Loving Yourself
I begin to realize that in inquiring about my own origin and goal, I am inquiring about something other than myself…. In this very realization I begin to recognize the origin and goal of the world.
— Martin Buber

I am sitting in bed, sick and under the weather, and feeling oddly grateful.

A dear friend just dropped off blueberry scones and I got a little teared up by the kind act. Now, I am mindfully eating this lovely scone, sipping some sweet orange and chamomile tea and thinking about my amazing mentor teacher, Jasmine Lieb.

She was from England and she would bake homemade scones for me and her other trainees. We would sit in her pretty little garden, in the home she rented just a block from Venice Beach, and talk about yoga, while having tea and scones. She gave these compassionate and selfless offerings and she filled my ‘belly with light,’ as Mark Nepo said.

Jasmine was a gifted master teacher and she shared with me the foundation of what would become my own teachings. I’m not sure how I got so lucky to study with a woman who was not only passionate about yoga, but also about her students. She shared the knowledge of many lifetimes in her teachings, that were part science and part spiritual-salve. She went above and beyond being a mentor and gave me a confidence and trust in myself and passed along a discipline, in which I could honor this healing practice.

Jasmine humbly only wanted to share yoga with as many people as possible, so that they too, could share yoga with as many people as possible. Before I teach, I say a silent thank you to my teachers. Now, I think this little sickness of mine has given me a new ritual of enjoying tea and scones! It will not only help me honor the my dear teacher, but it will help me love myself, so that I can also love the world.

Sip in the tea.

Drink in the love.

Taste the sweetness.

Exhale the love.

In his ‘Book of Awakening’, I adore the way Mark Nepo describes “loving ourself” and paints a poetic picture that inspires and uplifts…

“In loving ourselves, we love the world.
For just as fire, rock, and water are all made up of molecules, everything, including you and me, is connected by a small piece of the beginning.

Yet, how do we love ourselves? It is as difficult at times as seeing the back of your head. It can be as elusive as it is necessary. I have tried and tripped many times.

And I can only say that loving yourself is like feeding a clear bird that no one else can see.

You must be still and offer your palmful of secrets like delicate seed. As she eats your secrets, no longer secret, she glows and you lighten, and her voice, which only you can hear, is your voice bereft of plans.

And the light through her body will bathe you till you wonder why the gems in your palm were ever fisted.

Others will think you crazed to wait on something no one sees. But the clear bird only wants to feed and fly and sing. She only wants light in her belly.

And once in a great while, if someone loves you enough, they might see her rise from the nest beneath your fear.

In this way, I’ve learned that loving yourself requires a courage unlike any other. It requires us to believe in and stay loyal to something no one else can see that keeps us in the world—our own self-worth.

All the great moments of conception—the birth of mountains, of trees, of fish, of prophets, and the truth of relationships that last—all begin where no one can see, and it is our job not to extinguish what is so beautifully begun. For once full of light, everything is safely on its way—not pain-free, but unencumbered—and the air beneath your wings is the same air that trills in my throat, and the empty benches in snow are as much a part of us as the empty figures who slouch on them in spring.

When we believe in what no one else can see, we find we are each other.

And all moments of living, no matter how difficult, come back into some central point where self and world are one, where light pours in and out at once. And once there, I realize—make real before me—that this moment, whatever it might be, is a fine moment to live and a fine moment to die.”

– Mark Nepo, “The Book Of Awakening”