victory

'so you come back to your breath
over and over again
that is your victory'
- gitte

my inability to run seriously throws my perspective of victory out of whack. my victory no longer gets to be that feeling after a 20 mile training run. or a sports bra run in the middle of the day under the summer sun followed by a jump in the lake. or a run that turns into a speed workout with someone who is faster than you and knows how to kick your ass. or that feeling on race morning; the nerves, the adrenaline, the sheer love and drive and hurt running through your veins. 

yeah, those are no longer my victories. but last night at the yellow barn brigitte said this. coming back to breath can be your victory. it's so good. so good. reframing victory is big for me. it's something i need to reframe over and over again. and maybe it's not breath, perhaps it's coming back to movement over and over again.  or coming back to energy over and over, passion, reflection, spontaneity, love, adventure. come back to the things that trip us up, that we lose sight of. come back to it over and over.

victory.  

reclaim(ed)

source: yellow barn wellness

magic on a sunday night. in a yellow barn. with a little sunset flow.
i don't think i can speak to how amazing this place really is. i'm talking that real, raw smell of wood. like come on. is there anything better?

 there is something so simple and beautiful about a barn, yeah? and maybe it's this cooped up, pavements and city thing that draws us to the opposite. but it's incredible. it really is out of this world to be able to do yoga in a beautiful place, with beautiful people as the sun goes down and as the world is slowly going to rest.

you reconnect. you reclaim. you re-figure out why you do what you do and why you move the way you move. there's something about bon iver, reclaimed wood, the sunset and gitte guiding that create something pretty awesome.

and stubborn love by the lumineers was on the playlist. killing me gitte. you are some kind of amazing.  but seriously, the yellow barn check out their site. how beautiful is their space? how bad do you want to host farm to table dinners there that include yoga?

source: yellow barn wellness

send more mail.

" they don't teach you this in school. 

they don't show you the beauty of existing. 

they don't show you the wonder of the earth.

 they don't show you the unity that human beings are. 

they don't show you who's better, who's worse. 

they don't show you love. "

(author unknown)

it's the simple things that i look back on and wonder why that wasn't what i was learning in school. right? 

let your body rest, heal and grow strong. give it rest and nourish it. grow the foods that will nourish your body. get your hands dirty so you are not just reading about vitamin b and the nutrients found in dark leafy greens you are seeing them take root and grow. 

sleep is important, super important. i was not aware that our bones needed 8 hours of sleep each night to repair and regain their strength from the wear and tear we put them through each day. that is something i would have listened to in science class. 

send more mail. practicing cursive on that soft, fuzzy, weird paper with the dashed line through the center of each line, yeah you know what paper i am talking about. when you would erase your lower case a because your hump went above the dashed line and your tail went below the bottom line your eraser would create even more fuzz on your paper. yeah, that paper. all that time we were practicing fancy cursive, why weren't we writing letters, making homemade envelopes, addressing/postaging and walking together as a class to the little blue blue post office box around the bend. 

yeah. to send more mail. that is curriculum i can get behind. it shows us the beauty of existing, the unity that human beings are and it shows us how to love and be loved. 

rinse & repeat.

'people help the people
and if you're homesick, 

give me your hand  and i'll hold it'

| people help the people-birdy |

safe to say this has been on repeat for a considerable amount of time in my life the past few days. 

the moments.

| bring your breath to tightness

with your exhale send out energy |

r. mclaughlin

i will never be able to recreate this moment, or the words, or sequence of songs that hit just so right. but today made me realize that's pretty cool. when a a moment, a series of moments, 60 minutes of moments can get you in such a way that you can't recreate it that's pretty amazing, right?

today was that. un-duplicated. some crazy beautiful stuff happening in a sun-filled yoga studio, with exposed wood beams, broken bodies, powerful souls and breath. i struggle with breath, i struggle with listening to it, with embracing it's quite pace. but today i heard breath in a new way, through a new voice. send your breath to your tightness, to the aching soreness, to the part of your body that screams at you when you wake up it's still sore from you kicking it's ass the day before. and with your exhale, send it out as energy. 

i am lucky. lucky is the only word i can think of, and it is so lacking but it's all i can think of. i am lucky to have spent 60 minutes in a yoga studio being led by ryan and practicing next to micah. and i can't write down every piece of mindblowing wisdom or dharma talk that comes from ryan, nor can i capture and bottle the energy of flow and breath that is micah on her mat.

but the moments are not lost on me. the moments happened. that was real life. a thursday afternoon in the city i love. 

well lived summer

don't let the prospect of scraped knees or bug bites keep you inside. 
they're symbols of a summer well lived

| whole living magazine, last summer| 

play with natural light.

drink water. add stuff. if it's mint picked from a garden, even better. 

star gaze. 

make popsicles. or orange juice in ice-cube trays. improvise.

send more mail.

pick wildflowers. and wild berries.

live in layers. swimsuit sunrise to sunset. layer and repeat.

the process.

| learning to love the process |

i tend to live in a constant state of life lessons of learning to love the process, honor that things take time and listening to what your body is telling you. 

this one in the picture, the one who is always behind these little life lesson mantras has joined me in loving the process. the word solidarity comes to my mind. but then the annoying clique of 'misery loves company' comes to mind and that i don't love. 

when learning the process means active bodies being put to rest, when learning the process means that which empowers us is put on hold, when learning the process means running our bodies into the ground can no longer happen on hot summer mornings for a long run around the lake, when that is life i don't want company in my misery.

so my mom, the ultimate badass. the one who runs with me into the ground, but who is the first to reflect the idea of loving the process is now learning with me, full of titanium from a gnarly tennis injury. 

so yeah solidarity. and during a long crafting sesh of cards to send to her in minnesota, i clearly was struggling with what to say. i started writing from my own learning process. which is shaky at best with my recent staggered past of bummer running injuries. 

and this is what it comes down to for me, learning to love the process is an every day thing. i start over every morning learning to love it. every single morning i need to re-learn what it all looks like. 

these things take time? 

do.

do what you do, because it matters.
|olympics commercial| 

it goes without saying that we are in an olympics coma over here. in the best possible way. but in between serious watching of swimming + gymnastics this commercial turned out to be a gem.

do what you do. because it matters.

brilliant. so so spot on and perfect. clearly, my olympic coma and obsession with this quote distracted me from catching what the commercial was for. my apologies, but i am sure the youtube gods can find it for you.

but do what you do, do what makes you fall in love, do what gets you out of bed in the morning, do what makes you passionate, do your thing and embrace it with all you got. 

and if you need some inspiration for guys doing what they do because it matters. check out Hyde Expedition Co. a lifestyle company that is very close to my heart. 

dock talks

life talks on the dock, because really what better place is there to talk big life things. mermaid diet, why downward dog is called downward dog, if the tide changed huge amounts last night because of the rain, if there are whales out by the lobster boats...

and then there's this---

did it rain last night? - belle

                                                yeah, i think...the dock is wet. - karin

yeah guys, it's part of the circle of life. - conor

nothing like a little reminder, right.