Miracles Under The Full Moon Flow

On Friday night I had the pleasure of teaching midnight yoga on the beach to 28 yogis (many first timers!) under the twinkling stars and the light of the full moon. It was an awesome, magical experience that I am so grateful to have been a part of. Thank you to Matt Reedy and Leapfrog Running for making this extraordinary event happen! Many students saw a shooting star while in bridge pose; how cool is that?!

A few "yogic" lessons emerged from our practice next to the waves of the Gulf on Friday night. The one that sticks out to me the most is to learn to go with the flow, as we had to do a lot during that class. For the experienced yogis, being outside at night practicing with the grass beneath our mats was much different than practicing in a yoga studio. We had to go with the flow as the mosquitoes came out to feast on our skin while we got our sweat on. Instead of letting the skeeters ruin our night, we learned to accept what is and find the beauty and magic in the experience, even if that experience resulted in a few bug bites.

We had to go with the flow in dancer pose and the other balancing asanas with the uneven grassy ground under our feet. For some, balancing was easier this way; for others, it was more of a challenge. But the uneven grassy ground is what was there, so that's what we embraced. We also had to go with the flow when a police officer interrupted our pigeon pose to check beach parking. While the presence of the officer was distracting for a moment, we went with the flow and allowed the minor distraction to be just that: minor. We did not dwell on the policeman's presence or the interruption, just like we don't dwell on the intense stretch we feel in half pigeon, but allow our self to surrender into the pose, into the moment, to experience it for what it is. I could still be fuming at that police officer, but what good would that do me?

I never know what life is going to give me. I can never plan a "perfect" experience. I never know how my yoga practice - under the full moon or in the studio - is going to be. But I can learn to go with the flow. Yoga teaches us to take what we are dealt and make it good, to find the beauty in the moment instead of the agony, to flow with life instead of fighting it all the time. For some, the experiences of beach yoga could have been a fight or agonizing. But if you choose to open up to the miracle of each moment, each experience, life will flow a lot more gracefully.

Albert Einstein said, “There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle." Under the twinkling stars and glowing full moon, us midnight yogis chose to live our life as if the entire experience that night was a magical miracle. And it was.