I’ve been looking at a stack of old yoga magazines in my house for months… no, years. While I considered the benefit of filing them in the circular bin and freeing myself of the clutter, I never followed through with getting rid of them.  The truth is that I love the pictures and find some collective value in the magazines. So, my decision to hold onto them was finally redeemed this summer.

I held a week-long yoga camp for teenage girls and those magazines provided a great creative outlet. I introduced the concept of vision boards; basically, to create a poster of images that help motivate and amuse us to achieve personal goals. I presented them with questions for their inspiration piece: What healthy activities do you enjoy doing? Who can you surround yourself with that will be uplifting? What nutritional habits would you like to make? How can you serve others?

Each girl decorated her poster board with images from my old magazines. The room was always completely quiet as all seven girls thoroughly engaged in choosing and cutting out pictures. I was intrigued with their choices and amazed by their unique collages. They had something cool to take home and I was satisfied with the new life my old yoga magazines had in their creations.