I thought yoga was stupid...

How I came to the yoga mat the first time is a sad story. I have talked to many yogi's who have similar tales of woe that left them searching for something, something that might heal, something that would give strength or peace. Perhaps this is even your story. 

I grew up in the fitness industry. My father taught group fitness classes and participated in Reebok National Aerobic Championships. I started “body-building” in high school, my fitness goals at the time: look like Linda Hamilton in Terminator 2 and bench my body weight. It would be a long time until I could bench my body weight, but I have done it... once. At the time I weighed 122 lbs. 

As for looking like Linda Hamilton I would soon have another goal, compete in a Fitness America Competition. I qualified for nationals with my first try and even got to be on TV. The ESPN coverage of the show gave me a lot of screen time (I just happened to be the same height as the girl who won... I came in 48th). As the sport developed and became less of the pageantry that the Fitness America cooperation made it and more a division of the NPC/IFBB Body-Building Association I too developed and continued to compete. I competed off and on for 10 years earning pretty collection of trophies...

Professionally this would lead me to become the Operations Manager of a Big-Name fitness facility. This would be my first introduction to yoga. I thought it was stupid. Over and over I had to remind the class participants that they could not walk throughout the gym floor bare-foot, and I never saw anyone in a Yoga class who looked more fit than me. What did I need to stretch for I could already touch my toes...

Eventually judging politics would lead me to no longer compete on a stage and I took to training to beat the clock. For the fist time ever I started to run. I was in my early thirties and I decided that I would run a marathon. This is right around the time that the sad story starts. I'll skip it for now but I had found myself motionless and hiding under a blanket in my Arizona apartment for a period 3 straight weeks. I literally HURT from not moving. I decided I did need to stretch and so I found a yoga class on you-tube... thus started my healing.

I would not do yoga again for sometime but that you-tube class would become the catalyst for me moving to Costa Rica and going to Massage School. My next intro to Yoga would be from one of my massage professors who lead us in a short practice before class each morning. After this experience it is any wonder that I would still want to practice. Even tho I was a beginning yogi I was an advanced athlete and so the poses came easily to me. One day as I was deepening my pose to get a better stretch than was instructed, there was a challenge and a stare down and then the announcement that if I did not want to do the pose EXACTLY the way he taught it I could take Savasana, in other words: his way or dead. I still thought yoga was stupid.

Another of my massage professors told me that she saw me teaching yoga one day. She was a dread-locked hippie and such premonitions were common for her. I thought she was insane... One year later:  I was enrolled in Yoga Teacher Training.

After finishing Massage School I lived in a small beach village in Costa Rica until I ran out of money. Having no access to anything that might resemble a gym, I took to the road; to recover from running, I did yoga. I discovered iTunes yoga class pod-casts and practiced on the beach...

And now... I get it.

I didn't realize it at the time but that you-tube video saved my life. Yoga saved my life... And now I teach it so that everyone else with their sad stories can find something that heals, or gives strength or peace.

I currently reside in Tampa, Florida and practice and teach yoga at Jai Dee Yoga, but I still do pod-casts on the beach...