Living Yoga

A continuing theme in this blog is letting go of the need for external response or approval in order to be personally happy.  This is something I’m constantly working on in my life and yoga with meditation has helped me tremendously, after all the physical practice of yoga is about feeling the pose not about what it looks like from the outside.  It’s about the journey of the practice, not the end result. However, this week my ego did take a small hit.

Besides being a yoga instructor I’m an actress in New York City.  For those of you that may not know, most actors in NYC perform in many small productions for little or no pay in the hopes of being seen by the right people, to add to our resume and for the love of performing.  Sometimes these plays aren’t the best in the world and we still do it, because, hey, maybe my wonderful performance will be noted and who knows what can happen!

Well, last week I performed in a play that received a few dismal reviews.  Ouch, but not unexpected.  In one review my performance wasn’t noted, ouch but okay.  Yet another review said, “Prioste had good moments, but at times was only serviceable.”  Ouch, ouch and ouch.

How do I let go of that?  Well, it still hurts but I do something that helps.  Whenever my mind goes to the thought of that reviewer’s statement, I flip my mind to the memory of all the people that attended the show (mostly people I didn’t know) who shook my hand and told me that I gave such a wonderful performance.  Because in the end it was a performance for the audience not the few reviewers that mattered to me.

And that is the key to letting go…letting go of holding on to the negative thought and habitually returning to the positive one. It takes practice, but hey I got time!