It could have been magic, but I turned away. It had been a long day. Kyen kept me up most of the night with his snoring (he was sleeping with us because of his cold). I spent an hour cooking a homemade veggie burger that was bland and not worth the big mess in my recently cleaned kitchen. The dogs were barking to go outside, even though they had been out just 45 minutes earlier. …
Yoga is a practice of awareness. When we get on our mat, the first step in our practice is to become aware of our physical body. Our teacher invites us to observe our breath, notice the thoughts racing through our head, feel where our body is touching the floor. Then, we move into a greater sense of awareness with intentional action. We deepen our breath to create the yogic breathing, called Ujjayi. We focus our …
They say the third time’s the charm. Joy Discovered is my third blog and finally, I have gotten it right. My first blog HappyLifeYoga was created in 2010 to share what I was learning about myself and the world through the practice and study of yoga. Then I built SaraMuellerNow in 2011 to market my yoga teaching and writing. When I went back to work full-time in the conference production industry in 2013, I turned …
Wow, India. What a freaking smack-me-in-the-face change-my-life experience. I am not sure yet why I was meant to go on that trip, but it has impacted me greatly. My heart is broken for the so many people of India that live in poverty and also for our planet that is incredibly polluted. I truly have never seen so much poverty and pollution in my life as I did in Mumbai. I haven’t cried, been angry, …
I didn’t take pictures once we officially entered the slum. I could barely step one foot in front of the other. I volunteered in the slums of Salvador, Brazil, for 13 weeks after college. The favelas, as they were called, ran out of space for dwelling so inhabitants started building “homes” on stilts in the water (called palafitas). I visited the tiny rural village in Talanga, Honduras, where my brother Tyler volunteered for a year. …