When I was a young grasshopper yogi, I had this impression that every yoga teacher had their shit together. Like their life was love and light all the time. No stress, no worries. Namaste!
But I have come to learn that this isn’t quite accurate. It all started when I was considering a 200 hour teacher training back in the day. Wanting to get my feet wet and see if teaching could ever be a possibility for me, I decided to enroll in an art of assisting workshop with Mel McLaughlin (who now operates The Yin Space).
I remember fundamentals from that workshop but possibly the biggest takeaway from the whole thing was Mel’s demonstration of humanity and humility. When describing her early years as a yoga teacher, she said, “If you had told me ten, or even five years ago that I would be up here teaching you this, I would have vomited all over the place thinking about it!” This knocked my socks off. It was perhaps the fist time I had heard a yoga teacher say something so messy and real!
I still think of that moment often. At the time, it seemed like a funny, throwaway line. But I raise this story now because I’ve been thinking a lot about the nuances of living authentically. To act, speak, and live based on our core values and dharma. It’s not always easy in today’s world. Authenticity takes practice to maintain.
It’s taken awhile. But between memorable yoga teachers like Mel and many others (not always yoga teachers either), I have come to realize the potential for transformation when we take up space rather than shrink and hide parts of ourselves. This realization is the first step. Living wholly and authentically takes practice and time. We are essentially rewiring our brains and the ways we have conditioned ourselves to conform to our environments.
At the new year, I considered what I wanted to work toward and bring into 2026. I realized the answer had nothing to do with my job, where I might travel, or what I might acquire in terms of material. Instead, I thought about teenage version of me. The kid who got teased for talking too much and was a bit of a weirdo. But who also had an abundance of hope, compassion, and curiosity. I wanted to reconnect more deeply to those values again. Even among all the responsibilities of adulthood and through the process of aging, it’s possible to stay connected to our values through our words, actions, and choices.
When I was teenager, I found yoga and while I didn’t have the language for it back then, I realize now that I was just trying to stay rooted to my authenticity. And now, here I am, more than 20 years later, ready to head home to my authentic Self–where I have been waiting the entire time.
