I opened a yoga studio, MIdtown Yoga, in 2001.
At the age of fifty I started a business at least that is what my husband called it. There was no business plan because I had no intention of making money. I simply wanted a space in which I could teach yoga. People came. Rodney Yee had just been on the Oprah Winfrey show. Christy Turlington was on the cover of Time magazine. Unbeknownst to me, I was riding a wave destined to become a world-wide phenomenon. Yoga went from something that only hippies and naked Indian gurus did to something celebrities and soccer Moms did to get in shape and relieve stress.
Being a studio owner was hard work. I taught 14 to 18 public classes a week, managed other teachers, promoted and put on workshops with famous teachers like Rodney Yee, Shiva Rea, Richard Freeman, Cyndi Lee and others. My bank account grew. I put my son through college. He went to NYU. I bought a new car. We traveled to India and across America to study with world-renowned teachers of yoga philosophy and meditation. My little studio, Midtown Yoga, made a name for itself. I was successful.
Fast forward to December 2013. I sold my studio a year ago. I am one of the lucky ones. I found a buyer who was willing to take over the studio and pay me for the years of hard work I had put into building and establishing a “yoga business,” two words I never dreamed would come together. When I began, in 2001, having practiced and taught yoga for several years already, I only knew there was a need and I had the tools to fill it. As time went on, running Midtown Yoga, became more and more about bringing in more students, promoting visiting teachers, organizing and spear-heading a teacher training program that produced over 100 certified yoga teachers. I gave myself completely over to the business. I missed weddings, funerals, bar mitzvahs, birthday parties, vacations, and lost hours of sleep worrying about the studio. The passion I once felt for the practice of yoga dwindled. I started out as a humble yogini and ended up an over-worked CEO. I wanted to quit, to find someone, anyone who would take over the business. I tried unsuccessfully to get my husband to run the business side of the studio. I delegated responsibility in hopes of finding some relief from the stress and wear and tear, but the truth is, I did not want to give up the income. The more money I made, the more addicted I became. The little girl who grew up with nothing, who never had an allowance, who shop-lifted to get the clothes she so desperately wanted, was now a successful business woman, well-known in the community. I became so strongly identified with Midtown Yoga that I forgot who I was. I drank more, played less, and complained a lot about being over-worked.
Three things happened that change the course of my life. My son died. He was dead for seven minutes, his heart kept beating only by the CPR he received from a bartender who happened to be in nursing school. Nothing mattered to me more than his recovery. Somehow the studio managed without me. A year later, I found a lump in my left breast. It was malignant. I gave myself over to the “cancer industry.” On the advice of my doctor, I had the lump removed. After two weeks of recovery, I began 45 days of radiation which left me exhausted and unable to teach yoga. Again, the studio somehow managed without me. At that same time, I learned my daughter was pregnant with her first child. I suddenly realized I no longer cared about the studio or teaching other people how to be happier and healthier. I looked at myself in the mirror and saw a tired, sad, lonely, and exhausted woman of 59 who wanted her life back, but I was still unwilling to let go of the income stream I had created.
As a product of the sixties, I grew up believing that women were second class citizens. We voted, we worked, we held public office, but many men still thought a woman’s place was in the home. I worked in the private sector as a paralegal. I was underpaid, “hit on” by one of the partners, told to quit and stay home after the birth of my daughter, and finally driven out of the office by a demotion to subrogation clerk. So, yes, I was proud of myself for building a successful business, for starting something with nothing (I cashed in a $20.000.00 insurance policy), and for making a name for myself. When I left my first husband, he told me “I found you in the gutter and that is where you will end up.” That was not the worst of it. Because all of our credit was in his name, I had none and did not qualify for a credit card. When I left him, he gave me $7000.00 and nothing else. He kept the house, all the furnishings, our dog and my “good name.”
It took me a year of therapy to process money was not the key to happiness. On the contrary, studies have shown that once we have money enough to meet our basic needs with a little extra for enjoyment, an increase in income does not equal greater happiness.
Money and Happiness
In order to be happy we need enough money to pay our bills and have a little room to purchase extras. There appears to be an income threshold where making more than this amount contributes very little to being happier.
Having a household income below $50,000 is moderately related to happiness. A household income above $50,000 results in a vanishing correlation between money and happiness. There is some data indicating that the income threshold may be a little higher or a little lower than $50,000.
Americans who earn $50,000 per year are much happier than those who earn $10,000 per year, but Americans who earn $5 million per year are not much happier than those who earn $100,000 per year. People who live in poor nations are much less happy than people who live in moderately wealthy nations, but people who live in moderately wealthy nations are not much less happy than people who live in extremely wealthy nations (Gilbert, 2007, p. 239). ( excerpted from What Makes us Happy by Jamie Hale)
Bingo. More money does not correlate to greater happiness. Then why was I working so hard? For the same reason so many others do. We forget what really matters: family, friends, laughter, helping others, being a good neighbor, and doing what we love to do, not for the money, but for the sheer joy of doing it.
Here I am. At the computer, doing what I love to do…Writing. Will I be famous, will I be rich? The future is not mine to see. I write because I must. I write because doing it reminds me what real happiness is for me.
When I was just a little girl,
I asked my mother, “What will I be?
Will I be pretty?
Will I be rich?”
Here’s what she said to me:
“Que sera, sera,
Whatever will be, will be;
The future’s not ours to see.
Que sera, sera,
What will be, will be.”
When I was just a child in school,
I asked my teacher, “What will I try?
Should I paint pictures”
Should I sing songs?”
This was her wise reply:
“Que sera, sera,
Whatever will be, will be;
The future’s not ours to see.
Que sera, sera,
What will be, will be.”
When I grew up and fell in love.
I asked my sweetheart, “What lies ahead?
Will we have rainbows
Day after day?”
Here’s what my sweetheart said:
“Que sera, sera,
Whatever will be, will be;
The future’s not ours to see.
Que sera, sera,
What will be, will be.”
Now I have Children of my own.
They ask their mother, “What will I be?”
Will I be handsome?
Will I be rich?”
I tell them tenderly:
“Que sera, sera,
Whatever will be, will be;
The future’s not ours to see.
Que sera, sera,
What will be, will be.
Que Sera, Sera!
(Lyrics by Jay Livingston and Ray Evans))
Writing into the Light 