fate

As Andy and I drove to Washington DC last week, we drove past the exit for Gaithersburg, MD. I said to him, "If I'd gotten that job in Gaithersburg, I wonder if we'd still be there?"

When I finished graduate school at EKU, I was applying for jobs almost anywhere. I knew I wanted to work in city parks and recreation and I knew I'd probably have to leave the state to find a job doing what I wanted. Plus I was young, Andy and I were newly engaged, and I wanted to see what life would be like outside of Kentucky. The City of Gaithersburg was one of the places I interviewed, and as you can see I didn't get the job. Instead life took me to Pearland, TX a suburb of Houston. After staying in DC for the week I was sure that the DC would have been a much better fit for me. And had I gotten that job, chances are we'd still be there. Anyone that knows me knows how strongly I feel about the notion of "everything happens for a reason" and I'm always on the lookout for "signs" near and far. So of course, I feel blessed and lucky to have spent the time in TX that I did. It was afterall, where I found yoga....or where yoga found me. But as I look back I see all sorts of little signs that proved that yoga was on the horizon:

Little did I know that the little girl that loved watching gymnastics, using a tree limb as a pole to flip and turn on, and the one that loved to use an old couch to catapult herself through the air would one day be a yoga teacher.

Little did I know that the little girl from eastern Kentucky who dreamed of visiting beautiful places far and near, would one day teach yoga on the beach of Mexico and practice on the balcony of the Dominican Republic.

Little did I know that the girl who loved to study religion and philosophy in college would one day be intrigued by ancient yoga texts and yogic philosophy, and would one day share this information with others wanting to be a yoga teacher.

Little did I know that the girl who always chooses to see the good in people would one day finish all her yoga classes by saying "namaste",....meaning the light in me honors the light in you. Believing that ultimately we all are more alike than different.

Little did I know that the girl who loves the big questions of life, like "who am I really" and "what's my role on this earth" discovered a practice in which she can search and find those answers on a regular basis.

Little did I know that the girl that dreamed about getting away from Kentucky would find her way back to this beautiful state, dream of a space where people would join and share yoga, create that space, spend her days immersed in all things yoga....and continue to dream about all the possible places to share and experience the joys of yoga. Some things change, some things will always remain the same.

Funny how life has a way of coming full circle to the place that we're meant to be.