Author: Erin

I write - all the time - mostly random thoughts on that which makes me happy every day of my life.
Words in Sentences

Thinking Back

by ErinLeave a Comment on Thinking Back

I was thinking back on some blogging I did in 2021 related to training the brother and sister dogs we adopted. Seemingly in the constant pursuit of “what I write about” or “what I share about”, I wondered back then whether or not dog training was going to end up being “my thing”.

It’s comical now, 4 years later, with dogs who absolutely go ape shit at the fence for a german shepherd (they looooove a german shepherd). The only thing that makes any of that noise easier to swallow is the fact the sister dog jumps and barks while the brother dog stands with paws on the fence. It is as comical as it is absolutely irritating to the bone.

I have been near obsessively working on my program that has, at this point, been received by over five hundred people over the course of its existence and acknowledged by many as having “changed their life”. Holy shit – I realize – my approach to dealing with my own human emotions in order to give my life some purpose and not think everything is in vain has supported other people’s ability to do the same?

“I should really do something with this”, I think, “…then I could hire a dog trainer.” lol

And the truth is – I am thinking about it. I am doing it. I am recording and I am writing and I am creating every single week – something new – something old repurposed. How does it all come together? How do I start? Oh I am already started. What do I do.

I have so much faith in all of this, honestly. But the belief in right timing is only as good as the dedication to practice and use of right energy.

To do the things you love to do. To be the places you love to be. To allow the way you love to feel. It’s nooooooot always easy when you are covered in news and buried in headlines. It’s not always the first thing you think of “I love today!I love my life” when there are so many people dying and drowning in fear. BUT. HOW will it get better if the artists don’t art?!?

How will culture evolve in the creators don’t create?!

How will justice reign if the makers don’t make and the builders don’t build and the – what else – shakers don’t shake?

lol Taylor Swift nod.

Sigh. So – here I am, with my new Buddha (that honestly looks like me and my siblings likeness), my cat and my geraniums here in the middle of October ready for everything that is next. Are you ready for what is next?

Tell me honestly. Please – are you excited about your life? Do you feel purpose in today? Why or why not. Lay it on me.

Give me something to think about. ✌🏽erin

woman cat and buddha and geraniums set out to change the world on a wednesday october morning
Words in Sentences

Things are Sacred “Before They Are Beautiful”

by ErinLeave a Comment on Things are Sacred “Before They Are Beautiful”

I spent the last week in Green Cay, U.S. Virgin Islands in creative process, in conversation and – ultimately – in exploration of the deeper colors of life. What does it mean to be surrounded by beauty? What does it mean to be resourced by the earth?

Blessed be the Creator God – who made the heavens and the earth. 2 Chronicles 2:12

Part of this exploration was related to how, on an island, you celebrate the rain for filling up the cisterns, you wait for the sun to power up the panels before you do your laundry. This coordination with nature is and of itself a deeply desired internal rhythm I know I have, but I truly think we all have in our innate humanity.

What child doesn’t want to love and feel love from its mother?

Being in community with women who not only lived this way, but discussed which fish were eating which fish, increasing the big fishes’ mercury and who marveled over who had what trees growing on their property was nourishing and replenishing. Like rain to the cistern of my heart :)

Waking up this morning in the midwest with the type of tan I have found you really only get in St. Croix, I walked my garden similar to how I walked Samadhi by the Sea, the garden of my beautiful host for the week, Riya – a chakra oriented artist whose sculpture garden served as the key dwelling place for me and my creative spirit.

My garden – with it’s patchy weirdness, spiraling thin weeds and a serious need of mulch looked much different than Samadhi by the Sea. Thoughtfully still, I took my prayer beads and charged them by one of my favorite 2025 plantings: a baby rosemary shrub I am going to experiment with sheltering over the winter. I walked my garden slowly, kneeling down, looking carefully – naming what I believe are its main centers.

I moved the lemon eucalyptus and the pineapple sage together (near the “The Stump of Contemplation”) so they could be friends as they will both fruit Christmas gifts for my friends when I harvest their leaves, dry them out and bundle them for smudging gifts later on. I texted a dear family friend and studio member, Kim Joern – a master gardener and herbalist – for insight on my lavender. I danced in my garden when a neighbor stopped on her drive by. I pulled a few more weeds, said a few more prayers, noted a few more tasks and came inside.

One of the takeaways from my trip is a new installation in my vocabulary of the word “sacred” before key nouns in my sentences. Like the gold paperclips I picked up on my first day on island were dubbed sacred paperclips and kept all week in a dish, I started seeing the weird, the unorganized, the unmulched, the unattended parts of my Garden of Knowing as sacred.

My list of next round needs? A sacred rain barrel, small sacred fencing for the hostas… Among other things, of course, like sacred stones.

There is this stoic thought about how you cannot tell an emerald it is beautiful and it all the sudden becomes beautiful. Likewise you cannot tell it is is ugly and it becomes ugly. Rather, the nature of the emerald is that of an emerald, its nature is derived from itself.

As I spent time in my newly appointed sacred garden, in its overgrown honeysuckle and hidden irises, I reflected on how nature simply becomes. It unfolds without rush or definition. More rain does one thing, less rain does another. Early falls do things like late springs, hot summers and cold winters are an active part of the unfolding.

I promised my garden I would write in it. And I saw the process of the gardening serve up a lesson as I walked up the steps again (similar to a 12 hour writing day a few days ago, when I ascended and descended the steps of Samadhi by the Sea over and over and over and over).

“Discipline means walking up the steps again.”

It is my recent finding that the faithfulness to the process seems to be more important than the dedication to the outcome itself.

To allow my garden its sacred nature brought the same wave of gratitude and inspiration, nourishment and knowing as the waves crashing ear’s distance away from the vibrant intentionality of Samadhi by the Sea.

At the 3rd Eye Point, Ajna, the 6th sculpture in Samadhi by the Sea.
On Yoga Studio Ownership

A Defining Day

by ErinLeave a Comment on A Defining Day

It feels important to capture this moment in time.

It is amazing to me how hard it is to write what I am trying to write. I want to make some bold statement like “everybody is experiencing unhappiness and the elephant in the room is that it is my fault”. But in a way that clearly denotes it is actually my fault.

I think a lot about the story about how the owner of Starbucks’ father in law came to him when he was still in startup mode and told him he had to get a job. His wife was pregnant and he had not found investors yet. His wife told him “no way – keep at it” and, thanks to her, we have venti refreshers no berries.

I think about it a lot.

David and I blended families in 2020 and the past nearly 5 years have put some major wear and tear on the house…. There is dissatisfaction with the water heater, the need to fix nearly every bathroom, trim chewed up by puppies, a gap in the counter, a need for new paint and a new door and a new backyard and everything that was so beautiful and charming about my “art house” is now just kind of dingy, not that cute and in need of repair.

When you add to that the perspective that the grass is greener on the other side of all the streets and tracks, there is this thick sentiment that feels like sadness and I feel plain guilty straight up horrible that – while the past four years have been unfolding my life’s work and my life’s purpose, it’s not quite a corporate salary and great benefits situation.

Yet.

I mean – I know what I do. I know what I do well. I see the effects of my efforts. I am amazed at how quickly everything is moving and growing and changing yet it still seems so slow. In some ways, I feel like I can’t share my vision anymore because – well, it’s simply time to work.

And, even then I took a pause because I don’t want anybody reading this feeling like bad for me or like “sounds like things aren’t going well”. Things are thriving. Budding. Exciting. I am more motivated than ever. The studio turned a year old and we have 70 members and I have a ton to do to get ready to lead my inaugural training in St. Croix (which only has 3 spots left) and I understand what I do so clearly, that now it’s simply time to keep going. It’s happening.

You keep going and then, when you’ve spend too much time in flow, you stop for a day to take care of the laundry piles and vacuum and make a homemade meal to give people a break from (pretentious) hot dogs. So, there’s that… it’s definitely the marker of a chapter I am in. It’s why I want to capture this… it feels like a grab bag, an intersection, a messy bridge.

I wanted to capture it because I am headed full blast forward. We are at the beginning of a chapter that is going to be defined by my boundless creativity, love of storytelling and conversations with friends and my full faith in the practices my life has taught me that I am going to share with you. I mean – it’s already amazing, the way the studio feels is ripe and nourishing and joyful – why wouldn’t it get more so?

This post needs to exist so I can look back on this night that I made chicken in the new cast iron with a side of thai green lentil curry while reflecting on the podcast I recorded with my coach that made us both jaw drop – like, this conversation is real and good and powerful – this recording happened after cleaning the house which I completed after drafting an email to our 500+ person audience with 70% open rates which I wrote after responding to my team which I did after organizing my day which I took time to do after waking up and making a gut tonic and having a moment where I asked myself: what type of energy do I want to bring today?

The answer? Expansive.