I was constantly having to balance the anger I felt at myself for letting myself gain weight (to the point that I felt very uncomfortable in my body) with my desire to obtain self love and acceptance no matter what I looked or felt like.

With time, I noticed that I began not comparing my “outsides” with everyone else’s “outsides” because I was more focused on learning the pose to the best of my ability. And now I find myself in Teacher’s Training and I must admit to you that although I am much less flexible than the other students in my class, I feel comfortable with the place I’ve earned in this class.

I want to learn as much about Yoga as I possibly can. One of the reasons is that I love Yoga so much, is that I am constantly talking about it and of course many times people ask me to show them a pose or to take them through a flow.

I soon realized that with my love for Yoga came a responsibility to know how to communicate it so that others could experiment with yoga safely.

Just last month during a dive trip to the British Virgin Islands, the opportunity to share Yoga came up with one of dive masters (Blue Water Divers). He had been experiencing tight ham strings and immediately I knew that Yoga could help. I didn’t feel awkward about showing him the pose even though I am 30 pounds overweight, instead I felt gifted to be able to share what has worked so well with me (Hero’s pose).