I went through the checkout line at Healthy Home Market today and the cashier asked for a closer look at my wrist tattoo. I had it done right after my Level 2 teacher training with Baron Baptiste. It was the theme for the week, and now that it's permanently etched into my skin, the theme of my life: Defy the Lie.

She was taken aback because she was having a conversation with another customer about tellin the truth versus telling lies and asked me if there were every any exceptions or circumstances in which telling a lie was better than telling the truth. My immediate response was no, no good effect can come from lying. I could see the wheels in her heard turning and as I sat down for a quick lunch, she sat beside me with some more questions.

"Okay, so my friend really wants to go on American Idol but she can't sing. Do I tell her?" she asked.

I had to think about it for a minute until I figured out what sue was really asking me. Is it okay to hurt someone's feelings with the truth, or should feelings be spared with a little lie? I remembered back to when I was first learning about the yamas and niyamas. The first code of conduct that yoga teaches is ahimsa, mostly translated as non-harming. Second is truth. At a discourse with Blair Lewis, he said that they are taught in that order specifically so that we will put non-harming before the truth. His idea is that we tell the truth always, but we should always, "grease our words with love."

The cashier seemed a little lighter at this prospect, so I felt we could take it one step farther. I reminder her that ultimately love is truth, and that if she's torn between telling a lie or telling the truth, that there is probably some deeper fear or problem underpinning the situation.

This is the everyday work of a yogi. To live is to bump up against tough choices where we might lose something or someone. The practice though, is to sit with these situations long enough for the truth to become apparent. All events in life can be boiled down to a choice between love and fear. It is our work to not leave any situation until we can choose love and truth and be behind that decision fully.

*Excuse any typos or formatting issues. This post was composed entirely on an iPhone.

A few years ago some fellow yoga teachers in training and I decided to host weekly meet ups to teach our selves the art of Acroyoga. It was an amazing and sometimes bruise filled summer. We had the official Acroyoga Flight Manual, lots of videos and even found a couple of workshops to attend. By the end of the summer we were comfortable flying, stacking and spinning each other in the air in a combination of yoga, massage and dance. 

Fellow yogi & dancer Tai and I have decided to bring back the flying fun in an intro to partner yoga playshop. I emphasize play because we work enough as it is, and this is going to be fun! It's for all levels and we don't expect anyone to know anything. Actually, it's much easier to teach people who don't know anything. You don't even have to have a partner, but you get a discount when two or more people sign up together. We'll be working in threes for the acrobatics (a base, a flyer and a spotter) and twos for the partner asana. 

To sign up, call Yoga One (704.332.9911) or click here!

Time to dust off the mighty written word, or typed word, as it is, and tell you about my post holiday Vipassana meditation course. After Christmas, I took refuge with about 60 other people in an old (as in no heat and bad plumbing) Catholic summer camp to learn the teaching of Gotama the Buddha. It's a technique dating back around 2500 years and it is still being taught all over the world as a remedy for all ills.

From the website: www.dhamma.org

Vipassana, which means to see things as they really are, is one of India's most ancient techniques of meditation. It was rediscovered by Gotama Buddha more than 2500 years ago and was taught by him as a universal remedy for universal ills, i.e., an Art Of Living.

This non-sectarian technique aims for the total eradication of mental impurities and the resultant highest happiness of full liberation. Healing, not merely the curing of diseases, but the essential healing of human suffering, is its purpose.

If you read nothing more about my experience there, know this-- it was the most transformative experience of my life! Coming from someone who makes it his business to experience and teach transformation, I do not say those words lightly. I've been through many yoga trainings, even taught them, but nothing has allowed me to go so deep into my own being as the 10 day vipassana course.

The Experience

Just signing up for the program is a test of mental preparedness. After deciding that I wanted to do this for ten days, I had to fill out a questionnaire the plumbed the histories of my mental health and family life. Each step of the way is met with the recurring question Do you really want to meditate for 10 days? and Can you stay the entire length of the program?

The first night there, I took the vows of a monk, which are not really all that hard, especially the big ones like I will not kill anyone or anything or  I will not steal. It is slightly more difficult to take the vow of noble silence. For the duration of the course, I was to cultivate the sense that I was working alone, meditating in seclusion. Not talking to anyone was easy, but the vow extends to all forms of communication, including eye contact. I also adopted the schedule of a monk, which involves waking at 4am and meditating for 1-2 hour blocks until 9pm. Each day was about 11 hours total sitting in meditation.

Aren't there alligators in Florida?

The predominant thought for the first three days was Dear God, Please let a rabid alligator bite my leg so I can go home! I formulated plan after plan for escape the first few days. Every time I sat to meditate, either alone or with the group, I felt the urgent need to be doing something somewhere else. Or I would gain some amazing insight on some project I was working on back home and want to act on it. Since writing and reading materials were contraband, my only option was to continue meditating and hope that the thoughts would subside (and maybe that I would remember the good ideas in the New Year).

It got easier as the days went by. They blended together into a sludgy blur, as if time decided it really didn't have anywhere to be and could just take a little rest before getting on. My body was wracked with the most physical sensation I have ever experienced, even at the Baron bootcamps. After day three though, it just stopped. I could sit without pain for one or two hours. Around day six, I stopped worrying that zombie reindeer would ambush the camp and I realized that when I sit still, the mind keeps churning up thoughts and I usually miss out on the benefits of being silent.

There is no spoon.

The best stuff doesn't really show up until day eight or so, and I know now why they ask you to commit to the whole course. It takes nothing less that a total commitment to the process to reap the benefits or vipassana. The technique is simple, but not always easy. To sit and be still, on the inside as well as the outside takes a strong determination. The reward for such actions is clarity. I'm not talking about the clarity that comes with a good nights sleep or a cup of coffee, I mean the "this is the matrix and no, there really isn't a spoon" types clarity. Every bad sensation that arises, every negative (or positive) emotion that comes up and into the awareness has a cause--and I could see it. It was like having a magic xray machine into my own being. Thoughts would happen and I would see how they actually changed my body, either by pulling some muscles tighter here, say across the chest, or by releasing some new hormone into my bloodstream making me feel giddy and light.

Each emotional event disintegrated into all of its constituent parts. There was cause, action, reaction, new event, new cause, new reaction. Like the sense of time that slowed, each biological process revealed itself to me like stop-motion movie of how my mind was working. Even more exciting was that there were no blind spots. Everything I looked at came apart and revealed its history to me. It was easy to see the truth that we create the reality we see. What's hard is keeping  that awareness open and flowing while moving through life and making a living. Coming from 11 hours of meditation a day to maybe 1/2 an hour to an hour means that a lot more thoughts are churning throughout the day, clouding up that pristine sight that made everything so simple and clear.

The memory of all of that clarity is preserved, however, and it serves as a reminder that seeing things clearly is possible and more and more possible every time I sit and be still. 

Check out the not-so-silent ride home!

This is post nineteen in the Best of 2009 Blog Challenge. Read them all!

There are people that you immediately distrust. They send up a red flag before a word escapes their mouth and you just know that they're not a person you want to be around at that moment. This is about the exact opposite of that person. I had just returned from Montana and was about to embark on meeting this year's round of teacher trainees when Susie, a regular at the studio, but not one I had talked to frequently, asked if I want to go to the beach with her.

She was in teacher training, so I knew that if she murdered me people would at least know who I had been with, and I decided the beach was worth the gamble. We left early morning a few days before the Fourth of July. I figured if we didn't get along we could both just practice meditating for a few days and forget the conversation thing all together. It was only a few minutes before I was raiding her ipod to see what she had and I realized...we are going to be BEST friends. It's was all there in one album, significant and irreverent, the soundtrack to RENT.

Everybody knows the signature song Seasons of Love, so I played a lesser mainstream track to determine her level of fandom. As the intro tunes started up she looked at me, then started belting out every, single, word! It was instant recognition between the two of us. We knew each other's histories, past relationships, family and friends. We knew what each of us liked and hated and we knew that tis weekend was going to be fun. Three days of kayaking, shell hunting, slacklining and sunburn later we made our way back home in time for the 4th fireworks. It kicked off a great summer with all of the other teacher trainees as well. I have never seen a group so committed to making a training good. In the off weekends they would hike and swim together, carrying on the bonds that naturally form during such an intense time.

This is post eighteen in the Best of 2009 Blog Challenge. Read them all!

A few years ago I was fortunate enough to get to work at a small boutique in Plaza-Midwood called Pura Vida Worldly Art. I was coming from a high-end retail job in a swanky mall, but I always felt there was something special about this little shop, and it was in my favorite neighborhood in Charlotte. While I left the store in 2006 to pursue my yoga teaching career, I still drop by frequently to grab a cup of tea and incense. While I didn't spend mad money there in 2009, it was only this May that I realized how truly important this store is to Charlotte.

It was on my trip to Austin, Texas, very close to Pura Vida owner Teresa Hernandez's motherland and source of inspiration, that I realized what was so special about this place. In Austin, there are boutiques every twenty feet, and while they may all sell similar things, they contribute greatly toward a culture of appreciation and diversity. Tibetan Prayer flags sold alongside Dia de los Muertos dolls eschew selling to a niche customer based on religion of nationality. In my short tenure behind the cash register I met drummers, psychics, spiritual leaders and spiritual healers, yogis, mothers, tattoo artists and a plethora of individuals that make up the community I love.

Leaving Austin and returning to Charlotte I realized the importance of local gems like Pura Vida. They may be far fewer and far smaller here, but they are convergence points for the medley of human beings that make me love this city. A business like this thriving is the sign of a vibrant culture, and because of their inclusion of fair trade and local pieces, can be instrumental in educating people in ethical local and global consumer practices. If you live in or around Charlotte and think that it's only a banking city, please go visit Pura Vida. Order a maté and check out a drum circle in the Gypsy Lounge, or buy a skirt that will have everyone asking where you got it.