is unfair. I could show up with the attitude that nothing will ever change so why bother. Or that we shouldn't have moved. Those are all viable options. AND. They don't serve me or who I'm committed to being. Does that mean I don't feel angry or frustrated or upset? No. It simply means I don't hang onto those things and let them make me who I'm becoming. I'm committed in my life to leading others, and I am for building connections. If I say I am for those things, what I am doing to create that in my life? How am I choosing to pave the way when there is no road, or the road needs work? How am I choosing to stand for my husband and my friends, for the black people in my community and the world? These are the questions I asked myself at leadership training. What I got wasn't a lot of answers. I did get a feeling, though, and a response. "Keep asking the questions. Keep digging. Keep looking. Choose what to be committed to." There's a quote by Glennon Doyle that says "We can do hard things. " I repeat this to myself often. I also remind myself that the reason I can do hard things is because of the tools I've learned and gathered over the years, the biggest one, the most constant, being presence. Not presence in the cheesy "Be Present" kind of way, but presence as in living and breathing from "Right now is all I've got." There is no other moment besides the one right in front of me, in front of you. This moment you're reading my words here, it will pass, and the next moment will be yours, right now. When I live from this space, this is where miracles happen. Where I can handle hard news and not be knocked over. Where I can love myself more. Make decisions without worry. Find the clarity and the ease. If you've been living from worry, from indecisiveness, from doubt, check in with yourself. What would it look like, instead to live from "Right now is all you've got?" Teacher Training begins this coming Friday. The last day to sign up is Tuesday, so if living from "Right Now is all You've Got" means signing up, then don't wait. Join me, join us, and get some really good tools for your tool belt, to help you handle all the life situations that come your way, from the challenging to the joyful. Click here to apply.