I first want to share with you how very blessed I feel to be able to share the practice of yoga with you all. I wanted to give you a little insight into Om Sweet Om, and how it came to be. I figured I owe you that after 8 years. Apropos of today being Valentine's Day, to quote a lyric from Savage Garden "I knew I loved you before I met you". This is the way Om Sweet Om began. I have always felt the need to share what I love, and playing it safe has never been my style. So throwing all caution to the wind, a seed planted by two good friends became a reality. It has not always been an easy road to travel, but an abundant one in love and friendship. This is what life is all about at the end of the day anyway.

Because of the love and support that I have received in my life, I was able to bring this practice to those of you who now love yoga and can't imagine it not being in your life. I knew that it was a practice that needed to be shared, no matter what. So sacrifices are made, and at the end of the day seem so well worth it when you see how far you've come. It is like the practice, just show up to your mat.

"Perhaps in return for conquest, arrogance and spoilation, India will teach us the tolerance and gentleness of the mature mind, the quiet content of the unacquisitive soul, the calm of the understanding spirit, and a unifying, a pacifying love for all living things." ~Will Durant ( American Historian)

So in reflecting upon the trip to India, I don't want you to be disappointed because we didn't come back with any new yoga techniques.... We will however be forever changed. We came to India to be our yoga, not do our yoga. It's so easy to do that in India, everyone lives their yoga. From the woman selling wares on the beach right down to the people of higher stature that we would meet, when you look people in their eyes, you see their souls. You see the joy and the pain. Part of this is because they are willing to be transparent, something that we have a hard time with in our country. Which leads me back to Valentine's Day... to loving ourselves enough to let people in. Our practice helps to break the barrier that keeps us from letting people in. In India there is a spirituality that exists that I think every human being longs for. It's connection. It's about showing up, and being who you are and willing to be yourself. There is such a comfort in that. In not having to pretend you are anything other than who you are. It's about loving yourself. My mother always said you had to love yourself before you could love someone else, and that advice worked well for me. Luckily I was able to meet the love of my life who allows me to be the person I am. I was able to go to India and know that he was ok with my being on this journey, and he was comfortable enough to know that I was not going to run away with some guru or come back so different that I had no room for him.

So for those of you who want to know more about our journey to India, we will be offering an evening of photos and videos of our trip. The date will be in March, we just have to finalize details and we will get them to you. That way you can hear from all of us about all the great things we experienced.

"There are some parts of the world that, once visited, get into your heart and won't go. For me, India is such a place. When I first visited, I was stunned by the richness of the land, by its lush beauty and exotic architecture, by its ability to overload the senses with the pure, concentrated intensity of its colors, smells, tastes, and sounds. It was as if all my life I had been seeing the world in black and white and, when brought face-to-face with India, experienced everything re-rendered in brilliant technicolor."~ Keith Bellows (Vice-President, National Geographic Society)