Meet @yogimare__ sharing her #yogasavedmylife story with us. These are her words 💚

"I struggle with depression, anxiety, & alcoholism. It runs in my family. I try to accept it & work on it instead of fighting it" . . "It saved my life. Not just once, but many times. It’s really hard to love a part of you that causes so much damage. But to love is to nurture, & to nurture is to heal. Fighting something only makes it more aggressive . I had no idea how to love the part of me that I hated so much until I found yoga (or did it find me?) Instead of throwing back a shot to take the edge off, I used breathing exercises when I felt a panic attack creeping in. Instead of the fake happiness that catching a buzz creates, I was making my own happiness with the sense of accomplishment I felt after a nice flow . . My life started changing for the better. I was glowing from the inside out. Then in the midst of teacher training, on March 18, 2019, I got an earth shattering phone call. My dad...my sweet, goofy, handsome daddy committed suicide. The disease that plagues our family took my dad. It was, & still is, unbelievable . After him my grandad, my cousin, my friend since childhood, & 2 of my fiancé’s closest friends died. All of this in the span of 7 months. I was doing so well, then it was like I got hit by a train that knocked me a mile back. It was hard to pick myself up at first. I thought “if I just lie here it’ll all go away.” It didn’t. The only thing to do was get up & work through it . Knowing the pain I felt from my dads death, dying was off the table. So I’m working through it. If I was knocked a mile back, I guess I’ll start from where I began. One step at a time. Building myself into a stronger woman than the first time I went on this journey. I keep coming back to my mat to flow, pray, or sit & cry . Yoga is a never ending journey. It cannot control what happens in your life, but it offers tools to help you get through . I don’t know where I would be if yoga & the yoga community had not come into my life. Yoga, literally saved my life. My promise to myself is to always come to my mat. My sacred space where I can be exactly who I am that day 💚