16 Lessons Learned Over 16 Years of Yoga

“You’re never too old, never too bad, never too late and never too sick to start from the scratch once again.”― Bikram Choudhury

Year 1: 2002 Starting from scratch
Buy one get one free?  I tweak my neck in a posture and decide I will never return. But it is a buy one get one free. I return and am guided through class by a wonderful teacher named Jessica who prevents me from injuring myself.
Lesson Year 1: Sometimes you need to give yoga a second chance.

Year 2: 2003
"Most people either have flexibility or strength. It is easier to gain flexibility if you have strength. It is harder to gain strength if you are flexible." I have neither.
Lesson Year 2: Yoga is challenging.

Year 3: 2004 Starting from scratch again
My Jeep wrangler rolls four times off a freeway. I miraculously survive. After being released from the hospital, I somehow (no memory- had a concussion) arrive at yoga. I am unable to do any posture. I stand in the room, attempting incremental movements. The pain is severe. I cry. I do not leave the room. The next day, I hurt, but am able to move my head 1/4 of an inch more than I could the day before.
Lesson Year 3: Yoga is painful but kind

Year 4: 2005
I am on an adventure in Australia. I am in the middle of the Outback in Western Australia after having been on a bus for 24 hours. My whole body aches. I trek into the bush and do yoga. I feel miraculously improved. I continue this throughout my explorations.
Lesson Year 4: Yoga is adaptable.

Year 5: 2006: US/ NZ
I want to prove my practice is good. A teacher corrects my posture and advises me on changes that have occurred in the dialogue since I was out of the country. This teacher also recognizes I have several areas I need to improve upon. At first, I want to argue with the teacher. How embarrassing that I have been doing so many things incorrectly! But then, I take another look in the mirror.
Lesson Year 5: Yoga is humbling. 

Year 6: 2007 Adventure around the United States.
I print out the list of all Bikram Yoga studios in the USA and head off on a year-long road trip.
Lesson Year 6: Yoga is my compass

Year 7: 2008 Melbourne, Australia
I don't want to go to yoga. I am homesick and very sad. I miss my family and feel unfulfilled in my life. Sometimes the hardest part of going to yoga is getting into the room.

Lesson year 7: Yoga is facing and accepting yourself in the mirror







Year 8: 2009 Melbourne, Australia
I am so happy to be practicing yoga that I need to share my joy. I recruit friends and students I work with to try the yoga.

Kari flies from the US to AUS and does yoga

Lesson Year 8: Yoga is contagious

Year 9: 2010 Melbourne, Australia
If I'm awake enough to debate going to yoga, I am awake enough to GO to yoga.
I will wake up at 0440 am to ride my bike 2.5 miles uphill to get to the nearest Bikram Yoga Studio.

Lesson Year 9: Yoga is dedication to a higher self.











Year 10: 2011 AUS/USA
In a year where trauma and heartbreak are experienced, my salvation is yoga.
Lesson Year 10: Yoga frees the heart and the soul.

Year 11: 2012
For eleven years, I have practiced in baggy shorts and t-shirts. For years, I have adamantly re
fused to conform. One day a teacher tells me, "how can you improve your practice if you can't see your body?" This is such a good point that I immediately buy yoga clothes. And wouldn't you know it? I wasn't actually sucking my stomach in?

Lesson Year 11: Yoga is a MIND/BODY connection and what better way to grasp this union then half clothed?





Year 12: 2013
Significant life issues happen. Through it all, I have yoga.




Lesson year 12: Yoga is perseverance and strength. 

Year 13: 2014 The year of teacher training
The studio I practice at rally together and help me pursue teacher training. Without the love and support of Bikram Yoga Pasadena, I would not have been able to attend teacher training. 

Lesson year 13: Yoga is community [I am so grateful for this].


Year 14: 2015 Baltimore, MD
Nursing school, snow storms, and riots will not stop me from practicing and teaching yoga.
Lesson year 14: Yoga is integrity and commitment 









Year 15: 2016  The year I meet my fiance at a coffee shop.

He recognizes our mutual interest in yoga from my matching BYSJ key chains. I persuade him to take my class. He does. Later on, we meet and practice together.
Later this year, he flies out to Virginia and allows me to subject him to a private class of 123 degrees and 48% humidity.
Lesson year 15: Love is yoga, and yoga is love.

Year 16: 2017 Start from scratch again
"What's wrong with you?" my sister Romy asks me five days post-op from arthroscopic knee surgery, as I sit on the couch sobbing uncontrollably. "I left you for five minutes!" she explains. I tell her that the studio that kindly allowed me to practice Bikram yoga doesn't want me to come to the studio unless I'm fully weight bearing. "Well, where is the nearest Bikram studio?" "1.5 hours away!" I exclaim sadly. "Okay, let's go!" she says. "What?!" I ask, as my emotions shift dramatically. "I'll drive you!" she says with a smile. I almost cry again with joy! We get to the studio and I hop out of the car with my crutches, sling my yoga mat and bag around my shoulders, and run as fast as crutches will carry me to the studio.

December 2016

I need yoga in my life.

One year post-op, 12/2017

Mary Ann Nassa

Later on this year, I gain guidance and mentorship from Mary Ann Nassa, who shows me how to heal myself.









Lesson Year 16: Bikram Yoga is accepting. As quoted above, you are never too old, too sick or too bad to start from scratch again, again, again, again, again.