Here’s a useful acronym for FEAR that a student sent me:
FALSE EXPECTATIONS APPEAR REAL.

Pretty accurate.

What are you afraid of?

What scares you?

What are you avoiding?

If you answered “nothing” to one or all of these questions, you’re in denial.

I know because I was, too, for many years.

We all have fear, even Super-moms and Super-people. It’s what we do with the fear that counts.

If you can’t access your fear, get on your yoga mat, breathe, and listen. I am teaching this Wednesday and Friday at a Prana Power Yoga near you (Pranapoweryoga.com/schedule), so come to my class and bring your fear up and out of you so you can move on and enjoy your life.

This is a very safe place to engage in this process. And it’s highly effective. I was trained as and used to work as a Clinical Psychologist and have worked with my share of therapists, and while I honor and respect the work that Psychologists and Therapists do, I believe that breathing fear and stuck energy out of the body on your mat is the fastest and most efficient way toward joy and inner peace.

Before I began my yoga practice, I thought people who had fear were “weak.” I didn’t realize that I had harbored this erroneous belief until I started practicing yoga and loosening the hold that fear had had upon me for so long. I then realized that my judgment of “other people’s’ fear was my own defense against the intense fear I had harbored deep inside for many years.

With my yoga practice, I’ve learned to bring up any fear that is inside me, and let it go with my exhale.

And that is true freedom.

I now face my fear—daily—and live a life of joy.

If I can do it, so can you!!

It’s really so easy. The most challenging part is making the time to get on your mat. Once you’re there, it’s a piece of cake. Raw cake, that is.

A dear friend of mine from Brown sent me this story,

 and I think it’s got a nice message: 

A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how things were so hard for her. She did not know how she was going to make it and wanted to give up, She was tired of fighting and struggling. It seemed as one problem was solved, a new one arose.

Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water and placed each on a high fire. Soon the pots came to boil. In the first she placed carrots, in the second she placed eggs, and in the last she placed ground coffee beans . She let them sit and boil; without saying a word.

In about twenty minutes she turned off the burners. She fished the carrots out and placed them in a bowl. She pulled the eggs out and placed them in a bowl. Then she ladled the coffee out and placed it in a bowl. Turning to her daughter, she asked, ‘ Tell me what you see.’

‘Carrots, eggs, and coffee,’ she replied.

Her mother brought her closer and asked her to feel the carrots. She did and noted that they were soft. The mother then asked the daughter to take an egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, she observed the hard boiled egg .

Finally, the mother asked the daughter to sip the coffee. The daughter smiled as she tasted its rich aroma. The daughter then asked, ‘What does it mean, Mother?’

Her mother explained that each of these objects had faced the same adversity: boiling water . Each reacted differently. The carrot went in strong, hard, and unrelenting. However, after being subjected to the boiling water, it softened and became weak. The egg had been fragile. Its thin outer shell had protected its liquid interior, but after sitting through the boiling water, its inside became hardened. The ground coffee beans were unique, however. After they were in the boiling water, they had changed the water.

‘Which are you?’ she asked her daughter. ‘When adversity knocks on your door, how do you respond? Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean ?

Think of this: Which am I? Am I the carrot that seems strong, but with pain and adversity do I wilt and become soft and lose my strength?

Am I the egg that starts with a malleable heart, but changes with the heat? Did I have a fluid spirit, but after a death, a breakup, a financial hardship or some other trial, have I become hardened and stiff? Does my shell look the same, but on the inside am I bitter and tough with a stiff spirit and hardened heart?

Or am I like the coffee bean? The bean actually changes the hot water, the very circumstance that brings the pain. When the water gets hot, it releases the fragrance and flavor. If you are like the bean, when things are at their worst, you get better and change the situation around you. When the hour is the darkest and trials are their greatest do you elevate yourself to another level? How do you handle adversity? Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?

May you have enough happiness to make you sweet, enough trials to make you strong, enough sorrow to keep you human and enough hope to make you happy.

The happiest of people don’t necessarily have the best of everything; they just make the most of everything that comes along their way. The brightest future will always be based on a forgotten past; you can’t go forward in life until you let go of your past failures and heartaches.

When you were born, you were crying and everyone around you was smiling.

Live your life so at the end, you’re the one who is smiling when everyone around you is crying.

And have the best day ever!!

It’s in your POWER.