I need to write more. I also need to give less fucks about stuff being “good enough” and just get words out into the world. This is what is happening right now;  me putting “pen to paper” and just throwing ideas down on the page and throwing limiting ideas out with the bathwater.
Speaking of giving less fucks…
The yamas and the niyamas are ethical principles of yogic philosophy described in the first two limbs of Patanjali’s eightfold path.  They are moral codes suggesting restraints (yamas) and “things to do” (niyamas) to live a just, meaningful life.  I am sure that there are analogous principles or aphorisms in other traditions (Ten Commandments, “do unto others…,” never eat bagel bites straight out of the oven, et al.). One of the five yamas, which principally focus on our interactions with others and the world beyond us, involves the concept of Brahmacharya.  According to Patanjali, this yama is focused on the clear and deliberate use of energy. Acknowledging the profound power of sexual energy, it was originally applied to celibacy, but can be much more widely applied to deliberate use of energy and resources (or non-excess).  
“Anything that weakens you spiritually, emotionally, or physically; reject it as poison.” Swami Vivekananda.
Mic.
Drop.
As Swami Vivekananda suggests above, we only have so much energy. Brahmacharya pertains to a use of that time and energy in ways that are nourishing to us. So that may mean not eating a whole bag of Samoa Girl Scout Cookies for dinner (shout out Troop Beverly Hills, peak Shelley Long!). It may also mean not participating in relationships that do not feed you emotionally, not volunteering to host your book club again, or saying no to a party invitation because you are not feeling up for socializing. 
Using the example of saying what you need in the context of a party invitation...what can sometimes happen is that folks just choose to avoid the invitation and ghost away or use very ambiguous, non-committal language. This can be confusing to the recipient and selfish (keeps the “sayers” options open, and keeps the “hearer” guessing at what someone wants/needs/how they feel) and a remarkably tedious and energy draining way to communicate! As well, it discredits both parties as it assumes that someone cannot handle your feelings/wishes/setting boundaries.  It can be on the surface passed off a as a “way to spare” someone’s feelings, but is often just a way for the “sayer” to avoid whatever negative emotion they may have about POSSIBLY DISAPPOINTING someone or missing out on something! We can handle it! You can handle it! We are made to bear difficulty. Sitting in discomfort (whatever that may be) is a skill that can be practiced, and is entirely possible! Also emotional discomfort is temporary. And emotions are just sensations…we can trust ourselves to just experience our feelings, not get caught in stories around them (tricky!), and move on, just like waves they will pass (the “good” and “bad” feelings, which is both heartening and dismaying to consider). 
Being conscious of your needs and open and clear in sharing them, are benevolent acts that preserve valuable energy.  By being direct about communicating how you feel and what you need and having clear boundaries around those things you both respect another person’s time and energy and also their emotional ability to cope with whatever you tell them (they can handle their shit...not yours to manage) AND also frees your mind up for not having to stress about how you are going to “get out” of that thing that you did not want to do anyways.  All of which are soul and relationship feeding, and all of which preserve precious energy for what matters to you.
For me this is particularly relevant in my interpersonal relationships (dating, friends, family).  I care about what people think about me; go ahead and analyze it on any level that you want, it is just a part of me (the need for love and acceptance is a part of most people; if we did not care at all what others thought of us, we may be diagnosed with psychopathy).  I am aware of my desire for acceptance and am usually conscious of the ways in which it manifests for me and continue to remain curious when things come up that might rub up against my “wanting to be liked.”  Examples of this include feeling as though I am in charge of” others’ emotional experiences, spending time and energy doing things for others even when we only have a surface relationship, organizing social events, feeling responsible for others’ physical safety and so on. When things come up, I try to just notice what is happening; my mind may whirr with possibility, “oh it is so and so’s birthday on Thursday, I should bake a cake, organize a dinner, and oh yeah, write a birthday rap about them (one of my specialities!) I can just notice that my mind is doing that and just continue whirring. Or I can notice it, and ask myself “why might you do those things? would that be fun for you? Would that nourish you right now? Do they even want those things (step 1)?” and so on. This is an opportunity to both notice my mind and also ask myself if this is a good use of my energies in this immediate moment, and is this a good use of my energies in the longer run (is this relationship worth putting that much energy into or not?) And WHY am I putting that much energy into it? Do I just want someone to like me? Do I feel like that person would feel good being acknowledged? Do I feel like it is my “responsibility” to help them feel acknowledged? Does that feed me?
The most common response to this inquiry, in a situation in which the relationships IS a substantive, nourishing one,  is that it is both self and other feeding. Yes, this is something that they would like, yes, I want them to like me, yes, I think it is fun to do, yes it helps me feel good to be able to “show up” for someone in that way and yes, I want them to feel acknowledged. This is discernment; giving a fuck when it matters. This is using energy in a deliberate and soul feeding way. This is brahmacharya everybody! And if I responded "no" to any of those things, or if a relationship or experience is not nourishing me, then I don't need to participate in it; nothing wrong with me, the other person, the experience, just a choice about where and how to use my resources.
So don’t f around with people or situations that don’t nourish you. You just don’t need to give a fuck! And not giving a fuck does not mean ANYTHING about you or the other person (no value judgements on either! Both of you are still lovely and whole people) It just means that you have chosen to use your energies in a different way.  “You only have so many fucks to give” as Mark Manson says, so you might as well be intentional about the ways in which you use the energy and time that you have.  
Compliment this writing with William James on Attention (from my beloved Brain Pickings):
https://www.brainpickings.org/2016/03/25/william-james-attention/
Here is a link to the Mark Manson article referenced:
http://markmanson.net/not-giving-a-fuck
Yamas and Niyamas
Yoga Journal article:
http://www.yogajournal.com/article/yoga-101/live-your-yoga-discover-yamas-niyamas/
Book about Yogic Philosophy (there are a zillion of varying levels of comprehensiveness and quality):
Eliade, M. (1975). Patanjali and yoga.
Molly Lannon Kenny, a remarkable person and yoga teacher. The person who first exposed me to the teaching of Patanjuli:
http://mollylannonkenny.org/
 
 

I just saw this the other day and thought that it was great! Incidentally, Stuff Mom Never Told You podcast takes on some interesting topics and provides accessible science to guide discussions of everything from gender-based violence, to Taylor Swift, to erotica, women in construction, and so on. Hearty recommendation!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j4jlC2Ao-Bs

If you are anything like me, you may be well practiced in the ways of self-criticism (not your fault, many biological, interpersonal, historical, social and cultural variables influence this tendency).  Self-criticism can rob us of our ability to connect with ourselves and others in a meaningful way, impacts our health and well-being, and depletes valuable and unique human resources from the world! Researcher Lisa Firestone PhD says that self-criticism is antagonistic to the self and to forces in us that are life affirming (http://www.psychalive.org/critical-inner-voice/).
So please please please be kind to yourself and let your light shine! Surround yourself with others who also let their light shine and support yours shining; the world needs you to be the best version of yourself.
The Good News:
If self-criticism is a part of your life and you would like for it not to be, there is good news.  Research suggests that we can change our habitual mind habits and create more ease in our lives and improve our health and relationships! I might suggest the following:
Some people believe the self-criticism or shaming or diminishing ourselves plays an important role in "keeping ourselves in line" or being successful. We do not exist in a vacuum; the belief that self-criticism can be beneficial is common, came from somewhere (not just inside your head or even from your family, however upbringing and genetics do play a role), and has become deeply rooted in the colonized Americas.
The following practices might help you "get at" your own beliefs about self-criticism and your relationship to it. Feel free to do all of them, or just pick a few that speak to you.
a. Ask yourself and reflect upon the following "what role do I think self-criticism plays in my life?" "What might be "good" about that?" "What might be "bad" about that?" "Does the "good" outweigh the "bad"? Do I really have an interest in eliminating, managing, or modifying my relationship to self-criticism in any way? If not, then keep on doing what you are doing. No judgement in that.
b. Connect with a trusted other and talk with them about how they perceive your relationship to yourself/the ways in which you talk to yourself. Those that love us can provide valuable insight (choose wisely someone who you feel you can be vulnerable with and someone who you trust to be both honest and discerning with you. As well be prepared for the possibility to hear things that may be challenging to hear.
c. Engage in a new activity! Anything that you have never done or have little experience in...how does it go? What are your expectations of yourself going into it? How do you respond to yourself and your own capabilities? Did you become frustrated? Why? How did you respond to that feeling of frustration? What did those feelings that you had in the activity feel in your physical body (knot in your stomach, heart at ease, rocks in your throat, etc.) How did you feel about the activity and yourself engaging in it the day after?
d. Visualize a time when you felt that you failed at something. If this feels difficult, you can visualize an experience that someone has told you about, or visualize something that you could imagine another person or yourself experiencing. What happened? What did that feel like in your physical body? How did you respond to yourself? How did others respond to you? What emotions did you have around that experience? What helped you "work with" or "work through" that experience? If you are thinking of an experience that happened to someone else, how did you feel as the "outside observer" to that experience? 
There are a lot more activities that can help you explore our relationship to self-criticism (and begin cultivating self-compassion), but I will stop here (feel free to connect if you'd like more).
If you've concluded that you would like to eliminate or moderate the tendency to self-criticize in your life, read on!
There is a lot that we can do to work with our tendency to self-criticize (again for more resources, feel free to connect or see web resources at the bottom of this post).  One practice that I have found helpful is to simply notice; notice your thoughts, notice where your mind takes you during the day; notice your response to those thoughts; do you believe them? Always? Sometimes? Which ones tend to "stick?" Deliberately noticing where your mind goes, will help you to see if/when you fall into the same or similar "mind tapes" or habitual patterns of thought. Explore the content of those thoughts; are they kind and accepting of the person that you are in this moment?? Or are they not? Don't judge, just notice.
Noticing the habits of your mind will also enable you to intentionally put your thoughts and mind elsewhere. Your life can be what you pay attention to; so what are you noticing about the places that your mind goes in your day and how it is supporting the person that you want to be in the world?  When you notice where your mind goes, be kind to it; your mind does a lot of hard and good work for you, (including all of its thought generation, helpful or not).  Then choose not to believe diminishing, untruthful thoughts. If those thoughts have associated emotions and/or physical sensations, notice those emotions (or the emotions that you have labeled this to be). Notice how that feels physically in your body. Don't judge, just notice. Then take care of whatever sensations and emotions are coming up for you; stay with the sensations...do your very best to not hop on the thought-train for a high speed ticket to suffering and self-criticism. Offer yourself loving-kindness or unconditional positive regard (as it is called in some circles). I have a teacher that refers to himself as "love." You might say "Oh love, this hurts" or "my dear, this is hard, and I forgive you." Give yourself messages in a way that you might to someone that you love dearly or to a child. I have found that this small (but not easy) practice, can, over time deeply change the way in which you relate to yourself and as a consequence (and in parallel) to others.

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” Marianne Williamson

Resources for Cultivating Self-Compassion (these are just a few, there are many more):
Kristin Neff, self-compassion researcher: http://self-compassion.org/about/
Christopher Germer, self-compassion researcher: http://www.mindfulselfcompassion.org/
Stanford Center for Compassion and Altruism Research: http://ccare.stanford.edu/

So this will be a bit more stream of consciousness than even I typically write (fair warning!) Also this post will be about a white cis-female (me!) becoming a yoga teacher and the benefits that it brings to me now and hopefully in the future (another fair warning!) Totally self-indulgent.
I began working towards my PhD so that I could partner with others to make systemic change around the ways that we all feel in our own skin (what is “acceptable” bodies) as prescribed in the US by our narrow conceptions of “appropriate” expressions of gender, sexuality, ability, size, shape, and myriad other variables.  Without too much proselytizing or reductionism, these conceptions were formed by dominant Christian ideals which came to this land through colonization, the supremacy and reach of Westernized medicine and the medical institution, commodification and policing of bodies (Industrial Revolution and the rise of capitalism and a neoliberal state structure, changes in capitalism over time influenced by historical events such as war and technological innovation), and other powerful state and non-state entities based upon patriarchal notions of who and what has value/power/access and who/what does and should not.   In the ways that I felt that I could, I wanted to help shift these cultural norms that impact the ways that we feel in our own skin by doing research and policy work substantively around sexuality and gender.
Ultimately I wanted to help create an environment where people could feel good in their own skin and loved and accepted (not “tolerated”) for being exactly who they are; and to believe deeply that they are already enough (not perfect, and also not apathetic towards the experiences of others, or complacent towards their/our own growth), but OK just as they are.
So I started trying to do that from the most disconnected, isolating place; academia. I was trained to be with people and “doing the work,” (as a social worker) and being in the precious hallowed halls of the academy has been lonely (even with the presence of supportive faculty, staff, and fellow students).  Also, being an extreme extrovert, my being was not meant to be T-Rexing behind a computer all day long! I quit many of the things that brought meaning to my life when I began the PhD program.  And now, with intention have put old and new things back into my life with the aim to feel more connected to others and the larger world.  I have also been committed to not “waiting for this to be over” for my life to begin or segregating out parts of me while I begin to form my career.  I need to feel good in my own skin if I want to sustain this work, certainly, but also to have a meaningful, easeful, and pleasurable life.
So, yes, helping folks feel better in their own skin… I realized; “what helped me feel better in my own skin?” Oh yeah, yoga (primarily the yogic philosophical teachings that the asana can help access) and Buddhist principals; things that I have been learning and sharing and (trying) to embody for the past several years now!  Welp, it has happened.   I have proudly joined the ranks of the plethora of white, mid-thirties cis-women yoga teachers in Seattle!  Totally cool with it.  In my classes, I hope to partner with my students to create an environment of curiosity, acceptance, and healing and hopefully that goodness will be generative and move with them and those that they touch for the rest of their day.  That is how I often feel when I leave a great asana class or meditation session with one of my beloved teachers.  And sometimes I don’t, and that is cool too. The practice is the good stuff; showing up, noticing what goes down emotionally, and being kind to yourself around that, and remembering that you, just like everyone else, given all the history and experiences that you have had, and the context that you are in, are always doing your best.   
As well, I get to touch people and have them touch me (as an asana student)!  So hopefully (with appropriate boundaries and giving options to not be touched if folks don’t want to), I can help my students feel better in their own skin in the immediate moment as well!
I’m grateful for the opportunity of this new path and feel like facilitating yoga classes and partnering with others in this new forum and in the embodied, connected, grounded-in-yoga's-roots-way that I hope will help me feel more connected to my own body, to others, and to spreading good in the world in a more direct and tangible way.  

Some shit has definitely gone down in my life lately. You may or not hear about it on this site, but suffice it to say it has been a true opportunity to practice gratitude and presence and acceptance with what is, lean into the power of the kindness of others, binge on fun stuff, and fall unabashedly apart.

My recent exploits into the world of shameless emotional expression have been over the bulk bins at the grocery store, riding the bus, watching someone play Frisbee with their dog, watching someone pull their dog in a cart around my neighborhood (that is love!), watching someone pick up their dogs poop (noticing a theme here?! And I don’t even have a dog!), in yoga class, in dance class, likely in my upcoming History of Feminism’s class, at the rodeo, on a hike, that evening at some hot springs, in the car the next day, you get the picture!

In the past, and maybe you can relate to this, I felt  as though I needed to apologize for my emotions, or worse yet, not feel them (repression anyone?!) particularly the ones that we might label as “negative” such as fear, sadness, anger, uncertainty.  There were good “reasons” for this at the time, this is a very protective thing that our bodies and psyches do, however it becomes no longer useful when the threat is over.  Living with a narrow range of emotions meant an inability to feel and enjoy the depth of human experience and the richness that can come in life and relationships when you are truly living and experiencing the world fully, sadness, insecurity, hurt, joy, happiness, and all.  That invulnerability (or as  a good friend told me in few years ago, “you are untouchable…that means I cannot touch you”).  I was unable to be touched, or moved, or feel joy, or pain, or happiness in a way that made life much less meaningful.  What happens to us is part of the story, and how we relate to it and what we attend to is what shapes our experiences in the world.

So, at dare I say, the perpetual risk of analyzing my own and others’ behavior (which can be useful, but also tends to take me away from the felt, embodied experiences and has in the past been for me, used as a way to “justify” whether what I am feeling is valid or not), but anyways, indulge me for these insights.  Why not express our emotions or if we do why do we feel bad about it? Maybe we apologize for our emotions and their expressions out of fear that they may make others uncomfortable , or maybe it implies that we (heaven forbid!) might need something from someone; love, comfort, a hug, an ear, validation, and so on.  In short, it is just really really vulnerable to show the world what we are feeling.  And it is powerful!

Falling apart is powerful for so many reasons.  Repressed emotions are terrible for us! We all intuitively know this, but research suggests that repressing emotions can lead to increased physical and mental illness and seriously impacts our emotional health and well-being.  Even as far back at the late 1980’s social scientists and clinicians were interested in the role the emotional repression plays on health outcomes (see this New York Times article from 1988 at the end of this post).

But even beyond that, I think that falling apart, or really just showing our vulnerability as emotional expression, can be incredibly connecting! It allows other people an opportunity to show up for us; gives them permission to be able to help us out when we need it.  If we are feeling sad, hurt, angry, this can be a true comfort, and feel very affirming.  If we are feeling excited, like we just got great news, then this allows others to share in our delight; both really connecting and relationship deepening and calming experiences!  In fact, these acts of “micro love” shared between two or more people (even strangers!) can actually improve your overall health and well-being and just make your day feel brighter and more tied to the world around you (for more on “micro love,” see a the link below for great article by Kelly and Brooke Edwards originally published in the online publication Elephant Journal).  Giving someone an opportunity to show up for you and participate in your life is both a TOTAL GIFT to them and makes you feel better!

In a recent interview published in The Sun magazine psychologist Barbara Fredrickson said that she no longer judges her day by how much she accomplished, but by how many times she connected with someone (see link to that article below).

This unabashed expression of emotion also gives others permission to do the same in the inevitable times when they are feeling sad, angry, hurt, overwhelmed, confused, thrilled, excited, enthusiastic, relieved, and joyous! Allowing another (and theoretically endless) opportunities to deepen your emotional connection with another and create the relational closeness the makes life, in all its messiness, worth living! 

So go ahead, fall apart, and don’t apologize for it! Cry in the produce section, or in STEP class, or on your bike commute home, or at the dinner table, or walking your own dog (or watching someone else walk theirs), you will be doing yourself and the others that you connect with a favor.

The New York Times, Health; Health; New Studies Report Health Dangers Of Repressing Emotional Turmoil, Daniel Goleman: http://www.nytimes.com/1988/03/03/us/health-new-studies-report-health-dangers-of-repressing-emotional-turmoil.html

The Sun, The One you are With, interview by Angela Winter with Barbara Fredrickson:

http://thesunmagazine.org/issues/463/the_one_youre_with

Elephant Journal, Making the Seconds Count, by Kelly and Brooke Edwards:

http://www.elephantjournal.com/2014/06/micro-love-making-the-seconds-count-kelly-edwards-brooke-edwards/

Here is another really interesting article about how epigenetic research can harm women and perpetuate sexism:
http://www.nature.com/news/society-don-t-blame-the-mothers-1.15693

This is a great article that appeared in the Huffington Post recently (thanks to a friend for passing it along!) http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lea-grover/this-is-what-sex-positive-parenting-really-looks-like_b_5516707.html