by Brittany

I remember sitting at my desk every day at work, quickly eating my lunch and escaping for a few minutes through wellness blogs. It was early 2013 and I was working for a manufacturing company in Downtown Los Angeles. I had just started practicing beginner yoga regularly a year earlier and even in a short amount of time, I noticed the practice began to come with me off of the mat and seep into other areas of my life.

I’d catch myself chanting mantras in my mind while cleaning the studio. I started carving out time in my week to get on my mat instead of grabbing a beer with friends. And I’d sit quietly at my desk, eating my lunch between morning customer correspondence and afternoon photo shoots, reading blog posts written by health and wellness experts about what it was like to bring yoga into our daily lives.

One afternoon, I came across a post by Lauren Eckstrom. And I swore she wrote those words directly to me. They spoke to my heart. And they made my soul light up. The next week, I started an online yoga program with Travis Eliot. And after a few months of mustering up the courage to practice Power Yoga in a studio setting, I stepped into one of Lauren’s yoga classes in L.A. And it was in that first class that I thought to myself, “I’m fairly familiar with what it’s like to practice yoga. But what would it be like to teach and share this incredible practice with others?”

I definitely had my doubts about becoming a teacher. The old stories started playing about not being good enough and comparing myself to all the experienced teachers out there and wondering if anyone would ever want me to guide them. But yoga and meditation were creating HUGE shifts in my life. And after being personally inspired by both Lauren and Travis, I felt in the deepest part of my knowing that I couldn’t keep these magical practices to myself. I knew that their Holistic Yoga Flow teacher training was going to be a step in the right direction. Even if I just did it for me and didn’t teach for long. It was something I felt like I had to try.

Honestly, I had no idea what I was getting into. Because I soon realized that I had not only stepped into a teacher training program but I had also taken the first steps of completely changing my entire life. Throughout the training program, I started releasing more and more patterns that were keeping me stuck. Travis and Lauren taught me about the importance of ritual, true connection, tradition, a holistic approach to wellbeing and what it was like to make a real commitment to myself. And I gained the confidence to share these ancient teachings and the wisdom of countless life-changing teachers that have come before me.

I knew after completing this training that Lauren and Travis had set me up for success. And I realize today that they didn’t just set me up for success to become a kick-ass teacher. But they guided me through a process of creating changes, little by little in my life, that led me down the path I was meant to be on all along.

I not only learned about yoga philosophy, anatomy and how to teach the postures in a safe and fun way, but I learned how to relate these teachings to everything I was moving through in my own personal life. I learned what it was like to start to come home to myself. And I learned what it was like to take a seemingly scary leap of faith into becoming a teacher and later realizing that it was just a single step toward living my true purpose.

I later went on to advance my studies with Lauren and Travis through their 300 hour Teacher Training modules. And today, 8 years after reading Lauren’s blog post, I’m sitting here writing a post of my own in hopes of inspiring just one person. I know you’re out there. I know you’ll find these words through divine timing. And I hope that, in some way, you are inspired just as I was to take a leap.

Listen to your heart.

Allow yourself to be guided by your soul.

Say “yes” to you.

Trust the process.

Take one step at a time.

And know that you are fully supported along the way.

To explore Inner Dimension Academy’s Holistic Yoga Flow Online Teacher Trainings with Travis and Lauren, click here.