It's Tiki here, delivering your weekly Tiki-gram! This week I was thinking back to when I was a tiny young pup (yep, even tinier than I am now!). I had so many goals for myself, and there was so much fun stuff I wanted to be able to do. At the time, some of my goals seemed far beyond my reach. For instance, one thing I really wanted to do was to jump onto the sofa all by myself, but this seemed unthinkable because I was just so small and the sofa was just so huge and daunting. But every day, I kept after it; I kept practicing my jumping. First, I practiced jumping up onto a little pillow my mommy had left on the floor. After a while, I grew stronger and that seemed easy, so I practiced jumping a little higher onto a cardboard box. And sure enough, after a while, that became easy. Even though jumping up onto the sofa still seemed like a lofty goal, I persevered because I was moving in the right direction, and sooner or later, I knew in my heart that I would make it all the way up onto that sofa.

And believe me, there were times when I felt discouraged. I had been practicing for what seemed like an eternity and still couldn't jump on the sofa, when some of my doggie friends were easily jumping onto their mommies' sofas. But I remembered that we're all different and unique, and as long as I kept practicing, I would eventually reach my goal. As soon as I realized that and relaxed a little bit, I remembered all the progress I had already made. I gave myself a big pat on the back for where I was - after all, just a few weeks earlier, I couldn't even jump up on the pillow! And knowing how far I had already come made me excited to see all the progress that was yet to unfold.

Now I know some of you have experienced something similar in your yoga classes, and maybe even in your life. You want to perform a certain pose, whether it's a headstand or a crow or some other crazy thing I see you doing, so you come to class and keep practicing and keep practicing, but you're still not performing that pose perfectly. But what we sometimes forget is that yoga (and life!) takes lots of perseverance, and the progress comes in small increments, not all at once. So give yourself credit for all the progress you've made, and celebrate where you are today. And remember that as long as you're continuing to practice and move in the direction of your goals, there is no way that you won't get there. Knowing this, we can just keep practicing and having fun with that practice, and relax knowing that we'll get there eventually.

So, with my sofa-jumping, it did take me a little longer than it did some of my doggie friends, but that was okay with me. I mean, come on, my legs are a lot shorter than theirs! So when I finally relaxed and came back to the idea of just having fun with the act of jumping, something amazing happened - a few weeks later, I jumped onto that sofa all by myself! So this week, if you're feeling frustrated that you're not yet performing the yoga poses you want to perform, or disheartened that you're not reaching your goals in life fast enough, remember to just keep moving in the direction of those goals. Keep persevering and practicing and having fun with it along the way, and soon enough you'll be performing those poses that had seemed daunting at one time, and you'll experience the joy of watching the sofa-jumping unfold!

Namaste,
Tiki