Everything shows you everything about your self. If you’re paying some attention.

Ever since I started moving a whole lot in my life – with East Asian practices when I was younger, then climbing up mountains and flying down them, and now through yoga and tai chi – I’ve always felt that I am how I move.

My body follows my mind, my beliefs. It goes along with where my attention is, and where it isn’t. The things I find easy or run from, connections that seem effortless or times when I’m fast to bristle – it all all comes out in how I open a door or a jar, how I stand up or sit down, cross a street, or climb some stairs.

Movement is a simple way to see me.

Now I have a baby. There have been times in my life where I’ve given very focused attention to what I’m doing, what I’m studying. This one might set a new record. And in just days, it feels like years of seeing me. If I’m impatient or stubborn, uncreative or slow to change, she shows me. If I’m at ease, graceful, moving how I’ve been taught and try to teach, she shows me. It’s impossible not to see.

And the whole time she’s just here being Daisy. Not trying to be one way or the other. The whole time it’s just a yoga class or a mountain to climb, a challenge at work or a time to beat on the track. I think if you look closely enough at whatever’s in front of you – a goal or objective, a relationship or challenge – you’ll find it’s never itself impossible or unreachable, too stressful or overly complicated.

What we perceive outside of us
takes its shape inside of us.

What we see as easy or hard, possible or impossible, isn’t a fixed reality. It comes from us. It’s in who we are. And changes with how we move.

Here’s one way to look at things. The world is a tough place. Some things are just impossible, and some people will just never change.

Here’s another way. There isn’t an impenetrable reality to our experience, because we’re the ones shaping that experience. We’re always shaping it. We’re shaping it right now, in how we move through it. And we are as penetrable, as shapable, as we’re willing to see.

We are as shapable as we’re willing to see.

We can try to change the world by pushing it to change. Or we can try to change it through how we move in and around it. We can try to change people by pushing them to change. Or we can recreate our experience of each other in how we move with that experience.

I hope Daisy grows up seeing how much power she has to create, and to create change. I hope we all see this. Even in the challenging moments. Maybe especially in them.

You don’t need a yoga class. Or a baby. A fight, or a big mountain. All these things out there are nice. But whatever is right in front of you will do. Just pay attention. It’s really all you need. Once you see, how you move is up to you.

– Mike

About Strala Yoga Training

Strala combines the movement and healing wisdom of tai chi with the form vocabularies of yoga, tai chi, qigong, and Traditional Chinese and Japanese Medicine, to help people release stress, move easily through challenge, and live radiantly inspiring lives.

It begins with a mindset, that says our best way to get where we’re going is to feel good along the way. It also works miracles for whole health, helping us to find ease in our bodies and minds, and create the right conditions both for healing and optimal performance.

In our Strala Training Courses, you learn to shape your destiny on every level that counts, from your psychology, chemistry and neurology, to your chromosomes and even gene expression. The unique set of skills you develop – for connecting with yourself and others, unblocking your energy, healing what needs healing and accomplishing challenge with ease – uncovers your ability to create the life you want, and be an inspiring leader to the people around you.

Who’s What’s and When’s of Strala Yoga Training