So- the holidays are finally over. Gifts given, received, opened and enjoyed. Meals(ssssss) eaten. Stretch pants stretched. Mass quantities of chocolate consumed, bottles of liquor emptied. Christmas crap packed away again until next year (possibly “missing,” “accidentally” some um, adorable singing decorations a super thoughtful relative smuggled to your children. Those might have landed in the recycle bin. Maybe. Honest mistake…).

Hopefully you also brought in the New Year with social media photo headliners sans duck lips, misinterpreted gang signs or any other brilliantly bad ideas made in front of a camera lens circa midnight last night.

Wait- “brought” in? As in the past tense of “bring?”  As in 2013 is OVER? Like, over, over? Well that escalated quickly. 

Holy shit it’s 2014.

Two thousand fourteen. Say that again, a few times. Wow. So the fact that your server at brunch this morning (who you thought looked like a “baby”) is from the Class of 2004 actually means he graduated uh, a decade ago. . . F#*k. You were supposed to have ______ by now (insert a lofty goal there, whichever one you made say, this time last year. . .).

Shit.

Or not shit, actually. Let’s switch that word out for “WHOO HOO” or maybe “YIPPEE,” or, dare we try a “HELL YEAH!” Can I get an Amen up in here? How ‘bout a hallelujah? Okay, fine, I’ll stop with the glee club/televised church sermon posing- I was a terrible cheerleader the one year I floundered at trying anyway.

But really, time is flying by, fast. Fast, fast. Like, I feel the need, the need for speed (and yes, I just dated myself again with a “Top Gun” reference, what can I say- I like to quote original cinematic art. . .). Fast can certainly mean your life is too busy, too full, and can serve as a reminder that you may be choosing to spend your time on energy on things that in the end, aren’t where you might best be spending them. That in itself is a lesson worth having, and as many times as necessary.

However, fast can be an indicator of a good thing; if you choose to see it that way. For example, I swear I blinked and suddenly I was in my mid-thirties but still felt like a teenager cloaked in a grown-up disguise (so. . .yeah. To whom shall I address my letter of complaint regarding this promoted adulthood? Any takers? Nobody? Damn. Totally saw that one coming).  For sure I’ve had pain, and suffering, and challenges I didn’t/couldn’t resolve. I’ve had heaps of it all, to be quite honest, but also I’ve had a whole lot of fun, and fun goes by quickly. Like, if fun were personified into a superhero I’m pretty certain it would be called “the Flash.”

When things aren’t going well the pace is anything but fast. Ever sprinted a minute on a treadmill? Longest.minute.ever. Rested before the next HI in your HIIT? shortest.half-a-minute.in.history. Hate your job? Longest days in the world. Sat through an all day meeting? Pretty sure you were part of a science experiment to gauge human reactions to extended discomfort.

So, with a little perspective shift, fast just might mean your life is quite the ride you’d hoped it would be, full of life, friends and joyful moments passed quickly but long remembered. If you want to keep enjoying the trip, you’d better slow down and speed up. Be quick but don’t hurry. Stay focused but be flexible. Look ahead but be present. Yes, I would like to drop another metaphorical oxymoron to explain myself, thanks for the encouragement.

What I’m saying is- have at least a sense of what train track you’re jumping on, buckle up for the ride and then my darling, let it go. Put out there what you want, keep moving forward then and be present and aware when it comes.

Ready to put this into practice (he, he, pun intended, keep reading)?

The first morning of 2014 I chose to start the year off right and I dragged my tired ass to the first yoga practice of the day at Zuda. This was my tired, limping, ass I might add. Note to self- possibly do not go ahead and decide to bust out the full splits on both sides the same night you plan to wear sparkly heels later. It’s entirely possible that while yes- you can legitimately bend like our flexible green friend Gumby, he was like 10, you are um, not, and your hip might hate you for playing the role of poser. So you miiiiiggggghhhhhtt be hobbling out of the studio looking for flip flops instead of your precious foot bling.

I hear you universe. I’ll slow down. A little. Just enough.

So, in any case, as the universe’s reward/lesson/reaffirmation/spiritual awakening continuation, our most incredible instructor lead us into the practice with a declaration exercise. She asked us to choose one word that represented what we wanted for ourselves for 2014. Not a resolution, not a promise, not a goal. An empowerment. A source of strength and growth. One word that described what we were prepared to offer and receive for ourselves.  One word that would carry us through this year, allowing us to develop, to cultivate goodness, generate change, give to others and generally be the best version of us. Just one word. Yikes.

After working through a seriously fabulous series of flows that included, no joke, a full out dance party to Pitbull (in 95 degrees, in a room PACKED with 65 people who had been in motion for about 50 minutes), we returned to our word. We came back in a state of quasi-meditation to reflect on our word, how we demonstrated it in on our mat and how we would continue to manifest it off the mat- where the “real” yoga happens. Then we shared them, out loud.

Let me tell you, listening to a room full of people finish this sentence “I am____” with words like “enough,” “strong,” “inspiring,” “happy,” “thriving,” and “alive” moved me past my standard goosebump reaction straight into tears (luckily this is the one place where the combination of the stream of sweat rolling down your face plus a group of incredible people make my silent crybaby nonsense kind of super player, spiritual gangster behavior. PHEW. I think I might just never leave the room).

Dying to know what my word was? Oh I’ll tell you. What would this be if not a platform for oversharing after all?

Not surprisingly, there was a regular vocabulary battle happening up in my head as soon as I heard the word “word.” I changed my mind about thirty- five times in three seconds. However there was one word I kept landing on in between firing rounds of sophisticated lexicon wars. One word that for me- summed up the whole shebang.

The word I came to was AMAZING.

Today, and everyday, I choose to be Amazing. To give amazing. To show amazing. To love amazing. To bring amazing in and put amazing out. To live, Amazing.

What’s your word? To whom will you give it today? Tomorrow? Next week? Next month? Next year? How will you give it? Say it out loud. Write it down. Own it. It’s yours. Use the law of attraction to get it. Do it, give it, be it, live it.

Go light yourself on fire friends; success won’t happen as a result of spontaneous combustion; set your own flame.

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