Sometimes you just have to go back to the source. When I started Stoked Yogi, a huge part of my vision was blogging – sharing the triumphs and tribulations of life with the world though this digital forum. Why?
Well, it’s been kind of a secret but I think it’s time to let the cat out of the bag:
I love to write.
I mean, it’s one of my greatest passions, and according to my teachers/parents/friends, I don’t suck at it either. I have actually had many blogs before – the first one started when I was 19 – and always kept journals and diaries. The content has varied – during my dark times, the diaries were full of what I ate, depressed poetry, and grandiose plans for becoming the woman I wanted to be. During the good times, the entries were light hearted, peppered with inspirational quotes and notes of gratitude for the blessings of the day.
When I first conceived of Stoked Yogi, back in 2011, I wanted the blog to be a huge part of what I did. I visualized connecting with the world at large – inspiring and empowering people – through beautiful imagery and the written word. But somewhere along the path of building a feel-good empire full of yoga, surfing, trainings, retreats, business coaching, and social media mongering… I lost the commitment to the blogging aspect of Stoked Yogi. Communication has been reduced to (awesome) square images on Instagram and 140 character tweets, to Facebook posts which occasionally toe the line of sales-y (eek!)… and the depth and substance is gone.
It’s weird, because one of the biggest draws for starting my own company, for being my own boss, was the freedom to really be authentic.
I wanted the freedom to express myself honestly – to vibe on stream of consciousness instead of forcing copywriting to meet someone else’s needs.
I wanted you guys to know the real me. I need you guys to know the real me. And how Stoked Yogi came to be. So even if my blog posts are rambling and vulnerable, exposed and raw, I’d rather have them here – with you – than hiding them away or letting the words go unwritten.
Because, the truth is, I am just like you. I am a girl with a heart full of wanderlust and dreams of traveling the world, salty, sandy, and barefoot. Just like you, I grew up being told that we had to enter the machine – we had to become doctors, and lawyers, and work for the corporations. Dreams of a life full of art and magic were just that, dreams. Ten years of college, changing majors, changing jobs, kept mocking me as I resisted becoming part of the matrix. My dreams swirled inside of me, waiting patiently yet achingly for retirement, for winning the lottery, for the day that they might be realized.
There was a pivotal point. There was an epiphany. There was a sacred moment, a decision, a fork in the road. And when I reached it…
I decided that my dreams couldn’t just be dreams.
And the beginning of something beautiful was wrapped up in that decision.
“Stoked Yogi” was a concept for a class – yoga for surfers – that I doodled in the margins of my notebook during my 200 hour teacher training in 2011. If someone told me ten years ago that I would be a surfer, artist, writer, and yoga teacher, connecting with tens of thousands of people daily via the internet and inspiring people to change their lives… well, I really don’t know what I would have said. I probably would have scoffed and written it off, but deep down felt like that would be the most amazing future.
Once upon a time, during a trip to Las Vegas (during what I have affectionately dubbed the “champagne and cocaine years”) , I lied to a stranger and told them I was a yoga teacher. I think I was twenty two or so at the time. I wasn’t even practicing yoga… I wasn’t really doing much of value, actually, rather just hanging out, drinking, working out, and spending an inordinate number of hours “getting ready” and thinking about my appearance. It’s weird that I even came up with the lie that I was a yoga teacher, but I think on some level I knew that was the destiny of my future self.
So right now, I’m going to tell you a little something about myself: I am a dedicated blogger. More than that, I am an author. I have published my memoirs chronicling the journey from “superfuckedup” to “prettydamnaweseome”. I have proudly compiled my learnings on positive thinking into a book called “STOKED: Positive Thinking for a Radical Life.” And I am traveling the world, sharing the lessons I have learned along the way.
Really? Well, maybe not yet. But just as the “lie” of being a yoga teacher turned into the truth… so the power of these words will manifest, until I am typing a post looking back on this one, and reflecting about the power of intention.
I guess one of the main things that I want to share openly about becoming Stoked Yogi is that I am far from perfect. I didn’t grow up at the beach, surfing and practicing yoga and having a gorgeous husband. The path that I took to get here was winding, bumpy, and full of mistakes and misfortune. The magic in my journey, the pixie dust that is sprinkled generously all over my charmed life – it’s faith. No matter how dark, twisted, and weird the road was, the dreamer in me believed that something great was coming.
Something great is here.
Something great is now. Something great is living this beautiful, amazing life full of synchronicity, support, surf, sand, salt, sun, and smiles. Something great is my yoga. Something great is the love of every person reading this – because if you’re still reading, you really fucking love me. Something great is writing, for no other reason than the words come pouring from me. Something great is the courage to put it out there, and let it be.
So, what is it that you want to do? What has been sitting on the back burner in your life? Where can you find an hour – or ten minutes – TODAY – to live that dream? Now is the time. This is the place. There is no time except this moment to become who you want to be.
Tags: blog, inspiration, journal, motivation, stoked yogi