Satya & Serpent Symbolism

Hey, Yogi!

These past two months, I’ve been on a steady downhill slope of feeling burnt out, overwhelmed, and out of alignment.

Although I’m not a stranger to these feelings, sometimes it’s hard to detect, and I won’t realize it until I’m in the midst of a panic attack.

Unfortunately, I’ve been dealing with quite a few gut health issues. I’ve felt unmotivated to do my yoga class curator training, I haven’t been writing, and I’ve barely touched my Cricut unless I’ve gotten an order from my shop. My creativity and inner fire have felt flat.

And as I was going on this steady decline, I noticed a narrative repeatedly going through my head. I felt I had to abandon myself to work and abandon myself so I could show up for others. This narrative only pops up when I’m feeling slightly under the weather or during a mental health battle, and I push myself to keep going to work.

As I reached a breaking point the other day, with a full-blown panic attack and horrible acid reflux among other stomach issues, I decided to stay home. I decided my days off would be dedicated to slow, meaningful rest. Normally on my days off, I’ll try to go to Disney or do fun activities, which is wonderful! But when I’m doing all these activities to feel like I’m not missing out on life, I frazzle my nervous system.

After the tears and hyperventilating subsided, I felt some bottled-up creativity and clarity start to pop up.

I sat down and created multiple new designs in my Disney Etsy shop, and there’s a new design lined up for my yoga Etsy shop too!

I’ve purchased a diamond painting kit, which I find to be a mindful activity that not only calms me down but gives me a beautiful piece of artwork to hang up in my space.

I even finally opened my Yoga Class Curator lessons up. I sometimes feel discouraged doing the Yoga Class Curator because sometimes it feels like homework and it’s not supposed to. This program Susanna Barkataki created is meant to deepen yoga practices and allow participants to connect to their spirituality on a deeper level. I see the value of this program and I’m glad to participate in it. Still, I often find myself frustrated for not retaining as much information as I’d like to. I feel like I’m not getting as much as I could out of the program because of my mindset.

When I’m in those moments where I’m able to get out of my head and enjoy engaging in this practice that’ll make me a better yoga teacher, I end up filled with fresh inspiration for blog posts, TikToks, and all sorts of content as well as new ideas for my yoga classes that’ll allow me to be a more authentic instructor.

This brings me to today’s inspiration: Today, I took her Satya Asana flow.

If you’re unsure what Satya is, it is the second Yama in the Eight Limbs of Yoga: meaning truth.

As we went through the practice of being connected to our inner truth and the greater divine truth, she also used a serpent as symbolism. We went through our flow, exploring poses like Cobra. She also added serpent leg variations to our flow. Susanna described how the serpent is prevalent in ancient stories when these yogi legends were seeking enlightenment and truth.

The dharma talk brought up intense emotions because there have been many times when I’ve felt unable to express my truth.

I work every day to stand in my power, from performing Reiki on my throat chakra to expressing myself on my blog so I can step out of that generational trauma. I’ve seen firsthand the detrimental effects of thoat chakra imbalances and come from a line of horrible communicators.

Specifically, I always censor content containing stories about my mother. I’m afraid that if she discovers my true feelings and sees her negative actions put in the spotlight, she’ll come after me in one of the nastiest, most destructive, and critical tirades, including gaslighting, invalidation, shaming, and twisted justifications of her actions.

But the symbolism of the serpent in such a positive light gave me validation and reminded me of a specific instance I had with my mom. This was a couple of years ago when I was still living in New Jersey and I was stuck in an emotionally unsafe environment leading me to a frighteningly low point in my life.

One afternoon, my mom approached me and said she noticed a snake in the backyard. She told me that snakes symbolize dark and evil energy according to the Bible and that she believed that I was the reason the snake was in our yard. Yes, you read that correctly. She blamed me for this alleged bad energy. And then she gave me a look of disgust.

It was damaging how my mother thought I was manifesting evil energy and casting it on my family. Additionally, she accused me of talking to evil spirits that only she bothered to save the family from.

After that toxic interaction, I researched snake symbolism and found snakes symbolize transformation and healing. So that right there speaks on my mother's mindset versus mine.

I reflected on this instance during my Satya practice. I listened to Susanna explaining how our energy moves like the serpent and how we are all connected to divine truth. It felt validating and empowering. I felt called to share a fragment of my truth regarding my former toxic environment.

What I seek to do on my platforms, no matter how small they are, is to positively impact at least one person while simultaneously being able to process my emotions, grow, stand in my power, and evolve into my highest self. We’re all on this crazy journey called life together, right?

As we continue to navigate life, I invite you to recite the same reminders I give myself, especially if you have someone in your life declaring hurtful and untrue statements about you. I remind myself that I am of being of love and light and that my intentions are pure. I never tried to call in evil energy into my old household, no matter how much I was emotionally hurt there, and I still would never do that now as I’m healing. I constantly work to brighten my inner light and allow myself to shine.

I hope you learn to live in your truth, I hope you learn to speak your truth, and I hope you stand in it fully as you continue to connect to the universe is truth. Allow yourself to embody Satya.

Thank you for listening and sharing your time with me.

My light sees and honors the light within you,