Reflections & Spring Cleaning 🧹🫧

I was going through my closet today, doing some spring cleaning when I stumbled across a box full of my royal blue scrubs from my days of working as a nurse. These scrubs have been sitting in this box since we lived in Florida two years ago. I had taken a break from working as a nurse to prepare us and our house for the big move across the country to Oregon. Each time I have opened this box I have thought “I may need these one day. I mean, I’m a nurse and these scrubs are in great shape.” But today, while I still am a nurse (and always will be), I realized that nursing is not for me. Maybe not right now, maybe not years from now, or maybe not ever again. I don’t know what the future holds. But what I do know, going through those old scrubs, is that it’s a chapter I’m closing for right now. I am a yoga teacher now. That is what brings me joy. That is what I look forward to as a career. The nursing life is a part of me and always will be. I’ll always have my education, my experiences (the crazy, wild ones and the most dear ones). But I will always be a nurse. And now I can say, I will always be a yoga teacher as well.

Teaching yoga has brought me so much joy. It’s a career I never would have thought I’d land on. But it’s one that I am so grateful that I have. I always had a passion for helping others. I remember just starting college and my aunt asking me what I wanted to do. And I remember saying I don’t know but I know I don’t want to be a nurse or a teacher! We can see how all that turned out!  But you live and you learn.  Now I get to help others in a different way. I want to move forward empowering others to take control of their lives, their bodies, their health. You are not a disease, a diagnosis, a weight, an injury or any physical obstacle. 

I was recently talking with a friend and fellow nurse and it really got me thinking. As nurses we often are part of the medical team that treats an illness, a disease. You have a problem, ok let’s give you a pill/medicine to fix it. And while yes, medications are necessary for many illnesses, a matter of life and death at times. I think sometimes medications are given instead of getting to the root cause of a problem. Medicine is usually in “reactive mode”. You go to the doctor or the hospital because you have a problem. I am thankful we have medicine to treat illnesses and diseases. But medicine is not always incorporating preventative measures. I’d like to be on the prevention side along with many others. I want to help teach others ways to incorporate nutrition, movement and mindfulness practices into their daily life, not only to help heal but also to help prevent the many diseases and illnesses. I am not naive to the fact that some things are just unpreventable. But I refuse to just continue to take a pill because it alleviates symptoms without getting to the root cause of the problem.  This is where, I hope my love for teaching yoga, mindfulness, and studying Ayurveda can come in. There are many aspects to this that I am still figuring out, and that’s ok. Always a work in progress, always learning, always growing. 

Some may disagree with me, and that is totally ok! Everyone is welcome to their own views of all the things related to the medical field. 

So I’ll donate those blue scrubs today, knowing that while they are a part of my story, they are not my entire story. I’ll close that chapter in my career for now. Thankful for what it’s taught me and the wonderful people I met along the way. And I’ll move forward sharing my love for yoga, for meditation, mindfulness and wellness.✨