Today, Andrew and I went snowboarding here in Sun Valley, Idaho and I learned a valuable life lesson that I thought I’d share with you all as I believe the mountain AND this sport are both perfect metaphors for life.

Side story: Last night was the final night of a Wealth/Finance Conference we had here in Sun Valley Idaho, with the great Tony Robbins. I must say, I learned so much more than what I thought we were going to be doing here which was learning how to save, invest, protect and grow our money… you know… scary shit for some of us women! Hahaha!

What we ended up learning besides the technical stuff, of course, was how to endure through hardships and the “winters” as he calls it. Winters meaning the stage in life in which it feels like things are not growing and flourishing. Tony says, “you can either freeze in the winter or prepare yourselves in the good seasons so you can play in the snow.” All of this is a metaphor of course and is a good one if you are thinking of the US economy… This was definitely not the point of the story but I wanted to set you all up.

In order to provide us with enough insight and tools, he had some of the top influential people of our time come in and speak, just for the sake of name dropping a few, (hehe) Steve Forbes, Marc Faber, Peter Diamandis, Harry Dent, Larry Summers and more.

One speaker Tony brought in that serves the purpose of this story is an Aikido teacher by the name of Thomas Crum. For some of you who don’t know, Aikido is a Japanese Martial Arts that uses life’s energy as a form of connecting, grounding and protecting.

Breaking it down:

Ai – Joining, unifying, combining, fit
Ki – Spirit, energy, mood, morale
Do –Way, path

Every morning this week, we were to meet with Thomas Crum to do small practices that would help center ourselves for the slopes. Having him here was definitely beneficial and thank god I remembered his practice today.

Back to the story: Andrew and I decided to venture out on our own today and snowboard down the mountain, when I say mountain, I mean baby hill but none the less, this hill decided to show me who was boss. You guessed it, the hill won that match, I never thought I knew how to somersault, let alone several times at once like I did today and the only way I stopped, was my head doing one final pound to the ground.

I felt like I blacked out a bit, but was still able to get back up. The embarrassing thing (which I can’t believe I am telling you all this) was once I got back to the start of the ski slopes, I started balling like a little baby to my partner Andrew. He had no idea what was happening but knew that the mountain must have done something to me since the first things I said while taking my helmet off was,

“FUCK this! I’m done!”

Yep, that was me, the bawling little brat who threw in the towel. To back myself up I did hit my head pretty hard and as I am typing this I still have a headache. Thank my love for his understanding and compassion through my tangent. He sat with me until I wiped all the tears and snot off my face. I finally told him to take off without me and let me just sit and watch him. He first made sure I was all right, then left back up the mountain.

While he was gone, I was able to take a minute to acknowledge my anger. I remembered what Thomas Crum said about breathing. I took three VERY long breathes and asked myself, who was I really mad at? Was it the mountain? That bitch! How could it just flip me like that! Or was it completely me and how off centered I was with myself?

Regardless of whom I might have blamed, I realized anger would not get me back on that mountain again, instead, it would disable me probably forever from enjoying snowboarding in the future. I knew if I ended the day not getting my ass back up that mountain, I would for sure regret it.

So I did, I got my ass up; took another three breathes; and literally talked to the mountain, acknowledging her beauty, power, and energy then went up the ski lift. What I found, was something extraordinary. The moment I let go, gave respect, breathed and connected to my center, I was MORE connected to the mountain and the more I was able to move, glide and shift. Trough this, I found myself enjoying it much more and judged the terrain and myself much less.

Not to say I didn’t fall down a couple of more times, but I actually found a respect for the energy of nature. Which is something I teach quite often but experiencing and acknowledging it is always a beautiful shift.

Life knows how to show you that your ego and your problems are NOT of importance

Sometimes it shows you by light falls, and sometimes it shows you by somersaults in the air with a hit to your head just in case it thought you didn’t get the message, but in a single second, you can shift it by respect, by a breath, and my courage to take that mountain (life) up for the challenge again.