Clean your closet, clear your mind
If you’re like me, you have clothes in your closet that have little use. I pride myself on getting rid of things, but there are items, like business suits and several pairs of boots, that have stuck with me through three different moves. The guest room closet, I’m not so proud of: I’ve struggled even opening and closing the door.
Before a recent trip to Ethiopia, I prepped my closets for living, breathing visitors. I had to make room for their stuff, which meant getting rid of mine. I conducted a minor viewing of things and debated keeping or chucking certain items. In the end, I shuffled things around, packing more in tight spaces and gave 1% to consignment.
I went to Ethiopia with Glimmer of Hope Foundation. I walked and talked and played with children with no shoes. I connected with people in rural Ethiopia living in huts. I have seen what it is to not have access to clean drinking water. I saw and touched poverty at such a deep level that I came back knowing that it was time to devote myself to helping these people I had met in rural Ethiopia. These are our brothers and sisters who happened to have been born in Africa as opposed to America, or developing countries as opposed to developed countries. I had no frame of reference for poverty and human suffering on this scale.
And so was born the BYD Challenge. Students complete 60 Bikram Yoga classes and raise money for their favorite charity. It was my way to connect my life in Austin to my experience in rural Ethiopia. Time passed, and I wanted my husband Jeff to be engaged in this cause with me. I knew that he had to go see for himself, to truly get it. There’s no point of reference.
I returned to rural Ethiopia, but this time it was even more personal. I was introducing Jeff to the villagers whom I had met the year before. We saw the completed projects that Jeff and I and the BYD Challengers had funded. We visited the completed hand-dug wells, the completed schools, the completed hospitals. I had no idea the trip would result in the unexpected.
My perspective had changed forever, and I realized that there is a whole big part of this world that is not living the life that we are exposed to everyday. I began to appreciate my family, my health and the yoga in a new way. Most of all, I saw that we all have a duty to give of ourselves to help people in need.
I realized my attempt at creating space in my house had been temporary and lame. I want to be free, I decided.
In my mind’s eye, I rummaged through closets at home. A majority of things were housed under the in-case/fear-based scenario. I rationalized stuff under scenarios such as: future belly dancing classes, intended rollerblading trips, or attire for the accounting firm in case the yoga thing did not work out.
But rationalizing didn’t stop there. Before yoga, I had rationalized my entire life, my old job, relationships, things I didn’t want but had made critical decisions from an in-case/fear-based mindset. How was life to be transformed when I wasn’t honest with myself about what I wanted? Bogged down with things, I had created a false comfort zone. By hanging onto possessions, people, and possibilities, I was living in the past and the future but not in the present. Ethiopia showed me what my closet at home was trying to tell me.
With a new perspective, I set standards for my closets:
(1) No fighting when opening or closing closet doors (or with family members).
(2) Visible closet floors. (Transparency, I must speak my truth and be transparent about my hopes and dreams.)
(3) Clean and organized closets. (Every day I must practice fulfilling these standards.)
(4) Purge what you don’t use. (Letting go of things is hard but frees one up for new experiences.)
When I returned home, it got ugly. I spent jet-lagged days in a daze and nights ripping out the closets’ insides. I jumped over and swerved around an obstacle course of piles in my living room. The guilt that I felt was overwhelming. This was the old me. I had tried to heal through retail therapy, and to no avail. My happiness now comes from connecting with others, hearing their personal stories and through yoga, empowering them to take control of their health. In that moment, I knew that it was time to think globally and go outside of the PURE Bikram Yoga studios. It was time to heal the world with yoga. And so was born Pure Action.
Circling the piles, somewhere in the core of my being, I could hear a voice form the present, asking me to consider the exit plan the next time I was about to swipe my card to take on another item. Things we own and acquire define our past and hopes for the future. Our accumulations not only succeed in shielding us from the present, they also accumulate hours of time to manage, eating up life.
The physical process of purging my closet and my life was a trip in itself. I had created space for more love and compassion. I had created more time for things that I love – family, yoga and teaching. I realized that personal fulfillment comes not from acquiring things or fame, but from giving to those who can never pay you back. I had found my dharma, my purpose – healing the world with yoga.
PURE Mardy 
