The screen divider

I love the screen divider in my yoga studio, it has a special meaning for me. This week I was reminded again why.

 While planning our dream house I said to the architect

‘This space I want to close off for the time being until I have enough students to open a studio’.She looked at me and asked ‘How old are you right now?’

‘40’…‘Well don’t you think its time to open the studio now?’

And that’s was the first major step; not closing of an area for a future maybe, but claiming space.

When the house, including the studio, was finished I started collecting the stuff for the studio. The mats, yoga belts and blocks I had in no time. The bolsters I ordered took a while, thank God. Then I had to search for the exact right blankets. The available blankets on the market were not 100 % cotton.  

I could not open the studio without yoga blankets of course.

A little while later I met this yoga teacher who closed her studio and was willing to sell me her beautiful 100% cotton yoga blankets. Which would have left me with: opening the studio. Everything was there. I spread out the mats imagining 10 students in this set up or that set up. I put it all in a nice corner and decided I needed a screen divider to place in front of the yoga equipment otherwise you could see all the mess.

I could not open the studio without of course.

Relieved there was a valid reason for not opening the studio I went and did some errands the same day. I walked into a store that had nothing to do with screen dividers and there it stood..so striking in front of me it was funny (and for sale..)

With a giddy nervous heart, I brought it home, put it up and sat down in my completely finished beautiful yoga studio, scared shitless.

Putting yourself out there is scary. There are a million different reasons why you shouldn’t.

And all the reasons why you ‘should’ are negotiable.

Last year I studied with Rebecca Rosenstein, gaining knowledge in the never ending landscape of yoga and fine tuning existing knowledge. Such as this one about Asteya.

Asteya means non stealing and is the 3rd Yama in Patanjali’s Yamas and Niyamas. There is the obvious stealing of course, but there are lot of other ways to steal such as stealing someone’s time and energy, robbing ourselves of experiencing life in its fullest, playing it small and denying the world of the full you, are also examples of Asteya.

We are requested in these challenging times to put ourselves out there in the wilderness, hoping for the best. Playing it small and not being of service won’t get me anywhere. I hope I will be able to feel the nudges from the Universe in the next phases as well, while putting myself out there.

They might be subtle and sometimes not so subtle; such as putting a screen divider for sale in a clothing store..