Finding Strength

I love it when conversations happen with different people at different times and a theme emerges.  I think these themes become apparent during times when we need them most.  This week the theme of strength has become a popular topic.

The obvious strength conversation has been with my best friend Lydia, who has been working out with me at the gym.  I've been doing the weightlifting program since May... I think. And it has been amazing to find out what I am capable of doing.  Lydia has begun doing the dumb bell classes with me, where she, too, has discovered her own strength.  We have both enjoyed watching our bodies transform and become stronger.  We get so excited when we see muscle developing and we talk about our favorite trainer, Anthony, all of the time.  We love the other trainers, too.  We just seem to spend more time with Anthony, and he always pushes us.  Some mornings, when I'm feeling overwhelmed by the amount of weight or the amount of reps per set, he will tell me "I believe in you, Nadia, even if you don't believe in you."  I like hearing that because it reminds me that a lot of the time we are stronger than we think.  And he is always right about how much weight I can handle during the workout!  I have had to learn to trust my trainers, but they have also had to learn to trust me in knowing how my body feels.









To think that this was me a year ago! (I'm on the far left)

             
And now I do this! And it completely blows my mind that I do these things!

But I love it because I feel so badass when I lift the heavy weights... especially doing the hip-thrusts.  A few days ago, I hip-thrusted my heaviest weight, which was 295lbs!!!  Craziness I tell you!
It is a great feeling to feel physically strong.

I've been thinking about some of the other exercise adventures I've had and one that I loved the most was yoga.  I miss it, but don't really have the time for it. Two years ago, Lydia and I went to a yoga retreat where we did some really cool partner yoga.

I wonder how much easier would it be for us now that we are stronger???  We might have to try to recreate this photo!

The other strength conversation I found myself having this week with another friend was about emotional strength.  We were talking about how frustrated I am with life... more like how impatient I've been.  I feel like I've had some pretty big challenges or obstacles in life that were not or have not been easy to deal with.  Losing my dad continues to be this surreal experience.  There are good days, but mostly there are *huge sigh* alright days.  I don't quite feel like myself and just feel very blah. And it is frustrating to feel sensitive and vulnerable constantly.  The impatient part of me wants the grieving to be done with already, but I know it isn't that easy.  Most people have told me that I most likely won't feel normal for about a year, and even after that, when I'm feeling good, they said I'll randomly be hit with sadness.  I'm not looking forward to it.  I just want to be happy. It just makes me wonder what exactly do the higher powers to be have in store for me where I need to be emotionally strong?  But in my conversation of emotional strength I did point out that perhaps this whole experience was to teach me how to allow others take care of me and to allow my vulnerability to be seen while holding on to my independence... or it's to re-teach me patience.

Strength is an interesting concept to think about.  Everyone is strong in some way or another.  I've always hated when people tell me that I'll be fine because I'm a strong person.  The worst time was a year ago when a person who knew me from high school told me that it was ridiculous that I was depressed when we received news about my dad's tumors. He told me that I have always been such a strong person that I shouldn't allow this to bother me.  I think that is when I began to realize that true strength isn't necessarily dealing with problems by yourself, but true strength was allowing yourself to open up to being vulnerable.   It takes more strength to reveal the truth than it does to shield yourself.

Sunday Agglomeration- Getting back into the groove

As we get closer to the end of the school year, I have been feeling very scattered.  But I have managed to find time to get back into my creative groove.  This past week I had to substitute during my prep period, which normally bothers me because subbing can be such a nuisance.  Students often feel that a substitute means they don't have to do any work.  But this time was not too bad because the students did their work and I was had time to do some drawing.  I'm continuing with the yoga theme.  It seems to be working for me.

This week I also began the Hero's Art Journey course.  Our first assignment was a self portrait.  I thought it would be easy, but it was a challenge.  I couldn't figure out how I wanted to portray myself.  I decided to play with melting crayons on a canvas.  As I was doing this, I thought it would make a great background for my portrait.  I took it with me to my illustrator's play date and worked on it.  Within a few hours I was pretty pleased with what I had.  There is still more that I want to add to it, but I like it so far.  As an option to our self portrait, we were told we could do a children's book illustration of a child version of ourselves.  I figured I should play with this as well.  Since I love trees, I drew a little girl reclining in a tree drawing on a clipboard.  I didn't have large trees around when I was a kid, but I always loved movies where kids would climb trees, or hang out in tree houses. It is definitely incomplete, but I feel like I've made great progress this week.  I'm not feeling as stuck or overwhelmed.

Sunday Agglomeration

 I have been out of sorts lately.  My drawing routine has been completely disrupted by life.  I had absolutely no drawings for a Sunday Agglomeration post last Sunday.  It has really thrown me off balance by not having time to draw.  The school year gets closer and closer to the end and I feel like more and more tasks appear with no end in sight.  I am looking forward to summer vacation and being able to be a full time artist for a few months.  I managed to make time for a few creations. 

I'm still stuck on a yoga theme for my daily drawings.

sphinx

shoulder stand

plank

reverse warrior

I also made new Mizzles.  On my yoga retreat, my friend and I stopped and bought some socks that had a yoga vibe.  A few years ago, I began making Mizzles from any trip that I've been on. I haven't finished their faces, but they are already full of personality.

I finished a few more shrink-a-dinks.

I am hoping that this week will be the jump start I need to get me back into constant creation mode.  Tomorrow, I begin taking Mira Reisberg's online e-course, Hero's Art Journey.  It should be an exciting adventure!  There is still time to sign up for her class if anyone is interested. www.herosartjourney.com

 

Sunday Agglomeration- Spring Yoga Retreat :)

This week yoga was on my mind.  It is always on my mind, but this week in particular because of the yoga retreat I went to this past weekend at the White Lotus Retreat Center in Santa Barbara, CA.  It was beautiful and amazing!  It changes you.  To get away from facebook, twitter, TV, texting, and just technology in general is a great sensation.  You are forced to look at your surroundings, and more importantly, yourself. Samantha and Alexis were our group leaders.  They are both amazing people!  If you ever get a chance you need to do a retreat with Samantha and Alexis (www.shantishantiyoga.com).  They were extremely encouraging and inspiring.

Sometimes life is funny how it all works out.  The past few months I have been feeling stuck.  The only way I can truly describe it is that I feel like I'm running really fast, but I'm not moving anywhere.  I am just suspended while I run and watch everyone pass by me.  It is a horrible feeling.  This retreat came at a perfect time in my life.  I've had a lot on my mind.  I have been thinking about my personal goals as an artist, illustrator, author, and teacher.  Changes are happening at work...bitter sweet changes, but it has put my personal growth into perspective. I have different goals for each aspect of my life and many times they are not leading towards the same path.  I have also, been thinking about my divorce.  It happened three years ago, but clearly there was something unfinished since I was dreaming about my ex.  I had no intentions of dealing with any of these thoughts on the retreat.  I didn't know what to expect other than doing some yoga, and enjoying the scenery, but the events only brought those thoughts to the surface and confirmed what I have known to be true in my heart.  On the last day of the retreat, we had to select a mediation card with our eyes closed before our yoga practice.  This is the card I picked up.

I have always told people that my divorce was the best thing that could have ever happened to me.  I'm not saying my ex was horrible because he isn't.  We were just really wrong for each other.  But that was the critical moment in my life that became the rock that fell into the water and created a multitude of ripples.  Those ripples were guitar lessons, fitness kickboxing, attempt at surfing, running, cooking, my master's degree, illustrating, children's book writing, yoga, blogging, gardening, and rediscovering my love for simple things like sunsets, the beach, waves crashing, trees, rain, and walking in the rain.  It took getting lost in order to find myself again, but walking backwards sometimes is the best way to see yourself with new eyes.  It has been an amazing journey so far.

The retreat challenged me physically.  We did a lot of partner yoga, some acrobatic yoga (which was probably my favorite), and we danced.  I haven't danced in such a long time. It was a lot of fun!

 I did poses I would have never thought was possible for me to do.

My best friend sitting on me like a chair.

I'm doing a shoulder stand on my friend's knees.

A few weekends ago, I had talked with my illustrator's group about feeling stuck.  I told them that at this point I was just playing with drawings until I was inspired.  They agreed that I should just continue being creative because it could help inspire me. One of the illustrators loved my Mizzle yoga pin that I made from the Shrink-a-Dink paper.  She recommended that I continue to create drawings of my mizzles in yoga poses.  I thought this was a great idea. Here are some of the drawings I created this week.

 These were inspired by the retreat where we did partner yoga.

My yoga instructor called this the double scoop.
Child's pose on top of child's pose

This she called backpack.

Random Thoughts Thursday

Yoga, Yoga, Yoga!  I am so excited for this weekend.  My first yoga retreat! I am not allowed to bring any electronic devices, so my Sunday Agglomeration post will show up late Sunday evening, or Monday morning.  But I hope to have many photos and drawings to share!

Okay, back to my story.  For as long as I can remember, I have always been a runner.  I mean, my parents' favorite story to tell is about how I was 4 or 5 and started jogging 1 mile on Sunday mornings with my dad.  Their favorite and most detailed part of the story is about my blue jogging suit and my running shoes.  Running has been an on and off again form of exercise for me.  I was never a fast runner, but I have great endurance.  In high school, I ran long distance track and cross country.  I had stopped running for a long time.  Somewhere in my life I found myself in a relationship that encouraged laziness.  There were also some events that had happened which caused me to become unhappy with myself and I just didn't care.  Actually, I never realized that I stopped caring until I left that relationship.  I was at my heaviest weight and felt insecure in my own body.  As part of my personal journey to rediscover myself, I needed to feel healthy and happy again.  I began by taking a fitness kickboxing class.  I took this class for a little over 2 years.  I loved it.  But I started running again.  Things were going great until I did one of the moves in fitness kickboxing and pulled a muscle in my lower back. This put me out of commission for a month and when I slowly tried to go back to my routine, I would re-injure myself.  I was miserable.  I began walking.  Then, I received an email from Livingsocial.com about an offer for yoga classes at Freeman Yoga (http://www.freemanyoga.com/). Now, I was one of those people who did think yoga would feel like workout, or made the typical "om ..." meditation jokes that are made by people who only know yoga as how it is portrayed onTV.  But at this point, I thought yoga would be great to help strengthen my back muscles.  My goal was to strengthen my back muscles so I could return to running.  I admit my first yoga class was awkward.  I felt so out of place.  People are grabbing blocks, blankets, and belts.  People were stretching in silence.  There was a small group of people who were talking, but it was extremely quiet.  And as a notorious people watcher, I felt so on the spot because it was completely obvious I was people watching! But something amazing happened, I left class feeling relaxed and encouraged in a way I have never felt before.  Also, I never realized how I clenched my shoulders when doing various activities.  When I began, I had this small bulge that stuck out of my sports bra around the back of my neck.  It was more noticeable when I wore my bikini.  After a few months, it disappeared.  I noticed I would pay more attention to how I held my posture while standing, sitting, and walking.  With every class, I became more flexible and often times would surprise myself when I attempted a more challenging pose.  My body had changed so much.  I am stronger than I have been in a long time.  I can run again, too!  I haven't been running every day as I did before, but I have been participating in 5k's and I ran one 8k.  People notice and mention the changes they see in me.  I see the physical changes, but I think the emotional ones are the most important.  I love the way I feel!

At Freeman Yoga, there are different instructors and they each have their own style.  They are all great, but there are only a few that I absolutely love.  I think it is the energy they bring to the class. My favorite instructors are Jennie, Denise, Samantha, and Glen.   Of those, I enjoy Samantha's classes the most.  I think it is because of her personality.  She is like an artist with her medium.  She likes to play and explore with her poses.  I truly respect this being and artist.  I also understand it.  She is encouraging, but she also encourages you to laugh and have fun...especially when you fall out of a pose.  This makes it very non-threatening for a beginner.  I have learned quickly to trust her.  She guides you through each pose giving you great detail verbally how to move, and what the pose should feel like.  Usually by the end of our practice, I feel like superwoman because of the many challenging poses she guides us through.  Last week, we did the splits.  I have never in my life been able to do the splits, but I trusted Samantha would guide me into it successfully.  I was pleasantly surprised how close I was to doing the full splits.  My favorite part of her practice is the reading.  She reads a passage or quote from a book at the beginning and end of the practice.  She somehow always picks a theme that has been on my mind that day or week.  It resonates deeply with me, which creates a further calm in me because it is like the universe is reminding me that everything is going to work itself out.  If you ever get a chance to take her class, I high recommend it.  Here are a few of her websites:

http://www.yoginisam.com/
http://www.shantishantiyoga.com/

This weekend she is hosting a yoga retreat.  It presented itself at a time where I needed to do something for myself.  Three days in Santa Barbara doing yoga with one of my closest friends ,one of my favorite yoga instructors, and new friends.  I'm so excited!  I have a feeling I'm going to be refreshed and inspired in a much needed way!  I am taking sketchbooks, colored pencils, watercolor pencils, glue sticks, scissors... my usual creative kit.  I might take a Mizzle with me...or buy socks there to make a Mizzle from this trip.

New Year's Resolutions

It's that time of year that I dislike so much.  Everyone makes New Year's resolutions to exercise more.  I think it is great that people become concerned with their health and well-being, but it bothers me that they start in January.  This causes my favorite workout places to become more crowded.  My yoga class is fuller, so mats are much closer than before limiting movements.  Even the high school track that I walk/jog on has more people on it; a lot of newbies who do not know the rules of courtesy when working out on the track.  I used to avoid my fitness kickboxing classes every January for these very same reasons.  I look forward to the month of February when people break their resolutions, or settle into a schedule.  It will be nice to workout without the crowds again.

As for my New Year's resolution, I didn't make any.  I didn't see the point in making any.  I already make it a point to go to yoga 3-6 days a week, walk/jog 1-3 days a week, cook at home as often as possible, let go of the small things I cannot control, make as much art as I can, and laugh as much as possible.  Oh, and I never beat myself up if I don't achieve any of these as much as I hope to.  Life just gets in the way sometimes.

Feel Better

This week I was surrounded by people who were sick.  I don't want anyone to think I don't care about my students who are sick because I do.  And I know it is the hazard of being a teacher, but when the sick people are my friends it becomes a different matter.  I immediately go into "make better" mode.  I constantly make tea for them and myself throughout the day and checking in on how they are feeling.  A few of my students found this funny and said I was like a "mom."  I thought that was nice considering I'm not in reality.  To be honest, my "make better" mode/mission is a bit selfish.  I see two people who I spend a lot of time with and think "If they don't get better quick, then I'm going to get sick." 

I have been very fortunate this school year not getting sick. (*knocks on wood)  I have felt myself feel like I was fighting off something, but never actually got sick.  (*again, knocks on wood)  I know I've been very stress-free this school year.  As I've mentioned in a previous blog, I've attending yoga on a pretty regular basis.  In addition, I've eliminated some of my extra commitments at work.  Instead of being a part of hundreds (more like 5 or 6) projects on campus, I am focused only on my classes and art club.  It has been very nice not to be overcommitted.  I have also dived deep into my art, which has been neglected for many years.  All of this leads to a happy and healthy me!  I can only hope this streak of health continues and that those near and dear to me get better!

Tree

Feeling centered and strong.  I began practicing yoga 6 months ago and it has been the best thing that has entered in my life.  I have participated in many exercise regimes from running, to walking, to fitness kickboxing, back to running, and then finding yoga.  I had no idea how it would affect me.  It has made me physically and emotionally stronger. I enjoy the challenge of the poses, finding balance, and the support and encouragement from the community of people in the class.  As I continue with my practice, I am reminded that with continued work everything becomes increasingly better.  The same is true with my art.  Today's drawing is inspired by yoga.  Here Stargazer is in my favorite pose "tree." I'm a bit jealous she can hold the pose with her eyes closed.