I've Got Sunshine On a Cloudy Day

There I was. A feeling of excitement came across me but I suddenly got nervous. I felt vulnerable, exposed, unsure. In the same moment, I realized what's done is done. There was no turning back now! I had no idea that my picture and an introduction to my blog were going to be on the front page of Saturday's New Haven Register, but there it was. For all to see. I was about to hop on a train to NYC when I heard that I was in, so I picked up the paper. I was very surprised, excited, and hopeful. As my nerves calmed down and the views increased I realized I may now have a real audience and that I must fulfill this blog and keep it going in order to hook in these new folks, and some old loyal readers, for the long haul. Visions of the movie Julie and Julia came to me, where Julie is inspired by the work of Julia Child and creates a blog while cooking in her footsteps, that suddenly goes viral. Her life suddenly got busier as Julie had blogs to post, people to keep up with, and co

Yoga enforces a mind-body-spirit connection and encourages us to practice stillness and serenity, however, the correlation between yoga and life is, in fact, quite parallel. A key characteristic to maintain through the ebb and flow of life is strength. We need to be physically strong, emotionally strong, and spiritually strong time and time again, and these qualities are tested quite often. Physical strength allows us to get out of bed every morning and begin a new day. It allows us to proceed through that day with our heads held high while we learn the easy, yet challenging, task of always putting one foot in front of the other. In yoga as we learn the most basic of poses, we are told to stand tall and strong, as in mountain pose ( tadasana ). We must plant our feet and extend the crown of our heads to stand tall. Our muscles are engaged and our hands, with open palms, point down to the ground, extended, and also strong. Emotions run high through life and through the practice of y

As a lover of the English language, I enjoy every opportunity that teaches me new vocabulary. As a recent yoga fanatic with extra time on my hands, I heard a word in class the other morning that was new to me. Knowing it must not have come from the English language, I still enjoyed the sound and flow of the word. My instructor said it a few times, and explained it a few different ways each time she used it. "We want to find our prana , our life force, and get it moving in our bodies this morning" she would say. And later, "so as we breathe here let's find a way to bring prana back into our daily lives." Interesting. I was on my own hunt for happiness, for life force, while practicing peace, patience, and calmness, maybe this "prana" thing was something I would enjoy. I wanted to do some of my own research on the topic, and wanted to make sure I had the word correct. It did sound a lot like the word piranha , which would have confused me quite a bit.

Yoga has really got my mind working wonders. For one, it's a relaxer. It takes away any uneasiness I may have and it makes my mind focus on the present moment rather than useless bits of nonsense that will cause me to worry. Each class we are told to set an intention, and usually I set my intention for the health and well-being of others close to me, though including myself sometimes, too. I felt it was selfish to set an intention for only me, and therefore felt uncomfortable doing it, despite the fact that I would be the only one who actually knew what my intentions were. To go along with this mini happiness project, however, I decided to set intentions for the things that I need to work on. Spending an hour and 15 minutes of my day breathing and practicing this intention will indeed keep it active and ever-present in my mind. Though my 10 commandments are still under construction, I know what a few of them are without a doubt. Today I set my yoga meditation intention to "pra

Instant happiness. My photo from Lyman Orchard's Sunflower Maze.

Silly me. I should have known that what works for one does not work for all. Night one of my mini happiness project started as I was creating papers to place inside my beloved mason jar, and I thought to myself, Well this is funny. If I pull out the paper that says, "take a deep breath"  is that suddenly going to make me happier? Taking a deep breath is something I practice in times of uncertainty or when I'm nervous or anxious. Starting my day by taking a few deep breaths is the norm, so why will completing this task from a piece of paper provide anything differently?If I pull out on that says, "call Christina" am I suddenly going to be happy and my job for the day is done?" The efforts that I placed on the cards would be nice acts of kindness or chores or reminders for myself, but that's about it. Remix! Writing daily tasks on a piece of paper is not going to solve my problem of being bored for three weeks or feeling anxious; they are not going

I would consider myself happy by any definition of the word. I am successful, I have a loving family and loving friends, I have had wonderful life experiences. I would consider myself grateful, positive, and friendly. Not positive every minute of every day, not over the top friendly, but enough so that I am pleased with my life at the current moment. Do I have a lot more to look forward to? Of course. Am I where I want to be at this point in my life? No. But challenges are placed in front of us to see how hard we fight for them. The walls are built for us to break down. Every setback is a setup for a comeback. This is not my first rodeo. I have figured out that if something doesn't come to me, I must go to it. My summer job ended yesterday and I have to be back at work August 29th. This means there are a few weeks in between now and then. Given certain characteristics of myself and knowing how easily bored and anxious I can get, I have decided to create a short and sweet happ