Being Shown The Path
Six weeks later, as february turned to march, I was sitting in a coffee shop in Cusco, Peru. I had been in South America for about five weeks now, and had spent a month backpacking with one of my best friends through southern Patagonia. Now I found myself solo in one of my favorite places on the planet. I had just turned 24, and was investing heavily in my becoming; working with a naturopathic doctor, practicing yoga, and absorbing the wisdom of Carlos Castenada (A Separate Reality, Journey to Ixtlan), Deepak Chopra (Buddha, *Synchrodestiny), and Gary Zukav (Seat of the Soul), amongst others.
This particular morning, March 1, 2020, I was sitting in a coffee shop writing in my journal about my path, wondering what my next step was, asking for clarity. In the years prior, my style of traveling had been fairly casual, dictated by a “flow with the go” mentality. However, I was now feeling a calling to commit to something deeper, a training or an apprenticeship perhaps. I sipped my coffee, and typed into google: “Yoga Teacher Trainings in South America 2020”, just curious about the potentials.
Many yoga teacher training opportunities popped up, and I began scrolling. As I scrolled, a handsome and healthy looking man walked into the coffee shop, ordered, and sat down a few feet away from me. He took out an ipad to write, but immediately a girl next to him chatted him up. I had my headphones in, but could hear most of their conversation. They’re talking, I’m scrolling. Everything was unbelievably normal until I heard this man say, “.. and i'm doing a yoga teacher training in pisac next week.”
Yoga teacher training?!
I stopped scrolling.
I gently took my headphones out.
I turned in my seat to face this man who seemingly just answered my prayers.
“Excuse me…. But did you just say yoga teacher training?”
He confirmed I heard him correctly, passed along the YTT information to me, and slipped out of the coffee shop, obviously looking to do work somewhere without being disturbed.
Now, if I hadn’t been reading Synchrodestiny by Deepak Chopra at the time, I might not have been as moved by this “coincidence.” But Deepak Chopra says that there is no such thing as a meaningless coincidence.
I lay in my bed that night wondering if I would commit to this yoga teacher training.. Feeling a sense of delightful confusion in the way the days events had played out…
“The coincidences or little miracles that happen every day of your life are hints that the universe has much bigger plans for you than you ever dreamed of for yourself.” Chopra writes. “We cannot even imagine the complex forces behind every event that occurs in our lives. You never know how and when any life experience will reappear. You never know when a coincidence will lead to the opportunity of a lifetime.”
I awoke the next morning and began writing in my journal, recounting yesterday's events. Through the re-telling of this wildly random story to myself, I decided this was a sign I’d be foolish to ignore.
I committed to the YTT, eager to see my new friend, Jonathan, whom I felt I met by fate (I had no idea at the time how life-altering and monumental this friendship would be for me, but again that’s a story for another time).
On a sunny Tuesday morning, march 10th, the yoga teacher training began. And just five days later, on Sunday March 15th, a country-wide state of emergency was declared, due to the Coronavirus pandemic. On March 16th, Peru’s borders closed indefinitely. And thus, I spent the next 7 months in Pisac, Peru. It became quite clear that the universe did indeed have bigger plans for me than I had ever imagined.
