By Lynda Shadbolt
I suggest to my yoga students “let the beauty that you love be who you are.” Rumi wrote it and knew that love is stronger than hate. And being loving cultivating love takes practice. Love has a higher vibration than hate or fear or doubt and can be powerful in every situation in life.
In yoga we talk about having the intention of cultivating love inner peace and kindness in our hearts as we practice. We don’t always feel that way or get it right in every pose or class but it is our intention. Over time we keep holding that intention and then we take that into our lives.
A great way to begin the practice is to simply love the fact that our body is breathing. We are all breathing every day all day and there is nothing not to love about it. Without the breath we would die. We never want to take it for granted. Each of us can love feeling the breath move in the body or love the speed of it or love all the parts of the body that are making it happen.
Focusing on that love builds an attitude of gratitude. And from gratitude we foster kindness and inner peace. And then we take that into our day and to all of our interactions.
I heard a song recently that said “everything good starts from the inside out.” All the good things start in the heart and resonates from there. Having a practice where we turn off the outside world and open our inner vision can be very useful in reminding us of our own inner love kindness compassion and gratitude.
There are so many examples of people who radiate big hearts in our community. Sue Rae works at Stuart Baker Elementary School as an educational assistant. She has been an EA for over 20 years. Prior to that she worked at Wee Care for 11 years and prior to that she worked for the Resource Centre which became CHACE and Early Years Centre. For more than 30 years Sue has been working with young children and if you talk to any of her peers they will tell you that she is an angel. She loves the kids and is kind and patient and has so much fun with them. How lucky are the kids that have had her as their caregiver.
Every kid wants to be loved. Sue and Katie Bjelis just won awards from the Five Counties Children’s Service for their outstanding work with children. They were given the awards last week in Peterborough. I am sure that all the children and parents would want to thank both of these women.
Our children are precious. Every parent wants their child to be successful and it takes caring people to make that happen. My daughter Madeline wrote her last high school exam on Friday. She did a victory lap and had the most fantastic year. Madeline loves learning and has had so many great teachers. She is ready to take on the world! Thanks to everyone who makes our school system great!
