Yoga is an excellent platform from which to study the surreal.
Yoga teaches both awareness and humility (we are all matter, matter is the universe).
Surreal is defined as having the characteristics of surrealism/bizarre; and bizarre is defined as something unusual or strange, especially causing amusement.

I think practicing yoga grows our ability to embrace the surreal. Picture an entire room of adults sitting on the floor attempting to put their feet behind their head? From the sidelines, that would take on a sepia tone of incredulity. When in the moment, it's putting to rights what the unbelievable corporate and corporeal punishment of ridiculously cruel long hours with our eyes glued to screens and poor bottoms glued to our chairs has brought us. What is surreal is that we clamor for grounding, connection,  and reality. 

Recently I had the supreme pleasure of attending the local Creative Mornings chapter to hear Chris Pennington speak on the topic of "Surreal". I hadn't been to a talk since August of 2017, the auspicious Mary Jo Hoffman talk that kicked off my journey round the sun with poetry. So I was eager and attentive to everything Chris had to say, and it was, surreal. Strange and amusing and glorious. In the circuitous and disparate paths Chris' story would take us upon throughout his hour long talk Chris name dropped Salvador Dali, Derek Jeter, Banksy, the FBI, and Chris Cloud. I was especially excited about the Chris Cloud name drop as I attended undergraduate classes at the University of Minnesota with Chris. What'up, Chris (that's me hoping/pretending Chris Cloud might read my blog). Additionally, he used the word "ass-ton" which I haven't had the pleasure of hearing in a key-note address before (yet another reason I love Creative Mornings), and he coined the word "catacomby", right there, live! As we were listening!

It felt surreal and so right sitting in that room with open and creative minds. I listened to him talk as I watched a construction crane gracefully moving a large rock outside the window of the Science Museum with the gorgeous backdrop of the wintry Mississippi River. I felt connected to everyone around me in our amusement in Chris' harrowing tale of exploring a "catacomby scary-ass basement" armed only with a bic lighter and borrowed courage from a chained man in a suit doing performance art in the floor above. Laughing along with Chris at the hilarity of life, I realized what was different about his talk, humble candor. Most speakers talk about their hard work leading up to success, Chris had us holding our sides as he explained the query "what chicken video?" and why he can't go back to New York City. 

Through all the chuckles and the laughs he also managed some great messages. I heard the message that failure can lead to relationships that leads to success; that being smart about how art is funded is vital; that we are already connected through art and we can connect even more to each other. As a parting encouragement, Chris called on us to ask what we could do together to add to the greatness of the Twin Cities. Which brings me back to yoga. To yoke. To join. I so much agree with Chris Pennington. It is our responsibility to enhance our world because we are connected. We can appreciate the strange. We can emphasize what brings us closer. We can embrace with humility our small stitch in the fabric of time. We can laugh and share the joke that it's all surreal. 

Three days in and I've thought about writing poems more times than I can count. I concluded last week that even though I'm not doing another poetry challenge for 2019,  I will still write poems whenever they come to me and, well, I have...mostly. Last night as I drifted off to dreamland I had a fleeting beginning to a poem and I didn't roll over to capture it on the paper beside my bed. So, sorry. 

It happened again though, more recently, the urge to capture my thoughts. And so I did. 

I feel pretty good. Pretty darn good. 

It's the first day of 2019 and I'm taking a second to reflect back on the whirlwind of a year that was 2018 and I have to say, I'm satisfied. No Regerts (as the meme says). 

I remember this time 2017, writing my post reflecting on my ambitious goal setting and resolving to set fewer goals - which I, erm, sort of did. In 2017 I had set 4 categories of goals with 19 "sub-goals", let's call them. Here's where it got tricky. If you take the large categories, I completed 3 out of 4 (or 75%) but if you take the 19 sub-goals, I accomplished a measly 36% of them. Fast forward to 2018, I was doing the same thing, reflecting, and goal setting and here we are today.  I am happy to report that in 2018 I had set 17 goals (so...2 fewer) and I accomplished 58% of them. Whew. 58% . 

Now, I'm not just counting widgets here. I also do a deep-down reflection on ensuring the goals I set relate to my purpose, to my mission. And, if you've read any of my previous posts, you've probably concluded my mission is to help others find peace and go through life with ease. Whoa, what do I mean by that? Lately, when I read that phrase, and the phrase I have written on the home page, I get concerned I'm giving the impression that I think we should only do things that are easy and comfortable. Which is not at all what I mean. What I'm saying, is that with the right attitude, the right state of mind, the right tools, all experiences can be brought to comfort and ease. It's the premise through yoga, that with a mind to body connection, we can truly dictate how we experience being. Just with a yoga pose you try for the first time, take....fire log pose. Perhaps you get into it and the first few seconds your hips are tight and on fire and it's discomfort not pain so you sit with it a while, and maybe you are in a yin class so you sit with it for longer. And the music is playing and your instructor reminds you to breathe and suddenly you're no longer thinking about the discomfort, you're just being, and when your yoga teacher calls for you to notice, to see what's different, you realize that you've sunk deeper into the hip opening than you thought possible, and the discomfort has vanished, or it hasn't, it doesn't matter, because there's no judgement. And maybe, over time, you'll feel no discomfort at all, even though what your body is accomplishing is ambitious and amazing. That's comfort and ease. So did I get closer with my goals in 2018 to bringing that about? Yes, I think I did.