Against My Religion?

I had somebody in a non-optional yoga class not participate in class the other day because yoga was "against her religion." Wha? How can stretching and being in your body be against your religion or against anything for that matter? You may not feel like it, but how could it be actually against something? I'm still scratching my head.

I wonder if her not participating was more that she didn't want to do it rather than it was technically against her religion and she was perhaps using that as an excuse. Like not having the right clothes or having your sore this or that or whatever we say to not do yoga. (Personally, I'm "too busy," most of the time.)

Nevermind. So let's say it is actually "against her religion" to not do yoga, like not stretch and be in her body. It gets me to thinking. From this side of it, it seems ridiculous that it could be against anybody's anything to not be able to strike a pose and hold it or not. Taken out of context, doing yoga can mean a lot of things to people including worshipping many Gods (which it totally does not), to some sorts of blasphemy by saying we're god instead of someone in particular is God, that we're not capable of being, and it could be misconstrued in many different ways.

But everybody thinks their "practice" or "path" is accessible and if only other people could see it for what it is, they'd get it too. There are things that Jehovah's Witnesses do that I can really relate to (my best friend in grade school was JW and I'd go over for lunch on Wednesdays for "bible study" and that was fun), and there are things that Muslims do, especially in the Sufi traditions, that really resonate with me, and sometimes taken in another light, those things can seem weird or "different."

The truth is - people are people. We're people. We've always been people. We'll probably always be people. And how we are is fairly predictable. (I realize I'm getting old when I say this!) Especially if our neighbours are on a path as opposed to just doing their own thing, what our neighbours are doing that we think is weird, is something we could totally relate to if we took the time to check it out.

When people think yoga is weird, I figure they just didn't have yoga in a context yet that would make it seem normal to them. Given the chance to have yoga in a "normal" context, people will embrace it and at least let go for a bit of their judgements of it. I'm in the same conversation with my Landmark Education stuff. If people have the right context for it, it makes total sense. Without that, and taken in the wrong light, it can seem weird or strange. Not to me, but I see how people can see it that way.

If you find someone in your life who has beliefs that you think are weird, consider for a bit that if you were to look closer, those beliefs may have something in common with beliefs you have as well. We're all wanting the same things, ultimately, in life. It's not tolerance we're after, but rather a real sense that we're brothers and sisters on the very same path.

John and I often joke that if aliens landed we'd all get together as humans and let go of our religious differences. We'd band together so fast and drop all sorts of issues we currently have. Like I often say, little problems go away in the presence of a much bigger problem.

Yoga Evaluation

Now, I'm a yoga-teacher-teacher, so I know that there's a time for evaluation in yoga, but today I was caught a bit off-guard.

I am teaching yoga to kids at my daughter's school during their gym period for 4 weeks. It's a lot of fun and I've had lots of challenges dealing with this group, so it's a complex situation. Today I go in and the teacher tells me he's going to be evaluating the kids in the class today. "What?!" I'm thinking to myself. He quickly added, "for participation," and I didn't freak out. I started the class and I thought I really want to set them up to win and do well so how can I help them out here. I don't think I did much differently but I made sure I was clear about the instructions and made sure they followed up on what I'd told them to do because the teacher had said he was looking to see if they did what I told them to (yikes). The class went really well as they knew they were being observed and seemed to mess around less than usual.

And as it turns out, they all got an A+ I was told by one of the kids after school who asked the teacher. Phew! Can you imagine failing at yoga? We had square dancing when I was in elementary school and I'm sure we were evaluated on our alamain lefts and dosidos, but I didn't really notice at the time. So I learned today that I could perhaps run their class each time like it's going to be an evaluation class. Make things super clear, wait to see that they're doing what I told them to, and have a real sense of purpose when I'm working with them. Having a guy stand around with a clipboard, taking notes, would probably help too!

Going to Yoga is Tricky

You know, going to a yoga class can be a bit tricky. If you've never gone to a yoga class, sheesh, that's crazy-ticky! But even if you've gone before there are certain things that are variables and how you deal with them is well, it's how you deal with them.

I never really know who's coming to my drop in classes at Rama Lotus, which I've been teaching for 6 years as of today, pretty much. I still don't know how many people are coming, I still don't know who is coming, who's not coming, I just don't know.

So sometimes people ask me, "when's a good time to come when it's not packed?" They think Tuesday nights are always packed. Let me tell you, the best time to come if you don't want to go to a packed class is the week following the class that was packed. People get scared off. They don't come back for a bit. And then there's room! And that's not always true either. But there seems to be a pattern.

Another night that's not generally packed in my class is if there's bad weather or a hockey game's on. Come to class, you'll have lots of room.

And then there's the case of the good old teacher-switch. I usually warn people when I'm not going to be there a few weeks in advance but if you haven't come to class in a bit, you won't have heard me tell you that, so you won't know and you'll come all surprised that I'm not there! That happens sometimes, but not often, as teaching yoga is my livelihood, so I don't skip classes because I have something better to do or I don't feel like it. Teaching yoga is my number one thing.

Now, if you're doing a class like Bikram or Ashtanga or even Hot Yoga, you pretty much are going to get whatever it is that's gotten in those classes no matter who's teaching it. In other styles of classes it is often more teacher-dependent as to what's going to happen in the class. So going to a new teacher can be tricky, because you don't know what you're going to get. Some yoga teachers ask you to do some pretty strange things. There's this one teacher who has you do this energy stuff with your hands and she calls it "prana," weird. (That's me. We do that in the intermediate class a lot.)

Laurie subbed for me while I was away in NYC for my Landmark Education Introduction Leaders Program (which I'll be away for again December 15-16 and February 1-2 btw) and she found out that we warm up a lot more in my class than in her class. So teaching someone else's class can be a bit tricky too. I know when I'm subbing I feel a bit strange and I try to get a sense from the group how I'm doing and I can't always tell and people in Ottawa don't exactly always speak up and help you out as a teacher. And sometimes they do and I really appreciate it when you do!

So anyways, I strive for quality control in my classes and without knowing who's coming I'm always left with this unknown variable - YOU - and I do my best to make it a safe, predictable, count-on-able experience every time, and sometimes you're going to be too close to someone or you may touch someone by accident, and things may happen near you in your space that I didn't count on. And I'm sorry about those things - I want you to have a good time! And I can't tell if it's going to be packed or not. Keep coming and maybe you can figure out the pattern and then you can tell me. I'd like to know too!

Dog Boots

I didn't buy any yet. We tried some on her last week but none fit. This morning on a last walk with Luc before he's off to Hawaii we saw a dog about the same size as Zara totally decked out with boots, a coat, even a hood, which I figure was probably unnecessary as it's not even freezing, nor snowing, nor raining. Anways, I went out to the dog store to buy some more raw food, because that's what she eats as per my mother's instructions, and that's what I'm out of. But the store was closed. Oh well, we got a walk.

Although it is not raining, it is still wet out. So when we came back in I rinsed her off because unlike with bigger dogs, she gets completely soaked on her underside because she's so close to the ground. And she gets dirty. And she's normally white.

So I think she's going to need a coat and some boots. I didn't really approve of the dog coats I saw so I'm actually in the process of knitting her one. Yep, I'm a knitter too. She's pretty good about letting me try it on her and I'm doing in the round so there are these sticks all poking out but she stays still and I test and see how far I have to go. I'll take a picture to show you.

I don't think I'm going to do dog boots on my own though. And I think she's going to need them. Soon.

Megan's Blog

Megan shared in her blog yesterday about my blog. I want to say something about Megan and her blog - she doesn't pretend. When we go around pretending like we're not sad or bummed out or depressed we deny ourselves what's really going on. In the Landmark Education terminology, which is kind of jargony but makes total sense to me, you be authentic about where you're inauthentic. And that's the best place to be. Being real about where you're at.

And when Megan shares her story and her victories I'm with her. I learn too. I heal my sadness too.

If you're sad, you can be sad and just breathe into it and sometimes it passes. But you don't breathe into it to make it go away, it just will when it's done. It's the practice of pratyhara - taking your senses inside. It's on the way to meditation.

Yoga time...

Mind or Body

I was having lunch the other day with someone who's done yoga with me (I hardly know any other kind of people) and we were talking about the benefits of yoga and how it really helped her out after surgery. She reminded me about how yoga is so great when you get older because flexibility and range of motion will have a bigger impact on your quality of life than previous fitness levels. She said even people who were runners and worked out don't do better than the general population, but that people who are flexible are able to get around much better.

I shared with her about one student I have who has Alzheimer's and how he doesn't seem to remember me and I remind him regularly that we're doing yoga and that all the money in the world isn't going to buy that guy's mind back. It's really hard on his family, especially his wife to see him that way. My friend asked me if I'd rather be in a fit body and have lost my mental faculties or keep my mental faculties and lose my body, and wouldn't it be frustrating to be in body that can't do the things it wants to.

It didn't take me long to answer at all - I would have a preference - my mental clarity is really important to me. That doesn't mean I don't value my body and don't get me wrong, I really hope I don't have to make that choice! And I also don't know what's going on for my guy - his mental clarity might be super-strong but he's not able to communicate - it might not be at all how I imagine it. Nonetheless, for our conversation, for the way we had it over lunch that day, I chose to keep my mental clarity rather than physical fitness.

Our bodies inform our feelings to some degree, but it's really our minds that determine the quality of experience we're having. Strengthening the mind through right knowlege, through meditation, concentration, reflection, self-study, all that good stuff, is useful at sharpening our experience of life so it comes in crystal clear and we have an experience of being truly alive. All the fitness in the world won't give us that.

Meditating with a Dog

It turns out this little dog knows how to meditate! Okay, probably not, but she sat still on my lap (I'm telling you, she's part cat) for my whole meditation and didn't move and just stayed there. No twitching or jiggling or distracting me at all. Talk about a companion dog! She kept me company... Now maybe she stayed so still because we took a walk for an hour getting Remi to school this morning and it was cold and wet all the way, but I like to think she's a good meditator!

I'm Not This Body, But...

That starts off the little prayer we used to say at Kripalu for a while, "I'm not this body but the embodied spirit itself..." and it's all fine and good when it applies to us. But what about when it's something else, like a dog?

I am not really a dog owner. I have been in the past, but that was mainly by default, like it belonged to my family and although I would take responsibility for it regularly, it wasn't really my dog. I could basically come and go as I pleased. Growing up, we had many different dogs, none of which were my choice, I'd say. I wanted a regular dog and we always had "special" dogs. Like whippets and then a bichon frise. (Sometimes in the winter I'd walk the whippets and people would say I was starving the dog and I should feed it more.)

Since being on my own I've mostly only visited pets. When Remi got to the age where she noticed, I agreed to small pets, which ended up including a rat (Buddy) and a hamster (Hammie). Remi's been bugging me for years to get a dog but I've maintained that she needs to be old enough for me to leave her alone at night so I can walk the dog, so the minimum would be 10. She's 9 now and I'm not exactly a single mother anymore so the situation has changed. And then there's my mother...

So my mom's living her life's dream of beginning a dog breeding business, which I totally support her in doing, however, she's going to need a little help as she's living in a 2-bedroom apartment at the moment and she has 6 dogs. The City of Ottawa by-laws say she can only have 3. She wants to be a breeder so bad. A breeder of these tiny, white dogs called Bichon Bolognese. One of her dogs was given to someone out in the country. That left 4, but then she imported one more (little Allan) and she was back up to 5. She said would I consider keeping one until she moved into a house. I replied, "in an emergency." If I wanted a dog, I'd have one. And it probably wouldn't be a little white puffy dog.

Then I thought about it some more and I thought if she wanted us to try having a dog then I'd be willing to give it a go. I'm allergic to most dogs (these are supposedly hypoallergenic) and John didn't want to get a dog and Remi of course loves the idea. I really don't want to pick up poo and pee in the house but I was told she's paper trained and goes outside too. So last night we brought home Zarah, who happens to be the sister of the dog I had earlier this year, Dominic, who's now off in the country. Zarah has spent most of this year in Holland being raised, but my mom managed to work a deal to bring Zarah into her fold. And it turns out today my brother took Rhea, so my mom's down to 3 in the apartment, which brings her within compliance of the by-laws.

If she's paper trained she didn't show it. But other than that Zarah's soooo cute and we're all crazy about her. And this is within 24 hours. John says we can keep her. Remi's loving her. I love her and think she's actually part cat. But I didn't see myself with a fluffy, white dog. And I looked at her earlier today and thought, it's not personal. Her body is just her body. Who she really is as a dog is the embodied spirit itself and if she's not in a Lab's body, that's fine. She's who she is in a fluff-muffin package. It didn't take me long to get over it.

Practice, Practice, Practice

I originally typed "practise, practise, practise," because the context of "practise" is usually something you're supposed to DO or be in action around. In this case I mean practice as a noun, because I'm thinking of different kinds of practices people have. Most of us reading this know of yoga as a practice. It's something you do and you show up when you like it and when you don't. But I was thinking today about other practices we have in our lives...

I read the paper this morning and there was something about 2 muslim women in Ottawa who went to visit a synagoge to share with the people there about their faith. Religion is a practice.

Then a friend of mine called from Toronto to ask me a mothering question, and again I thought, parenting is a practice.

As I was getting ready to go to work to teach yoga, I reflected about how work is a practice.

There are many areas of our lives that are practices - areas we work on and in and keep showing up and learning about ourselves in the process. There's health, diet, finances, relationships, education, and loads more. We're all involved in many practices. And some of those practices are on paths that are shared by many others - we can find people on the same path who share a similar practice as us and we can get inspired or talk to people who've gone further along in the path than we have and can help us relax and know what to expect. We can share with others who are coming up behind us on the path and help them, warning them about the obstacles and encouraging them when they navigate their way along.

What happens when we continue with a practice is that we begin to love it. Love it for showing us ourselves and who we really are, or being a place or a way that we can truly express ourselves. And sometimes we get attached to our practices or our path and we think it's the right path and that other people who have a different practice are somehow missing something if they are not on our path or share our practice. Worse than that, because it's natural to want to share our practice with others, especially when we love it so much, is that we make other paths and practices wrong.

Like the muslim women who went to the synagogue - they were motivated to go because they had been experiencing other people putting down their practice and not really connecting with it as an alternative practice, but as a threat and something to avoid and not respect. By sharing who they are in their practice, they were able to relate to the other people on a similar path - people practising their religion - and connect with them on that level.

So if you have a practice that really speaks to you and you know that it's good and righteous and wonderful, that's so great! What a treat to find something you connect with so strongly and that brings you such joy. We need to trust that others who are on different paths are able to have similar things brought forth in their own practice without making them or their paths wrong.

And have you ever noticed how if you take steps to clean up your practice in one area of your life the other areas are impacted as well? My grandpa guru used to say with reference to the yamas and niyamas, which are also practices, that you just have to pick up one flower to get the whole garland.

So don't be attached to your practice but stay committed! There's a difference. Committing will keep you going deeper, allowing you to notice and respect other practices and keep you out of suffering and being attached will, well it may in time lead to misunderstandings and suffering...

Luc's Back

My buddy, Luc, is back in town. Luc inspires me because he's basically retired and he spends his time in spiritual communities doing interesting things. Some of the things I've done too (like work at Kripalu and Omega) and some of it I haven't done (like live in Hawaii and do the deeksha training in India). I don't meet many people in my daily life anymore who are wandering around doing that kind of learning and teaching. When I lived in those communities, I met people doing those types of trainings and teaching all the time. Now I don't come across people doing that very often. So it's nice when he comes to town so I can get a "hit" of a more non-traditional path.

On another note, I've been in the Landmark Education training for a few months and it's only yesterday that I checked out the new introduction to the Landmark Forum on their website. It's awesome! If you get a chance, take a look. I'm doing a training to be able to lead the "introduction."

Another New Computer

I was inspired by my DVD to take another look at the Macintosh. The guy who did the DVD, the very awesome Richard Tardif, used a Mac to create the DVD. It looks really good and I was impressed with the DVD opening sequence and how you can choose chapters and stuff.

John, my boyfriend, is working on a slide show for his work and was having some difficulty with the program he was using on his PC and I suggested we try it on a Mac and see if that would make a difference. Well, now he never wants to use the PC. We've only had the Mac since Saturday and he's really sure we're keeping the Mac and that he'll never work on the old computer again. The software is beautiful and intuitive and it's what a computer should be, really.

When I first moved into the ashram I spent 3 months cleaning rooms and being on the house hold crew. Once I was clear that I was staying on I was "hired" (we were all volunteers) to help administer a computer network and train the teachers in the Programs Department how to use computers. I thought that would be funny seeing as how I didn't know much about computers, but my "boss" said he'd show me and I ended up learning a lot about Macs. I used to say that sitting in front of the Mac was like sitting on a couch - it was so comfortable to use. I didn't even know what "Windows" was at the time and I enjoyed using the computer.

At Omega we didn't have Macs but used PCs, so I found out what Windows was and said goodbye to the Mac for a long time. When I arrived in Ottawa I was tempted to buy a Mac but they were more expensive than PCs and the network where I was working wasn't real supportive of Macs, so I stuck with the PC.

This computer is so sweet and lovely. I'd been dreaming of adding a Mac to my home network for sometime and even tested an iMac a couple of years ago only to return it to the store for a few reasons. The price has come down now and the system is smooth. It's all quite gorgeous, actually.

Now there's a line at home to use it. John wants to work on his projects and Remi wants to use Photo Booth to take silly pictures of herself.

It feels yogic to me to have a Mac, since I spent so much time on it when I was living in a yoga centre. I think it almost counts as sadhana (yoga practice) to work on the Mac!

New Program at Kripalu

I just got an email letting me know about this new program. It looks really great. So many of us finish school and really don't know what we're doing. This program addresses many of the things I was looking for after university and are why I went to Kripalu in the first place after school.

How many of our kids would benefit from a program that asks, "are you ready... to experience yoga as more than just a class at the gym? to commit to taking part in a community that demands the best in you? to make things change - starting with you?" I figure many of us could benefit from spending some time working on those things.

"For young adults ages 18-22, the program curriculum includes Self-Study and Contemplative Traditions, Meaningful Work, Effective Communication, Healthy Living, and Financial Awareness."

Wow. Good job, Kripalu!

The Teacher Training has Begun

The Yoga Teacher Training at Rama Lotus began this weekend and I'm really delighted to be a part of it. Teaching a group of highly motivated students is quite different than teaching non-optional yoga classes although the material is the same! (That's not entirely true as in the YTT we're going into way more depth, but it is the same stuff.)

When groups of people get together for trainings of this nature, things happen and some of it is stuff we like and some of it is stuff we don't like. Resistance will likely show up at some point. Then we get to practise being with ourselves in a way that can really make a difference. It's when we're in resistance that we tend to bother the people around us, not when we're moving ahead.

Removing the obstacles by observing where they are and getting them out of the way is a useful practice. I say this because I'm in a course myself that goes for 7 months and I am experiencing resistance there too! The obstacles are what can blow the whole thing - all the great work you've put in, all the great ideas and plans - and it's important to know that they're there.

We acknowledged the resistance on Friday night as the course began and just suggested that it might come up. Even though (especially because) we're doing yoga and people are spending the weekends doing what they love, resistance will still come up. It doesn't matter what we're doing really - just trying to get together and honour our commitment will have the places where we're not committed show up.

So we don't need to pretend it's all "nice-nice," just because we're practising yoga. In fact, practising yoga can be like hauling out the trash, because you're removing the parts that aren't you and getting them out of the way, and sometimes those parts are smelly and are not part of a picture people have of themselves as yoga teachers/practitioners.

Ultimately though, practising yoga, digging deep and working on yourself will make you nicer, or seem to, because your obstacles will be reduced or you'll be well aware of them, which has a similar effect because to acknowledge how things are is about as good as we're going to get - perfection as an ideal isn't real. Knowing what stops you and being honest about that has a calming effect on the people around you, ever notice that? So you may not get "nicer," but it will seem that way because you'll be able to be with reality, which includes the people around you, who are the ones that get to decide whether you are nice and good to be with or not.

Anyways, the training has started and I love watching the transformation that happens as people begin to get yoga and get themselves and create a group that lifts the whole community. The bonds that are formed in the YTT support the whole centre and go beyond it.

Life Was Easy at the Ashram

The thing that was most difficult about living in an intentional community practising yoga, was the part about it being so "alternative." But really, things were so easy in comparison to "normal" life. Sometimes I wonder how people do it, really.

We're supposed to work 40 or so hours a week for someone else (usually) taking at least an hour or so a day just to get back and forth to work. Then we're also supposed to have time to eat well and exercise now, what are the numbers? like minimum a half hour a day. We've got to get enough sleep and keep our homes clean and have hobbies to keep ourselves stimulated. If you've got kids, well, I honestly don't know how you're supposed to do it all.

I figured out a long time ago that I didn't like to go for a bike ride. I liked to ride my bike to someplace I was going. So I made sure the things that I considered really important to do were just built in to my life. I teach yoga for a living, so I have to maintain my practice and my job supports me in that. If I had to work all day and then come home and in my free time go to a yoga class, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't make it regularly to class!

And spending time with/raising my daughter - I purposely chose to work from home and to teach yoga so I can be home with her and go to her school functions and volunteer in the classroom and really be there with her as she grows up. I became a La Leche League Leader and supported other moms in attachment parenting, which is sometimes considered to be alternative although it seems like common sense to me.

I see people who work too much and don't take time for themselves and end up feeling used and tired and not sure of what they're doing anymore. I feel that way too sometimes - I work 6 days a week and fill my life with learning and volunteering and I'm busy too - so I built it into my life to reflect and take time for myself.

I'm still scratching my head and wondering how we function as a group. As our family members age and move in with us or as the facilities for our brothers and sisters are reduced people will take on even more responsibilities and have less time to cook properly and exercise and sleep, while working for wages that may seem grand in other places but don't go far in our expensive society (yesterday I paid the Sears guy $80 to tell me my $1000 washing machine was going to cost more to repair than to replace).

So I do my own practice and I offer back what I've learned and keep myself inspired, hoping that I inspire others as I do my job, and I hope that we're taking time to ask ourselves what really matters to us and are we attending to those things in the midst of all of our busy-ness and task completing.

There is always going to be more to do than we can get done, there are always going to be more people to be helped, more tidying to do, more projects to finish, so what we can do is practise being satisfied right where we are. We run around solving problems as if they're going to go away. We're always going to have problems! If we practise being right where we are with what we have and what we've created around us, we can practise being present and in that, be satisfied. Be content right where we are. From there things will fall away that don't matter and what does matter will be highlighted and appreciated.

Need help getting present? Listen to 3 minutes of a guided relaxation and get yourself into your body! (It's on the right hand side of the page.) You can take it from there :)

Meditators are Cool

I led a meditation workshop this past weekend and today in class almost half of them showed up in yoga class. Right on! Yoga and meditation are totally related and the benefits of yoga are ultimately the same as those for meditation.

There are some differences of course, but basically they get to the same place. What I'm talking about would take much more than a short blog post to get at and if you know what I mean then you already know!

The yoga teacher training is starting up again on Friday and one of my favourite things we do is go over Patanjali's yoga sutras. I love when people start to get into that stuff and how their yoga practice seems to take a new direction when they begin to "get" the sutras. We learn about muscles and anatomy and postures and alignment, but the path of yoga really leads us to inner peace and understanding. It leads us to meditation and to ourselves and all that. It's quantum physics! Experiential quantum physics, that's what it is.

I love that I get to teach yoga and meditation as my job. It's great. If you haven't learned to meditate yet, get started, or if you want some help, my Learn to Meditate workshop is happening at Rama Lotus on Sunday, December 2 from 11 - 1 :)

Still a Mystery

Well, I've retraced my steps and I have not run into my power cord or to the owner of the power cord I have in my Targus backpack. Oh well. Guess I'll have to order a new one!

So I have a bit of cold and I'm taking lots of cold stuff for it - oregano, Cold FX, ocsillium or whatever those little tiny homeopathic pills are called, chicken soup, rest, vitamin C and even some zinc. My neighbour told me to drink ginger. I know it will pass and it's not even really that bad. I've had way worse colds. When I teach yoga and I'm not feeling 100% it doesn't seem to matter. I still feel me inside and I actually get energy from teaching the class.

I teach 3 classes on Mondays and I really enjoy them. The first class is at Rama Lotus, which is drop in format, so I'm not really sure who's going to show up. There are some regulars coming to that class now so it's getting a bit of a flow and there are familiar faces. The later classes though, have the same people week after week in general and they know what they like and I get all kinds of requests. They'll ask me at the beginning of the class, or in the middle, or whenever the mood strikes them. It's actually a nice change to have a group that talks back!

Today I skipped a side in the leg cradle move and I got called on that so quick! I think I probably hardly ever miss a side of a pose and I figure if it happened in a big drop in class no one would tell me, but in the little class they'd let me know straight away. Maybe I'm underestimating my drop in classes and maybe it's really that I hardly ever skip anything people are expecting, but it was funny to have such an attentive group. Whoops! Guess my cold did get me in a fog after all...

Power Cord Mystery

If you've come to almost any of my yoga classes then you know that I bring my computer to class. I mostly use it to play music in classes because I have my playlists on the computer and there are speakers built in and I love having it with me, so I bring it along.

Yesterday morning I noticed that the power cord I was plugging in to my computer was a bit different and I thought that was odd and that maybe I hadn't really looked at the power cord in a while and it is an HP and well, it must be mine. I plugged it in and it didn't stick in all the way and I thought maybe I'd bumped my computer and that it was getting loose as that computer is well over a year old now. (Can you see my mind working hard to have this make sense?) I left the computer plugged in a walked away from it for half an hour while I did some other work. When I came back to it, the unit was super-hot and there was a smell of burning electronics or rubber or something not good when it comes to your second favourite computer.

So I "get" that this is not my power cord. I'm looking at it and I realize that of course, it's not my power cord, but it is someone's power cord and it is not going to charge up my computer. This is Thursday morning and I start back tracking thinking about where I've been that I could possibly of swapped my power cord. My Wednesday lunch time class was in Gatineau and I don't even bring my computer, so that can't be it. Tuesday night I was at Rama Lotus for 2 classes in a row so if I hadn't had the right cord that night my battery would have died because I played music for both of those classes straight through.

It must have been at the hospital Wednesday morning. So I call and they don't have mine and they can't think of whose power cord I have. Well, there's a mystery for you. I have an HP power cord and it is really not mine and somewhere out there is mine.

Tamsin (see photo above) told me about "universal power cords" yesterday and I figure I may have to resort to that so I go online. They're like $80 in the US and the price on the Staples site is $149 not to mention that they're out of stock at the time of this blogging. Aargh.

If you happen to have my power cord, could you please let me know asap? Maybe my theory of swapping it on Wednesday morning is wrong and it's out there someplace just waiting to be plugged in!