Tangled Up In Blue

 

I have this strange mix of sensations; one of getting ready to explode from the starting line and one of being tied up in a knot, unable to move.   It's as if I have been spending all my time in bound Parivrtta Parsvakonasana (http://www.yogajournal.com/poses/876  Yoga Journal, 2012)  This posture is taken by standing in a runners lunge, twisting the torso toward the front inner thigh, reaching the lower arm outside the front leg and under the torso while reaching the upper arm behind the back and clasping the hands together.  Such extreme feelings and yet they are both at the forefront of my being.  The time is coming for me to make some decisions in my life.  "Where do I want to be?"  "What do I want to do?"  "How do I get to those places?"  Those questions though are the least of my worries.  The most important question is "Who do I want to be?"  Do I want to be the person who idly watches their life float by or to do I want to be the person who controls their destiny?  I guess the way to get to that answer is by working on the other questions first. 

I have it within my own power to make external choices.  Those choices in turn effect who I am as a person.  While there is no doubt so much more than those external things that make me who I am, the choices are the clear and tangible sign to myself and those around me what I stand for.  

I am making choices that can change my life from this day on.  These are not easy choices, but are ones which impact my family as a whole.  Precisely because of this fact is the reason I feel tied up in a knot.  I'm not the only one who will feel the effect of my decisions.  That is what keeps holding me back, but I can't just keep saying "I don't know".  I have to confirm what I feel and follow through on my thoughts with action.  That's the only way I'll ever undo the knots and make my way out of the starting gate into this next phase in my life.  

Every choice that you make has the ability to set you free or bind you where you are.  There are choices I have made in the past that have bound me down and there are those that have let me loose.  I can only hope that the choices I make now will be there right ones for me at this time. 

Sit Back, Relax and Have Yourself a Ball

 

It's been a while.  Three months to be exact.  Things started picking up in our lives.  The blog went by the wayside.  Not to say that it hasn't crossed my mind numerous times, but every time that it did I had no idea what I would write about.  It's hard to write a blog when nothing strikes you as inspiration.  I was feeling pretty uninspired for a while before I started working at the resort.  As you may remember my last blog was all about spreading my wings and finding my place in Park City.  At the time when I wrote that installment I was feeling pretty confident that I was starting to figure it out around here.  It was a short lived sense of confidence.  My experience subbing the yoga class was a disappointment and I have not been contacted by the studio since.  Not to say that the class didn't go well because that part certainly did, it was my experience with one of the owners of the studio that was a let down.  I also had a mysterious situation with a person who I thought was becoming my friend confuse me and make me feel self conscious.  I wasn't sure how to handle it so I withdrew.  I took to the land and hung with my dog continuing to hike and bike.  I missed my friends in MD and longed to be closer to my friends in CO.  I felt lonely and yet wanted to be alone.  I looked forward to starting my job at the resort because it would be another opportunity to meet people.  I also was just looking forward to having a consistent place to go.   I mean I'm a pretty cool chick but even I was getting bored of being with me! 

Working at the resort has given me the opportunity to meet lots of new people, many of whom are transplants like me.  It's nice to be with others who don't know that many people outside the resort.  I have become friends with people who are my age, some who are young enough to be children of mine and others who are old enough to be my parent.  I love the fact that we're all so different, coming from places all over the country and even the world yet we've all come here to work at a world class ski resort.  I am really enjoying my job.  Working at the resort I get to ski for free.  Needless to say I have been taking full advantage.  I had never skied before December 10, 2011.  On that day I took a four hour lesson.  By the end of that lesson I went from never being on downhill skis to being classified as an advanced beginner.  The following Monday I went out by myself and skied for 4 hours, hitting as many green runs as I could.  From that point on I have skied almost every day that I've had off from work.  In just under 2 months I have progressed to mastering double blues and am hoping to hit some black runs within the next couple of weeks. 

Along with making friends at your work place, it never seems to fail that once you have kids your friends come as a result of their friendships.  I am so pleased that we have become friends with a wonderful family.  Their daughter is in Juliana's class and the two of them have become inseparable.  Each weeks sees us swapping days to pick up the kids from school, driving the girls to and from their sporting activities and afternoon tea and chit chat.  Each week we get to know each other better and each week we find we have more and more in common.  It's good to feel that I have finally found that friend here who I know I can depend on and who can in turn depend upon me. 

Thanks to all my skiing my thighs are becoming stronger.  Chair pose or Utkatasana (http://www.yogajournal.com/poses/493 Yoga Journal, 2012) has always been one of my least favorite postures.  I always felt the need to fight it, never really releasing and settling into it.  However now that I spend 2 to 3 days a week and hours at a time in this pose while skiing I find it oddly relaxing.  To quote my friend Ryan Montbleau and his band, I have learned to "sit back, relax and have yourself a ball".  This is really what I should have been doing all along.  I should not have let myself get insecure about things that were indeed beyond my control.  Skiing has become a direct connection to the idea of going with the flow.  I can't control everything no matter how much I would like to.  I need to remember to just let things happen naturally, staying loose and making adjustments as necessary, just like one does when they are skiing.  The same holds true for taking chair pose.  It can't be forced, instead it should be loose and fluid with unconfined expectations.