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Higher
Purpose - The Story of Body and Soul Connection
For
years I have been working in a high stress sales
environment selling print and Web advertising
for a publishing company in the high tech space.
As the market has declined over the years so has
my health. In the early years I loved my job,
I made lots of money and my life was happy. But
as the market declined so did the integrity of
my company and along with it my mental, physical
and spiritual health.
When
I started Personal Mastery back in February of
2004 I did not know exactly what I was looking
for. I just knew I was in tremendous physical
back pain and my life was completely stressful.
As a single mother and sole provider for my child,
I felt stuck in my job, locked in by my paycheck,
401K and health benefits. I felt I would be stuck
in my job forever, slowly rotting away just like
the company I work for.
As
I got deeper into Personal Mastery and practiced
my PM Goal of Self Love and Self Acceptance, I
began to realize that I loved myself enough to
entertain the possibility of doing something completely
different, but I didn’t know what. All I
knew the more I worked on myself the more I realized
my company’s operations were incongruent
with my beliefs and values. Loving myself meant
that I had to follow my heart and do the right
thing internally regardless of the temporary external
results. However, my fear kept me at my job a
while longer still.
One
night we were visited by Marsha Wieder. She talked
about how we can transform our lives in a moment,
and that we could really live our dreams. She
got us thinking about what we were really passionate
about. I remembered that I always wanted a new-age
bookstore in my hometown of Novato. I had even
explored the idea in depth at one time. However,
my fear gripped me and I never followed through.
I remembered how passionate I felt at the time,
I started to feel alive again, like I really could
follow my bliss, but how? I felt I had all the
support of the Personal Mastery group and I could
do anything. I was elated. I started to think
and feel that I really could do something different,
something useful.
As
I went home that evening I was meditating on some
of the things Marsha said. She said, “we
waste our lives when we say yes to doing things
we really don’t want to do”. I knew
I was wasting my life and my health (spiritual,
mental and physical) working for a company that
was far less than ethical to its clients, vendors
and employees. My back ached so badly I could
not sit in a chair for more than 5 minutes comfortably,
a sure sign that my life was out of balance, but
what to do.
I started
to think I could live my dream. Why not just do
it. I asked the universe how I could have this
bookstore and make enough money to take care of
my child and myself. The thought came instantly
to call Peggy Wallace, another member of my Personal
Mastery group. Peggy had been an inspiration to
me since she had come from a similar background
in ad sales and had escaped and was now living
her dream. She was now running a very successful
pilates and yoga studio called Elevation in San
Francisco.
Peggy
was working as a writer and developed carpal tunnel
and RSI. Her injuries were so severe that she
was unable to continue working as a writer. She
had been doing pilates for several years, and
it had helped her recover from chronic back and
neck pain after several car accidents. She decided
to design her life and work to support her health,
and trained to become a pilates instructor. While
traveling in Cambodia, she realized it was time
to take her life to the next level. She decided
to open a pilates studio, with the ultimate vision
of having a center where clients had access to
massage therapists, Reiki, coaches, and nutritionists.
She opened Elevation Pilates in June of 2003,
and then expanded her business in May of 2004
to include a yoga studio. The studio recently
started offering movement classes with Tambra
Harck on the first Sunday of every month.
 I
called Peggy and asked her to be my partner in
this new business. I had always thought if I opened
a bookstore it would have a yoga/pilates component.
I called Peggy, it was 11:30 at night but I would
never be able to sleep if I didn’t call
her right then. It turns out Peggy was very interested.
She had always wanted a bookstore component in
her studio. The universe had brought us together
in Personal Mastery to reach our higher purpose.
It was time for action.
We
put together our plans so easily; it is like all
the forces of the universe are supporting us in
every way. We named our business Body and Soul
Connection, because that is what it is doing for
us. However, we will operate under the name Elevation
because of the lifting effect we hope to have
on our customers. I know I feel better every day.
My back is healing and as I coach this round of
Personal Mastery I feel like I have so much more
to offer now the new participants, having learned
so much about myself.
Peggy
will be teaching Pilates and I will be learning
to teach too. We have excellent Yoga instructors
(some from Pathways) joining us as well. We have
space for workshops and will have folks like Carol
Kammen and Marsha Wieder doing workshops in our
space. In addition, we will have a massage room
where Tina Galordi will be giving massages a few
days a week and finally we will rent office space
for personal coaching from people like Robin Vereen.
This is a total Pathways community space.
 The
studio/bookstore will be named Elevation and will
be opening in Novato on October 1st after we return
from the Heart Conference. We felt that having
our heart opened a week before opening would be
very symbolic and we would then be able to run
our business from the heart! We will be having
a huge grand opening party on October 1st from
4PM to 8PM. The address is 1769 B, Grant Avenue
in Novato. We will offer door prizes at the party
and discounts on all products and classes are
available to PAC members. For more information
please call 415-386-9008 or visit our Website
at www.elevationpilates.com.
Please
join us in our new venture!
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