the wisdom of indigo

Aug 18

This past weekend, I stood over a vat of indigo dye with my hands deep in the process. I twisted, tied, dipped, and unwrapped napkins, scarves, and even my favorite linen dress. Some pieces bloomed into shapes and colors that took my breath away. Others came out quietly surprising. All of it felt alive.

What surprised me most was how playful it all felt.

Folding fabric into shapes, experimenting with rubber bands and string, dipping and waiting… I felt completely unattached to the outcome. And that, honestly, is exactly why I wanted to do it.

In past years, my creative and personal growth work was all about learning to trust myself, step into my power, and take up space in ways I hadn’t before. That season was deep, necessary, and sometimes hard. Lately, though, Spirit has offered a new invitation: to allow play back into my life. To try things without needing them to be “productive” or “perfect,” and to create simply for the joy it brings.

Indigo gave me that.

When you lift the fabric from the dye bath, it doesn’t look like much at first. The color is pale, almost green. You hold it up, and it’s easy to wonder if it worked at all. But then something begins to shift. As it meets the air, the blue deepens. Softly, slowly, the richness bleeds through.

That’s the beauty of both growth and play.

It unfolds in layers, in unexpected patterns, and in the willingness to trust the in-between stage.

Many of you reading this can probably see a thread here — how the rhythm of folding, dipping, waiting, and unfolding isn’t so different from the way we move on the mat.

Both processes invite presence, curiosity, and a willingness to not know exactly how it will turn out. Whether I’m stretching, designing a strength circuit, or simply sitting with my breath, my practice has never really been about mastering one thing. It’s a return to myself, just as I am. A place to tend, to listen, to soften.

We come to the mat not to perfect the pose, but to meet ourselves in the pose. We fold and unfold. We hold and release. We breathe through the messy, in-between moments — sometimes awkward, sometimes beautiful — and trust that something meaningful is happening, even when we can't see it right away.

And just like with the dye, play has a home there too..

I don’t know why I’m still surprised when I find myself excited about new ways of playing on the mat. Lately, I’ve been enjoying piecing together dumbell circuits for my new sculpt class. In a way, my strength practices — and the offerings that have grown from them — have actually created the space for my yoga to deepen. Releasing the need to show up as someone else’s idea of me has made room for all of it to expand.

I don’t know how it’ll look in another six months, but I’m enjoying the process.

This weekend, the dye pot whispered what I needed to hear:
There is healing in play, and wisdom in each creative experiment.

It’s become a quiet kind of reminder:
It’s okay to not always be improving.
It’s okay to just be in it.
To follow what feels good.
To let presence be enough.