Category: yoga

military, war, yoga

Beginning: Yogis and Soldiers of the US Military Have a Lot in Common

Christa Avampato

Army soldier in Trikonasana (Triangle Pose) at Fort Hood
“The Bhagavad Gita’s subject is the war within, the struggle for self-mastery that every human being must wage if he or she is to emerge from life victorious.” ~ Eknath Easwaran

“We prepare soldiers for war. We train them to kill. Why don’t we also prepare them for peace and train them to stop killing?” ~ Wartorn 1861 – 2010

The quote above is by a mother who was interviewed in the HBO documentary Wartorn 1861 – 2010. 4 weeks after her son returned from Afghanistan, he was arrested for aggravated assault of a taxi driver of Middle Eastern decent. He was sentenced to 6 years in prison and has untreated PTSD, as do 39% of incarcerated vets in our country. “They say what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger,” he tells his family the night before his sentencing. “That’s bulls*it because I came back from Afghanistan weaker than I was before.”

It was interesting to watch this film on the heals of talking to a friend of mine about my desire to help veterans and their families through Compass Yoga. “Yoga for veterans? Um, aren’t you trying to offer classes to the population most unlikely to take them? What kind of business plan is that?” It was the first time I ever received this kind of feedback on the idea and it gave me pause. And then I asked myself the question that every entrepreneur asks herself at one point or another: “Am I crazy?”

Yoga-strong
My moment of doubt lasted only a moment but it was a powerful moment. It gave me more objectivity; it helped me to strengthen my story in a more creative and powerful way. There’s a perception that yoga is some kind of hippy dippy practice, that we all decorate our homes with butterflies and unicorns and rainbows, and that its main purpose is to figure out how to tie ourselves into pretzels. The truth is that the practice of yoga has much more in common with the United States Military than we realize, and therefore makes it an ideal complement to soldiers’ training and should be an integral part of their wellness programs when they return home.

The idea of war is an integral part of yogic texts
The Bhagavad Gita is a central text for all yogis and many consider it the most important text. It is a small part of the larger Hindu epic, the Mahabharata. I’m re-reading it right now to remind myself all of the wisdom it stores in its 97 short pages. It’s setting is a battlefield likened to Armageddon, and its central characters are Lord Krishna (who also plays the role of guide and charioteer) and Prince Arjuna, a warrior. The Gita is the conversation between Krishna and Arjuna prior to the climatic battle of the Kurukshetra War. Arjuna is plagued by inner moral conflict over going to battle with his own loved ones, even though those loved ones have done horrible things to others, and the potential harm he will inflict on them. Krishna talks him through the conflict, ultimately explaining that the battle Arjuna is about to wage is the manifestation of karmic action, a righteous war for the purpose of justice. At the recent NYS Health Foundation conference I attended, guest speaker Colonel Sutherland explained, “War is vile, but there are things more vile to us: injustice. And that is why we fight.” Krishna concurs.

And this is only one example of war in Vedic texts. There are many others including the epic Ramayana, the story of how a war was fought by King Rama to rescue his kidnapped wife, Sita. Hanuman, the famed monkey-god of strength and masculinity and devotee of King Rama, is largely hailed for his never-say-die attitude that ultimately led him to rescue Sita and return her to Rama and to her home.

Where the gap isn’t being closed is that all of these text explain when war is necessary and then how to come down from conflict. It takes peace as the baseline, and gives warriors a context for understanding not only how to prepare for war in a time of peace but just as importantly how to prepare for peace in a time of war. This latter points is the great teaching of these texts. We need to provide that to our military – to arm them with tools to protect themselves in mind and body even in a time of war so that when they return home they can find peace.

Meditation seeks to settle the war of the mind
Many beginning meditators will say:
“I can’t meditate.”
“I can’t get my mind to calm down.”
“I can’t get my mind to stop wandering.”

Meditation is a practice to strengthen the discipline and focus of the mind. It drives our clarity and creativity. It helps us to quiet the chatter so that we can access the deep wisdom that already exists within each of us. It, in and of itself, is an act of faith. To be certain it is a hard thing to do – I failed on many attempts before I was finally ready to learn and understand it. We have to approach the mastery of our minds as a warrior approaches battle – with steadfast resolve and commitment to see the mission through. Because of a soldier’s strong sense of commitment and determination, the self-nurturing practice of meditation is a natural process to undertake in their own healing of mind and body.

Postures for warriors
Several of the base postures of the asana (physical) practice of yoga are named for warriors. There is a series of Warrior postures – 1, 2, 3, and Peaceful Warrior – that are central to all standing sequences. In yoga practice, warriors are emulated and admired as masters of poise and control.

Authenticity is critical for soldiers and yogis alike
There is a common belief that yoga is about peace at any cost. When I tell people I practice and teach yoga I sometimes garner a funny look. Someone once said to me, “Aren’t you a little too tough to teach yoga?” And by tough, he meant honest, strong-willed, and opinionated. I am all of those things, and yes, I’m a yogi, too. And no, that is not a contradiction.

For me yoga has always been about authenticity, about having the strength to honestly call a spade and spade. It’s in this honesty to recognize the actual state of being that allows us to then transcend that state. Without honesty and awareness of self and others, without a strong sense of justice and a desire to make things right, yoga has very little hope of achieving anything, peace included. The same is true for the missions of our military forces.

Bringing more yoga to the U.S. military
For all these reasons, I have to disagree with my friend who felt soldiers would never take to yoga. Soldiers are the perfect population to focus my yoga teaching efforts on through Compass Yoga. I’m doing a lot of business development and networking at the moment, and hope to announce my first yoga program for veterans and their families in short order. Stay tuned!  

choices, clarity, yoga

Beginning: To Focus, We Need to Stop, Assess, and Choose

Christa Avampato

To move a project forward, focus is necessary. You can’t know what beat to march to unless you can hear the drum. Without at least a general idea of where to go, a lot of effort is spent wandering around aimlessly. I’m an efficiency junky and I hate wasting time, or worse yet having someone else waste my time, so focus is incredibly important to me.

Stop and Get Clear
Compass Yoga is beginning to occupy a great portion of my life, which is what I’ve been working toward for the past 18 months. It’s very much the work of my lifetime, or many lifetimes, and it’s my legacy. I feel blessed to have found this calling so early on in my life and to have so much clarity on its direction and purpose. My yoga practice and teaching is very much focused on its therapeutic aspects and the relief it can provide us for both mental and physical wellbeing.

To get to this clarity, I had to really put aside to outside influences, get quiet, and listen. There were lots of people who wanted to send me off in different directions once I finished my first leg of yoga teacher training. I am very grateful that they were so interested, but when I really stopped and considered their advice, I just couldn’t follow their instructions and be authentic. I had to go my own way and forge my own path. It’s the message I received in my daily meditation practice and it’s the one that felt most worthwhile.

Assessment Time – Take Off the Blinders and Expand the Mind
Once I knew I wanted to have a therapeutic focus in my teaching, I took a look at the landscape of where to take further training and where to begin looking for opportunities to teach. I quickly realized that few training programs focus on therapeutics (which will be another focus of Compass Yoga once I build up the organization a bit more) and there is an incredible amount of need for it. I hit the opportunity jackpot with this road, and it dovetailed perfectly with my own unique personal experience with yoga.

I found my way to yoga for therapeutic purposes and it made a tremendous difference in my life. Finding this same emphasis as my teaching purpose brought all of my experiences, as challenging as they were, full circle. It gave them great value and purpose. Once I realized all of this available opportunity and all that I have to give in this realm, I felt like someone took off the blinders that I have been wearing for so many years. Now I see opportunity everywhere.

Choice – the Final Frontier
I quickly realized that I could easily spin myself around in a circle if I didn’t narrow down my business development efforts to a population or a cause that I feel most passionately about. There’s no end to the amount of work that can be done in therapeutic yoga and it’s easy to get caught up in wanting to help everyone. I’ve always found that by trying to serve everyone, you serve no one well. I had to choose, and choose I did.

How I chose to focus on helping veterans and their families
I found my way to yoga as a means of recovery – from trauma, stress, anxiety, and insomnia. By my early twenties, I found that my mind and body were sufficiently battered. Yoga helped me to pick up the pieces and put myself back together again. Over time, it helped to heal old and new wounds alike and continues to do so. It became so much more than an exercise I did on a mat. It became a way of life. I live my practice; it’s always with me and within me and that’s a powerful possession to have.

A Teacher Finds Her Students
My goal with my teaching is to help others like me, others who feel battered, beaten down, or lost, and want very much to feel independent and in control of their own lives again. When I hear and read the stories of veterans, when I hear the stats of how much help they and their families need, on some very basic level I understand that need. I have never been into battle as they have. I’ve never even held a weapon of any kind. I do personally understand the aftermath of trauma and what it does to a family, particularly to children. I understand profound, irreversible loss, grief, and guilt. I understand the feeling of not being whole, present, and engaged. I’ve been there, too.

Yoga, which literally translates to “union”, helped me to bring it all back together for me and I know I can use it to help veterans and their families. The practice gave me direction, discipline, and an outlet to process and feel my feelings so that I could move on, so that I could transcend. No matter what the cause, that’s what all people in trauma are looking for – not a way to forget but a way to move on and honor all that we learned in the process. Yoga gets us there. It takes time and patience, but the door is open if we have the courage to walk through.

business, yoga

Beginning: Compass Yoga Finds a Home at the St. Denis Hotel

Christa Avampato
80 East 11th Street, Compass Yoga's new home

“The journey of a thousand miles begins beneath one’s feet.” ~ Lao-tzu, Chinese philosopher

Tucked away on a quiet section of East 11th Street, there’s literally a tower of healing. Formerly the St. Denis Hotel, 80 East 11th Street is home to private practice wellness practitioners, now including Compass Yoga. I’ll be teaching yoga private clients and very small group classes at this address.

I learned about the building through an ad on Craig’s List. That ad led me to one place  that wasn’t exactly right for me, though that place led me to connect with the building’s Facebook page where I posted a message and got a number of responses. Today I picked up the keys to a space I’ll be renting on an hourly basis, and took a look at a few additional space so that I can have a network of options for added flexibility in my client scheduling. I took the advice of my dear friend, Lon, and celebrated this big yesterday evening. Today, I’m rolling up my sleeves and getting down to work on my business development plans. Time to build a client base!

Breaking the chicken and egg cycle of commercial real estate
There’s a tough paradigm about being a private practice practitioner of any kind: it’s tough to start to build a client book without an office space and it’s tough (and expensive!) to commit to office space without having a client book. So what’s an enterprising lady to do? Set her priorities / nonnegotiables and plan to move forward. Here’s what mine looked like:

Priorities / nonnegotiables
Easy access by a number of subway lines
Quiet
Safe space – for client and for me
Doorman
Clean space conducive to healing
Rent by the hour at a reasonable rate
Opportunity to cancel if I needed to
No lease signing or commitment of hours required

Action plan:
Decide if there is an amount of money I’m willing to lose on the space – could I afford to rent it to do my practice teaching with friend?
Poke around Craig’s List to get an idea of going rates for this kind of space
Identify a few key possibilities to call and email to ask LOTS of questions
Check out the spaces in person if they pass the sniff test via phone and email
Establish a network of spaces to call on when I book a client

Knowing what you want is half the battle
This set of priorities and action plan gave me maximum flexibility, convenience, and an appropriate level of financial and operational risk that I could live with. I was lucky to find an entire building of wellness private practice spaces that I could cobble together to fulfill my priorities. Though I was also prepared to be lucky and very clear on what I needed. If you know what you’re looking for, it’s much easier to find it!

A step in the right direction
So now the fun begins – I start to build up my client base with the confidence that I have a few places that my students and I can call our home. My friend and client, Crystal, has graciously offered to cater sushi when I’m ready for my grand opening reception in the space. There’s an invite heading to an inbox near you!

I’m ready to dive in and see where all of this takes me in due time. It feels so good to begin. I am continually amazed by the direct correlation between the clarity of our asks of the Universe and its willingness to fulfill those asks just when we need them to fall in to place. Onward and upward in the name of greater healing!

travel, yoga

Beginning: Trading Austin for India in 2012

Christa Avampato

”]This week I had to make the tough decision to let go of the idea of submitting to speak for a second time at SXSW. I had an incredible experience in March speaking about the topic of yoga and creative focusand teaching yoga to SXSW conference participants. The people at SXSW are inspiring and generous. I packed so much learning into those 5 days; it made me feel alive. When I got home, I immediately began thinking about speaking topics for SXSW 2012.

And this in the past few weeks an odd and wonderful possibility came into focus for me. For many years, I have wanted to travel to India, the original seat of yoga. This desire has become increasingly stronger over the past couple of years as I’ve committed more fully to my yoga path – as a student and as a teacher. India is a tough place, and particularly difficult for independent travelers. I have tried to plan a trip before and once I got the tome of a guidebook in the mail, it became immediately apparent that this trip would have to be much more carefully planned and measured than my other globe-trotting adventures. India seemed to be new terrain in every way, though as the birthplace of yoga, a practice I am very deeply committed to, it holds an odd familiarity for me, too. .

My friend, Akash, had a birthday a few weeks ago. I wrote him a simple message on Facebook and got the kindest reply back. He wanted to know when I was finally going to get to India (where he and his wife live now) and said he was prepared to roll out the red carpet. There was something in his simple message and beyond-kind offer that set my imagination on fire. Here was the opportunity I was hoping to find; here was a way to India.

Now of course this trip will cost money and time, and the best time to travel in India is during our winter months. Given the timing of SXSW in March, I needed to make a tough choice – commit to applying to SXSW and letting the chips fall where they may or forgoing the trip to Austin in 2012 in favor of an incredible experience in India. There is something about this magical time in my life that makes India feel like the right fit. I feel like I am about to break open and free, about to start zooming along my path, and a trip to India to experience yoga in place of origin seems to be in order.

So bring on the swirls of color, the jasmine and saffron, the bustle, the crowds. Austin, I’ll miss you, though India is pulling so strongly at my heartstrings that I just can’t put it off any longer. I am ready to take it all in, to grow and learn in its presence and with its guidance. Now I just hope India is ready for me, too.

community service, health, healthcare, wellness, yoga

Beginning: Returning Veterans and Veteran Families, Your Communities Want to Serve You

Christa Avampato

I remember watching the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003 from my couch. It was two days after my birthday and I was sitting in my living room with my sister, Weez. Our eyes were fixed on the television, silent. It was that moment in which I began to turn my attention toward trying to understand the Middle East, trying to understand the sacrifices made by the noble 1% of U.S. citizens who give everything so that the other 99% of us can know freedom. 8 years later I have only begun to scratch the surface.

“The tide of war is receding,” said President Obama in his announcement last night about the draw down of U.S. troops in Afghanistan beginning next month. I heard those words with mixed emotions – happiness that our troops will begin to leave a war zone that has caused so much pain in their lives and the lives of their families, and sadness because I have some concept of the war they will face within themselves when they return home. And it’s this latter point that motivates me to keep pushing forward with Compass Yoga and my focus on using yoga for therapeutic purposes to help people dealing with the effects of PTSD.

This motivation led me to attend the New York State Health Foundation’s event “Paving the Path Back Home: Mobilizing Communities to Meet the Needs of Returning Veterans“. The purpose of the event is best summarized by a short video that was shown during Colonel David Sutherland‘s speech: “When our vets return from serving their country, let’s make sure their country is ready to serve them.” There are a lot of concerned community members who want to help; I am one of them. There are a lot of veterans and their families who want and need help when they return home. This conference wanted to provide information and inspiration to close the gap between the two.

New York State Health Foundation‘s President and CEO James Knickman gave the opening remarks and Colonel David Sutherland, Special Assistant to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff – Warrior and Family Support at The Department of Defense, gave a heart-stopping speech. It was part of his 50 States in 50 Weeks tour to raise awareness about the needs of returning veterans and their families. He didn’t use notes. He never paused. He never cracked, and every word carried a strength and profound emotion that made every listener sit up and take note. By the end of his speech I had an enormous lump in my throat and teary eyes. After his last word, I shot up out of my seat to join the standing ovation faster than I ever have in any audience. (You can learn more about Colonel Sutherland’s initiative Vets Prevail by visiting this Facebook page and website.)

A few facts revealed at the conference
The conference sought to dispel a number of rumors about the process of returning home from deployment:

– 1/3 of returning vets receive an inadequate amount of care. 1/3 of returning vets receive no care at all, to say nothing of the lack of care of families of veterans.

– “We don’t come home to big government. We come home to our communities. We come home to you. We trust you.” ~ Colonel David Sutherland. Most returning veterans and their families seek help, support, and services in their communities, not on military bases. This makes the development of community-based plans crucial to their health and wellness.

– There is a “Sea of Good” out there. There are 4,000+ vet organizations in the U.S. The challenge is not finding people who want to help, it’s connecting those people to the veterans, who aren’t always readily visible in their communities.

– The DOD and the VA are two separate government agencies and there is a good-sized gap that exists between them. Community-based organizations should focus on helping to fill that gap, not compete with the VA. As Dr. Alfonso Bates, Chief Officer of Readjustment Counseling Service at the VA so simply said, “There is plenty of work to go around. Cooperation is the key.”

– Welcome home events are incredibly valuable experiences for returning vets, and they are only the tip of the iceberg. If organizations and individual community members really want to help veterans and their families, then they need to commit to be in this for the long haul. The needs of vets will change over time, and we have to be with them through those changes.

– And this last point is the one that really got me. It was confirmation of another piece of work that I know is so critical for Compass Yoga to carry-out. The children of vets are a population that needs so much support, and they get precious little of what they need.

A personal note
I’ve talked on this blog about my own struggles with bouts of PTSD brought on by specific incidents in my life. These incidents gave me only a small idea of what these returning vets are going through. What you don’t know is that I also understand what it’s like to be a child raised in a traumatic environment, to watch family members whom I love so fiercely wrestle with trauma and feel helpless in the process. And it’s that experience that I know in great detail, and where I am completely confident that I can guide children of returning vets toward happy, healthy, productive lives.

I will put those children first, where children deserve to be
I will never accept that kids are too far gone to be helped, nor will I let them be defeated
I will not quit on them or let them quit on themselves
And if and when they fall down, I will make sure to help them lift themselves up

New York City, yoga

Beginning: NYC, Can I Get An OM? Me and 8,000 NY Yogis Welcome Summer with Open Arms in Times Square

Christa Avampato

NYC yogis welcome summer http://bornintocolor.tumblr.com
I welcomed the long days of the year by wrapping up what felt like a too-long day in the middle of Times Square. Douglass Stewart taught a yoga class right in the heart of it all. He helped us to focus on how to feel a part of all of that energy without letting it frazzle our nerves. Could we be present and embrace the energy without letting it burn us out? Could we focus on internal hum as we embraced the outer hum of the city all around us, and in the process could we still have fun with it all? By the end of the class, I found myself feeling so much gratitude for the energy that surrounded us. It is a conscious, deliberate choice to live in this crazy city, and I’m thankful for its energy and it dynamism. So are the 8,000 yogis who took in one of three classes held today in Times Square in honor of the solstice.

Solstice 2007
When I moved back to New York in 2007, I attended the yoga in Times Square event for the first time and wrote this post about the experience. It was a much smaller event then. I had been back for all of 10 days and I hadn’t found a job yet so I had plenty of time to get re-acquainted with New York. I spent the first part of my career in Times Square managing Broadway Shows, and spent some time living on 49th & 9th just above the beloved Coffee Pot. In many ways, this area of the city helped to sculpt my view of the world as an adult because for many years this handful of blocks was my world.

Throughout Douglass’s class, I thought back to the summer solstice of 2007. I distinctly remember being on my mat in Savasana and feeling some street dust (or what I hoped was only street dust!) fly up my nose. I was a newly-minted MBA, a novice blogger, and a little hazy at best about my future. I felt adrift but distinctly certain that I was meant to be in New York City. I couldn’t articulate why I felt that I had to be in New York; all I knew is that it felt like home and I was craving to feel at home.

Looking back, I really should have been scared out of my mind with no job, a few suitcases of clothes, and a shared apartment sublet in Astoria, Queens, graciously offered up by a friend of mine. I had enough money to survive for a month or so and then I would hit rock bottom. And here I was lying on the ground in the middle of Times Square focusing on trying to find peace in the madness. I am more optimistic than I give myself credit for!

Solstice 2011
Fast forward to 2011, and I am amazed at the transformation – in my yoga and in my life. New York has indeed become my home, I am financial stable, earn part of my income from writing and teaching yoga, and have put the art and science of business together by beginning my own company, Compass Yoga. Despite all of this change, I laid down in the middle of Times Square on my yoga mat, still excited about the future, still soaking in all the vibes the same way I did 4 years ago. Though I could mentally register all the changes that have taken place in my life in the past 4 years, I was struck by how much my body’s experience of this year’s solstice class mirrored my experience 4 years ago.

New York, can I get an OM?
Toward the end of the class, Douglass asked us to do a round robin OM in which you take a breath when you need one and just continue the rolling OM chant. It’s one of my favorite ways to close a practice. The magical part was when our OMs were complete. The OM kept rolling in the city around us. The low hum that the city has sounded remarkably similar to the OM created by all of us. Unity, yoga, at its very best.

happiness, loss, love, relationships, yoga

Beginning: Healing By Chance – A Story of Feeling and Transcending Anger

Christa Avampato

“Forgiveness does not change the past, but it does enlarge the future.” ~ Paul Boese

I had an odd encounter on Friday that I wasn’t expecting, not at that moment, not ever. I was sitting on the steps of the main New York Post Office at 31st Street reading a magazine as I waited for my friend Jeff’s improv show to start that was playing around the corner. It was a nice night outside and I had just a few minutes to spend before heading over to the theatre.

A stranger I knew
A man stopped down on the sidewalk and stared at me. It was the guy I was dating when my apartment building fire happened almost two years ago. He was a gem in the immediate aftermath of the incident and showed is terribly ugly true colors not long after. His behavior and words were really hurtful; he kicked me when I was already down and out. We stopped seeing each other shortly after the fire, and I chose to completely cut off any contact with him. I was really, really angry with him and I had bigger issues to contend with. The last thing I needed in my life was someone like him, in any capacity.

He climbed the steps and asked if he could sit next to me, and then made a wise crack inquiring about whether or not my current apartment had caught fire, too. A very insensitive, cruel comment, especially given all of the trauma that unraveled in the months immediately following the fire. Sadly, I wasn’t surprised. Then he began his barrage of personal questions about my life, some I answered and some I left intentionally vague. I actually didn’t ask him a single question about his life because I didn’t really care what the answers were. I wasn’t happy to see him and I wasn’t unhappy to see him. I didn’t feel numb; I just didn’t feel anything. Not about him and not about us. All that anger was gone. I was shocked at how calm I felt. The conversation was only a few minutes long because I had to leave to go see Jeff’s show. We said good-bye – he went his way and I went mine – and I never looked back.

Automatic healing
Just prior to this chance encounter, I was talking to Brian about what I hoped to be able to give veterans and their families who I work with through Compass Yoga. Brian mentioned that I may want to focus on helping them heal to the point that they don’t even have to put themselves through the motions of yoga. The calm they gain through the practice with me would be with them always so that the stress response never even kicks in unless they truly need it to get themselves out of true danger. I wasn’t sure how this would work. though I told Brian I’d think about that idea.

After my brief encounter on the post office steps, I completely understood what Brian was talking about with the veterans and their families. If I had this encounter a year ago, it’s likely that I would have felt nervous, that I would have felt the need to meet his snarky comment about my fire with a snarky retort. Instead, I just told him a few details of my life in response to his questions. I was polite and detached, with no feeling about ever hearing from him or seeing him again. I was so angry with him for a long time, and I realized in this instant that I had found my way to the other side of anger as a much better person. A friend of mine once said, “You really know it’s over when you have nothing left to say.” True statement. I had moved on, completely.

The sweetness of healing found
As I walked toward the theatre to watch Jeff’s show, I thought about our immense capacity for healing every wound, no matter how deep, no matter how long it’s been with us. I found a way to feel anger and then transcend it in a powerful way. In the past year I’ve spent so much time caring for myself and building a life I truly love. It happened so gradually and with so much hard work that I’ve never taken the time to really reflect on just how much healing I’ve done, just how different I am. “You’ve come a long way, baby,” I thought to myself. “A long way. And it feels so good.”

determination, dreams, work, writing, yoga

Beginning: Take it From Yoda and a Yogi – All You Have Are Your Actions, and They Are Enough

Christa Avampato

“Do or do not. There is no try.” ~ Yoda

“You are entitled to your actions, not the results of your actions. You leave the results to the Divine.” ~ Marco Rojas, Yoga Teacher

I went to dinner with my friend, Allan, on Saturday night and he asked me how I managed to teach yoga classes in so many different places this past year since I finished my teacher training at Sonic. Without even thinking about the answer, I said, “Because I cannot be deterred, Allan.” And it’s true. If I really want to do something, I’m going to find a way to make it happen.

Lessons from striking out
This is not to say that I never strike out or fall flat on my face. I strike out plenty, and I’ve fallen on my face so many times that it’s shocking I have a face left at all. The truth is in the past year I’ve sent out so many emails, made so many cold calls, and just flat-out walked in to so many potential teaching spots that I’ve lost count. Most of them never returned my calls, emails, or in-person messages that I left. Most of them didn’t hire me. Sometimes I felt disappointed at all of the rejection, but I just kept showing up. Showing up was the only thing I could really control. And every rejection helped me refine my pitch, and my style, a little bit more.

And that’s the trick to getting over and through disappointment: figure out what you can actually do, and focus on doing more of it. I couldn’t make someone hire me. I couldn’t make someone even look at my resume or give me an informational interview. I could keep searching, and I felt confident that if I knocked on enough doors, one of them, the right one for me, would open, and I’d find the students I was meant to teach.

Ignore the skeptics, or at least learn from them
Everyone will tell you that what you want to do is too difficult, that there are already people who do what you want to do, and that you should just try to do something that’s easier. I’ve got news for them: it’s all difficult. Everything worth doing takes effort, and a lot of it. I wanted to manage Broadway shows. I wanted to learn how to be a fundraiser. I wanted to be a product developer who works with new technology. I wanted to move to New York City, and I really wanted to live on the Upper West Side, which always was my favorite neighborhood in New York (and remains so today). I wanted to adopt a dog. I wanted to travel, teach yoga, and be a writer. None of that is easy; it all takes effort and a lot of people told me that each and every one of those things just wouldn’t happen for me for one reason or another. I took their feedback and kept going.

I did all of those things and then some, and not because I have some kind of extraordinary talent. I did them out of dogged determination. I was stubborn and I just wouldn’t give up. If I could stay focused on the action, then I knew the result would follow. Sometimes it took longer than I thought it would. Sometimes I got what I wanted, and then realized it wasn’t all that it was cracked up to be. Sometimes I had to make trade-offs. But I tried and tried and tried again. No silver bullet. No magic formula. Hard work was enough; it always is. Eventually, even a mountain yields to constant, flowing water.

China, commitment, friendship, teaching, writing, yoga

Beginning: Commitment Gives Rise to Capability

Christa Avampato

“Capable people carry two brushes.” ~ Chinese Proverb

My friend, Allan, recently asked me to review an email he was sending off to an alumni contact regarding his job search. Allan had a lot of wonderful content in the email and I just brushed up the grammar and phrasing a bit. Allan’s response: “Brush is important. In Chinese, we call capable people someone with two brushes.” I’m guessing that this proverb must come from Chinese art in relation to calligraphy or oil painting. I love the elegance and power that it packs in a few simple words. All of Allan’s communications are like that – he is a product of his culture.

Work ethic
Allan is job searching after recently completing his second masters degree. I think of myself as productive, though his diligence and work ethic put mine to shame. I’ve never seen someone be able to sit and study for such a long stretch of time. He literally boggles my mind. I’m certain he is someone who always carries two brushes, and perhaps a third, just to be on the safe side.

Beijing to Charlottesville
Allan landed in scenic Charlottesville, VA directly from Beijing, China in 2005 when he started business school with me at the Darden School at the University of Virginia. He’d been to the U.S. for a few days once before (Chicago, if memory serves), and beyond that had never lived in an English-speaking country. His bravery to leave behind everything he knew to pursue his education and career aspirations (in a foreign language, which he speaks better than many Americans I know!) is a constant reminder to me of the power and magic that is born from commitment. We were in the same section at Darden so he was one of the very first people I met in Charlottesville. We were fast friends and remain so 6 years later despite hectic careers and lives.

How I started writing every day
I’ve actually never given Allan the full credit he deserves in my writing life. 3 years ago we went to dinner and Allan pulled out a copy of an excel chart that he had created that tracked the productivity of my writing on this blog as a percentage. During my first year of blogging, I posted often but not every day. Allan was really excited to see my productivity consistently around 90%; I was not. If I could be at 90%, then why couldn’t I be at 100%? Seeing those numbers in black and white spurred me to commit to writing and publishing every day for a year, just to see if I could do it. I’ve been writing every day for the past 3 years and now I couldn’t imagine not writing every day.

Embracing commitment
This was a poignant example in my own life of the power and magic of commitment. Practice made me a stronger, more confident writer. I used to think of being committed as being tied down, as being unable to change and grow. I was worried that if I committed, I’d regret the choices I made and then be trapped with a life I didn’t want. Now, I realize just how freeing and joyful thoughtful commitment can be.

Once I saw how much I gained from being a committed writer, I started to make other commitments in my life that have yielded amazing transformations. I committed to my yoga practice, which led to the creation of Compass Yoga. My relationships became more profound. New York City became my home. I adopted my rescue pup, Phineas. All of these changes gave me more happiness and they all found their roots in commitment. Doubling down on what mattered and letting go of what didn’t serve brought so much joy to my life that my only regret is that I didn’t learn this lesson sooner. It took me a long time to be ready for this truth: the right commitment breeds happiness.

I guess it is really true that when the student is ready, the teacher will appear. My thanks to Allan and to commitment itself for serving as 2 of my greatest teachers.

future, teaching, yoga

Beginning: Taking Compass Yoga in a Therapeutic Direction

Christa Avampato

“Therapeutic yoga is yours now. Take it out into the world and share it. This world needs so much healing.” ~ Cheri Clampett

On Sunday at 6pm I completed my therapeutic yoga training at Integral Yoga Institute with the incredible instructors Cheri Clampett and Arturo Peal. I teared up a bit at our graduation ceremony because in the beautiful words of Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes, I actually felt myself “crawling through the window of a dream.” I knew this was not an end but only the very beginning of a path that will unfold for me across many lifetimes.

After celebrating and bidding a grateful adieu to my classmates and teachers, who were all truly amazing and gifted, I turned my attention to the next item at hand: what do I do now? The Universe interceded some moths ago and showed me that I should take Compass Yoga in a therapeutic direction, that this was the work I was meant to do. I thought about this training with Cheri and Arturo for a long time and had been looking forward to it since the beginning of the year. Now that knowledge lives in my mind and hands, as if it has been there all along.

Over the last few weeks, a number of people have asked me how I plan to use this therapeutic yoga training and rather than answer them individually, I thought it might be more helpful to publicly talk about my thoughts to date. Your comments and ideas along this journey are always, always appreciated.

Starting up a full private practice
While the real estate market in NYC is always on the nutsy side, commercial space for a small office is relatively easy to find and fairly inexpensive. With therapeutic yoga, private sessions and small group classes are very powerful because it gives the instructor time to the use of props to perfectly calibrate each pose for each student so they feel the full benefit of the practice.I’m currently looking into a few different spaces in Manhattan to rent for private sessions.

Joining an integrated medical practice or working closely with a network of doctors and therapists
1 in 30 people who now practice yoga in the U.S. are referred to the practice by their medical doctors. Rather than hoping someone will stumble into my class, I’ve been more proactive about connecting to the medical and therapeutic community for mutual referrals. Eventually I would love to truly connect with a  group of doctors and therapists as a part of a joint holistic practice in which therapeutic yoga is just one piece of a system to help treat a whole patient effectively.

Establishing residence within a yoga studio or network of yoga studios
Therapeutic yoga is often used for very specialized populations who are managing a specific illness, injury, or condition that has specific needs. I’ve put together a set of populations whom I’m most interested in working with and started to look for partner studios who are interested in providing the space for me to create these specialized programs.

Continue to provide yoga to underserved populations through nonprofit partners
This work has been some of the most rewarding of my life. To see someone bravely walk into my class who has never tried yoga before, and then to watch them feel the tremendous benefits, is a joy that I have a hard time fully expressing. It’s my hope that Compass Yoga will continue to provide this service to everyone who has the courage to take up a practice, regardless of their financial circumstances.

May the healing continue
I continue to be amazed by how much I learn and how much I heal every time I teach a class. What I give in my classes is nothing compared to all that I receive in return from my students. Their joy gives me joy. Their peace brings me peace. Their encouragement gives me more confidence and courage than I ever imagined I could have. The only way I can think of to truly thank them is to keep teaching as often as I can, to pay it forward as often as I have the great blessing to do so. Here’s to a world filled with more yoga, to a world filled with more healing.