I Am Only Getting Started

Hi. Welcome. My name is Erika and I wanted to share a bit about myself and my background. In sharing, I hope to inspire others with my story.

I was born in Wetzlar, Germany and no, I am not German. My dad was in in the military and served for 22 years. I grew up moving around depending on the duty station that he was assigned. We usually lived each place for about 3 years, sometimes more and sometimes less. I have a brother and sister and I am the youngest sibling. My parents have been the biggest support and inspiration for a lot of things I have accomplished in my life and without them, of course, I would not even have a life (lol). I have lived in TN, KY, NC, and Europe.

I was pretty active growing up. I played tennis and softball. I ran track, did gymnastics, cheerleading and dance. I am very grateful for my parents being able to take me to all of these different activities. I think my favorite was gymnastics though. I truly enjoyed it and wish that I had not given up on it so long ago. (I'll share more about this in another post.)

Fast forward, I am in college. I attended University of Alabama in Huntsville; however, I earned my bachelor's degree from an online university. At UAH I took my first yoga class. I needed a few more credit hours for the semester and I thought, why not take a yoga class because that will be an easy grade. I truly enjoyed taking the yoga class. I met one of my really great friends in that yoga class and we are still great friends after 11 years. That yoga class inspired me to continue my practice. At the time I did not know it was "my practice" but I truly enjoyed doing the poses or asanas. My main reason for continuing yoga, at the time, was because I loved how cool the poses were. And I loved how cool (in my head) I thought I looked doing the poses. I did find this to not be true. Over time my practice developed by watching YouTube videos, reading books from the library and looking up reputable websites with information to help me develop my practice more.

Yoga was not what I originally thought it was. First, yoga is not "only for white people." Yoga is not demonic, perhaps it is your perspective and the environment you created within your practice that just truly did not align with you and that is ok. Yoga is not a religion. Yoga is simply the yoking of the mind, body and spirit, the 3 things that we are all made of. There are endless benefits to yoga for your entire body, your mind, to help gain clarity, improve your breathing, help prevent or reduce anxiety and depression as well as stress. The list of benefits goes on and besides, our bodies need movement, why not move positively intentionally in order to reap the benefits. Yoga keeps the mind sharp. I say all of that to say, in the beginning even though I thought I was practicing for the wrong reasons, it led me along this beautiful journey to improve my life and others around me that would like to do the same.

I slowly started to practice yoga more because my breathing was improving, my mind became clearer, I became more flexible and gained strength. I still really enjoyed getting into the asanas because I loved to challenge myself and see what I am really capable of with my body. There are actually 8 Limbs of yoga, and it is not only about the poses, postures or asanas, as some call it. Yoga is about so much more. As I continued my practice, I also became more aware. I became more aware of my surroundings. I became more aware of my own thoughts. I became more aware of certain parts of my body that I had no idea even existed. I felt muscles in places I had never felt, and it was the most amazing feeling. In yoga we create space, space within our bodies. We are able to release anything that no longer serves us. This may seem selfish to some, but how does one expect to receive from others when that person has not even served themselves. We must take care of ourselves and with yoga I am able to keep my mind clear, my body aligned and my breath intact. I could go on and on about why I love yoga and how I continue to love it more, the more I learn.

I have been committed to my yoga journey for 11 years and counting! My practice is for me. Each person's practice is their own. We all learn at different paces, and we are all different (period). My arms are long, and some people have short arms. I am short in height, coming in at a whopping 5'0 and others who practice are 6'0. I knew after only practicing for a short period of time that I would want to be a yoga teacher one day.

Rewind. Growing up I always invited my two best friends over to play school. My parents had given me an old typewriter that still worked, until it didn't (lol). But I loved creating homework sheets and a class roster. I created all the students first and last names, I called roll and basically taught school in my bedroom. It was my dream to become a schoolteacher and teach children. I did not even go to college for teaching, I went for Civil Engineering. I love architecture and buildings and floor plans. I love to draw houses and took a CAD class in high school because I decided to attend tech school. Once I got into my engineering classes, I realized it was not for me. I already did not like math, and I was not about to take Differential Equations or anything else. So, I then switched to business. At first it seemed like I was taking the "easy" way out. Engineering is definitely not easy, but business has its own challenges as well. We are all on our own journey and what works for one person, may not work for another and that is in regard to everything about life.

Fast Forward to today. I'm a yoga teacher! I am not the schoolteacher I thought I would be, but I am so thankful that everything in my life led me to this point! I will share more about yoga, my journey, my yoga business (yes! I have my own business, I never thought that would happen) and so much more! Stick around, you just might like it here.

I want to thank you for taking the time to read this post today. Maybe it resonated with you in some way or maybe this post verified that you won't be back (lol). I know I am not for every person, and I am ok with that.

Wishing you peace, love, health, wealth and abundance!

Erika