Myself and Sunali. She ran straight into my arms when I went into her home. She was singing with me, hugging me and touching my face, it wasn't until after we left the carer told me she's blind!
So on Sunday I am travelling to India for 6 weeks with The Hope Foundation. I was there in 2012 also and I have been planning to go back ever since. They work with the street and slum children of Kolkata (formerly Calcutta) and I can not wait to go back and see all the wonderful progress all the children have made!
My beautiful friend Helen, owner of Lahinch Yoga studio ,giving her loving energy to a boy with Downs Syndrome.
Imagine just €5 can care for one child for one week in the HOPE homes! Otherwise they face an imaginable life of abuse and crime on the streets. HOPE give them a wonderful life filled with love and care. They make sure they have the highest standard of education and support. They have a warm, safe place to sleep, food in their bellys, a chance to go to school, a mother's love, clean clothes, a chance to learn music, sing, dance, do art, be creative and explore their talents. It is truly wonderful.
The group I am travelling with will be doing yoga every day to ground and balance ourselves, we will then visit all the children in HOPEs various projects including their Hospital and Training centres. We will then do yoga with some of the children also. They respond so well to yoga and thoroughly enjoy the practice. If you would be interested in participating in this trip next year, or a similar one (trecking, drama, painting etc) check out more details here: Yoga for HOPE
One of my favourite parts of the trip is a pamper day for the 'House Mothers' that we organise. Basically there are women in each of the homes who 24/7 care for the children as if they were their own. They give them basic care as well as love, support, counselling and discipline. They are truly amazing. To thank them for all their work we give them a 'spa day' where we pamper them by doing holistic therapies, facials, nails, hair and make up. To them this is such a luxury as to put it in perspective one month's wages in India would buy you a bottle of perfume!
If you want to sponsor me you can at my link here: http://www.sponsor.ie/jean-lauder/event/yoga-for-hope/ and I will ensure every cent goes directly to the children (I am covering all my own travel costs personally).
After working in Kolkata with HOPE I will travel down to Goa where I am about to embark on a 'career change' of sorts! More a lifestyle change I hope! I am completing my Yoga Teacher Training with Himalaya Yoga Valley and will spend over a month doing intense training every day. Here I will practise and study the physical postures, meditation, classroom management, history and spirituality of yoga and I am so excited! More information on the course here.
So yes I have left my full time, permanent job with health care and pension (my father is still worried!) and I am about to embark out a complete change of profession. Yes it's scary and yes I have no idea how the next few years will pan out but a phrase I once read keeps coming into my head.
'If your dreams don't scare you, they aren't big enough'
This is something I've wanted to do for years and so I finally took the plunge. A wise woman once said to me 'You must believe in your cause' and this is a cause I truly, wholeheartedly believe in. It's going to be a long, tough road but one I am excited to travel. I can not wait to wake up each morning knowing that my job/career/profession, whatever you want to call it, is something I am passionate about, something that genuinely helps people live a better life.
So keep tuned into the blog where I will be posting lots of updates and pictures from the two experiences, Volunteering and Yoga Teacher Training. Both Kolkata and Goa are truly magnificent places I've have visited previously and can not wait to see again.
Is this a mid life crsis in my late 20s? Perhaps. As my group of school friends head off to Vegas to celebrate our collective 30th birthdays I'll be meditating on a beach in Goa and exercising for 6 hours a day! But I wouldn't change it for the world!
As I always say to people 'I was born in Cork but my soul was born in India.'
6 whole weeks to Eat Clean, Train Dirty and Live Easy?! Bliss
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