My 28 Days of Kundalini Yoga Training

I had six excuses for why I hadn't completed a Yoga Teacher Training. In August of 2018, I overcame these and completed an intensive Kundalini Yoga Teacher Training in New Mexico. Here's what I learned wasn't true at all...

I Can't Hold My Arms Up for 3 Minutes & I Can't Sit in Lotus

I thought that yoga teachers needed to be masters of every move before they started teaching. Wow was I wrong! I learned that you don't have to demo the poses for nearly as long as you're asking students to do them. Starting from the same place as many students (can't hold my arms up, can't sit comfortably in easy pose) was actually an advantage. As I learned how to improve my stamina, it was easy to translate that into suggestions for students working on the same thing.

I Don't Do Things I'm Not Already Great At

Kundalini Yoga Teacher Training was the first training I signed up for that I wasn't sure I could complete. Up until this point, I had only chosen to learn things I knew I could be world-class in. The first yoga class I taught was the first bad training I'd given in my life. I was mortified but I learned a ton! It turned out that Yoga wasn't about being perfect. It was about being brave enough to keep trying.

I Don't Wear White

My first career as stage manager in NYC was an all-black clothing affair. I was proud of my elegant, multi-functional, and very black wardrobe. I was resistant to a lifestyle change that required more laundry expertise. During school I discovered you only *need* white when you're officially leading a class so you can get through training with one nice white outfit. Secondly, I found buying white clothing from real people was a joy compared to supporting expensive clothes produced in cheap conditions. Lastly, I got better at laundry. I'm shocked at what OXO/OXY cleaners can get out of white these days.

I Don't Have the Money

The economics of training appeared insane. Not only does it require skipping a month of work but it costs thousands of dollars. And of course at the end of the whole process, yoga teachers rarely make a living wage. Kundalini Yoga Teacher Training taught me to trust. I arrived at my training with not enough money to buy the gas required to drive home if I didn't like it. As I meditated a thousand miles away from my friends and family, they were cheering for me. So by the time graduation came, I had a possibility of selling my company and friends flying in to pay for the road trip home.

I Don't Have the Time

I have learned from my wealthiest friends that having control over how you spend your time is the ultimate luxury. My motivation to attend Yoga Teacher Training was altruistic but in the end I was the one who benefited the most. Time will bend when you add this to your schedule. It's an amazing opportunity to ask for support at home or at work while you do something for yourself. I know you would put in extra effort to help a family member improve their mind, body, and soul so don't be shy about asking your family for help.

I Don't Want to Teach

I was shocked in the first opening circle of training where virtually every person said they were here to deepen their own practice. I was externally-impact oriented so the idea of coming to a yoga teacher training for myself had never occurred to me. They were right and I was wrong. I spent the most time in training deepening my own practice and setting the foundation of a daily home practice. I turned out to be my own best student.

What I Learned Turning Off and Tuning In

Picture of me in a hedgehog onesie on a giant teddy bear from New Years 2016, photo by Jane West.

2016 brought a lot of learning and a lot of joy.

My biggest lesson of 2016 was figuring out how to serve myself first in order to serve everyone else sustainably. People had always warned me about "burning out" but I had never hit my limit. Creating the 2nd Annual Women Grow Leadership Summit in Denver for over 1,200 women was my greatest accomplishment. It was also what broke me.

Although I could have blamed external challenges for breaking me. I realized that all my external challenges were reflections of my own inner struggles. So I went about investing everything I had into working on myself. Yoga, meditation, books, dance, music, purpose-driven leadership, cannabis, psychedelics and the School of Womanly Arts were my practices. We found a new CEO to take over my role at Women Grow on July 1st and I focused on myself full-time.

Leaving the CEO role at Women Grow was the hardest transition I've ever made. The unexpectedly tough part of aligning your personal and professional purpose is allowing them to separate when needed. It took me almost three months just to stop thinking of myself and my role as one.

I ran away to play in Spain, speak in Berlin, camp at Burning Man, and work Symbiosis. I traveled 26 weeks of 2016. I learned a lot.

I learned how to love myself unconditionally. I learned how to stop using food to solve problems that food doesn't solve (and lost 30 pounds). I learned how to stop caring about what people who don't care about me think. I learned how to put myself first every day. I learned how to process dark emotions and self-hatred. I learned to stop over-thinking the past at the expense of being present. I learned I didn't have to be afraid of my full emotional range.

I took six months off for myself. The changes I've made to my mental, physical, and emotional health have just begun to benefit me. I'll be back at the 3rd Annual Women Grow Leadership Summit in a few weeks. I invite you to join me at the summit, Feb 1-3. It’ll be an experience like you’ve never had. Click here for more info.

Scroll down to see how I learned how to be in a museum, how to Burn in Spain, new psychedelic treatments, the final Summit at Sea, winning licenses, and at the very bottom, everything else I'm up to this year.

I Learn By Teaching

I perfected the blend of education, inspiration, and community that encourages women to take huge risks. Over 1,200 women gathered in the Ellie Caulkin's Opera House in Denver to hear 32 speakers, including Melissa Etheridge.

I Learn What Burn-Out Really Is

I was wiped after this event. I couldn't think. We tried to do long-term planning but we had exhausted ourselves and the entire team. It was impossible to follow up on this momentum. I'm so grateful to the so many of you who gave me space during this sensitive period to grow and recover. I was no longer taking care of myself and I had failed to care for my team.

I Learn How to Release

I Learn How to Be in a Museum

Being featured in the Oakland Museum's exhibit on Cannabis in California was a first. You sometimes feel like you're both predicting and making history on days like this. I'm grateful we got over a dozen women featured in this exhibit.

I wrote

You have everything you need to start. Every time you are waiting for another teacher, you are wasting time. Learn in practice, not study.

I Learn to Relax in Europe

Grateful to Bar-Keep for showing me the most diverse Burning Man event in the west. 2,000 Europeans gathered on a small plane in the Spanish desert for a week in scorching July to build a humble city and party down.

Grateful for the invitation to speak at Tech Open Air in Berlin. I got to debut my talk on "Clarifying Your Calling with Cannabis" to a packed house.

Grateful to edge pushers like Cindy Gallop on "Why the Next Big Thing in Tech is Disrupting Sex" if you want to know what's up after cannabis.

I Learn About Relationship...

Excerpt from More Than Two

Grateful for the many books I read on relationship this year...including American Savage, Goddesses Never Age, The Law of Attraction, The Art of Everyday Ecstasy, and More Than Two.

Learning at the Burn

Getting the bus tuned up before we leave for the Burn.

Playa-bound!

For my fourth Burning Man, I attended for 10 days and lead a camp of 35. Friends from across the world came. I learned to run my first electrical grid (with lots of trial and error). I found a pair of exceptional Tantra Energy Teachers and became enraptured with their workshops.

I Learn About Fear & Love

John Lennon and I share a birthday in October and this thought

"There are two basic motivating forces: fear and love. When we are afraid, we pull back from life. When we are in love, we open to all that life has to offer with passion, excitement, and acceptance. We need to learn to love ourselves first, in all our glory and our imperfections. If we cannot love ourselves, we cannot fully open to our ability to love others or our potential to create. Evolution and all hopes for a better world rest in the fearlessness and open-hearted vision of people who embrace life."~ John Lennon

I Learn About Psychedelic Treatments at Horizons

The Horizons conference presented research on MDMA & psychedelics from celebrated universities...NYU, Columbia, John Hopkins.

Multiple studies showed patients experiencing up to 8 months of relief from symptoms with just one "magic mushroom" therapy experience. These "peak spiritual experiences" were leading to increased positive attitudes, altruism, and deeper development of social relationships.I was seeing that we had extended our physical bodies past our ability to fill our lives with meaning. Alzheimer's disease was preventable if we stayed mentally active and engaged. These patients showed how spirituality was actually a component of health, particularly at end of life.

I Learn Prototyping in November

I took Prototyping for Creative Innovation with Megan Goering, formerly of Google. We ran through prototyping techniques and tests until we could do them by habit.I wrote out dozens and dozens of business ideas and then weighted them on factors like start-up costs and market size. I began testing messaging of all the different things. The cannabis helps with ideation but didn't make narrowing down any easier.

I Learn About Sex & Sugar at Sea

On the eve of the election, I boarded a cruise ship for 3,000 "innovators" and we sailed out to the Caribbean. Marijuana was legalized in six states but we were all shocked by the Presidential election. We gathered to build new ways to a future we all want to live in. We workshop. We dance. We drink. We eat. We snuggle.

I attend panels like "Sugar is the New Tobacco" and learn from Dr. Dean Ornish that 86% of 3 trillion dollars spent in healthcare are spent on chronic care for mostly reversible conditions. We've created a food system, which externalizes all the costs of eating cheap food that causes illness.

Dr. Ornish reveals that "bad habits" are developed to deal with the isolation of modern life. He uses lifestyle as treatment by asking people to eat well, stress less, move more, and love more. He's found that fear is not a sustainable motivators for people to change bad habits. You have to fill the voids those habits leave with even more joyful and pleasurable motivators.

I Learn Good Work Pays Off in December

Grateful to the Women Grow community in the Bay Area celebrating two years.

Grateful for the dispensary license process in Maryland where two teams I had advised won licenses.

8 Reasons I'm Never Going To Hire You

Resume

I was so disappointed with the last round of job candidates that I just had to tell you why. Please share with your friends that are out there applying for jobs. It's competitive out there and fixing a few simple things will easily put them on top. 

1. You Never Applied

Applying for jobs is no fun but seriously if you don't apply I'm never going to hire you. Applying doesn't mean telling a friend of my friend that you *might* be interested in talking about the position. It means actually filling out the online application completely and then following up on any mutual connections. Skipping the 10 minutes to fill out your information online forces me and my HR staff work much harder to hire you. Make it easy on us!

2. You Sucked At Filling Out the Application

I realize filling out online applications isn't fun but you gotta do it right! Don't skip over questions. Don't screw up the grammar, spelling, or capitalization. For gosh sakes, spell and capitalize my company's name right!

3. Your Resume Is Longer Than 2 Pages

I'm going to spend 8-30 seconds reading your resume before I decide if I want to speak to you. Your best qualities for this position better be darn clear within the first 5 seconds or you're not getting a call back.

Remove bullet points like:

• Scheduled meetings

• Developed and maintained relationships

• Coordinated between X and Y departments

4. You Didn't Do Your Research Before The Interview

The first question I'm going to ask you is what do you already know about my company. You better have a good answer that shows you did more than read my "about us" page. Bonus points if you relate my company's strengths to yours or actually spoke to current employees or customers.

5. You Misspelled or Incorrectly Capitalized The Stuff You're Supposed To Be Expert At

You know who knows the different between MAC and Mac or Word press and WordPress? I do, because I'm actually an expert in those skills you claim to have.

6. You Negotiated On Salary Before We Offered You The Job

In a sales pitch they'll tell you everything about the product and how great it's going to make your life BEFORE they tell you how much it's going to cost you. Treat job interviews the same way. Never state the salary you expect up front. Make sure I fall in love with the idea of hiring you and how amazing you're going to make my business and then ask for a little more than I wanted to pay you. Of course if what they're offering is drastically different than what you want to make, you're wasting everyones time. However, if you're within 10-25% of what they're expecting to pay, you can probably get it if you're truly the best candidate.

7. Your Email Address is HotPants69@hotmail.com

If you're not an internet marketer, I'll forgive you for using gmail but please get firstname.lastname@gmail.com (or something very close to that). If you do claim to be a pro online anything, you better have your own domain.

8. Your Online Presence Isn't Present

You claim blogging as a skill but you haven't updated your blog since 2007. Your LinkedIn profile is half-completed and your picture is fuzzy. You tweeted twice two years ago and your icon is still the default egg. Honestly most employers aren't going to go years back into your social media accounts. If you clean up and update the last few months of posts, it'll probably be fine. If you're applying for a social media related position you should have at least two years of blog posts.

You Don't Know What Makes You Happy

What's your goal in life?

When asked most some people will say they want to buy a house, or get married, or run a marathon. Ok...but why?

Well because being a home owner means more security, or because they want to fall in love, or because they want to be healthy. Ok...but why?

If you ask why enough times, most people will reveal that it is because they believe their goal will make them happy. Tony Hsieh, in Delivering Happiness, asks us to consider this question in our personal and professional lives. Many of us are working feverously on goals that we believe will make us happy even when it turns out we're extremely bad at predicting what will make us happy. So if you're going to construct your life around goals to "make yourself happy", shouldn't you spend a little time learning about happiness?

My path to happy

I burnt out chasing external validation. I accomplish what I thought would make me happy but it didn’t. Watch the best 8 minute speech of my life…

How To Get Serious About Continuous Learning On A Budget

[quote]In times of change, learners inherit the Earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists." ~ Eric Hoffer[/quote] 

Read A New Book Every Month

John Spence says that the average business person reads one business book every 5 years. If you read 6 business books a year, you'll be in the top 1% of learners in America. If you read a business book every month, you'll be in the top 1% of learners in the world. However you can, make reading a monthly goal.

• Use Audible to listen to books during your commute, workout, or while you do chores (about $15 each or less).
• Use Read It For Me for video summaries and workbooks of major business books ($29.99/month).
• Start a book club with some like-minded colleagues to keep each on top of reading. If you're in NYC, join my (Reading Optional) Business Book Club.

Replace Your TV Time

If you haven't already cut the cord and ditched cable, now is a great time. With the money you save on your cable bill you can still buy your favorite TV shows and stop watching all the junk you're just filling time with. I've replaced my TV time with:

• TED - Instead of watching 20 minute sitcoms, watch 20 minute of the worlds greatest living ideas (free).
• Netflix Documentaries - They may not all be unbiased but they're definitely interesting ($7.99/month).

Take Free Courses Online

• Academic Earth is the largest directory of video lectures from universities like NYU, Harvard, and more.
• Most of us have skipped, forgot, or never really learned a few math topics. Use Khan Academy to really learn calculus or finance with easy to follow videos that build on concepts as you go.
• Open Courseware Consortium - Includes over 6,613 courses from 65 Universities in 12 languages.
• iTunes U - Hosts more than 350,000 free lectures from Stanford, Yale, MIT, UC Berkeley and more. Free, even for Windows users, and easy to download to your iDevice to watch on the run.
• Stanford - Online classes in entrepreneurship, computer science, anatomy, and engineering (free).
• Lifehacker - Has a great list of online courses they recommend for common majors.

Go Back To School To Defer Your Student Loans

Going to school part-time may be cheaper than paying your student loans. Since you can defer your student loans (some interest-free) while you're in school at least half-time, it may be cheaper to continue taking classes than stop. I'm not an accountant so do your research first but it's an excellent excuse to keep taking classes if you're on a tight budget. Even if you work full-time, you'll find tons of night classes and online classes that work around any schedule.

Building Your Resume Without Going Back To School

When men want to learn a new skill they get a new job, when women want to learn something new, they go back to school -- or so I found in years of hiring. In my experience, men were more likely to apply for jobs that they were under-qualified for and plan to fake it until they made it. Overall they were right to do so, if you're only applying to jobs you already know how to do, you're underselling yourself and stumping your growth. Here's three methods to build up your resume, make connections, and learn new skills, without going back to school.SpeakYou're an expert in something and there are organizations that would love you to share your expertise. Not only will you get great practice at public speaking but the next time a friend of an audience member is looking to hire an expert in your field, you may be the first person they recommend. Contact the organizers of the following groups to get started:

• Meetup.com - lists thousands of groups on hundreds of topics. You may know nothing about restaurants but there's plenty of restaurant owners who would love your advice on social media.
• Local Chamber of Commerce, co-working spaces, and professional associations - anywhere business owners and managers meet, you need to be.
• Conferences - you may not be ready for the big time but there are thousands of smaller conferences desperate for speakers. Start looking early though, many conference start booking speakers up to year in advance. You'll typically get a free full pass to the conference in exchange and some clout to boot.

PublishIt costs almost nothing to self-publish a book these days. Although getting picked up by a publisher is better for your resume, there's no reason not to publish yourself now while you search for a publisher. Don't think you've got enough material or time to write a book? Start a blog in your area of expertise or start publishing white papers. Soon enough you'll have enough content to string together into a book.

• Lulu - Popular print on demand service costs nothing to make your book available by taking a cut of each sale. They'll also translate your RTF or Word file to eBook format for sale on the Nook and iBookstore for free (but they don't support Amazon's Kindle).
• BiblioCrunch - Free platform to create your eBook for any reader. They keep 15% of sales. Support this female-owned NYC start-up :)

Volunteer

Want to learn a new skill or polish an old one? Volunteer your skill to the organization of your choice and you'll get free practice you can even put on your resume. Plus as you meet people throughout the organization, they'll remember you next time someone they know is hiring for that skill.

• CatchAFire.org - Matches volunteers with non-profits. Plus they're a women-owned start-up based in NYC.
• Idealist.org - Lists thousands of volunteer and non-profit jobs throughout the world.
• VolunteerMatch - A wide variety of local volunteer opportunities.
• Serve.gov - Tends towards government-related opportunities like helping military families, disaster preparation, etc.
• Hackathons - Bring together business developers, graphic designers, and hackers to create technology over a weekend. Even if you don't have the skills to participate, volunteer to help run the event. You'll meet hundreds of working and freelancing technologists in about 72 hours.

Pro Tips

• Always keep your business cards handy. Even if you don't have a current position, you should have personal cards made out with your name, general skill set/title, email address, and phone number. Add your personal blog, Twitter handle, and LinkedIn profile if you can.
• Get business cards from as many people as possible and follow up! Connect on LinkedIn within a week or send them a follow-up email thanking them for you their time and letting them know that you are looking for new opportunities if they hear of anything.

Photo by the Social Blog Network 

5 Enlightening RSA Animated Videos from 21st-Century Philosophers

The RSA hand-animates 21st century philosopher’s view points and ideas. Often amusing and always thought provoking. Professor Philip Zimbardo conveys how our individual perspectives of time affect our work, health and well-being. Time influences who we are as a person, how we view relationships and how we act in the world. Dan Pink‘s talk at the RSA, illustrates the hidden truths behind what really motivates us at home and in the workplace. Taken from a speech given at the RSA by Sir Ken Robinson, world-renowned education expert talks about the follies of judging people by “academic standards” and how the “epidemic” of ADHD is a lie. Acclaimed journalist, author and political activist Barbara Ehrenreich explores the darker side of positive thinking. Renowned philosopher Slavoj Zizek investigates the surprising ethical implications of charitable giving.Yeah he’s a “commie”.