Last week while I was away on vacation, there was a devastating fire next to Inner Strength Studios. The smoke damage rendered the place ruined, at least for the time being. This is the studio where I work and has been my community for some time. The news stunned me and I began to wonder why? As my teacher Roman always says, we need to ask better questions!
Yoga teaches us about Shiva the destroyer, Brahma the creator and Vishnu, the preserver. Whenever something is destroyed, it gives space to a new creation. I tried to approach the fire with this idea in mind. I know that what I love has been in effect destroyed (at least for the time being) and that Inner Strength will rebuild. In the time being, I must rebuild myself.
Thanks to my training and studies, I have learned that nothing has meaning until we give it meaning. I am reminded of the book Man’s Search for Meaning, by Viktor E. Frankel. Frankel was separated from his family who would later be murdered by Nazis and sent to concentration camp after concentration camp. He would survive the Holocaust to eventually rebuild his life and start again. Although the fire is a less extreme case than the survival of the Holocaust, it has a common thread; the need to rebuild and the need to not attach unhelpful meaning to what happened. It is to see what happens in life as the facts and then to clear- mindedly decide what next rather than decide what took place was because of this or that reason. It would be easy to put a negative spin on the fire and say that it’s not fair and the world is against me. I could interpret it as a sign post to leave Inner Strength and find elsewhere to work entirely. But I decided to instead see the great opportunity this presents me to take a second look at my entire business paradigm and the life I have built. I am asking myself how can I grow from this? Where to next?
Please stay tuned for exciting developments! J
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