It was a fun interview, but one part in particular really stuck with me:

The reminder not to compare yourself to your heroes.

They’re your heroes precisely because they’re ahead of you on the path. It’s easy to think they’re just superior, that you’ll never be as good/as successful/as [fill in the blank], but in fact, they were once where you stand now.

Neither, Johnny and Sonia reminded me, should you compare yourself to where you want to be. The target is constantly moving and always just out of reach. That’s the point of having goals, in fact: to push yourself forward.

It’s great to have heroes and goals, but comparing yourself to your heroes, or to where you wish you were, can only lead to feelings of failure. Not useful!

Instead, Johnny and Sonia sagely advised, compare yourself to where you used to be.

Ah, yes, infinitely more useful!

Which naturally led me to thoughts of music camp.

“This one time, at band camp…”

Okay, maybe the connection isn’t so obvious. But bear with me.

Today in yoga (when I should have had a mind empty of all thoughts except lines of energy and breath [though of course I never should on myself]), my thoughts were indeed on music camp. On Saturday I head to California Coast Music Camp (CCMC) for the week, and I’m super-excited! This afternoon, as I stretched into utthita trikonasana, I contemplated the microphone technique/performance skills workshop I want to offer to help out less experienced campers who want to perform in the student concert.

Suddenly I flashed back to my first music camp experience, in 2002: Puget Sound Guitar Workshop. I was a newbie guitar player, still struggling to get my fingers to grab the most simple of chords before the song was onto the next change. And although I knew I could carry a tune — and indeed I led services for hundreds of people at my synagogue every year at the High Holy Days — I didn’t think of myself as a singer.

How far I’ve come!

Some specific examples:

Then: I could barely play guitar.

Now: I can actually accompany myself — with jazz chords, no less — in a way that isn’t horribly embarrassing.

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Then: I didn’t even know what music theory was.

Now: I have a decent road map of music theory (and not only that, but I’ve discovered — thanks to music camp — that I love it!)

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Then: I could carry a tune, but didn’t have a lot of understanding of or control over my “instrument.”

Now: I can do things with my voice I never thought possible!

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Then: I was totally in awe of the professional level performances of some of the other students.

Now: I perform professionally myself!

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Then: The idea of having my own CD seemed fantastical.

Now: I have my own CDs!

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Then: The idea of writing my own songs seemed totally out of reach.

Now: I’ve not only written some original songs, but other singers have asked me if they could sing them!

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Then: I remember sitting in on the performance skills class, feeling rather overwhelmed.

Now: I’m teaching performance skills!

Benign reality and baby steps

It’s so easy to get bogged down lamenting what I haven’t achieved yet, and how far away my goals seem. Re-framing my musical life in terms of how far I’ve come turned my entire perspective around.

In 8 years I’ve gone from “Oh, I’m not a musician,” to a paid, gigging singer with a growing body of original songs, 2 self-produced CDs and a mailing list of over 500 fans.

And that’s just my musical life. I’ve made similar strides in my business, my living situation, my self-growth.

Just like a big hike through a canyon or up a mountain, progress feels slow when you’re in the middle of it, but it can take your breath away when you stop for a second and look back at how far you’ve traveled.

All of this gives me hope and a renewed sense of commitment and energy. The race is not always to the swift. Baby step by baby step I’m moving myself forward.

I wonder where I’ll be in another 8 years?

It’s psychological, of course, but that wall also serves a useful purpose: just knowing the wall is there to catch me lets me push further into an unknown space — the space of total balance.

The thing is, unless you’re perfectly vertical, headstand is a lot of work. Your arms really need to press into the floor to keep the full weight of your body up in the air. It’s tiring!

When you’re in balance, though, it feels effortless. Free. Like you’re floating. You could stay in headstand this way forever.

Training wheels

Remember learning to ride a bike with training wheels? My training wheels were always slightly off-kilter, so my bike (purple, from Sears, with streamers coming out of the handlebars) leaned either a bit to the left, or a bit to the right. Very uncomfortable. But oh, the stomach-churning panic when I first tried to ride the damned thing after the training wheels came off!

Getting to balance is scary.

Learning where perfect balance is — how far to launch your legs up without toppling over onto your back; how to make those two wheels go fast enough to keep the bike vertical and the skin on your knees intact — takes practice. It’s a learning curve, which for some people is easy and natural, but for others (like me with headstand), not so much.

Those of us in that second group might fall a bunch of times before we hit that sweet spot.

Which is where training wheels can help. For headstand, that might be a wall, or someone to spot you, or hell, just a big ol’ pile of pillows.

Some yoga teachers insist that headstand learners should start out in the middle of the room, the very first time they try, so that they never get psychologically dependent on the wall (like me!) There’s merit to that philosophy.

I, however, tend to be a gentler soul. If using some kind of “crutch” or “training wheels” helps you find that balance point and feel it in your body without hurting yourself in the process, I say more power to you!

This is not just about headstands and bicycles, of course

You may have figured out, 250-some odd words into this post, that the principles here don’t just apply to yoga, or riding a two-wheeler. Whatever your big goal is, when you’re in total balance, everything feels easy. Everything flows.

It’s getting to the balance that’s the challenge.

Where are you still looking for that balance point? Is there something big you want to accomplish, but fear of toppling over is holding you back?

Or are you struggling with something, working really hard at it and feeling like you’re not getting anywhere?

If so, maybe some training wheels are in order. Along with permission to use them. (That part’s key.)

Balance is the ever-elusive goal in every area of my life. Ever-elusive because the only constant is change, and since I’m always changing, what constitutes balance for me is always changing.

Right now the big area I’m focusing on is balance in my work and money spaces. I’ve been making huge changes, and since I’m tired of crashing my proverbial bike and scraping my proverbial knees, I’m making no qualms about the fact that I’m attaching some training wheels to get me going!

Here are some of my training wheels these days:

• Chris Guillebeau’s The Empire Building Kit and other Unconventional Guides

• Chris Guillebeau and Pam Slim’s $100 Business Forum (also an Unconventional Guides product)

• Johnny B. Truant and Lee Stranahan’s Question the Rules

• Dave Navarro’s The Launch Coach Library and workshops

• Naomi Dunford’s Marketing School

They’re making the transition from three-wheeler (my existing business life) to two-wheeler (my ideal vision of my business life) a lot more stable.

Specifics?

I’ve already written a preliminary review of the Empire Building Kit (preliminary only because the EBK is a year-long kit, and I’ve only been doing it about a month), and as I dig further into the other wheels of training, I’ll give you my honest opinion. (Or opinions, plural, because I’m not always of one mind.)

…And back to headstand

Because I feel a lack of closure if I don’t come full circle.

Cool thing: I have now experienced perfect balance in headstand a few times.

Near a wall, of course. (Which I have no plans to abandon anytime soon.)

You may be the Torpedoes-Be-Damned, Learn To Do Headstand In The Middle Of The Room type, but I, for one, am grateful for training wheels!

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And yes, in case you’re wondering, those links in the bullet list are affiliate links. [With the exception of Naomi's Marketing School, because I couldn't find an IttyBiz affiliate program. Anyone?]

That means if you click through and end up buying something, I’ll make some money, and you’ll be helping to support me in my quest to create a sustainable life doing what I love. How cool is that?

Just one of the many tools I’m learning from my Business Training Wheels.

I’ll provide a more detailed review of each of these products later, but suffice it to say that I think they are all good products. I only sign up as an affiliate for products I can honestly recommend without feeling all queasy and gross about it. Just sayin’.

Will they be the right products for you? That I can’t say. But I will share a lot more details about each of them in the weeks to come, so watch this space.

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My jivamukti yoga teacher, Giselle, really knows how to push my buttons.

Giselle always structures her class around a theme of the month, and this month’s theme is Fear. Perfect timing!

As I move through what Pam Slim calls the Change Cycle for New Entrepreneurs (otherwise known as “Why do I feel so flipping crazy?”), facing my fears in yoga is exactly what I need to help me face my fears in my business life.

Right now I’m in Square Two of the Change Cycle, which Pam calls “Dreaming and Scheming.” Whereas in Square One (“Death and Rebirth”), it’s typical to feel spaced out, disoriented, uncomfortable and “not like myself,” typical Square Two feelings are excitement, a flood of creativity, openness and sometimes overwhelm from the range of possibilities.

Um, yeah. That would be me.

In other words, all hopped up and rarin’ for a yoga class to bring 90-minutes of single-minded focus to my otherwise scattered-feeling day.

So I got myself to Giselle’s class, ready to work on inversions — head stand, forearm balance, hand stand — all the asanas that bring up fear, that make me face the places where I don’t trust myself.

Bring it on, Giselle, I thought as I rolled out my mat. I may not lose my fear of inversions overnight, but I’m committed to showing up and making the effort.

(Baby steps, right? They’ll get me there as sure as huge leaps [if a little slower], so bring it on!)

But then Giselle had to throw something new into the mix:

Blindfolds.

What the – ?

That’s right, she brought a pile of bandannas, and instructed us to tie one over our eyes for the duration of the class.

Now, if you’ve ever taken a yoga class, you know there are a lot of tricky postures that can be hard to put your body into and hold. There’s a lot of balancing involved, a lot of precarious poses where just a funny look from somebody might be enough to topple you over.

And in a jivamukti (or vinyasa or Power) yoga class, there’s a lot of moving in between postures. It can be really challenging, even for someone like me, who’s done a lot of yoga and gone through intensive yoga teacher training.

And blindfolded?

If Giselle wanted to light up some fears, she chose a very effective way to go about it.

But she was so blithe and matter-of-fact about this blindfold exercise that I shrugged my shoulders and dutifully tied on my bandanna. And kept it on for the whole class, I might note.

I learned a few things from this crazy experiment, many of which apply to what’s going on in the rest of my life (isn’t life always like that?) Here’s what I came away with:

1) You can do more than you probably think you can

Yes, I’m here to tell you that it is actually possible to do yoga blindfolded. It’s even possible to do ardha chandrasana (half moon pose) blindfolded (though admittedly not very well).

Ya think this might be true of other things in life that I’m feeling a bit scared of trying?

(Um, rhetorical question.)

2) It’s okay to back off a bit when you add something new to the mix

Though I wasn’t able to achieve my fullest expression of many postures, I allowed myself to be a beginner and be okay with not reaching that fullest expression. For right now, my fullest expression of crescent pose, for example, is a lot less full when blindfolded than when my eyes are open. (Hey, I don’t want to bust a kneecap!) And I let myself be okay with that.

I was having a brand new experience, being challenged in a way I never had before. It’s good to take risks, but it’s also okay to be gentle with yourself.

A vocal teacher once told me that getting better at a new thing is like juggling. Maybe you learn to juggle three balls, and then someone throws another ball at you, and suddenly you’ve got to juggle four. For awhile, you’re going to drop one of the other balls until you get up to speed. Then when you get comfy juggling four balls and want to move to five, for awhile you’re going to drop one or two of the others until you get up to speed with five.

All part of the process.

Similarly, as I figure out my new business directions, I’m trying all sorts of new things. This is scary shit, people!

Blindfolded yoga reminded me that I can put myself out there and try things, but I can do it at my own pace. And it’s okay if I drop a few balls in the process. Yes, I want to push myself, and I don’t want fear to stop me, but I can proceed at a pace that feels safe. And I can forgive myself for other parts of my life that may be temporarily neglected.

3) It’s good to go “inside” sometimes

Now yoga is, theoretically, a lot about what’s going on inside. The best teachers (or at least the ones I like the best) will tell you that it doesn’t matter what a posture looks like from the outside, it’s what if feels like on the inside that counts.

The problem is that our egos have a tendency to get involved, and sometimes it’s hard to stay focused on the internal. Egos want to know “How high is my leg going today??” and don’t care so much about how a posture feels.

One of the reasons I love yoga studios without mirrors is that no mirror to look at keeps my ego quieter.

But if you really want to remove your ego one more level, try wearing a blindfold!

(Of course, the ego pops up in other ways, such as, “Oh my god, I’m falling over; I must look like a moron!” But because you can’t see anyone watching you, it’s easier to stop worrying about whether they are.)

What happens is, you really have to focus on what your body is doing, on what’s happening inside. No using the mirror as a crutch for your balance or placement! It all comes down to feeling.

And wow, how cool is that? (Giselle is f-ing brilliant.)

In my business life I’m looking at so many creative ideas, I tend to get stuck in a feedback loop of “I should do this… but maybe I should do this… or maybe this…” This is not useful.

What is useful at this stage is going inside, asking myself how each of these various possibilities make me feel. Put on the proverbial blindfold and listen to what my body and soul are telling me.

4) The more you do something, the more familiar — and less scary — it feels

A friend of mine used to say, “If you do something enough, it becomes normal.” Case in point: when I first started singing in public, I was terrified! Holding a microphone felt awkward, I didn’t know what to do with my other hand, my mouth felt like sandpaper, my breath support totally went away and so did my ability to think.

It was awful!

But the awfulness didn’t last forever. Little by little singing with a band, performing for an audience, became just something I did. So much so that now getting up in front of even thousands of people doesn’t phase me at all!

At the beginning of blindfolded yoga class today, not being able to see felt pretty damn scary. Would I fall over onto my neighbor? Would I even be able to stand up out of forward fold without falling over, let alone get myself into challenging asanas?

Although I wouldn’t say I was comfortable with blindfolded yoga by the end of class, I can say I was a helluva lot more comfortable with it. With each new posture I managed to do, I realized what I could do, and I got a little less scared.

Each and every one of my new business ideas are new to me, so they feel scary. But just like blindfolded yoga, I know with each little step I take it will feel just a bit less scary. And eventually I’ll be totally rockin’ it and it won’t be scary at all!

And then, of course, it will probably be time for a new challenge!

5) Sometimes all you need is someone else who believes in you

Would I ever have tried blindfolded yoga if Giselle hadn’t made me? No freakin’ way!

Honestly, it wouldn’t even have occurred to me. But if it had, I probably would have thought “Oh, that’s too hard; I couldn’t do that.” Period. End of story.

But Giselle brought in the bandannas and clearly had faith that everyone in class could do this challenging thing. She believed in me, so I believed in myself.

Everybody has people in their life who believe in them, and god knows there are always plenty of naysayers who don’t. When you’re doing blindfolded yoga, or when you’re launching some new business ideas, it’s pretty damn important to surround yourself with people who believe in you.

Wrap up

So there you go: one yoga class + blindfold = five cool life lessons. Not bad, huh? (Can you see why Giselle is one of my favorite teachers?)

I wonder what she’ll throw at us next week.

Comment love: if you’ve gotten some great lessons from something scary you tried (sky diving? flying trapeze? swimming with sharks?), I’m dying to hear them!

Now I’m off to find a bandanna and try blindfolded ardha chandrasana again.