eye to eye.

jennette and i went on a hunt for thrift store treasures yesterday that took us to the unique thrift store on lorain as well as the salvation army on euclid down-town. we also had coffee and lunch at gypsy bean & bakery (my favorite!) and visited the sweetest danielle at her store, Room Service (check out her fabulous blog here). also - strangely - i stumbled upon the coolest leather couch, that upon further examination was actually already sold... to an old friend of mine. his name was on the red sold tag. how random is that? cleveland is a small city. i considered calling him and saying, 'thanks for buying the couch i wanted!' ;) after jennette and i finished our delicious beet, fennel and goat's cheese sandwhich, we parted ways - she to teach a yoga class in independence and me to go to yoga teacher training in beachwood.

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TT was wonderful and inspiring yet again. after a rockin' 75 minute asana practice (during which i sweat so much that a puddle formed around my mat...), we had several hours of group sharing and even began practice teaching the integration series to each other. at the end - just before leaving - we did an unusual meditation practice. tami had us sit, cross-legged, and facing another person. she asked us to then stop talking and quiet ourselves as we stared into that person's eyes for several minutes. as you can imagine - there were lots of giggles... but my partner and i (after smiling and giving into laughter nervously) actually calmed down and began to breathe deeply together. at one point i even felt like crying. after it was over, i asked her, 'did you feel like crying at all?' she said, 'no... but i wanted to hug you the whole time'. it was amazing. we had never even spoken two words to each other, but after 5 minutes of this meditation, we felt connected. many others had similar experiences - some were crying as they shared. what a powerful exercise! i'm constanly amazed at the growth and self-discovery we're all beginning to experience as a group - and it's only week two!!!

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i hope everyone is having a wonderful week thus far... cheers and namaste. xo

*photo found here.