Tag: Yoga

Wobblyogi Wednesday – Lunch Time Vinyasa!

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My dear West Lafayette friends for whom my 6 am Wednesday Sunrise Yoga session is too early,

Welcome to my Tuesday and Thursday 12:15 – 1:00 p.m. yoga sessions starting next week, September 6th. Here are three reasons to join me,

Reason number 3: Short and gentle session open to all levels of yogis.

The shortened session is intended to be an afternoon break from the desk.  We’ll do a few standing poses to help recover our strength and ground, balance poses to help us focus on our remaining work and hip openers to help us sit through the rest of the workday.

Reason number 2: Wear comfortable work clothes.

No need to change into gym clothes. If you can take a wide stand, fold forward and take your legs up to the sky (comfortably and without flashing anyone),  any stretchy pants and shirt combination will work.  I don’t plan on getting us hot and sweaty. Despite the commercialization, there is no need for specialized yoga clothes! There I said it.

[If you feel the need to change, our bathroom is always available.]

Reason number 1: Grown-up rest time – Savasana.

Doesn’t a mid-day short break sound wonderful? Take yourself back to pre-school nap time (without the drool, waiting for your parents to pick you up, eyes half open, imprints of the mat on your face etc.). Nurture yourself, move your achy joints and muscles, stop the noise and hear yourself breathe for a few moments before you go back to your busy day.

A single session is $15. Try it. If you like it, treat yourself to one of the many packages. Sign up is easy on the Community Yoga Website: https://communityyogalafayette.com

Come move, breathe and rest with me!

Hope to see you next week,

The Wobblyogi

Image from a yoga studio in Bristol England: https://flowyogabristol.co.uk/. I would go there if I lived there. But, I don’t. Sigh. The lady looks so blissful.

 

 

Wobblyogi Wednesday: Yoga body containing and transcending ego?

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I was asked recently to identify what type of yoga I teach. She asked, “Hatha?”

In typical philosopher style, I wanted to answer, “Yes and no.”

Yes, the focus of the session will be the unity of body, mind, and breath by flowing through movements.  Yes, I hope the session carries both your mind and body to more ease. And yes, Hatha, as the practice of Sthira-Sukha, stillness and ease, I hope the yoga session helps us find balance.

On the other hand,

I wanted to answer, “No, not just Hatha yoga, as the yoga tradition most devoted to cultivating the body. No, I’m not interested in pushing  you to your physical limit. No, I do not expect you to master difficult poses, head stands or binds. No, I am not invested in your physical wellbeing drained of emotional strength.”

The dilemma about Hatha yoga is common, as we try to balance fitness with mindfulness,  assuming a mind-body duality. There is a long history to this question of the mind as it relates to our understanding of our embodied selves and our material world.

Here is one yoga scholar’s description about the dangers of holding the body as the locus of ego-centric practice:

“…the disciplines of Hatha-Yoga are designed to help manifest the ultimate Reality in the finite human body-mind. In this, Hatha-Yoga expresses the ideal of Tantra, which is to live in the world out of the fullness of Self-realization rather than withdraw from life in order to gain enlightenment.

…The Hatha- Yoga practitioner wants to construct a “divine body” or  “adamantine body” for himself or herself, which would guarantee immortality in the manifest realms. He or she is not interested in attaining enlightenment on the basis of prolonged neglect of the physical body. He or she wants it all: Self-realization and a transmutated body in which to enjoy the manifest universe in its diverse dimensions. Who would not sympathize with this desire? Yet, as can be imagined, the practitioners of Hatha-Yoga have sometimes sacrificed their highest spiritual aspirations and settled for lesser, perhaps magical, goals in service of the ego-personality. Magic, like exo-technology, is a way of manipulating the forces of Nature, whereas spirituality is about the transcendence of the manipulative ego-personality. Narcissism, or body-oriented egocentrism, is as great a danger among hatha-yogins as it is among bodybuilders.”

from George Fuerstein’s The Yoga Tradition

After alerting us about the potential dangers of egocentric self-absorption, Dr. Fuerstein suggests coupling Hatha-yoga with Raja yoga. Perhaps, that ego-countering coupling can include many other forms of yoga: Mantra (chanting), Bhakti (faith), Karma (action) and my favorite, Jnana (wisdom).

This is why as we move through the poses attentive to our breath, we look towards our inner landscape to find moments of pranayama (breath control), pratyahara (withdrawal from outside stimuli) and even dharana (concentration on something specific, like breath or tense tissue). I like to think of asana as the pivotal yoga-limb grounded in the yamas (how we behave with others) and niyamas (how we cultivate ourselves) while reaching and touching pranayama (aware breathing), pratyahara (focusing inward) and dharana (focusing on a single thing). It may or may not help us with dhyana (meditation) that may or may not lead to samadhi (transcendence). Asana can help us walk through 6 of the 8 limbs of the yoga-path. Or, we can metaphorically and literally be stuck in a peacock pose.

When we share our yoga practice with others, we become a community of individuals each striving towards the same thing through different breathing patterns, body types, and levels of awareness. Our bodies are not the same, how can our minds be? We may not be saying the same prayer or holding the same intentions but we are all praying and intending. Unity in diversity, not uniformity.

For me, asana practice, celebrates the diversity of bodies, of being, of lives, of minds that all strives towards the same human need for ease, goodness, and stillness.

But, I simply answered the lady’s question, “Hatha?” with a, “Yes.”

Hope I see her in class soon.

Happyoga,

The Wobblyogi

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wobblyogi Wednesday – Jar of Pickles

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A jar of pickles….is not a standard yoga practice theme. Since I started teaching Sunrise Morning Yoga classes, I’ve been thinking about opening, waking up and ways to unfold. The first week I looked at poses that reminded me of opening a book like dancing warrior. The second week I looked at poses that made me think of flowers blooming or birds taking flight, like locust, ustrasana or brikasana. This week I looked to gentle twists, like opening a jar, like a revolved side angle or twisted chair. Exploring how we wake up and open to the world through yogic poses and movement has been fun. We started seated one day, in a child pose another and today from a reclined position. Each start progressed through the standard sequencing practices of centering, sun salutations and warmup, standing poses, balance poses, seated poses and back to floor. At this point, I’m getting better at time awareness and “feeling” where I should be in the sequence. I still have to figure out my unique concluding phrase that each yoga instructor seems to have. Do I even need one? I don’t know yet.

Today I’ve been thinking about Aristotle’s De Anima (On the Soul) and how the soul (and nature) is understood as movement, as animation. Can there be philosophy-themed yoga sequences? Nietzsche would definitely require a headstand. Hegel, a lot of opposing movements and then centering. Aristotle would definitely be an Iyengar practitioner, attentive to alignment between movements. Hmmm…I like thinking about this strange yoga thematic turn in practicing philosophies of embodiment. My mind is certainly wobblying now!

Maybe I need to compose Philosophers do Yoga like Monty Python’s Philosopher’s World Cup. Makes me laugh every time. Enjoy!

Wishing you ease and laughter,

The Wobblyogi

Image from: https://daphilosophers.wordpress.com/2011/02/06/yoga/

Wobblyogi Wednesday: Happy Place Escape

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Has yoga helped me find my “happy place”? Will it help you find yours? Confessedly, my definition of happiness has shifted from being associated with joy, laughter, passion to being associated with ease being in my own skin and ease being with others in this often unkind and unpredictable world. Today I ended our morning yoga practice with the words of my grandmothers. I’m sure some of my readers have heard the phrases: Shuke Thako, Bhalo Thako. Stay in ease (or happiness, here is the confusion again), Stay in goodness.  I feel bad now for taking those words so flippantly or sometimes even mockingly.  The simple advice to “stay” is basic yoga. Afterall, we are all trying to stay in our bodies, in our minds, in our hearts, in our world, through moving, breathing, focusing and meditating.

Most of all, I’ve learned that yoga is not about escaping to a “happy place” but about being able to just stay in unhappy, uneasy places without becoming unhappy or uneasy. There is unhappiness and there is happiness but I am not happy or unhappy. I am more than my feelings at a given moment, more than a sum of my feelings, more than my existential condition that gives rise to those emotional responses. Meditation does not help me escape my feelings but rather helps me sit with them without being constrained, defined or imprisoned by them. I watch my feelings and say, there is sadness, there is worry, there is joy, there is love, there is anger and so on and so on. Congratulations, I’m human. I’m alive and aware. By tagging and releasing the feelings I emerge lighter. The nagging emotions that refuse to fly away and keep returning to take up space in my mind and heart need more attention, more meditation and sometimes more action. The amount of emotional energy I release always amazes me. So few things are worth lingering over. If I can’t change it, devoting my mind to it won’t help. If I can change or affect it then my concern shifts to practical struggles of how:  from awareness to thinking.

I’m working through Jon Kabat Zinn’s book, Where you go, there you are: Mindfulness Meditation in Everyday Life. I found the chapter titled, “Meditation: Not to be confused with positive thinking” particularly helpful in relation to the notion of  a personal “happy place.” First, a food reference:

“Not only is it [our fundamental nature] not limited by the potpourri of our thinking mind, awareness is the pot which cradles all the fragments, just as the soup pot holds all the chopped up carrots, peas, onions, and the like and allows them to cook into one whole, the soup itself. But it is a magical pot, much like a sorcerer’s pot, because it cooks things without having to do anything, even put a fire underneath it. Awareness itself does the cooking, as long as it is sustained.You just let the fragments stir while you hold them in awareness. Whatever comes up in mind and body goes into the pot, becomes part of the soup.”

Kabat-Zinn concludes the section with these words about the limits of positive thinking,

“If we decide to think positively, that may be useful, but it is not meditation. It is just more thinking. We can easily  become a prisoner of so-called positive thinking as of negative thinking. It too can be confining, fragmented, inaccurate, illusory, self-serving, and wrong. Another element altogether is required to induce transformation in our lives and take us beyond the limits of thought.”

Don’t get me wrong. I often retreat to my happy place (usually when threatened by loud places filled with restless children and rushed adults like, amusement parks). But, that is not meditation. That is escape. I want to be able to escape from my life less and less. So I try to meditate more and more. Become more aware of my pot of soup instead of the peas and carrots.

I want to tweak the  Socratic dictate to,  the unaware life is not worth living.  The difference between the examined life and aware life is worth exploring in another post.

For now, I wish you easy awareness of your own unique pot of experiences,

The Wobblyogi

For a look at the Image and a good article about escapism and meditation visit: http://melbournemeditationcentre.com.au/articles/is-your-happy-place-really-a-happy-place/

Wobblyogi Wednesday – Teaching Fears

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My adventures in yoga teaching has officially begun! I am horrified and thrilled. Horrified, that, I, anxious and awkward, dare to invite people to move meditatively. Thrilled, that I get to share my efforts to calm my frenetic mind and heart with others.

I suppose it is the same combination of joy and fear I felt when holding my baby girls, getting married, writing my dissertation, teaching my first philosophy class or eating something unknown. I am mindful of the novelty, the moment of joy and fear and the awareness of a new path. I don’t know where it will take me and for how long but it feels good to look ahead.

Despite my fears, forgetting a pose in a sequence, wrong breath cues, limited alignment direction and the infinite little things that I could’ve done better, it was a wonderful experience. I know this because I want to do better. As soon as I got home, I found myself looking through music, researching sequences, considering different themes and advise on alignment cues. I found myself thumbing through my yoga teacher training notebooks and other books for direction.

I assume that anything or anybody that makes me want to be better is,  despite fear,  good for me. My kids make me want to be a better mom, my beloved makes me want to be a better partner, my philosophy students make me want to be a better teacher, my blog readers make me want to be a better blogger and so now my fellow yogis make me want to be a better yogi. Sharing, amplifies both good and bad, like cooking for others. It is a risk.

Yes, it was a good morning. A good beginning. I am so thankful for the graciousness of my sunrise vinyasa yogis. They have certainly helped me connect to my gratitude.

I was looking online for an appropriate quote that summarizes the crazy complexity of “first” experiences. Didn’t find one yet. I did find two about fear on goodreads that spoke to me. The first, short and sweet, is attributed to artist Salvador Dali.

“Have no fear of perfection – you’ll never reach it.”

There is something comforting in accepting imperfection as  evidence of continuous growth and striving, instead of failure and inadequacy.

The second quote is much longer from Herman Hesse about his admiration of trees.

“For me, trees have always been the most penetrating preachers. I revere them when they live in tribes and families, in forests and groves. And even more I revere them when they stand alone. They are like lonely persons. Not like hermits who have stolen away out of some weakness, but like great, solitary men, like Beethoven and Nietzsche. In their highest boughs the world rustles, their roots rest in infinity; but they do not lose themselves there, they struggle with all the force of their lives for one thing only: to fulfil themselves according to their own laws, to build up their own form, to represent themselves. Nothing is holier, nothing is more exemplary than a beautiful, strong tree. When a tree is cut down and reveals its naked death-wound to the sun, one can read its whole history in the luminous, inscribed disk of its trunk: in the rings of its years, its scars, all the struggle, all the suffering, all the sickness, all the happiness and prosperity stand truly written, the narrow years and the luxurious years, the attacks withstood, the storms endured. And every young farmboy knows that the hardest and noblest wood has the narrowest rings, that high on the mountains and in continuing danger the most indestructible, the strongest, the ideal trees grow.

Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They do not preach learning and precepts, they preach, undeterred by particulars, the ancient law of life.

A tree says: A kernel is hidden in me, a spark, a thought, I am life from eternal life. The attempt and the risk that the eternal mother took with me is unique, unique the form and veins of my skin, unique the smallest play of leaves in my branches and the smallest scar on my bark. I was made to form and reveal the eternal in my smallest special detail.

A tree says: My strength is trust. I know nothing about my fathers, I know nothing about the thousand children that every year spring out of me. I live out the secret of my seed to the very end, and I care for nothing else. I trust that God is in me. I trust that my labor is holy. Out of this trust I live.

When we are stricken and cannot bear our lives any longer, then a tree has something to say to us: Be still! Be still! Look at me! Life is not easy, life is not difficult. Those are childish thoughts. Let God speak within you, and your thoughts will grow silent. You are anxious because your path leads away from mother and home. But every step and every day lead you back again to the mother. Home is neither here nor there. Home is within you, or home is nowhere at all.

A longing to wander tears my heart when I hear trees rustling in the wind at evening. If one listens to them silently for a long time, this longing reveals its kernel, its meaning. It is not so much a matter of escaping from one’s suffering, though it may seem to be so. It is a longing for home, for a memory of the mother, for new metaphors for life. It leads home. Every path leads homeward, every step is birth, every step is death, every grave is mother.

So the tree rustles in the evening, when we stand uneasy before our own childish thoughts: Trees have long thoughts, long-breathing and restful, just as they have longer lives than ours. They are wiser than we are, as long as we do not listen to them. But when we have learned how to listen to trees, then the brevity and the quickness and the childlike hastiness of our thoughts achieve an incomparable joy. Whoever has learned how to listen to trees no longer wants to be a tree. He wants to be nothing except what he is. That is home. That is happiness.”

All this, blogging and yoga, helps me share, helps me survive in suburbia, through the pick up and drop offs, the left behind water bottles, the grocery, summertime lunch, dinner planning for 10 hungry dance team girls, an article to write about Indiana woodware, another on an artist, a tagine and coffee pot to wash, a dog to let out, weeds to address and so on and so on.  I can embrace and enjoy it all because I took a full breath with others this morning. Gratitude, indeed.
Wishing all of you many new “firsts” ahead,
Wobblyogi

Wobblyogi Wednesday- YTT Journal Week 20

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Graduation!

Where did the time go???? We officially graduated from our 200 hour yoga teacher training yesterday. I was just getting started. Yoga is so much bigger and so much more generous than I ever imagined. There is a path for everyone and the fun part is discovering your own. I came to yoga to calm my frenetic hungry philosopher mind. In the vast yoga terrain I like to roam Hatha yoga, Vinyasa and Yin. As Jacqueline would say “let your thoughts rest on your breath.” I have found my place of rest on the yoga mat in movement inside and out. Relief.

I was honored to have my fellow yogis at my home for a celebratory dinner. What a wonderful group of people! Our menu included

  • Chicken Kabobs [chicken pieces marinated in yogurt, almonds, saffron, ginger, cinnamon and cardamom]
  • Aloo Gobi [Potatoes and Cauliflower cooked in a raisin, onion, ginger, tumeric, coriander and cumin sauce]
  • Eggplant and pumpkin [cooked with indian panchforan/five spice, red peppers, tumeric and onions]
  • Three lentil Dal [ a combination of red/masor, yellow/mong, and yellow split peas cooked with tumeric and ghee fried onions]
  • White Basmati rice and store bought naan

We also had a delicious (surprisingly gluten free) brownies, a cake with nutella, a cheese platter, chips and dip, mango and malai ice cream and tiny samosas (the baked frozen packaged kind).

Most importantly, there was laughter. It was a great night celebrating our time together, full of gratitude, good food and friends. Makes any journey worth it.

More wobblyogi adventures to come!

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Yoga image from nobleworks greeting card

 

 

 

 

Wobblyogi Wednesday – YTT Journal Week 16

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I am a wobbyogi and I am scared of head stands. There…..I confessed. I don’t enjoy being upside down, never have, even as a kid. Struggled through gym class unable to do a forward roll or a cartwheel. Last time I tried hanging upside down in an aerial yoga class I felt nauseous and dizzy. My dislike and distrust of almost all inversions run deep.

This is exactly why, maybe I should practice towards a head stand. I may never get there. I am no spring chicken. But, the process of building up my arm and core strength is worth the effort. At the beginning of this training, even a chaturanga had been difficult. I still can’t roll my toes but I feel stronger and able to lower down into the pose slower. A crow and a head stand are the two poses I want to work towards. Having tangible goals might give my practice the consistency and direction it needs. The deeper yoga trick is to not let these soft goals feed ego-centric victory or self-defeating doubt. Finding that balance between ease and effort, like any asana practice or meditation takes practice. It is all about….practicing an intent-full instead of a task oriented life.

As a part of the teacher training four of us students offered a karma yoga class last night. We lead a yin yoga class to benefit our local food bank, Food Finders. We looked into books and websites by Paul Grilley, Bernie Clark and Sarah Powers. Debra Steinhauer, who teaches Yin at Community Yoga offered much needed advice. We considered issues like talking and silence, timer chimes and music, props and modifications, lighting and more. This is really a beautiful time in our yoga teaching journey where we are getting comfortable yet still remain very much aware of all the details. When we started we didn’t even know the details or the questions to address. Next step would be to drop the nervousness that goes along with awareness of all that could go wrong. From my other teaching experience I know that teaching can easily become mechanical like a reflex. In such cases, challenging oneself to present material in new ways becomes the challenge. For now, how nice to be able to thoughtfully plan and semi-comfortably lead a session together. It was most satisfying to hear that our yogis felt relaxed and didn’t pick up on our inner anxieties. Next step, for each of us, is to lead an hour long session on our own in the coming and last few weeks of yoga teacher training. What a trip!

I didn’t begin this journey with the expectation of teaching but it soon became apparent that my own path depended on sharing the road with others.

Here’s one way to get into a head stand and a crow pose. Wish me luck!

Much love,

The wobblyogi

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Image from: http://www.memecenter.com/tag/headstand

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wobblyogi Wednesday- YTT Journal Week 15

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We are at 15 weeks! How fantastic that our yoga training keeps broadening into an endless horizon. I’m excited about exploring this sense of an internal landscape with high points and low, movement and stillness, sunshine and rain. For the first time in my life instead of looking outward for answers, in books, in art, in movies, in experts, in philosophy, I am looking inward. It is tremendously empowering to feel self-sufficient. I don’t feel this euphoria all the time but I do see glimpses more often than I used to. I know it is there and some days I can coax it out of hiding through asana practice, meditation, walking or just taking a few slow, intentional breaths.

We’ve been covering anatomy for a while. Today I am fascinated by our bony architecture. How strange that the weight of our hands, arms and shoulders are carried back through the scapula, clavicle then the sternum in front to release into the ribs and then down the spine. Our weight doesn’t just move directly downward but moves through us in circuitous ways. What amazing joints we have in our hips and shoulders that are able to rotate AND support. The universal elegant dance of “Sthira” and “Sukha” or stability and movement plays out within us, literally in our bones. The spine, itself, such a wonderful example of strength and flexibility, of softness and structure, of squishy and rigid. No wonder the spine is such a good indicator of emotional and physical well being. In the clip below Leslie Kaminoff talks about how we physically suppress emotions, how we “hold” anger, worry, resentment, and anxiety.

Sending uplifting thoughts that might lessen the burden on your bones,

Wobblyogi

 

 

Wobblyogi Wednesday – YTT Journal

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It has happened. I’ve taught my first 15 minutes of a real yoga class (outside the comfort zone of my fellow trainees) today. I mumbled, forgot to breathe, relied on notes too much, missed modification cues, was lost for a moment and probably missed other things I don’t even know. And…… it was wonderful! All my mistakes were loud and aggressive in my head but the experienced yogis in the studio graciously overlooked my inner panic. For a moment during a chaturanga, it occurred to me that I was sharing something I so enjoy with others. That moment made it all worth it. I could feel our energy collectively rise as we progressed through the sun salutations.

The conversion from practicing yoga to practicing yoga AND teaching yoga is challenging!

  1. During practice, I focus inward. It seems intrusive to be looking at others when teaching. I feel like a student spying on my fellow yogis.
  2. When to demo and move with the class and when to stop, observe, talk and notice the class? I have yet to find a good rhythm.
  3. The balance between cueing and silence is another skill I need to work on.
  4. Inflection of voice to convey calmness and energy when appropriate is yet another issue.

Despite this self-critique, I’ve grown and learned so much! So thankful that I’m not asking how do you get into a twisted extended side angle [parivttri parsvakonasana]? or what is a sun salutation?, or how do you breathe in a twist? why breathe with movement? Is chaturanga a movement or a pose? What does a neutral spine mean? Only a few weeks ago, I would’ve asked these questions and so many more.

After I deliver food to the table, I eagerly notice the reactions: who jumped to serve themselves, who had seconds, who moved the food around the plate, who picked ingredients out, who got more to drink, who was quiet in her enjoyment, who was adding condiments etc. It is time for me to focus on my fellow yogis to watch and notice as they move and breathe to my cues. Teaching yoga is a new relationship, like any other, full of happy anticipations and nervous anxieties.  I learned today that the beauty of people moving and breathing together is so00000 much better than my crazy inner monolog. I thought through teaching I would help others, turns out they are helping me just as much, if not more. Cue a humble warrior pose……..

Hosting and witnessing the magic of shared breath is the privilege of a yoga teacher.

Thank you, Debra, for sharing your class with me.

Image from: http://www.doyouyoga.com/what-its-really-like-to-teach-a-yoga-class-illustrated-40340/

Wobblyogi Wednesday – YTT Journal Week 9

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I’m starting to lose track of the weeks! 8, 9, 10 I don’t know.  I suppose it is a good thing that the learning process is becoming more routine. Still lots to learn. Working on sequencing, anatomy, voice, teaching 5-minute segments of a class and more. The poses are getting more familiar and breathing more aware. I have noticed I lose my rhythm when I have to adjust my pose, grab a block, shuffle my foot forward, set my knee down or lift it up. Off the mat, I’m noticing when I start feeling annoyed with someone or anxious about something. I can sense when my energy is strained or equilibrium disturbed. I am not yet good at recovering quickly. That ability may take a while to develop. With the basics addressed I can see how our development as teachers now rest on practice, practice, practice. I feel we’ve shifted from training to more emphasis on teaching. As dates for team teaching, partner teaching, and finally teaching “alone” are set, all this teacher training is getting very real! I’m anxious and excited.

I continue to visit as many classes with different yoga teachers as possible. The diversity reminds me how wonderfully personal yoga practice is. I have started to see each teacher’s yoga style like an artist style. So far, I have met teachers who remind me of Seurat, John Singer Sargent, Renoir and Mary Cassatt. I also imagine my own style to mature into a Cezanne painting.

We learned about the chakras. I feel the same panic I feel looking up symptoms on webmd. It seems all my chakras are imbalanced!

Now that we are closer to the end of teacher training than the beginning, I suppose as a reminder our teachers asked us to reflect on our short term and long term goals regarding our yoga practice, about how we hope to evolve as a practitioner and teacher, about our thoughts on “finding your authentic voice.” All good questions. I wonder how you, my fellow yoga teacher in training would answer. Please feel free to share. How would you describe your style, your spirit artist?

Here is how I answered:

Short term Goals:

  1. To cultivate a steady and consistent practice
  2. To keep learning and becoming better acquainted and comfortable with various poses and styles
  3. To learn more about the internal “non” physical practices of yoga

Long term Goals:

  1. To develop a responsive personal practice that can help me get through the day with less anxiety and more ease
  2. To help others do the same

Ideas and thoughts in regards to “finding your authentic voice”

As a teacher, cook, writer, philosopher I strive to be authentic and mindful. I would like to bring that spirit to my yoga practice and teaching by cultivating:

  • a big picture, a thematic, a meditative attitude
  • awareness of how breath and alignment relate to the sense of yoga as connection
  • humor that admits the contradictions and difficulties in yoga on and off the mat

Who you are as a yoga teacher now

Like an elementary school kid: open, curious, aware but not very confident.

How you desire to evolve as a practitioner and teacher

I hope to be someone who can combine mental, physical and spiritual aspects of yoga seamlessly both on and off the mat. I want my teaching style to be like a Cezanne painting very much invested in the physical by honoring different perspectives on poses, breath, intentions and alignment. Be suggestive and tentative yet clear and purposeful. Like the lake painting where we can see him build an image with uneven and layered strokes into an atmosphere of calmness, (neither dreamy like a Monet or photographic like a Vermeer).

 

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