Plenty of people wrinkle their noses when they hear I’m a yoga instructor
Assumptions, stereotypes and pictures of bendy people flash through their minds. Boom – a wall goes up.
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Leap of Faith Life
Leaps of Faith in Life, Travel, Yoga, and Happiness
Month: October 2014
I’m a writer (not that I’ve ever confirmed it out loud). I loved to write as a child and as a teenager, and during my public school education I had plenty of experience in writing courses with teacher feedback. However, my last course was about 10 years ago.
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“Sometimes, you read a book and it fills you with this weird evangelical zeal, and you become convinced that the shattered world will never be put back together unless and until all living humans read the book.” -John Green, The Fault in Our Stars
Want to know how to make happiness a way of life? So did I.
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I love lists, and I love random facts, so it was so much fun to put this together! There is a bit of a chill in the air here today in the Netherlands, along with some gray skies.
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Or a literal title might be named, “How to calm down in any anxiety-giving situation, or situation you perceive to be negative.” Not as effective.
When the ship is going down, in the moment of anxiety-driven situations and high emotions (anger, frustration, jealousy, stress, or mind-blowing-madness), to say something like, “let’s block this negativity together,” might not have the same effect as the captain yelling to the group to regain control, “Just calm the F down! Everything’s going to be okay!”
Think about it – the adrenaline pumping through your body is like the crazed ship group running into each other to get to the life boats, and your mind is the captain trying to get their attention.
So, how do you calm the F down? Luckily, it’s easy to do – it’s called breathing. Or, if you want to get fancy, prana, which means life force, energy, vital breath.
Yoga starts and ends with breath. As do we. So it makes sense that we have control in any situation, negative or positive, to direct our emotions with our breath. It might not feel like it at the time, but after some practice, it will get easier and more useful to you to use anywhere.
When you panic, or get upset, the breath tends to get short and fast. This leads to less oxygen to the brain and the body, and induces a panic sensation in the body. Think about when someone is hyperventilating – to get them to calm down you may have seen them breathe into a bag. Part of the reason that helps is due to the focus on breath, to make it longer and fuller, rather than short and fast. Continue reading
“Passion is energy. Feel the power that comes from focusing on what excites you.” -Oprah Winfrey
What are you passionate about? What drives you? What makes your eyes light up and cheer out loud?
For me it’s travel. Going to a new place, observing the culture, tasting the food, smiling at the new people, and watching family and friends interact. I think it is so amazing and beautiful to watch how other people live. Traveling means I actually get to live it, breathe it, taste it, and feel it first hand? Well, that just makes me do a happy dance.
For a long time I thought my days living abroad were over. I mean, where is the opportunity after studying abroad in college and then again for graduate school? You’re supposed to settle down, get married, have babies, and/or do the big corporate job by (insert insanely young age here). Right? Well, that’s at least what I thought. I have no idea where that seed came from, but it was a full fledged oak tree by the time I was 26.
At 27, and a breakup of a six year relationship, I had to reconstruct what I thought I wanted. In this reconstruction phase, someone close to me asked, “Yes, but what do YOU want?” I had never really, truly asked myself that. When I started to get happy in my own skin, decide what made me happy and not care what anyone else thought, I found myself living abroad in another country by age 28.
The Light Bulb Moment I Realized I was Living My Passion
I was in Amsterdam for a day trip with my boyfriend and his two friends, a month or so into my leap of faith abroad to live in Europe with my German boyfriend. After a long day of walking around, site seeing and exploring the city we stumbled upon a small pizzeria along a canal.
It can be scary to create something and then put it out there for the world to judge, but creating is all about leaps of faith, and leaps of faith are always worth it!
My journey of self discovery has been long and winding. I’ve always known what I wanted and what made me happy (traveling, yoga, learning), but I was too scared to reach out or to realize I deserved more.
It took a massive breakup of a seven year relationship (no idea where that courage came from) to bust out of my shell and take on the world. From there, it took many little faith leaps to move out of the corporate/nonprofit business world and enter the shoeless-entrepreneur-yoga-wanderer world. This is the space I belong in.
I have no idea where this less traveled road leads, but I could not be more excited for my present moment, and for the future. I am so glad I took the little leaps to get to this place that is such a ginormous leap from where I used to be. Looking back on the past two years I realized I could not be happier.
I started this blog to inspire others to live the biggest dream possible, and to let others know they are not alone in their wanderlusting, yoga obsession or trying new things that scare them. It was because of spaces like this on the interwebs that I found the courage to leap out and try something new, because if you are at all like me, you love people’s personal stories stories of self discovery and inspiration. Those moments when their life turned into something amazing. The internet is FULL of those inspirational, ‘this is so me!’ big moments, the light bulb realization a more blissful life is possible and that you CAN make a difference doing what you love. That is what I want for this space.
Because we are all searching for contentment. You know, to seek and work towards that elusive happiness? Turns out the happiness we look for lives in the scary place – the place just outside of our comfort zone.
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” ~Mark Twain
But WE chose to move the line of what is our comfortable space and what is not. So our happiness is up to us. How cool is that?
I’m here to help you connect with what you desire most, and to leap out and take hold of that desire. No more hesitation, only inspiration and excitement.
I believe in taking leaps of faith every day, large or small, to live the juiciest life possible. No regrets. I’d love to know, what was your last leap of faith?
Want to know more? Peak at my About Me page. Are you ready to challenge yourself to take more faith-leaps? Jot your email in the bright blue email form on the top right of this page for inspiration and tips on taking leaps of faith towards your juiciest life possible.
Thanks for stopping by! My name is Azahar, and I am an avid traveler, daily yoga student + teacher and holistic happiness seeker. Join me as I dig through all the world has to offer in lessons of leaps of faith with travel, yoga, and holistics in learning to practice happiness.
Read more bio here.
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