Under the Influence

Over the last few years, there have been many occasions when people will ask how I ended up teaching yoga in Akumal, Mexico. When a dear friend, Kim Zanti, turned it into a list of questions for her blog, it became a nice opportunity to focus and write about Living with Intention.

Please visit her blog Zuzu's Petals

Dharma

Dharma. Every day it seems I am asked similar questions. How long have you lived here (Akumal, Mexican Caribbean)? Where do you come from? How did you get here?

And mostly, my answers are pretty straightforward for the first two: 3 ½ years (now), and San Francisco. There are many answers that say one thing for “How did you get here?” God is how. Divine guidance, inspiration; asking for what I wanted and being willing to ride the ride towards it. I am a dancer who has practiced many magical leaps of faith.

The turtles also got me here. Akumal means place of the turtle, or home of the turtle because these shores are nesting grounds for Loggerhead and Green turtles. And Akumal Bay hosts a number of teenage Green turtles who feed on a type of sea grass and hang out with swimmers and snorkelers! The first night I spent here and for the rest of the week of vacation in paradise, we witnessed giant mama turtles crawling out of the sea to dig a deep hole, shoveling sand away with her humungous flipper, to make a smaller hole. My very first experience was seeing Her in the glaze of releasing her eggs, watching them drop one by one into the deep space in the sand she had created. That was truly one of the most privileged moments of my life, to be in that presence, to witness this precious event. 

Learning that a marine sea turtle returns annually to the place where she hatched, from migrations that scientists still don’t know, and that these girls were in a lineage that was perhaps 10,000 years old, altered my reality. Add to that the impact of the 21^st century on these endangered creatures and the voice of my Mama, the Earth said, you have work to do here. She called, she opened a door. I listened and walk on through.

After some pretty radical leaps of faith, this particular one landing me in paradise, it is interesting to observe the anticipation for what is next. Leaping in stillness to be exactly here where I am is all I can do at the moment. I spend my days loving Divine Creation, finding gratitude, diving and digging deeper and deeper into the Yoga. The daily practices, teaching, and chores keep me present and engaged.

These are some elements in my story. The story is The Search for Happiness, or more like Pretty Dang Happy, Now What Am I Supposed to Do? Is the quest really over? What do we do when we are not questing?  Finding joy, contentment, a simple life gives me great happiness. Now the question is how to BE in that.