Over the last 12 months, we’ve experienced more change than many people see in a lifetime. We moved house in July, I traveled to the US in September to see my family for the first time in five years, and then in October, Layne came down with an antibiotic-resistant infection that left the doctors unsure of the outcome. He was in and out of the hospital for 16 weeks between November and February, and when he finally went back to work in March, his landlord dropped a bombshell: the rent was going up to a level that would be impossible for him to sustain working alone, as he’s done since COVID.  

Layne was fully ready to downsize his business, but even the smaller workshops we looked at were just as expensive as the one he was in. One of our dreams has always been to move his business to a property where he could work and we could also live—a slice of heaven we would purchase, as we imagined it. But that dream seemed out of reach, especially after Layne had been unwell and not working for so many months. 

But then, against all odds, we found a place we could rent long-term. It had a house, a workshop for Layne’s business, and four acres for Boo to run around on. Just three weeks after Layne went back to work, still quite weak from his ordeal, he began the monstrous task of moving AND downsizing his auto restoration business. Meanwhile, I got started getting the house ready for our second move in eight months.

The amount of work involved was staggering, especially with the business, which had literally tens of thousands of moving parts, most of which weighed 100 kilos or more. Layne did the vast majority of the move himself. He said at the beginning that if the move didn’t kill him, it would make him stronger. And you know what? It did make him stronger, and probably sped his recovery up a lot. 

We’ve been here for a few months now, and it’s taken me this long to process everything that’s happened over the lastyear. We’ve landed in an incredibly beautiful spot, and we’re living a life that we’ve dreamed about for ages.  

I’m naturally optimistic, and when things get stressful, I tend to get busy looking for solutions. But after all that had happened, I had nothing left in the tank. 

Uncharacteristically, once the hard work of the move was over, I couldn’t shake the feeling that the other shoe was about to drop; that this was all too good to be true. I found myself waiting for the next dramatic event, feeling that now that we had arrived, it was too good to last. 

It was Layne who reminded me to return to yoga. He gently pointed out that life had guided us here. This path may not have been the one we originally saw ourselves taking, but it’s the one we chose at the fork in our road, and we ARE here. Bless him—he worried a bit, but he never pressured me to “snap out of it” or “be happy.” 

This isn’t my first big challenge in life, but it might be the first time I’ve let myself really “feel the feelz” without trying to stay positive, solve the problem, or change anything at all. And, in time, I did find my way back to gratitude and joy. 

In my classes, I often talk about opening to Grace, about looking at what life is showing us even when it’s not necessarily what we want to see. Having faced some pretty challenging times over the years, I truly believe that there’s an intelligence behind the way life unfolds, and that Grace, Spirit, God—whatever your name for this intelligence is—conspires to support us in life’s peak moments and in its valleys. 

The yoga part of yoga, the part that the poses are in service of, is there to remind you of this. 

Always.