Category: Yoga

Cooking With Essential Oils and the Blondeyogi

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Thank you, blonde yogi, for cooking with me! We tried Beef Stew with Rose Mary Oil, DoTerra Winter White Chocolate with Cinnamon and Clove oil, and Toast with Wild Orange Butter.

Here is what I learned from the experience:

  1. Oils are easiest to incorporate in beverages, hot or cold. The Winter White Hot Chocolate was a delicious concoction of almond milk, spices, and white chocolate. So soothing. Here is the recipe.
  2. Oils are also perfect additions to flavored oils and butter. Our buttered toast with two drops of Wild Orange Oil and a touch of honey was my favorite.
  3. The taste of the stew with Rosemary oil was perhaps the most subtle. I like the idea of a collection of essential oils as both part of a medicine cabinet and a flavor pantry. Reach for whatever you have.

The experience was a change in perspective about how I use essential oils beyond the yoga mat and take the practice into the kitchen. I can see myself including bergamot, peppermint, ginger, lemon, cloves, cinnamon etc in my teas and adding oils like rosemary, thyme, oregano to olive oil or butter for dipping warm bread. Maybe I need to move my oils closer to the kitchen. Hmmmmm……

What are your favorite ways to use essential oils in your recipes?

More hungryphil-wobblyogi experiments to come! OnGuard Pancakes, next. Join me blondeyogi.

Wishing you good eating, moving, breathing and Happy Thanksgiving for readers in the U.S.,

Hungryphil

P.S. I was not the only one who liked the buttered toast the best! Thank you, Blonde Yogi Junior for taste testing with us!

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Meditative Monday: Lessons from a Labyrinth

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At first glance, this patch of grass looks like a creative mowing project. Like anything, how you approach it makes it either a frustrating walk in circles going nowhere or a transformative inner journey of self-awareness. For most of us, it may be both.

I crossed paths with this labyrinth courtesy of a recent Community Yoga Retreat. This was my first time. If you have never meditatively walked along a labyrinth let me try to describe my first experience.

We, about 16 of us, were asked to walk slowly in silent meditation through the labyrinth. As we walk in we were to consider all the things we are grateful for, after we reach the center indicated by a bowl of floating flowers and as we walk out of the labyrinth, we were to mindfully shed all the things we want to be free of.  This walk, warned the retreat center director could last 45 minutes.  Simple enough. Right?

I was the last to enter the labyrinth. I watched as everyone entered the labyrinth and walk slowly along the curves. My feet were bare. I could feel the cool grass below my feet. As I first entered the walk, I noticed my arms shivering and tingling. Maybe I was just cold, maybe I was feeling something. I don’t know. I felt calm and quiet. I also felt like I was walking with many others, in front and behind me (there was no one behind me). The labyrinth felt full. The first few moments of reverie soon dissolved into…why is it so hard to step slowly? is this ground uneven? Am I making the right turns? am I walking too closely behind? am I going to fast? oh, there’s a branch, gosh I’m cold….you get the point. It was a flood of how long is this going to take and am I lost? I can’t be if I can look up and step out at any time. My mind was playing weird games.

As I felt like I was spinning in circles becoming myself a labyrinth of confusion, I decided to enjoy the experience, to find a way to savor each step, each thought of gratitude, to send love to my friends walking with me. Magically, the craziness eased. I began to notice the journey, my unsteady steps, my worries, my fellow walkers, the sun, the warmth, the shadows, the trees. I began to move in and out of the labyrinth to find my horizon, feeling both lost and located at the same time. By the time I reached the bowl of floating flowers at the center, it felt like a long-delayed accomplishment. Joy and relief. Walking out of the circle as I allowed self-doubt drip down my fingertips I began to feel lighter. When I crossed paths with another, I felt a rise of self-judgment, am I going the right direction? Should we be crossing paths? Again, I reminded myself, it doesn’t matter, just walk, breathe and enjoy this morning.

Like life, there were rough patches, beautiful views, isolation, company, obstructive twigs, comforting sunshine, confusion, and clarity, ground and sky, turns and curves, crazy mind, calm mind, grateful heart, irritated heart. Maybe we are always in a labyrinth, either imprisoned and trapped or liberated and exploring.

There was a sense of relief after completing what felt like a long journey. As I stepped out, following a lady in front of me, also named Lisa, she said “Thanks for keeping me company.” I returned my gratitude for her company as well.

It was a trip, best, shared.

Last to exit, I joined the others, some resumed their conversations, some sat quietly, some shared their confusion about the labyrinth. We all survived and learned something about ourselves. I learned that I can make walking in circles bearable and even enjoyable, if I want. Maybe I can make anything bearable…….almost, with fellow walkers.

Happy Monday, everyone. Happy walking the week.

Wobblyogi

 

 

 

Wobblyogi Wednesday: True Yoga

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Dear Yoga Friends,

Meet my favorite book of the week!

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The book introduces Pantanjali’s yoga sutras without being pedantic or self-righteous AND offers practical strategies and contexts for application.  The author, Jennie Lee, is creative in presenting the philosophy as well as corresponding affirmations and self-inquiring questions to journal.

Finally a book that presents yoga as SO much more than asana!

Here is an excerpt emphasizing the willing and rational devotion to kindness, happiness and peace. As such, yoga becomes the practice of choosing to not to suffer particularly when we acknowledge pain.

To be truly happy is to be successful at life and, like anything worth accomplishing, these practices require dedication. We must choose a peaceful response in times of conflict. We must choose a grateful thought when we feel negative and down. We must choose to tell the truth even when it is not convenient. These are not always easy choices, but if we are ready to claim true happiness and security that can sustain us through all the ups and downs of life, then these choices become a small price for the serenity, power, and wisdom they bring.

Lee, Jennie. True Yoga: Practicing With the Yoga Sutras for Happiness & Spiritual Fulfillment (Kindle Locations 132-136). Llewellyn Worldwide, LTD.. Kindle Edition.

This may even make the list of my favorite yoga books for all time.

Hope you enjoy it too.

Wishing you happy self-discovery,

the Wobblyogi

Wobblyogi Wednesday: Sutra Inspired Gentle Sequence

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Today’s Gentle Yoga Practice was based on one of my favorite sutras that reminds us: Yoga is NOT a quick fix.

A yoga practice requires consistency, duration and intention. Like anything in life, small steady steps lead us through any desired change of habit or state. When I find a pose difficult this sutra gives me assurance. When I feel the road ahead long and impossble, it’s a gentle reminder about the greatness of small consistent steps.

Here it is according to Georg Feuerstein’s translation:

Yoga Sutra 1.14:

But this [practice] is firmly grounded [only after it has been] cultivated properly and for a long time uninterruptedly.

For our asana practice, I used circles: arms, hips, legs, toes as a way to give shape to the idea of steady continuity and repetition. For our meditation, we focused on gratitude for something that gives us consistency and steadiness to our days.

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Yoga Poem – Lucky by Luis Jenkins

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Here is a beautiful poem about gratitude for you —

All my life I’ve been lucky. Not that I made money,
or had a beautiful house or cars. But lucky to have
had good friends, a wife who loves me, and a good
son. Lucky that war and famine or disease did not
come to my doorstep. Lucky that all the wrong
turns I made, even if they did turn out well, at least
were not complete disasters. I still have some of my
original teeth. All that could change, I know, in the
wink of an eye. And what an eye it is, bright blue
contrasting with her dark skin and black hair. And
oh, what long eyelashes! She turns and with a slight
smile gives me a long slow wink, a wink that says,
“Come on over here, you lucky boy.”

“Lucky” by Louis Jenkins from In the Sun Out of the Wind. © Will o’ the Wisp Books, 2017.

From the Writer’s Almanac at  http://writersalmanac.org/

Wobblyogi Fall Schedule

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Hot Vinyasa

Join me for a steady, mindful, and warm practice that cultivates a calm heart despite sweat and effort. Let’s burn and detox from what no longer serves us.

12:15 pm – 1:15 pm Tuesday and Thursday

Community Yoga, West Lafayette, Indiana

For more information and to register go to: 

Home

“tapah svadhyaya isvara pranidhanani kriya yogah”

concentration- self-reflection-surrender

 

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Gentle Yoga

Join me for a mindful practice that helps develop body awareness, range of motion, and overall mind-body-spirit health. We will use relaxation, breathing, and meditation techniques to help us stay in ease and balance.

Wednesday 10:00 am – 11:15 am

Session 1: September 6th – October 11th (6 weeks)

Theme of Yoga Philosophy (Sutras)

Session 2: October 18th – November 15th (5 weeks)

Theme of Great Questions (What, When, Where, How and Why)

 

Morton Community Center, West Lafayette, Indiana

For more information and to register go to:

http://www.westlafayette.in.gov/department/division.php?structureid=131

“sthira-sukham-asanam”

The posture steady and comfortable

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Continuing Yoga (Gentle – Intermediate)

Join me for a mindful practice that helps develop body awareness, range of motion, and overall mind-body-spirit health. We will use relaxation, breathing and meditation techniques to help us stay in ease and balance.

Thursday 9:30 am – 10:45 am

Session 1: September 7th – October 12th (6 weeks)

Theme of Yoga Philosophy (Sutras)

Session 2: October 19th  – November 16th (5 weeks)

Theme of Great Questions (What, When, Where, How and Why)

 

McCallister Community Center, Lafayette, Indiana

For more information and to register go to: 

https://in-lafayette.civicplus.com/458/McAllister-Center

“heyam duhkham-anagatam”

That which is to be overcome is sorrow yet to come.

 

May I Be Happy Workshop Invitation

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Hello Local Yogis,

I’m planning snack boxes for our upcoming yoga book club workshop! You know that I, hungryphil/wobblyogi am super excited about combining my two loves: food and yoga.

Summer is Pitta season. According to Ayurvedic tradition, summer is the time to enjoy bitter, astringent and sweet tastes (eat less sour, pungent or spicy foods). So, I’m looking for tasty afternoon bites that would be cool and light. Please sign up for the workshop ahead of time so I know how many snack boxes to make. Here is more information about the workshop [Saturday, August 12, 2-4].

Let’s try these treats together………………….

Summer Samosas

Baked light and flaky pastry filo- dough filled with potato and cauliflower spiced with summer Pitta-seasoning (includes warm sweet spices like fennel and coriander)

Sweet Coconut Dusted Raisin Almond Balls

Almonds and raisins ground together and rolled in shredded coconut

Cooling Co-Cu-Mint Mocktail

A blend of coconut water, cucumber, mint, and lemon

If you read “May I be Happy” by Cindy Lee, wonderful! Jacqueline will lead an extended asana practice inspired by themes from the book that will be familiar to you. If you haven’t read the book, you’ll enjoy the practice focused on cultivating personal happiness, just as much. The book is not a prerequisite, only an inspiration to ask: How may I be happy?

And, there will be snacks!!! I don’t know about you but that makes me happy 🙂

Enough said.

Hope to see you in a few weeks,

Wishing you a lovely late summer,

the hungry and wobbly yogi

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Wobblyogi Wednesday – Summer Book Club!

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May I Be Happy: A Memoir of Love, Yoga and Changing my Mind

by Cyndi Lee

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Take this book to the beach with you as you relax in the sun and bask in your own happiness. Read a few pages, pause, close your eyes and reflect.  Cyndi Lee talks about body image issues, mom issues, spouse issues, teaching issues and almost everything in between. Some I related to and other I did not. Eitherway the book offers a good focus for conversation about how we each invite yoga principles into our lives.

Here is my favorite passage:

I’ve learned to listen to feelings in my body, as another form of meditation practice. Often when I’m walking home form the studio, I’ll realize that I have a butterfly in my stomuch or I’m gripping the strap of my yoga bag too hard. I practice being curious about it. It’s fun. I investigate by asking myself, “Okay, what’s bothering me?” The answer is usually right there on the surface and then I can puzzle it through, either coming to a resolution or at least gaining enough awareness of the issue to be able to table it for now and bookmark it for later. The body knows, the mind clarifies, and when I can get them to hold hands with my breath, things usually work out all right.

I wonder what questions the book sparks for you. Share your comments here or come join us (whether you read the book or not) for discussion, an asana practice, snacks and more August 12th 2:00 pm-5:00 pm at Community Yoga, West Lafayette, Indiana

Sign up online at https://communityyogalafayette.com/workshopsevents/

May you be safe, may you be healthy, may you be happy,

the Wobblyogi

 

 

Wobblyogi Wednesday – Yoga Poem- The Necessary Brevity of Pleasures by Samuel Hazo

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Enjoy this yoga AND a food poem celebrating moderation. May we all have the wisdom to “savor every bite of grub with equal gratitude.”

Prolonged, they slacken into pain
or sadness in accordance with the law
of apples.
One apple satisfies.
Two apples cloy.
Three apples
glut.
Call it a tug-of-war between enough and more
than enough, between sufficiency
and greed, between the stay-at-homers
and globe-trotting see-the-worlders.
Like lovers seeking heaven in excess,
the hopelessly insatiable forget
how passion sharpens appetites
that gross indulgence numbs.
Result?
The haves have not
what all the have-nots have
since much of having is the need
to have.
Even my dog
knows that—and more than that.
He slumbers in a moon of sunlight,
scratches his twitches and itches
in measure, savors every bite
of grub with equal gratitude
and stays determinedly in place
unless what’s suddenly exciting
happens.
Viewing mere change
as threatening, he relishes a few
undoubtable and proven pleasures
to enjoy each day in sequence
and with canine moderation.
They’re there for him in waiting,
and he never wears them out.

“The Necessary Brevity of Pleasures” by Samuel Hazo from A Flight to Elsewhere. © Autumn House Press, 2005.

From the Writers Almanac on April 25, 2017.

 

Wobblyogi Wednesday – Learning to Breathe

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I am fighting a battle; I fear I am losing. It started as a cute blossom filled spring-time allergy that morphed into an angry full-blown, noisy nose blowing, scratchy throat coughing, body aching, ugly cold. I continue to fight with a steady stream of tea, oregano drops, and uplifting mantras like “I am healthy and happy…I am healthy and happy….I breathe freely and efficiently”…. to no avail.

This situation comes at a most inconvenient time while I’m trying to learn how to breathe. You heard me….I’m trying to learn how to breathe. Sure, I know how to automatically breathe, but not as efficiently, smoothly and mindfully as I’d like. I’m reading The Yoga of Breath by Richard Rosen. I have yet to work on the suggested practices because….you know…my current battle with snot.

Why do I need to learn how to breathe better? Rosen writes,

She [The efficient breather] breathes slowly, which streamlines the breath, with the free and easy movement of diaphragm, engaging the entire torso (in fact the entire body). She mostly breathes through the nose, which filters, warms or cools as needed, and humidifies the breath. Nose breathing naturally slows the exhale, because the nostrils offer more resistance o the breath than the mouth, and gives the lungs enough time to extract the maximum amount of oxygen and energy from each breath. With the correct proportion of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the body, which dilate the blood vessels, blood and oxygen circulate smoothly and easily through the efficient breather’s body and brain. The full excursion of the diaphragm and the well-toned abdominals massage internal organs, like the heart and intestines, and so improve digestion and elimination. Efficient breathing activates the parasympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system and the relaxation response. In all, the efficient breather is much calmer, more clearheaded, and probably healthier and happier, than her inefficient friend.

At the moment, I am clearly not an efficient breather. I can feel the shallowness of my breath that makes me feel anxious and annoyed with myself. Perhaps, my current battle makes me appreciate the need for slow, sustained breathing more than I would otherwise.

Maybe I have better motivation to breathe my best when I can.

I learned about Richard Rosen on the Yoga Land Podcast. Thank you, Andrea Ferretti!! Check it out at https://www.acast.com/yogaland/richardrosenonlookingbacktogoforward

Wishing all of you smooth breathing,

Wobblyogi