How fitting that BYSJ is turning 21! Officially an adult, it’s time to make big choices! Being 21 years of age reinforces the message that it is time to GROW UP. If you are looking around for who that is – that’s YOU, that’s ME – BYSJ IS you and me that make this place. As a yogi, you are no longer asleep but mature enough to make (here we go) the Right decision – now get stronger with it! If you are new or your practice is just sporadic, then choose now to “start” or “start again.”I heard this recently and recall its brutal awakening:The average life expectancy in the United States is 77 years, so there are 8760 hours in one year. That’s 674,520 hours in an average life span.If you are 30, you already used up 262,800 hours.If you are 50 years old, you’ve already used up 438,000 hours.All the things we do mean that time equals currency.How many of us are making payments on things that don’t matter? For me, my iPhone tells me my screen time went up this week by 15% – ugh.For most of you sitting here, please feel good that you are making payments on your life with yoga. And it is not my intention to make anyone feel guilty.But time waits for no one. What this says is that LIFE for each of us is a vapor.Going through this speech quite a few times, I thought, geez Michele, this speech is kind of depressing – it’s actually the opposite; sobering truth is liberating. Someone needs to say it – AND you couldn’t be in a better place for it. In my opinion, IF YOU ARE HERE, LISTENING NOW OR LATER, CONGRATULATIONS, YOU ARE NO LONGER WASTING TIME!Listen to this: Bikram, who was recently at the teacher training during my trip to Thailand, gave a late-night lecture that briefly reviewed the five attributes we mentioned in class that “make us better humans.”Remember what they are:1. Faith – With yourself, your God, and in others.2. Self-control – Self-discipline.3. Determination – Willpower; never stop until you reach your goal.4. Concentration – For 90 minutes, you don’t know your name.5. Patience – Bikram says that this is his hardest.This visit was the first time that I heard him also add this:“3% it’s gifted to you; you are human. 97%, you need to prove it with behavior and character.” In other words, your practice is “convincing” you on the inside. Faith, self-control, determination, concentration, and patience are what you project on the outside.My story, my song, is just one of the thousands of testimonials here tonight; it’s part of my 97% in “proving.” YOU TOO!I see Thomas, Meron, Jody, Sundar, Ajit, and all of you practicing and proving on the inside to change on the outside. As I said earlier, yoga provides “physical uplifting, mental soothing but very much also, spirit enriching – that’s the “zest” for life!” And our ability to “dance even when it’s raining.” These things make us better humans, and, as Bikram states, so simply the vision for what Bikram Yoga is.Take a deep breath! As I stated, you all couldn’t be in a better place to take on this bold choice than being at BYSJ, where we teach this authentic, committed, true 26 and 2 practice with such care from the building’s preparation to the people teaching it. Please stand, staff: Look around and applaud these people who don’t make stock money but make real currency by giving their time, love, and skill! Okay, let’s get real a little more. Here are some great questions to measure how you’re doing on your proof. What’s your pain response? Do you drink, shop, or eat? How about scrolling? Are you healthy enough for playoff pressure?Meaning, would you let paranoia set in? Would you say that this is just my karma and sort of play victim, like, why is this happening to me? Would you be overly consumed by things you should’ve done? What you should not have done? These are just a few.Bikram will tell you that “you are the loser when you let anything rattle your peace.” Pastor and straight-up, no-nonsense realist Jerry Flowers states, “When peace vacates, pieces relocate.”So, the question is, how can we grow up more? How can we keep “proving” as we do our yoga practice? Let’s start with us teachers:1. Bikram will tell us, “Teach my way, hard way, Right way.” He says,“The teacher’s job is to make sure students understand there are some things their body cannot do now, but as long as they do it the right way, they will get there.”2. Give hope. In a study on rats, they were placed in water to swim and found they could last up to two minutes before drowning – they just gave up. Yet, if they were lifted out of the water just seconds before drowning and then back in to swim, they could last 18 hours. Raging Rooks, a competitive chess team from an underprivileged area, beat out all the Ivy League chess teams that have studied chess since age four. Raging Rooks coach Maurice taught them a more backward approach: instead of the usual “pawn moves like up two spaces; bishop one up diagonally,” he showed them ways of “checkmate” first. This strategy instilled hope when they were inside the intense playing arena as they already “felt” a win. These are confidence scenarios that we have, too, students, every time we experience an “aha” moment! The first time you lock your knee, you can lift both hands after many years of practice in Toe Stand, and you can see the back wall in a back bend. You’ve been lifted before drowning; you, too, felt the big win with a smaller win through a pressure process. So, if we do it right and allow the students to have THAT experience, we as teachers will generate this ever-important HOPE. Speaking of hope, this, to me, IS what Rajashree IS in our Bikram Yoga World. She says to us teachers, “Show people HOPE, and they can improve their lives. Say the dialog – 100% Right Way, uplifting from your heart. Students may be frustrated and deflated. Your job is to observe and see their sea of issues: shoulder, knee, endurance, energy (are they giving up?) Allow for space, see there 1 millimeter at a time, and encourage THIS.”As students, how can we grow up more; how can we keep “proving using our yoga practice?”1. Try.“As long as you try 100% the right way, have it forever,” Bikram states over and over again. When you do this, you’ll have longevity and health. It doesn’t matter if you think you can or if you think that you can’t, it doesn’t matter how far you go, it doesn’t matter how good or bad you are, and it doesn’t matter if you get “there” or not. Yoga you try; you don’t do. “You will benefit your whole life trying, and it takes 50 years, but in those 50 years, you benefit,” says Bikram. The book of James states this scripture in the Bible, which illustrates time-tested Wisdom: “When your patience is finally in full bloom, then you will be ready for anything, strong in character, full and complete.”2. What does it take to really try? It takes feeling awkward and getting uncomfortable. In Hidden Potential: The Science of Achieving Greater Things, Adam Grant states how imperative it is to be in the Right moments of awkwardness and do this many times to make progress. In one of his studies, a linguistics master, at first glance, you’d assume this person was gifted and started learning different languages at a young age. Not so. The key ingredient from someone who disliked learning languages into full adult years was “allowing for utter discomfort.” He says, “My goal was to make 200 mistakes a day!” In other words, the more mistakes you make, states author Adam, the fewer mistakes you will make.Steve Martin, the famous comedian, was another study, at one point labeled as “the most serious booking error in the history of Los Angeles.” he claims his success was in confronting the most uncomfortable thing he never wanted to do, “writing his own jokes.” He eventually embraced the discomfort of crashing and burning on stage, but as you know, he’s now one of the most popular comedians in America.Discomfort takes discipline, creates discipline, and eventually desire. I’ll end with this: You may or may not know that BYSJ has lived by a Mission and Vision since its inception in 2003.Our Mission is to bring improved health and well-being to you and all our members by providing the highest quality Bikram Yoga instruction. Our teachers are certified and experienced, and we continue to educate ourselves. We remain dedicated to serving all in our community – our students, San Jose, and the South Bay – with excellence and to fostering an environment conducive to learning, inspiration, and self-realization. This year, look for seven posture workshops and clinics to further your “proving,” along with our other “every year” commitments; a new pipeline of “yoga talks” giving you a behind-the-curtain conversation about each of these poses encouraging “aha” moments; and hope. Our Vision for BYSJ, which is all of you, is “Empowering Self-Realization, Igniting Compassion.” This broader verse simply says that BYSJ’s role is to help you see and be YOU, realize GOD in you, naturally becoming the actual beautiful definition of what it means to be human as a result of extending love by first the love you have for yourself. Bikram Yoga uses the physical to take care of Everything. Because, again, “what is the most important thing in your life, your life.” These are NOT new concepts, but as we turn 21, immature excuses no longer fly, so ask yourself, “Is my life really the most important thing in my life?” and “If not now, when?”