When I was a kid, there was a metal swing set on our hill. That is where I would swing and sing for hours. I sang loud. When I didn't know the words, I made them up. I vividly remember seeing Cinderella on TV, the 1965 Rodgers and Hammerstein version with Lesley Ann Warren. Those songs felt like they were written just for me.

I ran up the hill, sat on the hard metal seat, pumped my legs with all my strength and began:

"On my own little swing set, on my own little hill, I can be whatever I want to be".

A song about freedom.

Freedom for my mind to dream, wish and wait for my Fairy GodMother to appear and impart her wisdom that nothing is

"Impossible, things are happening everyday". My belief in possibilities was unwavering.

At 16, when I got my driver's license, I was allowed to drive myself to my job at a shoe store at the mall. With the FM radio blaring inside the gold colored Pinto hatchback, I sang loud. Aerosmith's, Dream On, deserved a full volume crank! I had wheels! I had more freedom.

Additionally at 16, the house rule was that once you were able to work you were able to pay for essentials. Clothes, entertainment, gas, family vacation, even college.

Freedom had been fleeting.

Since 16, my mind has had a running loop with thoughts of scarcity, insecurity and fear all based around money.

How will I pay for college, a car, an apartment? My mind and thoughts held me prisoner so many times with the same fearful thoughts until I started to recognize I could choose what I was thinking. I could reclaim freedom.

It's not easy, but it's simple.

Train your mind, like you train for anything else.

Practice.

Discipline.

Commitment.

My yoga practice is all that. It brings me back to my breath, back to what's in front of me and back to freedom.

How? I get to notice and pay attention to how I'm feeling and what I'm thinking.

In the early stages of my practice, my mind was a bitch.

It screamed out the negatives about every pose. "You're not flexible, you're not strong, you can't balance, I thought you were a dancer and could handle this easy shit! You suck!".

After nearly three decades of practice, the screams have turned to whimpers. The training is working. I don't think they will ever be completely silenced, but I'm suffering less. Less suffering, more freedom. It just takes some time to watch and observe my ludicrous thoughts.

My first feelings of freedom will always be recalling my swing set and the creaking, rhythmic pattern from the rusted chains and hardware. Remembering swinging so high the back legs would rise out of the ground enough to give me a shudder of danger that it would tip over. It never did. My Mother's yell to come inside, which had to be louder than my singing, signaled the end. The two strips of ripped grass which served as a runway for my feet to slow me down. The rust-colored chain link pattern indented into my hands from holding so tightly. The sense of unsteadiness when my legs had to stand straight in order to dance down the hill while singing 10 Minutes Ago.

Remember when you felt freedom?