This time with my Mom has been the best yet. Often when my Mom or Dad visits, I revert back to childhood, to a little girl. I can react quickly to their comments and even lose my patience with them. I thought that it would be a good practice to be as sweet with Mom as I am with my students. Whenever I teach and practice yoga I am at my very best. Yoga invites me to align with the highest in me, existing and expressing myself from that place. This whole week with Mom I have tried to be as loving to Mom as I would be to others and she has noticed. And in turn, she has been as loving and giving. Yoga continues to help heal my relationships with others and self. 

I also have been listening in the last few years (and in particular in the last month) to Dr. Marshall Rosenberg's CD's on Nonviolent Communication. In one of them he mentioned that we treat neighbors in a nicer manner than we do our own families. That really shocked me and made me think why that would be the case? A lot of it is samskaras; that is, age-old patterns and a lack of curiosity about our family members. So again, this time around I have been practicing being more patient, loving and sweet and it has paid off thousandfold. I have truly enjoyed every moment with Mom.

Thank you Mami for the best time yet. So glad you could see my life here in LA, meet my friends and students, and enjoy each other's company. I will miss you!

Lastly, I've been writing a list of things that I am grateful for from my Dad. I've been writing them each day till my Dad's birthday on September 17th. Here goes:

Papi, I love how each time we go to the movies you always ask, "Is the movie we are about to see about cowboys or about love?" You always ask that and I find that so cute. I love how you divide movies into two categories: cowboys and love. I also am so grateful for how much you treasure movies because you showed me so many of them growing up including THE GODFATHER films, the James Bond franchise and many Westerns. But mostly I love that as tough as you are, your favorite film is WHITE NIGHTS. How great is that?