Yogasana found me in 2005 when I was a senior at Clarkston High. I didn’t play sports or dance and most social gatherings made me very anxious. I spent most of my time as a giant nerdy stress ball, taking the hardest classes and working out obsessively on the equipment in my mom’s basement. When it came time to choose electives, I chose female conditioning because I figured that working out at school-as terrifying as locker rooms were- would be great, as it would give me more time to study at home. Yea…high school hadn’t been too great.

Well, the class was full so my advisor strongly urged me to take a stress-management class. I wasn’t good at confrontation, so I said ok. But the thought disgusted me because it seemed like something a lazy person would do.

I remember learning my first postures in the wrestling room full of girls. Our yoga instructor was a DVD. Despite not knowing the eight limbed path; despite not knowing how to breathe; despite not knowing the first thing about relaxation…I found santosha and moksha (contentent and liberation) within those first few classes.

What the hell was happening to me? My brain had stopped spinning and I realized that I had to be kind to my self in order to move freely in class. I found that I was actually strong and open and, well, pretty much dealing with the same crap as all the other girls in the room who had always seemed pretty perfect to me. I discovered that in order to have a good savasana (corpse pose at the end of class), I had to have a nonviolent practice. Which meant I had to eat well and sleep well and breathe well. My heels didn’t even reach the floor in downward facing dog. And I could not have cared less!

I found Hilltop when I was a junior in college. Six months later, I worked up enough courage to walk through the doors. About four months after that I took Hilaire’s 200-hour teacher training and last fall I trained for my 500-hour certification. My sangha has become my family and I am so thankful for their generous compassion and patience with me.

The practice doesn’t quit on you. And once you know yourself, you realize you cant quit on it. Because what you begin to recognize is regardless of when you found asana, you already knew yoga. Yoga is what happens when you soften into knowing that you are your own greatest mystery, dearest friend, strongest fighter and wisest teacher. Yoga doesn’t really change you; it introduces you to the best pieces of who you always were.

I hope you know how entitled you are to peace, how capable you are of strength, and how perfectly infinite you have always been. Shanti.