Breathing Time Yoga offers 1:1 Yoga Therapy and Somatic Experiencing with Karen Lee. Yoga therapy is fully customized practice of yoga, meditation, and somatics that help with anxiety, depression, insomnia, trauma, as well as physical aches and pains. Appointments take place virtually, but nonetheless are a time of personal connection.

Read More about Yoga Therapy here.

Book a free 30 minute consult or an appointment with Karen Lee here.

Tapping into Joy

We must tap into our joy. It is essential if we are going to show up for the way the world is unfolding around us, and take our place, where ever that is, doing whatever we are well suited to do, in standing up for what we value.

Joy is what will give us the strength and power to do what we must do.

Sometimes things are very hard, and seem endless, impossible. 
On May 16 I was in the middle of a walking pilgrimage in Scotland. Over the previous week or so I’d walked over 87 miles. I was now crossing Rannoch Moor, a hike of over 13 miles.

I was in a completely alien landscape, treeless, windswept and wet. I knew if I stepped off the trail I could fall into a bog, possibly unable to get out, possibly never be found.

I was damp. I was a little cold. My feet hurt. I had been hiking up a hill that seemed to never stop. I’d see what I thought was the top, and then get there and find out, there was yet more. I’d gone 4 miles uphill. My ankles turned with every step on the uneven road surface. I was developing tendonitis in my left ankle.

I was alone. There was no way to opt out of the next several hours of walking. I was feeling, at best, skeptical. I saw the only possible place to shelter and looked at it with longing, but went on.

I stopped and centered myself. I turned toward the sky and the earth and the elements and opened my heart with deep appreciation of their beauty, breathing in their fundamental generosity that makes life itself possible, all life, my life. I loved the rain. I loved the people who built the road in the 17th century. I loved the bleakness of moor, the mountains, the amazing sky and clouds. I loved all the people who passed me (slow poke that I am.) I even loved my body, still carrying me, despite the pain and fatigue.

And in so doing I found joy, a joy that carried me through the final miles to my resting place for the evening. By the time I got to Kings House, my legs were swollen, the ankle needed ice, I needed food and rest. But carrying me still was the joy.

Joy, born out of appreciation and gratitude of the earth, the web of life and our place within that web is powerful. It can give us the strength we need to face life’s challenges.

This skill of developing joy is something you can learn, you can experience, and through practicing it, develop your own power to show up.

Whatever challenges you are facing, whether you are concerned about personal challenges, illness, aging, financial troubles, or more the more global challenges of our times, I believe this practice can help you.

I’d like to invite you to join me in a community of people learning The Art of Pilgrimage, as an everyday practice, available to you, where ever you live.

Email Karen to Find Out More

But if you can’t join this community, please, please, find your source of joy and plug in every day, and then do what you can, find a way forward in your personal life, or in addressing the global concerns you feel passionate about.