Marcia’s Musings: Regime Change – A New Era
/The headline for this soul-baring sounds faintly geopolitical and sinister. It’s as though Hercule Poirot stands on deck to solve a great mystery. This situation requires no famous investigator, however. What is unfolding is the normal flow of the sweet river of life and a happy, joyous bend in it. I can’t wait to tell you this long-held secret.
During this Thanksgiving week, I share the news with you as my heart swells with gratitude and, yes, thanksgiving.
Effective December 31, my full-time involvement in Green Lotus Yoga and Healing Center will conclude as I, MB, and Green Lotus flow into the exciting next phase of life. On that date, I will begin my retirement from most day-to-day operations of Green Lotus, though remaining as an equal partner in it.
Seventeen years ago, an idea popped into my head, reflecting my heart’s deepest longing to one day open my own business. I envisioned one with a mission that would sustain me and hopefully others for a long time. In 2007, the Lakeville center opened, and my heart’s desire took flight.
It’s been a wild ride ever since as I flew headfirst, accompanied by MB who signed on in 2009, into a fledgling industry that didn’t yet claim the now-familiar lingo of wellness, self-care, and integrative healing. Even yoga seemed like a foreign and slightly suspicious concept in the greater Twin Cities. Through it all, we trusted our instincts and that of our clients, students, guests, healers, teachers, and managers to tell us what they needed. We listened, we learned, and we succeeded in many of our new ideas. Thankfully, we failed in far fewer.
We survived the normal challenges of launching a business because of the support of many people. I’d like to recognize several:
Christie Singleton, one of my original business partners, stayed with us for a long time even as she managed a corporate career on the rise. This boosted our confidence and helped to ground us in the early years of experimentation and growth. She provided wise counsel and unwavering support through the thorniest issues. For several years, she taught a challenging, fun-filled Vinyasa class on Saturday mornings.
Candy Bell, another early Green Lotus partner, brought years of experience as a yoga teacher, as an educator, and as a faculty member in another stellar Minnesota-based teacher-training program. She shepherded our fledging school and helped us to open Mendota Heights. Her keen eye for making a space comfortable and welcoming lives on in the brand to this day.
Our current licensees, Amy Dirksen (Eden Prairie) and Tania Stephens (Apple Valley), and a past one, Elizabeth Cabalka Bayer (Annandale), believed in the mission and brought it to new communities with care and an eye and ear for understanding the different localities.
David Kaley, our highly respected massage therapist and lead Reiki master in Lakeville, joined Green Lotus on day one and still offers his services there. Dave and I met in 2005 at a small new Lakeville studio, The Yoga Path, in which I’d invested time and money. Dave delivered his unique healing skills at this studio, the first dedicated one in Lakeville, and taught Reiki training. He risked joining a brand-new company with its dream of offering community-based integrative healing, and he was willing to try new ideas like Restore & Renew, a two-hour event that combined Restorative yoga with massage. My well of thanks has no bottom when it comes to Dave.
Pat Arling, a banker who listened and learned, gave support to my business plan and helped me to navigate financing options until we landed on one that would work for Green Lotus and its partners. At a time when many others couldn’t quite get the idea, Pat did, and the rest is history. Thank you, Pat.
To my family and dear friends: You know who you are. Thank you for listening, encouraging, and sometimes working at Green Lotus. You lifted me higher.
It’s hard to write about the next groups because tears blur my screen. I honor the two wonderful senior managers who have been with us so long – Maureen Farley and Tracy Hovde. They wear so many hats that in my mind’s eye they are 12 feet tall, metaphorically speaking. We’ve laughed, cried, debated, teased, cajoled, and encouraged each other; not all colleagues accomplish this. A shoutout makes its way to Patti Opsahl, who served as manager of the Lakeville facility for a dozen years and then moved to Apple Valley when it opened. Her steadfast commitment as manager and teacher steered the Lakeville mothership ably and calmly. Throughout the years the ship found ballast from the cast of center managers and desk staff members, and the current lineup hits the high bar. Thank you to Jen, Liz, Stephanie, Crystal, Kailey, Devan, Olivia, Lindsay, and Micaela for managing the centers with kindness and skill.
Then there are the current marvelous professional teachers and healers who show up and do the work – to help others heal and grow from the inside out (and the outside in). This diverse group of talented individuals contributes to the cause we share with grace and professionalism. I will miss each of you profoundly and feel kinship and respect for you. Over the years, other healers and teachers touched me and thousands of others – wherever you are, I send my gratitude.
To the guests, clients, students, and visitors of Green Lotus: As I have written in this space before and said often when teaching my classes, Green Lotus doesn’t really belong to me and MB. It belongs to you. Your energy, your very cells strengthen the centers and each other. Together, we created a concept that has survived the Great Recession that began in 2008 and seemed to last an eternity. We clung to each other through an epic once-in-a-century pandemic. Despite the fear and disruptions these seismic events, and some minor ones, caused, Green Lotus endured because of you. If I may, I give one gentle “nudge”. We need more of you back once again to help the healing and to build on the sense of “community-based” that is the bedrock of our mission. There is a declared loneliness crisis in this country that carries warnings from the Surgeon General. Green Lotus and you form antidotes to that.
The standing invitation to belong to the Green Lotus community includes this special one: I hope to see you at our Holiday Fair December 2. A constellation of healers and teachers signed on to participate at all centers, and MB and I too will be present at both – she to lead a mala-bracelet-making workshop (you’ll go home with one) and me to lead a free retirement-oriented LovingKindness mediation. We’re offering these at both Lakeville and Mendota Heights, and I would love to have you join this event with me.
Speaking of MB, my fourteen-year Green Lotus business partner: She’s able, prepared, and excited. Many years ago, my mentor taught me a wise lesson. When he decided in his mid-forties to retire early from a powerhouse company, I asked him, “Why?” He said that when a founder or chief executive stays too long, new ideas and energy drain. A vibrant organization requires change, most importantly “at the top,” he said. Many people ask me, “How can you leave your baby?’, meaning Green Lotus. “Well,” I reply, “the baby grew up.” MB is ready, I am ready, Green Lotus is ready. From my perspective, exciting times are at hand because MB and our team will protect the mission and create new opportunities.
As for me? When a motor vehicle struck my car 30 months ago, I hit pause. Once again, I began listening intently to my heart’s deepest longing, which has never failed me. I’ve got two spectacular kids and their mates, a four-year-old adorable, lively grandson and another grandchild on the way, a lifelong partner – the father of my children – and precious cousins and friends in the Midwest, California, and Washington. I long to spend more time with them. I have a home and friends in Florida, too, and I long to enjoy that community without this work I love so much and that also can be all-consuming.
At age 73, I am eager for the next phase. I want to study, travel, help others, volunteer, swim, hike, bike, play cards, and meditate and move on my mat. MB and I will continue to share in the strategic direction of Green Lotus behind the scenes, of course. Kindly, she has invited me to continue to teach when in Minnesota, contribute my “Musings”, assist her in other ways if she needs me and time permits, and perhaps lead a few more retreats with her. I long to dedicate myself to aging gracefully as a role model for my family, and it’s difficult to do that when working full-time.
And there is this challenge I face as you might have read in Musings a few issues ago: Recently I realized I must develop a few indoor hobbies to complement all my outdoor ones, and there’s no time like the present. In fact, in all things, there is only the present. As we approach Thanksgiving Thursday and then the extended holiday season, I give thanks for you and for Green Lotus, for my family and friends, and for the rich tapestry of the journey each of weaves.
I leave you with this: Thank you for practicing at Green Lotus Yoga and Healing Center. You – and it – filled me up. I’ll see you around.
