down time

well i finished my yoga teacher training program. last night was our ceremony. we shared amongst one anohter and did a beautiful meditation where we focused our attention on each other. one of the things i realized and shared with the group was that it was significant that i completed the course. recognizing how easy it is for me to start new things and how difficult it is for me to complete things. so i give myself credit for this and i am truly proud of myself--something that i don't always feel. I usually notice where something could have been better or wasn't quite right, moreso than seeing all the good that happened. this happens with myself much more than with others, i am very hard on myself and i had a chance to see this clearly during our training. i am practising loving kindness and acceptance toward self. i feel very grateful to be seeing this now in my life. i have spent a lot of years seeking external validation and judging my worth based on external responses and while i think that is useful to a point, it does not allow me to cultivate lasting happiness within because the without is always changing and making it seem like i need to change my external environment. big lesson here.

i am going to take some down time for awhile. Amma has been here for a week and will be for another. I have spent two days with her last week and then will go all day tomorrow through Sunday. I am sure this will be a transformative, ripening experience as always. spending time by the pond, singing bhajans - IGET TO sing BHAJANS Again- YAY! i have missed this more than anything perhaps, and haven't been practising on my harmonium the last three months.

i have had two ideas for the future in the last week:
one is doing some public chanting with the harmonium, like singing bhajans, but instead reciting mantras -over and over and over while i play the harmonium. this would be good with the mahamrityunjaya mantra.
and the other idea is to do very extended yoga nidra classes based on what i have learned and the more extensive possibilities from the Swami Satyananda book I am reading. Maybe teaming up with Asoka and asking him more about jnana yoga and ways to integrate the two.

i think it would be fun to do workshops at Integral Yoga. I think i would also like to teach there. there is an application process that will take some time, but it would be good for me to keep my teaching muscle flexed, or get started I guess. I want to hold free classes at my house in the living room for a small group. we'll see what happens.
in the meantime, i am chewing the cud. going slow and easy, never straining or laboring.