"At a crossroads. Faced with the dissolution of my marriage of 17 years, a custody battle, & at the throws of addiction to booze & pills, in July '17 I was checked into a detox facility by family, hardly conscious, in the hope that I had reached a dark enough place that I would sober up & change my ways
Within 3 months I was sneaking behind everyone’s back to the same vices I had just spent months professing I had let go. By August '18 I had reached that dark place. The bottom. For almost a year I had been spiritually dead. Trying to numb myself with booze & pills, but all it did was amplify my pain. This time was different, I recognized that I needed help
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I knew I had lost control to addiction & life had become unmanageable. So, I made the call this time & signed myself in. Detox, again. I could barely sign the papers, my whole body shaking
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48 hours later I woke in that tiny facility bed, & I couldn’t have been happier. It was like someone had turned the lights on in my soul. I didn’t feel foggy for the first time in longer than I could remember
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In my process group that morning I was asked what I could do different to change up my routine so I didn’t turn to substance abuse again. I recalled that yoga was something that had always made me happy in the past, although it had been years since I had a strong practice. They told me they had a yoga instructor coming in later that day to the center! Two days sober & life was about to change. Meeting that instructor changed my life, & helped shape it into what it is today
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That class & teacher, now my mentor, inspired me to become a yoga instructor. I have now been teaching since May 2019. Predominantly I teach in substance abuse, detox & rehab centers. I teach others how yoga can be a tool for them in their sobriety as it has been for me. Full circle if you will & leading by example that yoga is a practice not perfect, and that it honors us & meets us where we are" Cydne 🙏