It has been a year and a half since I last sat and wrote about this life... and since the last time I wrote, before I came back to India, my heart was broken. I have now been thru things that have allowed a reconnection to my soul... to my heart and to the beauty of this earth. After arriving to India before my yoga TTC I instantly became ill.... India style ill which means fevers... and well... spending a lot of time next to the toilet. I always see this as a very necessary "initiation" back into this place. A place asking you to honestly see yourself... and first, I must be empty ;) after recovering, rehydrating, my TTC was on its way. I spent 30 days, 200 hours with amazing people that sat as mirrors for my new life. Sometimes difficult to see, but necessary to acknowledge! After 2 weeks, I realized that my relationship that I had left in Australia was pulling my mind to a place far off, and I wasn't very present. So, I decided to ask for some space from the man I adored, it was the most difficult request. But the space served me well, and I began to tap back into Chantel again.
As imagined, many transformations happened during these days in Rishikesh, daily exploring my body, my mind and my soul. As things came to an end in Rishikesh, it was time to decide where to go from this place, which way do I step? I had a deep loving connection with the teachers of the school I studied with and we decided to meet in Goa, where I would teach as part of their internship program. And so life began, again, as it does when a big decision is made, choosing to stay in the country that challenged my heart daily. And from here, things sprouted, blossomed and came alive in my being. I was more sire than ever that no matter how difficult some days may seem, across the world from Campbell, from my family, I knew I was following the path the universe so beautifully laid before my feet. And the healing began, my belly started to release the sadness, the dark waves of energy that seemed so stuck, they began to shift. Everyday, my heart became lighter, my smile bigger. The world started again to seem kind!
From this time of transformation last year, until today, life has brought me so many beautiful gifts! So many dark spaces that could only be seen because of the gracious gift of the light! And today, I sit here in Pushkar, in a place I have always dreamt of coming to, and it all came without effort... I just arrived :). But, with this ease came much effort, much learning, and the intense need to learn to speak from my heart, to forgive, and to accept.
When I arrived back to India in September of 2013, I had spent 6 months living in the USA, staying with my father, teaching yoga to beautiful, loving people who so openly shared with me so much love and energy. My heart though, was here, in India, and I found myself unpresent, I found myself desiring to be in a place that feels like home in my heart. Casper, Wyoming is home to my father and my sister and her family, and sometimes I try to talk my heart into believing that it too can feel like home to me, but each time I arrive, I feel... things. It reminds me of where I was before I began to travel 8 years prior. I hadn't yet had the opportunity to have my heart pried open by seeing the outside world, by traveling alone, feeling uncomfortable, vulnerable, afraid, and to continue to live each day with an open heart. I find myself feeling invisible, with no eye contact, no sincere communication, or even a pure, solid hug. I arrived full and ready to share, but found myself feeling also isolated, and i too began to lack the ability to be my real loving self. I had to change the way I saw my days, I had to see my purpose was to share how to open, how to see our true essence, how to see ourselves in eachother! This was my reason for being there! So for the next months, I worked daily to love, smile, and remember who I found out in the world while travelling... this I could share, and inspire people with! And so I built around me a beautiful community of loving yogis ready to open, ready to inspire eachother! But slowly, the time was coming to return back to India, and it was one of the most difficult times, to break this bond and return 'home,' I knew something grand and difficult was awaiting me back in India, it's always my greatest teacher, my greatest mirror! I returned and took a flight to Dharamsala from Delhi, arriving to a land that took my breath away! Full of mountain peaks, trees and clean air! Taking a deep Breath, I knew something big was coming... a lesson that would make a massive shift in my being... in my heart.
Sometimes i can have very high expectations of myself, which tends to roll over to those around me... fair? No, but its something i have realized about myself this trip. So, with a heart full of expectations of how I feel things should be, how life should be, how people should live and speak to one another I began to find my heart disappointed, when we allow expectations to arise, we are destined to feel disappointments. And so the disappointments came, and instead of communicating, I let my truths fester in silence, and the festering became gossip and the gossip, as it will, became darkness. I found myself from the Himalayas to Goa feeling like things may not be as I think they should be, my standards rather high, or just very unnecessary.
Goa... :) was an experience with so much love, light, excitement and in the same extreme, hate, and sadness. Exaggerating? Maybe... but I really don't think so! So let's talk Goa. I arrived with my best friend Stephanie On November 6th, we were full of joy, excitement and tired, dirty, ratty hair from 2 days on the train! We were eager to meet our new housemate and see our new home! But the excitement was truly extinguished very quickly!
