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The other day, my sister’s friend invited her to a different yoga studio for a class.  “I can’t do it”, said my sister. “I’d love to, but I’m not good enough. I suck.”   Fear shows up in funny ways. Tory pictures an entire class pointing at her and sneering.   This made me laugh for about four seconds. Then I realized that whenever a new challenge comes my way – going back to class after weeks away, trying a new kind of yoga, going to a different studio – my immediate, insane response is, “I can’t, I’m too fat.” This is obviously absurd. There is no sign posted anywhere in yoga that says Stay Out If You Think You Are Pudgy .  Nor have I met a yoga mat that hasn’t welcomed my solid thighs. (Oh my god, the mats are too small for my lardy bum! I’ll have to put four of them together!)  Nor, come to think of it, have I ever encountered a yoga teacher who raises one eyebrow and says, “Oh, you think so, do you? If you were enlightened enough to be in my class, you’d be thin.  Now stop crying. You can come to my Class For The Fat and Unenlightened .”    Absurd, excessive, twisted, completely un-constructive, I know. But these are the trolls that leap up from under my bridge when I’m facing something new and scary. Or old and scary for that matter. I like stating my fear out loud. It looks more ridiculous than ever that way. Gives it a loving kick in the head. I suck. I’m too this, too that. Do you have a fear that yoga brings to light? Would you like to kick it in the head? Thanks to yoga for showing me where and how I’d like to be more fearless, and thanks to you for the conversation. Kristin Shepherd is a chiropractor, actor, and speaker (about All Things Wonderful) from North Bay, Ontario.  Join her on Facebook at Dr. Kristin Shepherd or on Twitter at kristinwonders.

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Yoga Trolls

It doesn’t really matter where you practice, as long as you do. Right? Right. But having practiced yoga everywhere from a church basement to a plush studio to a mountaintop on the outskirts of Katmandu, there’s something to be said for creating a welcoming atmosphere for spiritual practice. The same goes for creating a nurturing and inspiring place for our children to hang out and play and sleep. When Neil and I had Lucien, we were temporarily living in a sublet in Brooklyn. Arranging Lucien’s “nursery” involved setting up a co-sleeper next to our bed. (He ended up sleeping in our bed those first six months, nestled between a yoga bolster on one side and mommy on the other.) Next, we moved to Vancouver and rented a furnished one-bedroom apartment. Neil set up Lucien’s crib in the walk-in closet of our bedroom, and I put some decals on the wall – an airplane, a pink moose. While I loved exploring new places (we were in New York for Neil’s academic leave from Harvard, and moved to Vancouver for his new job at the University of British Columbia), I couldn’t wait to settle down and make a proper nursery for Lucien. The truth was I was completely envious when I walked into my friends’ baby rooms in Boston and Los Angeles. Poor Lucien in his closet!  Of course, he didn’t care or know the difference. At that age he just wanted to be close to his mama and dada.   When Lucien was almost one, on Halloween, we moved into our house – a fixer upper that came filled with character, potential, and a never ending to do list. My first priority was Lucien’s room. We painted the walls with a non-toxic pale green and yellow paint, bought an  IKEA rocking chair   for his nursing corner, and got him some rolling see-through containers for his toys and books.  Since then, I’ve added and subtracted to the room. At  Collage Collage , where I take Lucien for art class, we picked up posters from local artists. Now that Lucien has weaned, the rocking chair is in the living room, and on our summer vacation on Vancouver Island I came across a super cheap stash of vintage children’s chairs, a handmade wooden table, and some old school books and toys that are now my favorite things in his room. Just as I feel at home and at peace in my upstairs yoga corner, Lucien seems content to hang out in his room for hours- playing, singing, reading books, and just generally chilling in his pajamas. Where in your house or apartment do you – and your children – feel most comfortable, most creative, and most inspired?  Jessica Berger Gross is the author of  enLIGHTened:   How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer (Skyhorse),  she lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two-year-old son.

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Making Room

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When Ava, my manager, suggested that instead of flying in and out for my Los Angeles teaching gigs last week, we rent a car from Lake Tahoe and take a 16-day road trip through California, I thought she was crazy. That is, until she explained a) all the fun we could have, and b) all the people we’d be able to meet in person.   As a yoga teacher with students all over the world, I know the precious value of creating real relationships with those with whom we share a like-minded practice.   If I had just flown in for my weekend of workshops, and not explored for the week before and after, I would not have sat down with editors and publishers, helped a woman figure out what kind of poses she could do with her cranky knees, or witnessed a stockbroker come to an epiphany about his life over dinner. I would not have visited with my friend Ariel, danced in front of a fireplace, seen Shiva Rea’s video shoot, bonded with Ava, or so much more.   Ariel is a feng shui master. He has said for years that it’s not enough to make space to be who you are right now; you need to create the space for who you want to become. For example, if you want a love relationship to come into your life, you’ll want not only to get yourself ready for it, you also want to pull your bed away from the wall, put a nightstand there, and pour a fresh glass of water each night in anticipation of your new partner.   Energy loves a void, and when you make one in the shape of your ultimate goals, such as abundance, partnership, prosperity, love, or career success, it can start to pour in. If you’re still engaged in the same habits that got you where you are now, and are keeping you there, either resisting your greatness or maintaining the status quo, then new possibilities will have a harder time taking hold.   In this way, when Ava proposed a more intensive trip, but also one that left a lot of room to create new relationships and deepen ones I’ve already begun, I knew it was the right move. Things happened that neither one of us planned, like an incredible meeting that could skyrocket my teaching career and help millions of people be exposed to the healing benefits of yoga and mindful wellness. Sometimes, we want one thing to come into our lives, but the way we think, see the world, and act are not aligning with that which we say we would like to attract.   In yoga, we can easily practice working with this concept. When you breathe, you don’t actually pull air into your lungs. Your muscles pull the ribs apart, the diaphragm drops, the lungs open wide, and then the atmospheric pressure of the Earth pushes air in to fill the space you’ve created.   T.K.V. Desikachar, the son of Krishnamacharya, one of the founding fathers of yoga asana, says that prana , life force, cannot be controlled. We can only make the space it requires to infuse us, and remove obstacles to its flow.   This is why in yoga class, we begin by bringing attention to the breath. If it’s short, restricted, or choppy, we can be pretty certain that we are experiencing the same, on all other levels. The practice of yoga, therefore, is not to force openness, happiness, or health, but to seek out the places where we’re blocked from wholeness, and do the work required to remove those blockages.   In their place, we construct new riverbeds and banks, samskaras or habits, that serve us and take our prana in the directions we want it to go. Then, just like tearing down a dam, the streams and tributaries of circulation, central nervous system communication, lymph fluid, self-understanding, peace, and vitality will organically begin to irrigate your entire system, nourishing you for a lifetime from the inside out.     Core Pose: Making Space Breath   This is a simple breathing technique that will bring you back into harmony with the way the body actually breathes. Come into a comfortable seat. Close your eyes and direct your awareness to the tip of your nose. Without using the more yang Ujjayi breath (no Darth Vader here!), let the breath quietly but fully slide in as you flare your ribs wide in all directions. Note that as you inhale, the lungs fill from top to bottom. As you exhale, they empty out from everywhere at once as the ribs compress.     Listen to your body and notice the places in the side ribs, the front abdominals or around the mid and upper back where you find a jerkiness or stubbornness residing. Hold your breath in for a moment, and move in ways that help to release and resolve your resistance there. If you notice emotions or thoughts arising that cause the body or energy to contract, maintain the rhythm of your in- and out-breaths until they dissipate.   After two minutes of the making space breathing technique, you should feel a difference in the freedom and quality of your breathing, and in your body, mind, and heart.                    

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Making Space

If you’ve been reading my blog regularly this summer, by now you know I’m more than a little obsessed with taking my son Lucien swimming. Being in the pool with him is a joy. The cool water, the feel of his body intertwined with mine – it’s delicious. For months I’ve been looking forward to the opening of a new neighborhood pool here in Vancouver, part of the deal the city made with its citizens for hosting the 2010 Winter Olympics.   Vancouver already has some amazing city pools, and this new one promised to be the largest and best yet, and just a fifteen minute walk from my house. (Not to mention affordable, as it’s part of the city parks and community center system.)  I crossed my fingers that Lucien would like it and not be overwhelmed by the sprays and jets and water cannons and lazy river, not to mention the 70-person hot tub. To my surprise and delight, Lucien loves the new indoor pool paradise. So here we were in the pool, having a mommy baby pool party. The first time we visited we spent a record breaking (for us) two hours in the water. On this, our second visit, it seemed like we’d be there all day – fine with me. I noticed though that even in moments of mommy-son bliss in the shallowest end of the hot tub (more like a hot tub river) I kept asking Lucien if he wanted to go see the next big thing in the pool – journey down the lazy river or back to the bubbles or waterfall area. But Lucien was perfectly happy just to be. To sit in the shallow end of the hot tub and look at the families playing, chat with me, sing his repertoire of songs, and be one with the warm water lapping over us. Looking at Lucien, I remembered what had drawn me to yoga asana and philosophy back when I was an ever-searching twenty-something. As Ram Dass famously wrote, “Be Here Now.” I didn’t need to explore the rest of the pool, or teach Lucien how to swim that morning, or even go into a deeper section of the hot tub. I just needed to follow my yogi-in-training’s lead and be here now in that hot tub. And so I did. And it was a time-stopping moment of peace and oneness and through-and through-contentment. Until I noticed them. Tiny brown pieces of toddler poop bubbling up from Lucien’s diaper and into the 70-person hot tub river. Yikes! I felt a wash of panic and then shame come over me, but tried my best to stay calm. I gathered Lucien, ran to a lifeguard, and rushed a howling don’t-want-to-ever-get-out-of-the-water-and-certainly-not-to-change-a-dirty-diaper toddler to the change room and shower. I felt horrible for the other patrons of the pool that day. It’s one thing to deal with your own child’s poop, but nobody wants to encounter other children’s poop while relaxing in a hot tub.  Oy. Needless to say, everyone in the hot tub was evacuated with a whistle as an entire section of the pool was closed off, drained, and cleaned. Once he was clean and dry, Lucien was un-phazed by the events of the day. He just figured he had a dirty diaper – not realizing the hot tub had become a HAZMAT scene. On our way home, I heard employees talking about the “emergency.” Triple yikes.   Enlightened Motherhood Lesson of the Day: Be here now and take each situation in stride. Jessica Berger Gross is the author of enLIGHTened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer (Skyhorse), she lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two-year-old son.

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Be Here Now

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Uh oh. Who would have guessed that 10 months into my yoga life, I’d lead a class? Well, a small class. Three of us and a dog named Emma. At a cottage. I may not know what I’m doing when it comes to yoga, but neither did they, and we all felt certain we’d come to no harm. So we gathered on a deck looking over Big Marten Lake on a gloriously blue Saturday morning. We started with a few Sun Salutations, followed by variations on Sun Salutations. We flowed gently from posture to posture, plank to Chattarunga to upward dog to downward dog. I gave them every tip I could remember (shoulder blades down, inner thighs rotating backward, rooting through hands and feet) and made up several extra. More than once, Jenni said, don’t you mean my left leg forward? And isn’t it the right foot pivoting this time? (I am far more dyslexic than I imagined.) We moved onto slower poses, a ridiculous rendition of yin yoga – ridiculous given that I have not once attended a yin class.  I watch my lovely man do his poses at home and thought they’d be fun to try with my friends. Class was a rousing success. Until day two. During our Sun Salutations, neither Sue nor Jenni can move gently from plank to chattarunga. Not even the first time. Sue says, I don’t remember doing this yesterday. We did, I tell her. We did exactly the same thing. “It didn’t hurt like this,” Jenni says. “Hurt like what?” I ask. “Like hell,” she says, “pointing to her chest and arms.  It hurts like absolute hell.” “It’ll get better,” I tell them, hoping it’s true. And through every Sun Salutation (and we only do five), they collapse like big bags of potatoes from plank to Chattarunga. Smack. Slam. Thud. Thwack. Bang. Crash. The new sounds of yoga. We laughed so hard I thought I’d blow a bhanda. Great lessons from chattathwack yoga: 1.  Yeah for the shoulder and arm strength that comes with practice!!!! 2.  I adore sharing yoga. My only goal in leading the class was for them to want to do it again the following day. They did. Sort of. 3.  Yeah for real teachers, who know right from left, how to start slowly, and how to let us laugh. Have you taught, those of you who aren’t teachers yet?  I’d love to hear about it. Thanks to yoga, for fun on vacation, and thanks to you for the conversation. Kristin Shepherd is a chiropractor, actor, speaker, and workshop wonderwoman in North Bay, Ontario.  Join her at kristinshepherd.ca or on Facebook at Dr. Kristin Shepherd.

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Teaching!

America’s red-headed sweet heart has been seduced by the spiritual lures of India. Julia Roberts told Elle that she is “definitely a practicing Hindi” after her time in India filming the upcoming Eat, Pray, Love . USA Today followed up on the cover interview with a story Sunday. According to a 2009 Associated Press story relying on The Times of India newspaper, Roberts’ children have been given Hindu names. It quoted a Hindu priest, Swami Dharam Dev, as saying : “I have named her twins Hazel and Phinnaeus as Laxmi and Ganesh, while Henry will be called Krishna Balram.” No word yet on whether or not Roberts’ practices yoga, since of course being Hindu does not require it. USA Today was also quick to distinguish the difference between practicing yoga and practicing Hindism, but couldn’t resist posting an image of Sarah Palin in Tree Pose as an argument for the “poses don’t have to be spiritual” side. (We couldn’t resist either.)   ” Yet, we have been doing Hindu-Lite for years, sampling of the flavor , images and style of a 6,000-year-old faith but with no actual theology involved. Anywhere you look you can find loose chatter about dharma (a way of living leading to spiritual advancement) and karma ( the “neutral, self-perpetuating law of the inner cosmos,” Hindu monk Sannyasin Arumugaswami, editor of Hinduism Today magazine, said in 2006) . Yoga Journal estimated at that time that nearly a third of folks who try the 5,000-year-old Hindu physical and meditative discipline, say they’re seeking ’spiritual development.’ ” Is yoga spiritual for you, or is it simply a good work out?

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Pretty Woman Converts to Hindu Woman

There are days – pushing my stroller up a steep hill, scooping dog poop while answering the phone, trying to meet writing deadlines while Lucien plays at my feet, managing outings and baths and meals and schedules, not to mention making time for my yoga practice-when I could almost forget. How hard it was getting here. It was hard for me to become a mother, excruciatingly so. (Now, in comparison, is the easy part.) Neil and I married when I was 30, and though it seemed prudent to wait to try and have a baby-for our careers to become more stable, to have more of an income, to settle down in one city -I wanted to get started right away.  Maybe deep down I knew. After six months of trying, I became pregnant. We lived in Los Angeles at the time and immediately I changed everything. My diet: Goodbye coffee, hello egg salad sandwiches. My asana practice: so long Mysore series, hello Iyengar. Even the way I thought of myself changed in the instant I saw that plus on the pregnancy stick. In a flash I went from struggling would-be writer to contented mom-to-be. That pregnancy was seven years ago. At eight-and-a-half weeks (that half week was as important to me then as Lucien’s “half” a year after his two years is to me now) I went to the doctor for my first ultrasound. In that fancy office in Beverly Hills I sat feeling out of place but confident in my impending motherhood as I flipped the pages of the magazines laid out in the waiting room. And then the exam. There was no heartbeat. What followed was an everyday nightmare that I know many of you reading this have been through-the blood work and waiting, the D & C, the endless and unexpected free fall of grief. It took a long time for me to heal. One thing that helped was working on my first book, an anthology I edited, About What Was Lost: 20 Writers on Miscarriage, Healing, and Hope . I wrote my story and collected others.  Hearing women’s stories, immersing myself in them, steeled me as I spent the next several years determined to become a mother, but not sure how or when or some days, if, I would. Yoga helped too. In class I felt cared for and comforted, and on good days I felt that everything would be all right. (On the bad days I stared in envy at the gorgeous pregnant women in class, on the really bad days I cried at home on my mat, and on the worst days I stayed in bed.) Now, all these years later, I have my beautiful boy.  As he sings to me and as we snuggle and make believe, and even when I get so exhausted from keeping up with him that I need to collapse in front of hours of reality television in a pop culture coma, I remember, and I feel for all the women (and men) out there struggling-whether with IVF cycles or adoption waiting lists or simply the monthly still-negative pregnancy tests. I’m sending love to all of you and prayers that soon you’ll be with the children you are meant to parent. And believe me, I know how lucky I am. Do you have a story to share? Jessica Berger Gross is the author of enLIGHTened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer (Skyhorse), she lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two-year-old son.

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Remembering

On Monday, in the space left behind by the thousands of yogis who attended Wanderlust, my friend and I decided to climb a mountain. (You can see it in the background in the picture below.) OK, it was more a civilized trail than something I’d need a rope and rock shoes to tackle. But let me tell you, it was pretty darn challenging. The high altitude makes it harder to do even simple things, like breathe, much less hike. I was a little daunted thinking about scaling a steep path for an hour, especially since I haven’t done any other exercise besides yoga for a decade, unless you count climbing the stairs to the 9th floor walkup I lived in for a year in Manhattan. Yoga prepared us both for the adventure of doing something new with our bodies, and though the air was thin, and my heart rate was about as high as the hill itself, I felt strong, capable, and, finally, grateful for all those long-held Warrior poses. When we reached the pinnacle, a pyramid-shaped outcropping of flaking shale, my friend had the idea to pick up a large piece and heave it over the side. It bounced and skipped until coming to rest among another pile of rocks farther down. I felt so inspired by this that I got up from my serene perch overlooking a mountain waterfall and stream and start throwing rocks too. It felt like every rock I tossed was a heaviness I was deciding to release, lightening my mental, physical, and emotional load. There is a parable I love, about a monk and his master stopping at the bank of a wide stream. There they encountered a man dressed in fine clothes. This man looked at the master and asked, “Will you carry me across? I don’t want to get my nice clothes wet.” The monk volunteered to take the man across, as his master was older, and, well, the master. But the master said, “No, no. He asked me. I’ll take him.” So the master put this perfectly strong, healthy guy on his back and struggled across the stream with him, getting his own clothing all wet so the man could stay dry. Once across, the man went his own way, without any word of thanks. The monk and master continued on, with the monk indignant. He mumbled under his breath and cycled back into a dark and stormy state every few minutes. Finally, after about two hours, the master said, “Brother, what’s bothering you?” The monk exploded: “I can’t believe he didn’t even thank you! I mean, you’re a master, and he was capable of getting himself across. The nerve of this guy! What a complete jerk!” The master looked at the monk, undisturbed, and said, “I put that man down on the other side of the river–and two hours later, you’re still carrying him.” We all tend to carry unnecessary baggage around with us. Whether it’s regret for what could have been, anger at a past experience, or even tension from a stressful job that builds in the shoulders or low back, it ends up as extra weight that prevents us from engaging with and enjoying the present moment. Sometimes we might feel that punishing ourselves for past actions or keeping them alive by dwelling on them over and over again will keep us from repeating the behavior. But this is a toxic attitude that will slow you down as surely as carrying someone across a stream. Instead,  just as you enter a challenging practice with the intention to shake up and dissolve areas of restriction in your body, use your yogic tools to shake up and dissolve those stories or habitual “truths” you tell yourself that diminish you instead of lighting you up. Through mindful practice, we realize that we can remember the lessons we’ve learned from our experiences, but drop the weight of living them over and over again in ways that erode our happiness. When, with arms overhead and with all my might, I threw the last rock, I did the following pose. This is a wonderful, instant way to release any negativity that’s following you around. Do it regularly, to ensure that you’re not gathering tension or destructive energies on any level, and watch your body, mind, and heart lighten and move with more freedom. Lion’s Pose Take a deep breath. Imagine it traveling from your lungs to your belly, and all the way down to your toes. Really gather up any inner negativity you can find. On the exhalation, release the breath up and out through your mouth as you stick your tongue way out and roar like a lion: “HAAAAAAH!” Repeat this 1-3 times, or until you start laughing. That’s a good sign: As you lift the energetic stone of whatever has been weighing you down, you’ll uncover the joy that is your right–and birthright–that’s within you at all times.      

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Lightening Your Load

I know there are branches of yoga. I know most of us are focused on the physical branch. Some multi-branched yogis don’t love our primary focus on the physical. I think it’s all right. Here’s why: I began with Hatha yoga. But it doesn’t take long before I realize, without any teaching, that yoga has at least a second branch for me. Let’s call my two branches outside yoga and inside yoga. The physical is outside. I love its strength and flexibility, its warmth, love the physical buzzy calm after my practice. At some point on the trip, outside yoga introduced me to inside yoga, a kind of calm, accepting, eyeball-dissolving something, so often accompanied by huge sighs the end of class. And just as the physical branch teaches itself to me, class by class, the inside branch works its way through me, too, telling me a thing or two or twenty that I didn’t see at first. Like the fact that I don’t feel inner peace after every class. In fact sometimes I’m as relaxed as all get out during class and then my head races during Savasana. Go figure. And sometimes I find that lovely, floaty peace without doing a physical practice at all. Sometimes it shows up out of nowhere, while I’m driving or eating or scratching the dog’s belly. Today I saw an old man sitting on a guardrail, watching traffic go by while he picked something from the sole of his shoe, and my heart melted as though he were my grandfather.   Somehow, my yoga practice helps this inside thing happen, even when they don’t occur together. So. There you go. I have two branches, now. Who knows what will show up next, and what kind of tree I’ll be in the end. How about you?  How many branches?  What kind?  What’s your current growth? Thanks to yoga for such gorgeous growth, and thanks to you for the conversation. Kristin Shepherd is a chiropractor, actor, speaker, and workshop wonderwoman in North Bay, Ontario.  Join her at kristinshepherd.ca or on Facebook at Dr. Kristin Shepherd.

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My Own Branches

This is the first of a series of blogs by yoga teachers on tour. Join them as they find inspiration to practice all over the world! Seven years ago a friend invited me to his hometown of Haines in Southeast Alaska. I had never considered visiting Alaska and didn’t give it much consideration; however, he didn’t give up easily and started sending me pictures of the river and mountains that persuaded me to visit  the little borough of Haines (pop. 2,400) for a week.   I fell in love with Haines at first sight and have returned every summer since. The people are friendly and generous and the natural beauty unparalleled. I started teaching a yoga class or two at the local community center that also houses the public radio and theater, and now have expanded into leading a full weekend workshop and evening kirtan. An incredible family (Beth MacCready and Gregg Bigsby) who practice yoga and meditation host me at their unique 15-acre waterfront property where the river meets the ocean. I stay in a yert, pictured above. Eagles fly overhead, seals and whales swim by, an occasional moose or bear wander in, and  snow-capped mountains rise out of water as far as the eye can see. It is here, by the sea in southeast Alaska that I have precious time to recharge my battery that gets worn down from living in an urban environment the rest of the year. My month here is a time for me to remember the practice of slowing down, the importance of rest and the healing power of mother nature. My singing, mediation and asana practice have plenty of space to unfold in this unique natural setting.   I plan my workshop with nature as a theme: trees rooting down to grow up toward the sun.  We practice rooting down into the earth with our feet and drawing energy up from the earth through the spine and out the crown of the head, allowing it to open and expand from the sky. We practiced this in Tadasana and through the standing poses. I gave the students a “home play” assignment to practice this extension as they stand and walk throughout the day.  I invite you to join us in this practice as well! Where do you go to recharge your battery? And what makes you feel connected to nature? Sarana Miller is trained in the Iyengar and Forrest Yoga traditions and is currently studying the Sarah Powers style. A student of Jai Uttal, she teaches yoga and leads kirtan in San Francisco. 

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Moose, Yoga and Alaska!

This woman is 68. What’s her secret? Yoga, of course! One of the things I love about yoga is practicing with inspiring women who are older than me. It’s always the 50 or 60 year old in class who has the twenty minute headstand with variations.  After all, she’s been practicing for decades. At my recent yoga retreat with Marla Apt, I was surrounded by wise and graceful women in their 50s and 60s, women with children my age, and, in some cases, grandchildren. One of Marla’s students-a yoga teacher named Marsha with a lovely practice-is a great grandmother, 68 years old, beautiful and knowing and filled with light.  She teaches yoga to women living in prison (not that she’d ever mention this herself, she’s way too modest.) She’s calm, gracious, and ageless. Marsha is the kind of woman I want to grow up to be like. Patricia Walden, whom I studied with in Massachusetts before moving to Vancouver, is my all time favorite role model of an older and oh so much better yogi; she’s wiser–and more beautiful–than any woman I know in her 30’s. It’s women like these who remind me that getting older means learning more, going deeper– into my practice, into my self, becoming more of a woman, a mom, a yogi, a seeker, with each birthday.  This is only the beginning.   What scares you about the aging process?  What do you look forward to most?  Who are your role models?   Jessica Berger Gross is the author of enLIGHTened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer (Skyhorse), she lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two-year-old son.

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Enlightened Grandmothers

Okay, what is it with triangle pose???? (Those of you who are experts need not read this one. Go back to practicing your one-armed handstands with your legs in full lotus. I adore you, I do. I worship your accomplishments. But today’s thoughts are not for you.) Triangle pose. Pretty basic. Do the triangle thing and reach forward to grab your first toe. For the entire 10 months of my gorgeous, intensive involvement in yoga, this is exactly what happens with my right leg. I reach down, gently grab the first toe of my right foot, and look up to the ceiling. I breathe slowly and evenly. I don’t care if Rob and Cristina (my teachers) count to 29 on this one. Happiness. Not so with my left leg. On my left side, I reach down, all the while thinking, I am so flexible, I am flexibility itself, I am flexibility incarnate and reincarnate. And my hand reaches mid-calf. Not an inch lower. Makes me crazy. I know, I know, patience, kindness, acceptance of what is. Even if what is is a daily reminder of my exaggerated imbalance. All I wish for is balance, I tell myself. So guess what happened this week? For no reason I can think of, my triangle pose has changed! But not the way you think it might. Not the way it happens in fairy tales and romantic comedy yoga videos. Now neither of my hands can reach my toe! I mean it. I just tried it again before sitting here to write. Both sides to mid-calf. Not an inch lower. My thoughts? Be careful what you wish for. I wanted balance. I got it. Is there a pose that drives you crazy? (Okay, if it’s the one-armed handstand with full lotus, you can play, too.) Thanks to the yoga poses that drive us crazy, and thanks to you for the conversation. Kristin Shepherd is a chiropractor, actor, speaker, and workshop wonderwoman in North Bay, Ontario.  Join her at kristinshepherd.ca or on Facebook at Dr. Kristin Shepherd.

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Poses That Make You Crazy

We’ve all had days like Alexander’s in the children’s book Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day by Judith Viorst. In case you haven’t read it (you should) one thing after another happens from the moment he wakes up: from finding gum in his hair, missing out on the cereal box prize to fighting with his big brother, a trip to the dentist, and having a broken nightlight, Alexander wishes he could forget this mess and simply run off to Australia (me too!)–they don’t have bad days there. As adults, and as yogis, we hopefully have outgrown some of these limited belief systems–but somehow it seems like this “bad day” allowance issue still comes up. We wake up and know this day is going to be off, so it is written off as such. What does science, and yoga have to say about that? Steve Schwartz of LifeHacker checks it out: The brain’s facility to simplify, in most contexts, is very useful and beneficial. Our brains develop symbols, or abstract representations of complex ideas, that allow us to connect the represented ideas with other ideas, and to build upon them, without having to keep the full details of every complex idea at the forefront of our minds. In other words, simplification clears our minds, freeing our brains to draw additional connections and conclusions from complex ideas, data, and experiences. But what happens when we simplify experiences with the wrong symbolic conclusion? This is precisely what happens when we conclude that we are having a bad day. We blame our misfortune on factors outside of our own control, in order to avoid analyzing the real reasons things happened as they did (or perhaps even to eschew our own responsibility). Hence, it is easy for us to believe we’re having a bad day. The obvious downside is that once you accept the convenient conclusion that the entire day is for naught, it will actually cause the rest of your day to go horribly awry. Experiencing the world with negative expectations is like viewing reality through a muddy water glass. Your view will be distorted and you won’t like what you see. Schwartz offers a four-step program on how to not have a bad day any day, most of which sound pretty much like yoga to us. In summary: 1.Reflect on the negative feeling you have right now. (Presence) 2.Re-evaluate the situation or events that lead to this stress. (Perspective) 3. Remember that the outcome of the previous minute is not indicative of the outcome of the next minute. (Avoid Samskaras) 4. There is no number four…get on with your life already! (Yoga is now!) Next time you wake up on the wrong side of the bed, try being present and changing your expectation–just like we do in yoga–and see if you have a wonderful, awesome, not bad, very fantastic day. Because some days are still going to seem like that, even in Australia.

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Got a Bad Case of the Mondays?

After moving into my new apartment, the first thing I did, after unpacking, of course, was to place a statue of Ganesh at the entryway. My friend, feng shui master Ariel Towne, says that besides a fountain, the other necessary item near your front door is the little elephant otherwise known as the Remover of Obstacles. When you don’t let negative, sticky energies in, they don’t have a chance to affect you. “Cutting them off at the pass” is a phrase that might apply to what Ganesh is doing there at the front door. Aside from that massive job, Ganesh is also the Lord of Thresholds. Threshold . What a beautiful word. It reminds me of watching wind ripple the wheat fields during my Midwestern childhood. Yet, the concept itself has different meanings, not only describing the doorway itself, but what the doorway represents: a starting point, the beginning of any new journey or transformation. Ganesh is not some magic statue, without which you would have no protection against resistance, doubt, and fear–three of the biggest obstacles of all. It’s the act of placing Ganesh that brings awareness to our own desire to remain free of anything that diminishes or limits our potential to fly. In that sense, he represents that aspect of ourselves that is ready to swing open the door to our next adventure–and ready to step out of our own way long enough to clear the path straight through it. Henry Ford said, “Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off the goal.” You see, we have the power to either turn our experiences and truths into obstructions, weights tethered to any possible rise in self-esteem, greater awareness, and health; or to remove them.  Yogis have fabulous resistance-busting tools. We can get on the mat and practice, opening tight places and dissolving emotional and mental tension. We breathe, switch our thinking, learn to see more clearly and, by deciding to love ourselves a little more, we begin to widen the very doorway into our own hearts. By applying awareness to each situation we encounter, we open a threshold to our core, allowing our deepest wisdom to sweep through, and away, into the world in the form of our most courageous, conscious actions. In my classes, any time I want to clear the threshold, I ask my students to focus on hip opening. I call the hips “the Gateways,” because they can allow, or block, the energy moving from you foundation into your core. If the gateways are closed, the posture is incomplete and with it, the opportunity to gain the full benefits of the asana is lost. Try the following pose any time you feel a little closed yet feel ready to  make the space you need to cross the threshold into that next, most incredible state of being who you really are. Core Pose: Funky Lunge   This posture clears a common tight area–the side leg and outer hips–all the way from the foundation to your center. When you open this gateway, issues like sciatica may recede, since the piriformis muscle at the side of your pelvis often compresses it. As well, you’ll open the IT band, making this a wonderful way to free yourself from over-closure of the gateways of the hip muscles and joints and, quite literally, be able to walk through any threshold more freely. Come into Down Dog. Step your left foot to your right thumb. With this crossed foot placement, you’ll bring the right knee to the mat. Center your hips, and come onto palms or fingertips, on the mat or on blocks, so that your hands are under your shoulders. Begin to roll onto the pinky toe edge of your left foot. As you ground the foot down, and resist it back towards your hip, roll the outer left hip and upper thigh back and down so that it’s not hiking up toward your ribcage. Inhale, lift your lower belly and wave long through your spine. Exhale, and fold at the hip creases as you bend the elbows to your capacity. Play your edge of flexibility as you begin to straighten your front leg until you begin to feel sensation. Breathe and soften there before moving further into your stretch. If you want more of a challenge, try tucking the back toes under and lifting the back knee as in a Low Lunge. Your hands will walk back to remain under the shoulders for support. Breathe here for one minute, taking small spinal waves on the inhalation, and deepening your fold on the exhalation. Return to Dog Pose, and switch sides.    

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Clearing the Threshold

My mother and I were at the same family gathering on the weekend. Which is not a big deal if you come from someone else’s family, but my mom and I only see each other once a year or so. And that’s a huge improvement after two decades of down right difficult, then jaw-clenchingly tense, and now tentatively willing relationship. (There’s a mouthful.) She looks beautiful. One bionic hip, and two hearing aids (which she’d forgotten at home), but a soft, gentle face and a kind of high, croaky, older woman’s voice. Once planted on the couch, she stayed put. I brought lunch to her while she watched her kids mingle and her grandkids fling themselves around the room with my dog. She did yoga when I was a kid. That was my introduction to yoga, to meditation, to the whole idea of looking inward as a form of health care. It astounds me, writing this, when I consider how central this looking inward is to everything I believe now. It is the core of my work in health care, in theatre, in parenting, and in all relationships. My mother doesn’t do yoga any more.  She can’t get down to a floor and has no local chair yoga classes. More than that, she’s lost the oomph it would take to do yoga at home. When we talk about it, she says, never, never stop doing yoga. It was the best thing ever, she says. People make their own choices. I know this. And yet, if I had one wish today, it’d be that my mom could still do yoga. Or that somehow, I could do it for her, while holding her closer and closer to this croaky heart of mine, which, I hope, is growing more flexible over time. Is there anyone you’d love to hold during your practice? Thanks to yoga for looking inward, to my mom (love, love, love), and to you for the conversation.

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Holding my Mother

Two interesting, and strikingly different articles caught my eye in Sunday’s New York Times . The first, a book review by Pankaj Mishra that somewhat negatively reviews the rise of yoga in the United States. Whether in the streets of Mysore or on Fifth Avenue, yoga cannot be disentangled from specific histories or specific cultural and economic practices. Of course, the more vulgar aspects of its inevitable commodification in the United States, like $1,000-a-night yoga cruises, ­ought to be deplored. Certainly, the civic or political virtue that results from limber, yoga-toned bodies is not yet measurable. And it would be nice if American followers of yoga, who increasingly define the future of this Indian discipline, would at least occasionally seek something like spiritual transcendence. And the second, a glowing interview with Anusara founder John Friend by Mimi Swartz . The first time I encountered John Friend was at a workshop at a Woodlands community college nearly 10 years ago. At the time I was practicing a stricter form of yoga, and Friend’s joke-cracking and mind-boggling acrobatics — he is famous for his handstands — were something of a revelation. Yoga could be . . . fun ? As Friend led us through the poses, he spoke in a soft voice, insisting that we contain divinity within ourselves and must discover and express our inner goodness to fulfill our obligation to better our world. How to do so was never expressly stated — except for practicing yoga, of course — but I left the workshop feeling better physically, mentally and emotionally. I didn’t know at the time that this was my introduction to what others call “the cult of John.” If Friend could be compared with anyone outside the yoga world — and I am not sure he would like this comparison — it would be Joel Osteen , the magnetic evangelical megachurch minister with the feel-good message and a book-and-television empire. Osteen’s God is loving and forgiving. Osteen doesn’t get hung up on dogma, and thus everybody is welcome. I, for one, am happy to see yoga being discussed in the mainstream media. Glad that it is a part of our culture and open to debate. It’s good to know that people are thinking about these things and that makes it more likely to reach a deeper stream in our society. What do you think? ps- John Friend (@anusarafriend) plans to post his response to the interview today!

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John Friend and Yoga in America

As an urban yogi I often day dream about coming to a bustling, messy street square and seeing–instead of garbage and taxi cabs– hundreds of yogis. Wouldn’t that be a sight? Well, Bay Area yogis are in luck because you are all invited to yoga it up in Union Square on August 7. Stephanie Snyder and Darren Main have signed on as volunteers to lead the masses, and just to add a little agave-flavored icing to this holy granola treat; registration fees benefit City of Hope . Here’s the spiel: Yoga for Hope is an event for yoga beginners and experts alike to bring awareness to the benefits of yoga practice for patients with life-threatening illnesses. Join City of Hope’s efforts to expand awareness of the importance of the mind-body-spirit connection is when battling cancer, diabetes or HIV/AIDS. Don’t forget to keep an eye out for Yoga Journal’ s sponsor booth to get a goody bag and magazine. There are also prizes and incentives to raise donations above the registration fee, for more information visit Yoga for Hope. Who says New York yogis get to have all the fun?

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Yoga in Union Square

Last week I took Lucien to swim camp. Now, “swim camp” when you’re two involves getting into the water with your parent or caregiver and practicing the most basic skills like kicking and blowing bubbles into the water. I wasn’t exactly dropping him off for sleep away camp. But, on the first day, my guy was terrified of getting in the water, even though we swim together in one of the public outdoor pools in Vancouver. He refused to go in. Lucien’s fear and resistance reminded me of how I feel when I’m in yoga class and it’s time for backbends, specifically Urdhva Danurasana. Give me a chair backbend or an Ustrasana and I’m happy, but when it comes time for wheel, I have a hard time not heading for a bathroom break. But when, despite my urge to flee, I force myself to stay and work through the tightness in my upper back and shoulders and the voice in my head saying “No! I’m scared. I don’t want to do that pose!” I end up feeling a sense of freedom and elation that only come from breaking through a mental or physical block. Back at the swimming pool, it was seriously touch-and-go for a few minutes (major crying and “No, I am NOT a fish!” on Lucien’s part, and some serious cajoling–um, make that supportive encouragement–on mine).  Eventually we made it into the water. As you can imagine, Lucien loved it once he was in. The water felt great on a hot day, and the songs and games his teacher used to encourage comfort and familiarity with the water worked like a charm.  By Friday morning, the fifth and last class of the “camp” session, Lucien refused to get out of the water! All in all a huge success.   Sometimes, you have to force yourself to stretch. Which pose makes you say “No, I’m scared!”?     Jessica Berger Gross is the author of enLIGHTened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer (Skyhorse), she lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two-year-old son.

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Swim Camp

In a recent Anatomy of Yoga class with Leslie Kaminoff, we watched a video that I’ll never forget. And hopefully, neither will you. And, trust me, this all has a heck of a lot to do with your yoga practice! It features anatomist Gil Hedley explaining The Fuzz. You can watch it yourself, but be aware that it shows him working with a cadaver. Yet it’s such an important piece of knowledge that I’d like to define this incredible concept for you, and you can choose to view it or not and still take it forward into your daily life. Each night while we sleep, or any time we’re still for long periods, like sitting in a car on a long road trip, our body begins to build collagen fibers. They look a little like cotton candy, and are just as sticky, causing friction between what should be smoothly sliding muscle surfaces. The end result is the stiffness you might feel in the morning getting out of bed or standing up after watching a three-hour movie. Now, this is usually no big deal for those of us with a consistent movement practice. We feel creaky, we do yoga, we’re good. But if you don’t lubricate your joints and move your muscles to break up the fuzz regularly enough, it begins to knit together. Over time, the normal, subtle stiffness becomes limited movement, and even pain as the spider-webbed, bound body tries to move against resistance. Instead of confronting the fuzz, to avoid discomfort, many people simply move less. It becomes a vicious cycle that we often chock up to aging, but really is a cumulative, and mostly avoidable, buildup of fuzz. Now, that’s not to say that all physical slowdown is due to the fuzz, and if we simply stretch more, we will never feel the effects of age. But there is much more we can do to keep our bodies–and therefore our minds–as open, vital, and free as possible. This parallels the yoga teaching about samskaras , the mental and emotional patterns that make up our conditioning. Samskara is a neutral word, indicating simply the actions we take that lead to certain results, but our habits can lead to either constructive or destructive outcomes, depending on our goals. The yogi seeks to strengthen those positive habits that maintain the full range of spiritual motion, and, importantly, dissolve the ones that have become diminishing and threaten to hold us back from reaching our potential of living from love, light, and joy. It’s exciting to see science finding that the same lessons apply to our actual body as well. In fact, I see the two as interconnected, since continual mental and emotional stress, for example, leads almost unerringly to muscle tension, which is a direct physical manifestation of the samskara of anxiety or fear. This is the mind-body connection the yogis have known about for centuries, and though sometimes yoga philosophy can get pretty obtuse, much of it can be translated into the real world as simply as you want to make it. That’s nice to know when you’re looking for tools you can apply today, right this moment, that can help you release what doesn’t serve you, and keep, even amplify, the things that do. Yoga doesn’t have to be confusing. It’s the art of living in balance, and taking actions that fuel your happiness, whatever that means for you. From there, you’ll be inspired to offer some of that goodness to the world through your creative self-expression, and with a burning desire to help those who are still suffering. This is the road map the samskaras offer us: What kind of a life are you carving out through your choices? Is it shaping up as you’d like? If not, then start chipping away at another way of being until it more closely resembles your heart. The next time you’re on the mat, or doing a few Sun Salutes just out of bed, you are not only solidifying healthy habits, you’re creating the potential for new ones to take root in your life in so many ways. Here’s a great all-in-one pose for dissolving restrictive samskaras, and, with them, the fuzz. Do it in the morning just after you get out of bed, and you’ll greet your whole day with more resiliency, flexibility, and freedom from all sorts of fuzz. Core Pose: Low Lunge with Cat/Cow Variation Come into a Low Lunge position with your right foot forward. Your front knee is stacked over the heel, not out in front of it, to avoid knee pressure. The back knee stretches comfortably behind the hip, not directly under it. The front foot and back knee are hip-distance, or about two fists-width apart. Keep your hands on the floor, framing your front foot at first. Take a moment to back off the hips, since you don’t want to sink too far into this pose. This can cause you to overstretch the connective tissue. Instead, lift out of the pose a bit until you can ground the foot and knee, draw in the low belly, and bring your torso upright, hands onto the knee or thigh. You should now feel a stretch in the center of your muscles, not in the back hip crease and front sitting bone only. Your legs are also working to maintain the buoyancy of the pose. Inhale, carve your tailbone long, and arch your spine. Keep the back of your neck long, and lift the chest sky-high. As you do this move, pull your shoulders back and slide your shoulder blades closer. Exhale and round your back. Remember to keep the length in your lower back and roll more through the upper back and shoulder area. Gently lower your chin for a mindful neck stretch. This pose is meant to lift through the back of your heart and spread the shoulder blades wider apart than it is to press out your lower back curve. So although you will activate the low belly fully on your exhalation, lift it in and up towards the chest, rather than squeezing it back towards the spine only. Repeat the spinal motion with your breath for 5-10 rounds, then return to a Down Dog or Child’s Pose, and repeat on the left side.

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Fuzz Buster

My office was burgled (what a lovely sounding word! It sounds like water pouring over rocks in a cool stream) on Friday, while I was in a back room speaking with someone. For the first two hours afterward, I thought, oh, this is just like trying to find the toothpaste on my bathroom counter. That substantial amount of cash is here somewhere. I just can’t find it. When the reality of it sank in, my gut writhed for a few minutes. Until–and this is the yoga part –until I realized this is what is. It is exactly like my hamstrings. They are short. No whining about that helps. No gnashing of teeth, no “why did this happen to me”, no “I should have done this or that”. My hamstrings are short. The money is gone. Can’t do much about it. Except. Except that I can look at the situation gently, and positively, and with a lot of love for myself. I can soothe my gut by contemplating the good things that might come from this. I can dwell on how lucky I am to be safe, happy, and engaged in work that will never land me in jail where the food is bad and my yoga props might be confiscated. A sense of humor comes back to me. Which, strangely, helps me wish my burglar friend well. For him (it turns out I met him before, which is why I know he is a him), I wish peace, well being, a relaxed gut, and good life choices ahead. In fact, I’ll go all out and say I wish long hamstrings for him. Somehow I know my own flexibility on this point will help both of us. Here’s what yoga is teaching me: What is, is. I do better when I let go. Looking at everything with peace and love makes it all better. It turns a burglary into water pouring over rocks in a cool stream. How cool is that? Has yoga done this to you, too? Thanks to yoga for the alchemy in this, and thanks to you for the conversation. Kristin Shepherd is a chiropractor, actor, speaker, and workshop wonderwoman in North Bay, Ontario.  Join her at kristinshepherd.ca or on Facebook at Dr. Kristin Shepherd.

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Burgled!

Feeling a little burnt out on your yoga practice? How about a little inspiration for your practice from a few of the greats? Check out Krisnamacharya’s totally zen moving Sarvangasana (Shoulderstand)! And from Mr. Iyengar himself: Who, or what, inspires your practice?

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Old School Yoga

It’s my first week in a new town, having moved from NYC to Austin to focus on yoga, travel and all that it entails for me right now. It’s slower here, no doubt, with a local news story lamenting that the new city Metro system doesn’t have enough people riding it! I’ll soon be parking my grateful derriere on one of the new, cushioned seats (with actual airspace between bodies) on my way to a yoga class. I miss New York, but I’m interested to see what health and yogic possibilities lay ahead for me here. In this transitional period, where cardboard moving boxes vie for my attention along with daily responsibilities (as I write this blog, all my books sit next to me in U-Haul containers, awaiting their freedom), I can’t help but feel, well, empty. This is a specific kind of emptiness, not the windswept sensation after an emotional storm, or the primordial suspension of a deep meditation. It’s more like a mixture of mourning and excitement, so evenly matched that it generates the time-standing-still feeling you have while retaining the breath after an inhale, or letting the exhale slide into a silent moment of nothingness before inspiring again. And when I say, “inspiring,” I mean breathing in and getting back to the creation of my life’s work, my dharma.  This is the calm before the flood, when creative elements will sweep me forward. And I have to be ready to both direct the wave and ride it into places I can’t foresee. It is scary, yet wonderful. I wonder if this could be the Middle Path the Buddha spoke of, or the “field” between happiness and sorrow that Rumi wrote about so eloquently. I think of it as The Void, taken from the Runes, the ancient Viking stones etched with symbols used by those seeking clarity. Here’s one definition of The Void from the Book of Runes : The Unknowable represents the path of Karma–the sum total of your actions and their consequences, the lessons that are yours for this lifetime. And yet, this Rune teaches that the very debts of old karma shift and evolve as you shift and evolve. Nothing is predestined. What beckons is the creative power of the unknown. We all hit The Void at one time or another, sometimes multiple times a day. It’s that pause that seems hollow but that is actually pregnant with possibility, full of creative energy, or shakti, waiting for you to decide which action to take next to direct it into form. The Void itself is often what ignites fear: of the unknown, of letting go, of being alone, of moving to that next level of ourselves, and risking failure and public ridicule to do it. Many people never cross The Void, because of what seems an impenetrable closed door of “I can’t, I shouldn’t” or “I’m not enough” blocking the entrance to the bridge across.   Yet when we practice yoga with as much determination off the mat as we do on it, when we get present and focus on what really matters–living completely, passionately, and without regret–we take destiny back into our own hands, the doorway magically opens, and, Void or not … we leap. Here’s a pose that may help you understand how solid the Void actually is, as you begin to see that you’re always where you stand, and from there, you can channel this veritable ocean of energy towards your biggest, brightest goals. Core Pose: Ankle-to-Knee Chair(Eka Pada Galavasana Preparation) This pose leads to taking flight in the arm balance of Eka Pada Galavasana, but for our purposes, we’re going to start where we are. Running too fast into the Void can cause you to miss out on the information coming at you from the core, and from your environment, a conversation that needs your full attention. Come to the front of your mat, feet hip-distance apart. Bend both knees and generate as much lift from your lower belly as from your lower back. Keep your spine long as you ground into your left foot and lift your right knee mindfully into your chest. Don’t rush; rather, make every moment of this pose an opportunity to find balance again. Once you’re stable, cross your right ankle over your left knee. Roll the thigh outward so your right knee lowers, and sit down deeper. Bring your hands to the chest, palms together in anjali mudra, which celebrates your connection to the Divine, or universal energy. Offer your heart forward as the hips move back to anchor you in this new place of balance and freedom. Take 5-10 breaths here, then return to Chair Pose, and fold forward over bent or straight legs for a few moments before repeating the balance on the other side.      

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Filling the Void

Summer is busy. This week, my lovely man did a yoga session on a sheet of plywood covered by a raincoat. He said it was great. I have done handstands in my office, downward dogs on an enormous rock by the lake, and side planks at the public library while waiting for a meeting to begin. I sneak yoga while waiting for my car to be repaired. And I would do it in the park and I would do it in the dark and I would do it on a rock and I would do it on a dock Yesterday I hung in a forward bend at the grocery store while looking at cans of tuna on the bottom shelf. No one said a word. I was there for ages. Where will yoga show up next?  Where is your favorite place to sneak it in to your day? Thanks to yoga for being so delicious that we want to sneak it here and there, we want to sneak it everywhere, and thanks to you for the conversation. Kristin Shepherd is a chiropractor, actor, speaker, and workshop wonderwoman in North Bay, Ontario.  Join her at kristinshepherd.ca or on Facebook at Dr. Kristin Shepherd.

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Yoga Here and Yoga There

testing Green Living Blog

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Green Living Blog test

testing top five tuesday

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Testing Top Five Tuesday

testing entry for Challenge Mondays

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Monday test

You know your child is a yogi in training when: 1. He knows what a neti pot is and can explain how to use it and why. 2. She sings along to Krisha Das and Wah! 3. Not only can he do cobbler’s pose, he calls the pose by its Sanskrit name and prefers if you do, too. 4. When he wears his Ganesh T-shirt, he wants to “sing the song about Ganesh.” 5. He is MUCH more excited about the Babar yoga book than Toy Story 3. 6. Favorite foods include: avocado, peaches, quinoa pasta, steel cut  oatmeal, kale, and hemp milk. 7. The stuffed animals in your house play yoga rather than war. 8. He drinks chamomile tea in a sippy cup. 9. She gets really, really happy when she hears Mama’s off to yoga class. 10. He — see photo above — does a chair back bend off his high chair in the morning just because. How do you know your child is a yogi? Jessica Berger Gross is the author of enLIGHTened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer (Skyhorse), she lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two-year-old son.

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Ten Ways You Know Your Child is a Yogi

This morning, I talked with my lovely man about all of your comments on home practice vs. yoga classes. We love both, but he feels pretty strongly about his class last night. He’s been working like a Tasmanian Devil this week and found it beautiful to go to his yin yoga class, during which they are now holding some of their poses for 15 minutes. (Holy moly! Might as well ask me to fly across the Atlantic. Without a plane, I mean.) “What about my face?” he asks. “How could I remember to relax my jaw without prompting?  And my eyes, how do I let those go? Oh, and my throat, I love it when she reminds me to relax my throat. And Savasana is so good when someone else is in charge.” This is the reason I’m going to class at lunch today. There is something wonderful and easy about receiving the practice. Yes, I’m doing the work, and making all the personal choices about how much, how far, how strenuous or not. But, oh, how lovely it is, sometimes, to have my mind settled into each moment of each asana, rather than wondering what I’ll do next, jeez, there’s the dog at the door wanting a walk, woops, that’s my dad on the phone, and all of that. It’s as though, in class, they take me by the hand and just walk me down a path through the woods. I don’t have to choose the path or check my directions or wonder what’s ahead.   Just hold the hand and walk. That sounds good to me today. How about you? Thanks to yoga for being so many things to so many people, and thanks to you for the conversation. Kristin Shepherd is a chiropractor, actor, speaker, and workshop wonderwoman in North Bay, Ontario.  Join her at kristinshepherd.ca or on Facebook at Dr. Kristin Shepherd.

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Home Practice or Studio?

I left New York City on Monday with everything I own packed into a trailer, and set out for Austin, Texas, where I will be living for the foreseeable future. Though this was my decision, and I think a good one for my yoga career, my health, and my sanity, today it hit me: Everything I knew about my life in the city is now technically gone from me. My home, my neighborhood, my social scene, my yoga classes, even my local cafe have dissolved away as if in a dream, since I can no longer rely on them to help me feel grounded and secure. I spent a decade getting to know friends, eating at my favorite places, living in an apartment I loved, and settling into a routine that comforted me.  The fact that I know that moving to Austin will be more productive for me doesn’t change how floaty and surreal the world feels right now. Even the ground itself is moving, the highway spooling out and spinning away beneath my wheels. When most everything external literally proves to be as impermanent as the Buddhists and yogis tell us it is, whether it’s a big move we’re going through, the loss of a relationship, a job or smaller transitions, like a well-worn pair of jeans finally kicking the bucket, there’s always a sensation of shift.  These moments of ebb and flow can be unbalancing and scary.   Yoga teaches us about ideas that come from the things other people have lived. We turn to our teachers as guideposts, as those who have navigated similar situations, and emerged victorious using the tools of conscious awareness they then pass onto us. When our studies meet our personal life, and we are asked to walk the walk along this path, it’s a whole new yoga practice, perhaps the hardest one of all. I don’t know about you, but I’d much rather endure Warrior 3 until my leg gave out than go through a breakup or a radical move.   When we as seekers of center experience times where all that we thought was real turns to smoke and slips through our fingers, and we’re dealing with the grieving process of moving from the past into the present, there’s a powerful question I can think of that we might ask ourselves: This is happening. Now, what am I gonna do about it? Believe me, when I was in the space of first realizing how much I’d just given up in order to follow my goals, one thing I could have done was totally, completely freak out. I felt the panic rising, as if I was that little bubble that’s supposed to be in the middle of a carpenter’s level, but someone tipped it, and my poor bubble was squished way up in the corner. In that moment could have turned back, canceled the whole crazy Austin idea, and settled back into what I knew.   Then again, my heart is calling me towards something different, and if yoga has taught me anything, it’s to be able to endure uncomfortable sensations in the body, mind, and heart, long enough to get to that atman, the soul, or center of myself. Once there, I can more easily bring myself back to a leveling off place, and find that calm bubble of my core returning to center. In fact, it’s not our inner peace that wavers as life does, but our moveable parts: thoughts, emotions, expectations, perspectives, and even the physical body. When we remember that just because our outer world changes doesn’t mean our innermost one has to, we dissolve the illusion that we are the constructs, and not the constant. So, we can answer our own question by choosing to draw not from our first reactions, but from the stillness inside. Then we can act from equilibrium to move towards the next, though as yet unformed, part of our journey, with the integrity it takes to create the future experience we want to live most of all.   Here’s the pose I did at the Virginia rest stop that helped me remember that … Core Pose: Natarajasana   If you see a statue of Nataraj, you’ll notice he’s standing on what appears to be a baby. Don’t be alarmed–it’s actually a demon. Nataraj is the cosmic dancer, and he exemplifies the power of riding the wave of universal energy rather than being consumed by the dark forces of doubt, insecurity, lack, and fear. Whenever I want to find my ground, and from there, let the joyful dance of life take me where I’m supposed to go next, I make sure to include Natarajasana in my practice.   Stand with feet hip-distance, about two-fists-width wide. Ground into your right foot, and bend your left knee so you can take hold of the outside of the left foot or ankle in your left hand. As you draw your low belly up and lengthen the tailbone down to maintain space in the front and back of your lumbar curve, begin to kick your foot behind you as you reach the chest and right arm forward, or up to the sky as your balance and flexibility allows. The amount of backbend here is up to you, but if you stay rooted into your standing leg and foot you’ll gain the stability and gravity this pose requires in order to inspire its freedom dance.

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Finding Center

Getty Images Starting you kids out young in yoga sounds like a great idea, but would you bring your child to a hot yoga class? In case you haven’t heard, Bikram’s self-proclaimed “torture chambers” are a series of twenty-six postures in a 104-degree room for 90 minutes. It is an extreme workout. Instructors say it’s natural to feel nauseous, dizzy and maybe even black out. This blogger from MomLogic.com starts investigating after a mother brings her four-year-old to the weekend hot yoga class. “At the beginning of the class, this little yogi was trying each of the moves, naturally having trouble holding any pose. By 15 minutes into the class, the poor thing was playing with her water bottle, spraying herself and rolling around on her towel. I am in my mid-30s, and I can barely stay focused for the hour and a half. So I totally understood how this little one was bored out of her mind. As the class continued, she got up and down and tried more moves. Of course her mom kept trying to correct her, but the instructor insisted that she let her daughter learn on her own. Meanwhile, I was hot as hell and wondering, Is this healthy for the child? So of course, back at work, I just had to get an expert opinion. Pediatrician and momlogic expert Dr. Alanna Levine said the following: “I do not recommend that young children participate in Bikram yoga . Children handle high temperatures differently than adults. They have a higher surface-area-to-mass ratio, which means they absorb heat more than adults do. They also have a smaller blood volume, which makes it harder for them to dissipate the heat. Lastly, they have a slower rate of sweat production than adults, and sweating is a mechanism to cool us off. Children are not ‘mini adults’ — and should not be treated as such.” I thought it was only fair to call up the Bikram Yoga College of India and talk to someone there. Jessica, 32, has been a Bikram instructor since 2008. Here’s how our chat went: ml: Does Bikram have a minimum age requirement?  Jessica: There are no strict rules, as long as the child is quiet and well-behaved. There’s a youth category for the annual Bikram competition. Bikram, the founder, has three children, and they all started doing “hot yoga ” at a very early age. ml: How old was your youngest student ever? J: I haven’t have any younger than 9 or 10. Sometimes younger students wait outside during  the standing series and come in for the floor series. ml: How would you respond to our doctor’s claims that Bikram is unhealthy for kids? J: With any physical practice, you should have a doctor’s recommendation. A decision to do Bikram should be taken person by person. It’s case by case. What do you think? Do kids as young as 4 belong in a hot- yoga class? Have you ever brought your child to yoga ? What types of yoga are acceptable?” Read more here .

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Hot Yoga for Kids?

I think yoga is a sport, just like the World Cup. Hear me out. Tuesday was one of those days. I love yoga, love my home practice, love class, but there are some days, some weeks, even, when it all goes off the rails.   This is one of those weeks. I’ve been in hotels two weekends in a row, I’ve seen my share of drive-through windows over those weekends, and my hotel practice has been less thorough than my home practice. I’ve been away so much that my dog rolls her eyes when I come home. The result is that my body and spirit are tired, chunky, and unsociable.   It took Olympian determination to get myself to yoga class on Tuesday. It was touch-and-go all morning. I kept thinking, “I can go home for a break, I can eat, I can read, I can get some work done, I can sit here and stare out the window for an hour.” Most of these options looked much more appealing than going to class. (It’s possible some of you never feel this way. I am determined to like you anyway.) By the grace of Whatever, I get changed, get in my car, and drive to the studio. I lie down, and almost immediately I could cry, I am so happy. Class starts. My left hamstrings have shrunk considerably over the weekend, somehow, I have NO balance, my thighs and rear end burst at the inadequate seams of my formerly roomy yoga pants, and still there is no place I’d rather be. This is where the World Cup comes in.   When we go to class on these days, I think our teachers should welcome us at the door with big, glossy medals. “Would you like a medal today?”  “Yes,” I’d say. “Bronze, silver or gold?” “Are you joking? Do you have any idea how far I’ve come today?The French fries and pizza I have overcome, the hotel coffee, the hours in the car, the dog’s face, and lethargy the size of an oil spill? Give me the gold, absolutely. I am the champion of the world today.” There are days when we should all have medals around our necks. Thanks to yoga for making me show up, and thanks to you for the conversation. Kristin Shepherd is a chiropractor, actor, writer, and workshop wonderwoman in North Bay, Ontario.  Join her at kristinshepherd.ca or on Facebook at Dr. KristinShepherd.

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Champion Yogis

I just did something so major I have to write it down to believe it. I’m relocating from New York City where I’ve lived and taught yoga for nearly a decade, to Austin, Texas. I’ve decided to relocate so that I can focus exclusively on my health, yoga, travel, and teaching for what I’m calling my yogi artist’s retreat year. After that, I’ll see where I am. The requirements of my burgeoning yoga career are intense, and living in a place like New York City doesn’t make things easy. For example, it took me 4 hours to drive 11 miles to the airport the other day, only to miss my flight. Total cost: $1,600. Austin has a shuttle that goes from my new apartment to the airport in 10 minutes. Total cost: 50 cents. I kid you not. Now, don’t get me wrong. Just like the T-shirts say, I (heart) New York. That’s why I’ve lived there for so long. But it’s time for a change, and specifically, I’m interested in what will happen to my yoga trajectory when I steep in it fully for a good period of time. This will be a Dharma Immersion, if you will. At first, I was torn about whether or not to make such a radical move. So I practiced what I teach. I put fears and judgments aside and thought about what would serve my ultimate goals the best. Right now, I require ease of travel; a location that is equidistant to both coasts and the flyover states; an affordable apartment with enough space for me to film my YouTube and training videos; and a community that values health, good food, and good yoga. A creative environment and a lack of traditional winter weather is just icing on the cake.   For these reasons and more, Austin was an obvious choice for me. The cool thing is, once I chose it, I was surrounded by so many universal green lights that I have to believe the signs are pointing me on the road I’m meant to take now. Before I was a yogi, I would have shut myself down before I ever began this journey. I probably would never have left the safety of the Midwest to try my luck in the Big Apple, or taken any of the risks that have brought me to where I am now. Yoga teaches us how to step out of our own way, remove the veils of uncertainty, and quiet the voices that tell us we’re insane to do what we are being called toward. If we can turn down the volume of our fears, it’s possible to hear that still, powerful whisper of our satya , or truth; that core voice that can move us toward transformation. We do this through cultivating a regular asana practice so our limiting patterns don’t build up and slow us down. We learn to sit in meditation and listen intently until we hear only our inner guide and not the confusing cacophony that surrounds it. We implement our lessons off the mat, do our best to be brave, and lead by example into our next incarnation of who we want to be. Most of all, when grounding is called for, we ground, and when flying beckons, we find out how wide our wingspan really is. The yogi is a shapeshifter, an energetic alchemist who uses the raw materials of experience, relationship, self-knowledge, and prana (life force) to create magic out of what others see as a static reality. Is it the perfect choice for me to take a year in Austin? Perhaps not. Staying in the city has its benefits, too. But we can always go back to what we know. So why not try going forward? Yes, it takes a big leap of faith sometimes. But we yogis have that in spades, y’all. So what is your dharma calling you to do next? Core Pose: “First Eye” Goddess This asana is one I teach and do whenever I want to envision my next move. It stimulates the forehead center, the seat of our intuition, and expands perspective away from the constriction of fear. This is why I call it the First Eye. It’s a primary tool of perception, your mind’s eye, and keeping it wide open will serve you well as you navigate your next steps along your path. Sit on your mat. Bring both feet together, knees open wide. With a long spine, tilt your sacrum and top hip crests forward as you bring your elbows onto the floor or two yoga blocks. Place your thumbs inside your eyebrows, just above your nose. Allow your forehead to release towards the thumbs even as you maintain the open hips and spinal alignment of the rest of the pose. Breathe here for 1-2 minutes, and then come into knees-together Child’s Pose for a few breaths to counterbalance the asana.  

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Moving Forward

As our nation turns to backyards, barbecues, burgers, bright colors and explosions in the sky, it seems appropriate to celebrate independence in a personal way as well. Perhaps with some yoga? Independence. Freedom. Liberation. Moksha. Most cultures take time to celebrate a form of letting go and feeling open and alive to possibility, and it seems the height of summer is the perfect time for this expression. Your pores are open and warmed by the sun, encouraging your body to release, the days are long and, in most places, the weather is inviting.  What do we, in this modern day, need to do to disentangle ourselves from our oppressors?  What are our oppressions anyway, and why do we feel tangled in the first place? Yoga can help answer all of the above. I woke up with Bob Marley’s “Redemption Song” in my head: “Emancipate yourself from mental slavery. None but ourselves can free our minds.” This will be my mantra in practice this weekend. Any obstacle I perceive has been placed there by me, and I can also choose to remove it. My morning yoga practice, of course, will be my revolution. Today I celebrate independence from the mind stuff, vritti .  I will not allow myself to be worried about the extra traffic caused on a Friday before a holiday weekend…or the longer lines at the grocery store, or the wait at the bank or how crowded it will be at the park and the beach. These things are fun and they are choices. I will enjoy my liberation with breath, movement, and maybe a little reggae. How will you liberate yourself this weekend? Check out the accidental yogist if you’re in SoCal and looking for studios that are celebrating their independence. Erin Chalfant is a writer, yoga teacher and the Web Editor at Yoga Journal.

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Independence Day

The sigh with the first sip of coffee. The click of my mug when I set it on the coffee table. The grunt when I realize my left hamstrings are still half the length of my right hamstrings. Ujjayi breathing, when I remember to do it. Seagulls squawking outside. The yeah! yeah! yeah! I say under my breath with my handstand and anything resembling a back bend. Heaving groans that ease their way into regular breaths during side twists. The big, fat sighs that settle me into Savasana. Shanti, shanti, shanti, which I whisper to the lake (don’t know why I whisper at home). The tickety-tickety-tickety of Rosie, my dog, who hears me whisper and comes to join me after her own upward dog, downward dog series. It’s worth it just for the sounds, isn’t it? What are your favorites?   Thanks to yoga for the sounds and thanks to you for the conversation. Kristin Shepherd is a chiropractor, actor, writer, and workshop wonderwoman in North Bay, Ontario.  Please join me at kristinshepherd.ca or on Facebook at Dr. KristinShepherd.

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The Sounds of Yoga

In the midst of wedding season, it seems like a good time to think about what we are committing to when we gaze longingly at our mat or wish we had more time for Namaskar-ing at sunset. In chapter five of the Bhagavad Gita : “The resolute in yoga surrender and gain perfect peace; the irresolute, attached to results, are bound by everything they do.” So, we’ve got to resolutely let go? Sounds tricky. Even if we can conceptualize this, how is it applied and how do we live this truth on and off the mat? Susan Piver at the Huffington Post seems to have hit it right on the yoga toes. Not sure if she does asana on a mat, but she certainly sounds like a yogi in this reflective blog written on her twelfth wedding anniversary. “It’s just now, 12 years later, that I’m finding out what, apparently, I said yes to. I said yes to the unfolding, impenetrable arc of uncertainty. I guess I thought that finding love was an endpoint, that some kind of search was over and I would find home. We would leap over the threshold together into whatever we imagined our ideal cottage to be. But really we stepped through a crazy looking glass. It seems that I committed to a lifetime of delight and sadness, inseparable from each other. Every time I look into my dear one’s eyes and feel how deeply we’re connected, the moment disappears before I can actually hold it–and I have to watch that happen. It’s excruciating. It’s much easier to do this with your thoughts when you’re meditating than with the feeling you get from his breath on your shoulder as you fall asleep. But now I get that I have to repeat this until the end of my life, and that somehow this is love’s road. I didn’t really understand that love does not arise, abide, or dissolve in connection with any particular feeling. It has almost nothing to do with feeling. (Nor does it seem to be a gesture, a commitment to stay, becoming best friends, or anything else I might have thought.) Love has become a container in which we live. Through time, riding mysterious waves of passion, aggression, and ignorance (and boredom), I think we began to live within love itself. At least I did. E ach time I have opened up, extended myself, accepted what was being offered to me, stepped beyond my comfort zone to embrace him, the structure has been reinforced. I no longer have any idea if I love my husband or not. I can’t imagine what the feelings I have for him could be called. I’ve even given up trying to love him. Our relationship is what gives us love, not the other way around. This is how it is. And if you’re looking for a crucible in which to heat compassion, this is a really good one. Someone once told me that compassion is the ability to hold love and pain together in the same moment. So at least we’re learning something, which is what I tell myself. When you find your true love, there is something inside that simply and inexplicably says hello to him. Yes to him. Of course to him. Certainly. Obviously it’s you. There is no choice. I do.” Are you ready to commit or re-commit to your practice?  What poses do you use to remind yourself to commit to surrender? I like Ardha Chandrasana for this balance. Whether you’re getting married this summer, attending a commitment ceremony or finaly ready to take the leap with yoga, this article on celebrating with meaning may help get you in the mood. Erin Chalfant is a writer, yoga teacher and the Web Editor at Yoga Journal.

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I do Yoga

I’m about to do something radical. Something I’ve never done  before. I’m about to pack my yoga mat, board a plane, and leave Lucien for five whole days while I go on a yoga retreat.  He’s two-and-a-half and we’ve never spent a night apart. Until a few months ago when we finished breastfeeding, going away without him wasn’t even an option. (I never managed to get the hang of pumping.) I can count on both hands the days we’ve been away from each other for more than seven or eight hours.  My husband Neil has been out of town a dozen times or more.  Not jetting off to a man spa or anything. But every month or two or three he gives a talk or has an academic conference or meeting to attend in Ann Arbor or Sweden or Atlanta.  Lucien and I hold down the fort here. Now it’s my turn. Thanks to my husband (and morning day-care plus a  babysitter) I’ll be studying for five days with one of my favorite  teachers, Marla Apt, at the Feathered Pipe Ranch in Montana. I’m elated–and scared, too.  Sure, Lucien and his dad are as close as can be, but will my baby be okay without his momma? As much as I want to go on the retreat, as eager as I am to study with Marla, I wonder if I’m doing the right thing. The day I signed up for the trip I practically had a panic attack and needed Neil and  two of my best friends to convince me to buy my ticket. The truth is, while I’m worried about leaving Lucien and how much we’ll miss one another, I know he’ll be fine, more than fine with his dad. They’ll have a great time. And I’m longing for the chance to rediscover my yoga practice-and myself-while on the retreat. I love being a mom and I love the pace of life with a young child, but  I need a break. What I’m most looking forward to is the stillness, the alone time, not having to run to catch a bus after Savasana. But I’m going to miss my boy like crazy. I’ll let you know how it goes… What was it like the first time you spent a night or two away from  your child or children? Jessica Berger Gross is the author of enLIGHTened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer (Skyhorse), she lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two-year-old son.  

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Feathered Pipe Retreat

All this World-Cup-inspired team spirit reignites the debate about yoga as a sport. Bikram has been lobbying for a Yoga Olympics for ages. One need only watch the New York Regional Yoga Championship video from New York Times to conclude that yoga is VERY challenging and amazingly beautiful and fun to watch. There are of course pros and cons to having all this attention in the yoga world. Those opposed say yoga cannot be judged and that doing so misses the point entirely. Supporters say exposure inspires children to get involved at a young age.   What do you think about yoga as a sport?  And what about some of these crazy poses…is that even good for you? More advanced poses here: Extreme Yoga Poses Join the debate: Can that be Good for You?!

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World Cup Yoga?

Years ago, a friend named Tracy offered me an acting tip that has become part of every on-and-off-stage day of my life. It also affects my yoga. We were in a play called Good Night Desdemona. I had to travel through time each night by disappearing through an absurdly small garbage can into, well, into the past to meet both Desdemona and Juliet. I climbed towers, faught with swords, was nearly strangled by Desdemona, and iambic pentameter-ed my way through seven enormous monologues that would have humbled Hamlet. It was a monster of a challenge. On more than one night, I cursed myself for getting something wrong–missing lines, breaking my sword (tough to fight convincingly with a sword stump), not projecting my lines from under the pillow Desdemona used to suffocate me, etc. One night, Tracy (Desdemona) heard me whacking myself to smithereens at intermission. “No way,” she said. Gotta stop that. She said we can’t afford to criticize ourselves. It takes us out of our story, out of our best skills, and it ruins our relationship with other actors and our audience. It ruins our relationship with everything to come. Practice instant forgiveness, she says. It’s the best tool there is for an actor. Everything starts again now. This morning, in a seated forward bend, I thought, holy Toledo, my hamstrings are tight. Not enough yoga and too many butter tarts yesterday. (I don’t see the relationship between the two, now, but they felt completely connected this morning.) And right behind it, like a great actor on cue, I thought; instant forgiveness, honey. Everything starts again now. Which saved the show. Thanks to Tracy for the acting lesson, and thanks to you for the conversation. Kristin practices yoga, theatre, public speaking, writing, and chiropractic in North Bay, Ontario, at kristinshepherd.ca and at Dr. Kristin Shepherd on Facebook.

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Everything Starts Again Now

One of the world’s largest yoga classes proved also to be one of the shortest. An estimated 10,000 people showed up for yoga in Central Park on Tuesday only to find–mid Surya Namaskar–that lightning and rain would cut the solstice celebration short. Legendary yoga teacher Elena Bower lead the mass of yogis. Participants on the scene say even the rain and thunder could not dampen their moods or destroy their inner peace. One of the greatest things about yoga–and New York City–is its ability to unite young and old, and people from all parts of the city proudly waited in long lines for a chance at this great coming together of community in the park. As they waited, they did what yogis often do: yoga. In the end, the day will be remembered as yet another lesson in willful intention with non-concern for results. Aerial image by Geoffrey Goodridge / Michael O’Neill Photos by J oe Schildhorn/Patrick McMullan

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The Faces of Yoga in Central Park

Last night in New York City, I met my manager and a few others for a business meeting and afterward we went to visit a friend whose band was playing in Tribeca. It was a French bistro and they were playing Latin music.   When we arrived, no one was dancing, a contrast to every other place in the city where they pack the dance floors. The music was good enough to make a meditating monk get up and boogie. Yet still, according to the band, it’s dead like this every week despite their efforts. So my girlfriends and I, yogis all, did what we had to do. We put our purses down and created a dance floor of our own. Within 10 minutes, 20 other people came out there with us–the same ones who supposedly never dance–filling the space, and having a great time. It stayed like this for the next 2 hours until a grateful and sweaty band was packing up to go. Where as the restaurant manager was telling them to keep it down earlier in the evening, he was clapping and supporting the party by the end. He was even up there with us at one point, shaking it like a Polaroid picture. One of the band members approached us afterward and said, “It’s so much better for us to have an energy exchange we can draw from. Thank you for being in such a state of perpetual celebration!” That beautiful phrase struck me, and I realized that in order to create fun, adventure and magic wherever we go, we can each cultivate our lives into becoming constant expressions of our vitality and gratitude. The yogi understands that their innermost state is one of perpetual celebration, and then sets about doing the work it takes to keep themselves readily available to that source of love and light. If we are always dancing on the inside, then why is it so incredibly challenging to access that feeling? After all, life doesn’t always provide us with a bistro and a great band. We are sometimes asked to seek our vibrant center in the midst of heartache, grief and the stress of uncertainty. How can we find the beat when there doesn’t seem to be music at all? We can look to the yoga asanas for a clue. Our teachers ask us to enter into intense situations–like holding Warrior Two for what seems like an eternity. Then we are directed to channel the big energy of those sensations into something that lights us up, and moves us towards sparking more transformation instead of less. We do this in part by learning to understand our satya , or truth, at its most distilled essence. A more superficial reaction might tell you that your burning quads are uncomfortable, and that could be true. But it’s not your ultimate Truth, which, upon reflection, might help you see that besides being uncomfortable, that Warrior Pose is also giving you the opportunity to be powerful. Yogis don’t run away from the fire of our existence. We walk straight through. And sometimes, if we lack outer support, like that night on the empty dance floor–we simply have to go first. I remind my students that they are more than exercisers. They are conduits, channeling the heat of their inherent life force, prana, toward their most passionate expressions of who they are. This results in a strong, supple body, a mind able to focus on what matters, stories that we re-write to be empowering, and engaging in one of the  foundational practices of yoga–dissolving resistance to our greatness wherever we find it. In this way, yogis face down any fear, any difficulty and endure the sensations of suffering until they find a way to use it to their advantage. Even if no one else is on the dance floor with you and you feel alone, your heart is breaking or people are disappointing your expectations, you can dive into that perpetual celebration inside, and even through your tears, bow to your next doorway to wisdom, integrity and living out loud. Say “thank you” first–then, get to dancing! Core Pose: Dancing Fan Pose This is a favorite variation on Fan Pose, one I use whenever I want to loosen up my legs, and access my creative source energy that can too often become constricted by tight hips. Come into Fan, feet parallel, and spaced wide enough apart so you can bring your palms to the floor or onto a block. Begin to bend one knee, and stretch into the inner thigh of the straighter leg even as you build heat in the bent one. Make sure to maintain healthy alignment with your knees always facing the same direction as your toes. You can get more wild and free with this movement, swaying from side to side as one leg bands, then the other, or try a longer hold if you’re loving the stretch. This will help you remove obstacles to your inherent sense of play, freedom and ability to dance  anywhere, any time. Do Dancing Fan for one minute or more.  

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Perpetual Celebration

In 2009, Father’s Day cost individual consumers an average of $90.89, while Mother’s Day spending was $123.89, according to a recent National Geographic article . Even though the wallets open less wide than for mother’s day, psychology lecturer Gilbert Cole says the smiles are likely genuine when millions of fathers across the U.S. open boxes, peel back tissue paper, and admire their new neckties–still somehow the most common gist for the holiday. Her research shows that even though dads get less attention on Father’s Day than moms do on Mother’s Day, fathers are more likely to be satisfied on their holiday. This letting go of expectation and contentment with what is presented makes Dad, even though he’s never set foot in a yoga studio, a yogi in my book.  Your dad may also embody the Brahmavihara’s , which Thich Nhat Han considers a blueprint for true love. After some brief reflection, it’s obvious that my dad has done yoga his entire life. Maitri , Loving Kindness My dad’s second grade teacher said that Larry had never met a stranger. He was instantly friends with whomever crossed his path. While my mother sometimes briefly bemoaned the additional guests, our dinner table was always shared with those in need of a friend. My father was that unwavering, loving friend for anyone he met.  Karuna, Compassion Every winter my father, without fail, would gather up our old (and sometimes favorite) blankets and drive them to shelters. I remember being dragged out of bed early on Earth Day to clean up the St. John’s River, missing out on a mall trip to accompany him to a soup kitchen–and on more than one occasion being late to school because my dad had stopped to save a (turtle, rabbit, squirrel) that was (in the middle of the road, sick or abandoned).   Mudita, Sympathetic Joy Whose father has not beamed with pride at their graduation, teared up at a wedding or gingerly framed their first finger painting? These life events make it easy to share in others’ joy, but what about the father who is proud even when you make the tough decision to drop out of college or take a chance and move across the country or even across the world? Putting his own preferences aside, he is able to share joy in that which brings me happiness, truly, honestly and selflessly. Vpeksha, Spaciousness, “Seeing the big picture” Whether I was going through a dramatic break-up or disappointed with my SAT score, Dad was always there to put it back in perspective. Dads are good at that.  Whether he takes his time to enjoy a great meal or simply enjoys being outdoors, in what ways has your father proven to be a yogi? Which of these sounds most like him and which of these can you work to embody in your life? Erin Chalfant is a writer, yoga teacher and the Web Editor at Yoga Journal. She would like to thank Sianna Sherman and the Kapi Shashi Kula for inspiring this reflection.

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Is your Dad a Yogi?

When I began practicing yoga, I studied at a beautiful, inspiring, and decidedly glamorous yoga center in downtown New York City. The students saluting the sun beside me were often dancers, actresses, and models-including some big name celebrities like Russell Simmons, Woody Harrelson, and Christy Turlington-all very nice, but I couldn’t help but be intimidated.   Celebrities aside, I used to compare myself to the glossy women in my classes. They were skinny; I wasn’t. They wore high heels, designer clothes, and carried expensive handbags; I wore Converse sneakers and thrift store dresses, and ported my stuff around in a $5 Strand Bookstore bag. More important to me, they had their poses down. Handstand? Headstand? Five wheels in a row? No problem. I was struggling to simply follow along. Now I look back with compassion on the 20-something me. I must have looked cute in my bargain finds. And so what if I didn’t have my asana practice down to a science! It’s called being a beginner, right? These days, I don’t compare myself to others very much in the yoga room, but I do have to stop myself from making comparisons when it comes to Lucien and other children his age. It’s a mind game, and no good for anyone to compare where each child is at when it comes to the particulars of developmental stages. Last year at this time, moms and nannies would come up to me in the playground looking really worried. “He’s not walking yet?” they’d exclaim, as an eighteen-month old Lucien crawled up the stairs and down the slide. And my mind would race with all the worries I had about my slow to walk, not yet toddling toddler.  Nowadays, when people on the playground hear him go through his musical repertoire-don’t get me started on how many songs this boy knows by heart-I get questions about his crazy verbal skills. No, I am not drilling him with flashcards, he just happens to love language and all things musical. Of course, secretly, I can’t help but feel something like pride when mothers and nannies are impressed by Lucien’s rendition of “This Land is Your Land” or “Three Little Birds” or “Seasons of Love” but then I realize that’s a false reality.  The minute I let myself buy into the praise, is the minute I have to also buy into the fears. Is Lucien “too” shy and bookish? How are his motor skills as compared to the other kids his age? Should he be racing down the sidewalk on his balance bike rather than slowly investigating it in the backyard? All of a sudden I’m back at my glamorous yoga center, beating myself up for not yet mastering those advanced poses, rather than embracing the beauty of that 20-something me.   One of my early teachers, this one in Cambridge, Massachusetts, liked to tell us to keep our eyes on our own mat, to not compare our practice to anyone else’s. Great yogic advice-and it works just as well on the playground, too. Next time someone on the playground makes a comment about Lucien-whether praise or a concerned worry-I’ll try and smile graciously, and then let the comment go and get back to some quality time with my boy.   Jessica Berger Gross is the author of enLIGHTened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer (Skyhorse), she lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two-year-old son.

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Monkey Bar Mind

I’ve been away from yoga class for almost two weeks. Granted, I’ve done lots of practice in hotels, other people’s basements, and on the deck of a cottage in beautiful morning sun, but jeepers, I miss class. This morning someone asked me if I have a dog. “Do you like yoga?” I replied. “No,” she said.  “What does that have to do with a dog?” “Nothing at all.  It’s just the only thing I can think of right now.” I have lots of these conversations when I’ve been away from class. I miss my teachers, who are kind and excellent at what they do, and funny while they’re at it. I miss the other students, most of whom are strangers to me, all of whom love what I love and are therefore friends of a kind. I miss the sound of people breathing in unison. I miss the gorgeous, quiet yoga music they play during Savasana. I miss that dopey feeling that comes from a fully relaxed body and mind. And I miss chanting om together at the end.   You forget how lovely all of this is until you’ve been away for a little while. What would you miss if you missed two weeks? Thanks to my home studio for being there tomorrow (I’m so excited!), and thanks to you for the conversation. Kristin Shepherd practices yoga, theatre, public speaking, writing, and chiropractic in North Bay, Ontario. Contact her at kristinshepherd.ca and at Dr. Kristin Shepherd on Facebook.

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Missing Class

My husband Neil–an exceptionally dedicated father, and an equally dedicated workaholic–goes to yoga class on Sunday mornings. This is a miracle ten years in the making. While Neil has always loved the feeling of stretching himself out in an asana class, finding the time in his busy schedule has been a struggle. The only time he attended class faithfully was years ago when I was teaching yoga in the evenings down the road from the college where he was a professor. For a long time after that, Neil would take a class here and there, or very occasionally practice at home, but he never managed to build in a regular practice. Neil, a sociologist, loves his work, and he works very hard. He also puts in a lot of time with Lucien. Unlike me, he never takes the occasional Saturday afternoon to meet a friend, go on a bike ride, or read in the hammock for an hour–on the weekends he’s either hanging out with the family, doing errands for us, or working. With little-to-no personal downtime, I knew how much yoga could help him. The physical benefits of asana practice would be a perfect antidote to his hours at the computer, and the peace of resting in Savasana at the end of class might be the only complete relaxation he’d have all week. But there’s no forcing someone into a yoga practice. Sure, Neil wanted to find time for yoga class, but he wanted to be with Lucien and me and work more. Much more. Every so often, though, I’d bring up the topic. “Wouldn’t you like to…?” I’d ask him, suggesting an evening level 1/2 class offered by my teacher.  But I didn’t push–not too hard, anyway. On his own, after some trial and error, Neil finally found a class that works for him. It’s a Sunday morning “men’s class” at my Iyengar center. At first we worried about losing our Sunday morning family time–the one morning of the week we all have together, since I often take Saturday mornings to catch up on my writing and on the laundry.  We needn’t have worried.  “Daddy doing yoga,” as Lucien calls it when Neil heads to class, has had an entirely positive effect on our family. And Neil doesn’t need to be convinced to go, either! While he hasn’t made it to class every Sunday morning (see my previous posts on how sick we’ve been!), he has gone most mornings since signing up. Lucien and I use the time to host a play date in the backyard, or just to be together. Neil comes home by noon–rejuvenated, rested, relaxed and ready for the week. Jessica Berger Gross is the author of enLIGHTened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer (Skyhorse), she lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two-year-old son.

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Daddy Does Yoga

My Tuesday noon class follows a morning of work for me, work which involves reasonably serious conversations with reasonably serious adults. Then I whip into my office at 11:30, change into my yoga duds, and drive over to the studio, arriving ridiculously early for my 12:15 class. In fact, when I arrive, they’re still sweeping up Cheerios from the floor.  Moms carry babies on their hips, all of them completely relaxed after a moms-and-tots class. I love this. I put my mat down in the back corner, and dream about being a yoga baby. In this dream, my body has no resistance. I flop forward and sweep my hands across the floor. My head turns like an owl. I do somersaults for the fun of it.   In this dream class, I laugh whenever I feel like it. I also sing: This Little Light of Mine, or Baby Beluga, or You Are My Sunshine. I dance while I sing. We all do, in this class. I eat the odd raisin or Cheerio off the floor.  I drink hot chocolate out of one of those sippy cups.I hang out in Child’s Pose when I get tired.  I have a nap if I feel like it. And someone carries me out at the end. I like that part the best. I am so into this dream that by the time my real class starts, I am about 4 years old. Do you have a dream class? I’d love to hear about it. Thanks to all of you yoga moms and yoga babies for the inspiration,and thanks to you for the conversation.

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Yoga Babies

Hi guys, I hope you haven’t been feeling left out of my outfit picks, because this week is all about the men! I know many of us, ladies included, often fall back on the standard black and white palette, but don’t be afraid of a little color. It radiates such great energy. I also know you certainly don’t need a hat in yoga class, but this one by Prana was so cool I couldn’t resist. Overall I was impressed with Prana’s men’s collection. Nice basic pieces with a few suprises thrown in. I also adore Toms shoes for men and the ladies, great style and a great cause. the details: Impact Sleeveless shirt by Prana $32.00 Ultra Shorts by Patagonia $55.00 Straw Fedora by Prana $32.00 Paper Tote Bag by Peasants and Travelers $88.00 Grey Heezen/Burlap Men’s Stitchouts shoes by Toms $58.00 Revolution Natural Sticky Mat $90.00

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Wish I was Wearing: Dude Duds

Students often come up to me after my Core Strength Vinyasa Yoga workshops and tell me how surprised they were about what they learned. Many of them didn’t expect the kind of information they got during a class they walked into thinking was going to just target their abs for two hours. That’s because I teach that the core is more than just the abdominals. Abs are an integral part of yoga, or any movement form, to be sure. They help stabilize and mobilize most everything we do, on or off the mat. However, they are only one aspect of what gives us the power to be strong and resilient in our practices and in our lives. Whenever I teach core work, I always interplay the abdominal actions with their muscular counterparts, such as the erector muscles along the spine, which help keep the abs in check. I also discuss and work with the diaphragm to make sure we’re able to keep our core resilient enough to enjoy the freedom of the breath. Anatomy and yoga experts like Tom Myers, author of Anatomy Trains , and my mentor Leslie Kaminoff, author of Yoga Anatomy , tell us that the abdominals link up and communicate with other muscles in fluid lines that run from the feet to the head.  I love to see students’ faces light up when they find out they have a “core” body running close to the skeleton that they can access to amplify the effectiveness of any pose. But there’s more. In addition the holistic nature of the abs (for example, what you do with your rectus abdominis muscle affects the whole front line of your body) this root area contains so much latent energy waiting to be accessed. It also harbors our most personal fears, the very resistance that often blocks us from realizing our inner truth. Making a core connection might begin with working and releasing the more obvious outer body, but the yogi learns to sense the more subtle world within–whether this is the quietly powerful core myofascial line, the still space between the thoughts, the unwavering heart at center, or the soulful state of being aligned with who you really are.   All of this awareness leads us straight to one place: satya , or the practice of honesty. In my experience, being true to yourself comes from developing a consistent relationship with your inner nature of goodness, clarity, and peace. When you can tap into this part of you, an ocean of energy and wisdom opens. Once you find your way to the deep water inside, you can always return, even as you express what you’ve found out into your world. Your satya will always be there, offering a sometimes-surprising perspective that can truly rock your world from the core. CORE POSE : Eagle Curl Here’s one of my signature Core Poses to target your abs that also lets you practice being uber-honestly you. It’s hip and shoulder opener even as you work your rectus abdominis (the six-pack) and transversus abdominis (the girdle that wraps from sides to front of the torso) muscles.  The bound arms and legs means that you can’t rely on them as much for support, so the movement of this posture has to come almost entirely from the abs. Come onto your back. Wrap your left arm over your right at the elbow, and your right leg over your left leg at the knee, as in Garudasana (Eagle Pose). Both legs are lifted with your left knee stacked over the hip joint. Inhale with your shoulders and head on the floor. Exhale and firm your belly to curl your shoulders and head up, so just the tips of your shoulderblades remain on the floor. Don’t move your knees closer to your arms, but do try to touch your left elbow to them. Do 5-15 repetitions of this pose then lie flat on your back with legs long and arms overhead. Take a few belly-stretching breaths. Note: If this variation is too intense on your neck, place your fingertips into the back of your head and do the pose this way. Be mindful not to yank yourself into the pose with your arm strength, but use the abdominals to initiate the movement.      

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The Whole Core

Photo: Rows of lettuce and greens growing in our vegetable garden. Growing up, I struggled with my weight. I used food for comfort and companionship, taking bowls of potato chips and pistachio nuts to my room where I’d hide out from my unhappy home–eating, reading, and dreaming of my escape.  Throughout my teens and early twenties, I bounced between “good” periods of eating relatively well and exercising moderately and “bad” phases when I’d eat bagels and cream cheese for dinner, and then again for desert.  As you’d imagine, my weight went up and down–I was sometimes thin, often chubby, and occasionally undeniably overweight. When I was 29, I did some serious soul-searching, turned my life around, and lost the excess weight once and for all.   As I chronicle in my book (see below for info.), yoga and yoga philosophy helped me dig my way out of depression, and change my relationship with food.   I’m 38 now and, thankfully, food is no longer a struggle for me.  I eat when I’m hungry, favoring whole grains and lentils and vegetables and fruits, with the occasional splurge on pizza or a chocolate croissant.  The suburban girl who didn’t eat or know much about vegetables is now a gardening mom, growing carrots and kale and lettuce and spinach in the backyard.  Having struggled with food and body image issues, I’m committed to helping my son Lucien develop a healthy relationship to food.  That’s easier said than done. Lucien is a relatively adventurous eater, trying tortillas and pakoras when we’re out, chomping on cooked carrots and brown rice and beans and tofu slices at home.  A snack for Lucien is a brown rice cake and cheese, not a bag of chips or cookies.  So far, so good, right?  But life with Mommy is one thing, and then there’s the “real” world.  A child at morning daycare celebrates a birthday by bringing in cupcakes with enough sugar to make Lucien skip his afternoon nap; a friend comes over with a packaged and processed snack Lucien has never seen before, but desperately wants to try.  I don’t want him to be afraid of food, or think of certain foods as forbidden.  But at the same time I believe his diet is a crucial component of his physical and emotional health. Those whole grains and veggies and dairy and lentils are his daily vitamins–literally.   Things will get more complicated, I know, when he gets a little older.  He doesn’t yet know about McDonalds, hasn’t tried candy, or heard about soda.  My plan? To keep the fridge, pantry (and garden) stocked with healthy food, and show him how yummy it can be to eat like mommy and daddy.  I’ll keep you posted, and I’d love to hear how you’re coping with feeding your toddlers a yogic diet. Jessica Berger Gross is the author of enLIGHTened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer (Skyhorse), she lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two-year-old son.

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Enlightened Eating for Toddlers

When I began my yoga teaching career, I thought I had to be perfect. I felt the need to know as much as possible and be able to master every yoga pose. I wanted to be able to make Dharma Mittra’s calendar jealous. So I spent hours each day doing yoga, reading about yoga, and then doing more yoga. The end result? Not the perfect body or a ninja-like command of postures that would make Ana Forrest cry. Just chronic injuries and a constant feeling of self-doubt. “Am I good enough yet? No way!” seemed to be my mantra. Then one day, I was at a toy store shopping for my niece’s birthday. I turned a corner and saw a little girl trying to shove a Tonka truck into the garage of a Barbie house. (Just for reference, a Tonka truck is big, bulky, about the size of a shoebox. A Barbie garage is made for a tiny pink convertible.) This kid was starting to get more and more frustrated and upset because the truck wouldn’t go in. So she started to pound it wildly against the little plastic garage and cry. I realized that what she was doing was exactly how I was approaching my yoga practice. My teaching was, and is, geared toward teaching real people real yoga, and giving them the freedom to be right where they are, even as they take transformative actions. My classes are never about attainment, but about the joy of play, curiosity about what will best serve us in each moment, and, of course, a deeper core awareness of who we really are. I wasn’t practicing what I preached, and that discrepancy, in my mind, didn’t make me better than my students–it made me a hypocrite. How could I tell a room full of people to be themselves, to relax and go with the flow, if I wasn’t willing to do the same? I needed to cease my unattainable quest for perfection and allow myself to be as imperfect as I am. Not in a bad way, in an organic, honest way. So I stopped trying to shove my truck into a Barbie garage. I am no other teacher, woman, or person but myself. I shifted my style of practicing yoga to a kinder, gentler one. Now I don’t force, I play. I don’t aim for increasingly difficult variations, I enjoy backing off to go deeper inside. And, importantly for me, I offer my body room to breathe, days off, and a loving awareness of what it really needs. I’m not saying that we should all stop wanting to attain our goals, in yoga or elsewhere. But we should strive to enjoy the harmony that comes with aligning what you do with who you really are, not who you wish you were. My personal style is still vigorous, but now a softening has occurred within it. I built a Tonka garage–or acquired a Barbie car, as the case may be–and now my outer life fits its own inner dharma , or nature.   What can you do next to take actions that better represent who you really need and want to be? Here’s an asana that can help you study what that is and gain insight as you move forward. CORE POSE: Parivrtta Trikonasana (Revolved Triangle) variation This posture gives you an opportunity to stay centered in your core connection then decide what expression or action (aligned with your best interests or not) is right for you today. It’s really a mindfulness meditation disguised as a physical movement. But then, aren’t they all? From Down Dog, step your left foot forward and come into a Low Lunge. Your fingertips should be under your shoulders and your arms straight. Maintaining strong legs and a centered pelvis with navel pointing at the Earth, begin to unfurl your left arm toward the sky.  You can look up or down to stretch the neck. After a few breaths here, try grounding your front big toe mound into the mat as you wrap your left hip around behind you to move the leg straighter. Make this stretch a journey–don’t rush towards the goal of a completely straight leg. Meanwhile, keep the right hand under the shoulder instead of immediately crossing it to the outside of the left foot. This will provide you with more stability for your foundation, so you’re more likely to remain grounded and core-connected as you spin. Sense when the urge to express begins to throw you off center, and then turn the navel to the left. Keep your hips, back knee, and toes positioned as if still in lunge position. From there, play with revealing the heart exactly as your body allows.

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Striving for Imperfection

While chemotherapy can save your life, the process is brutal and difficult to say the least. Patients report sleep loss, loss of hair, little appetite, and a general sense of dis-ease. But a new study –to be highlighted at the next meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology–finds that doing yoga in addition to chemotherapy improves sleep, reduces dependency on sedative medication, and helps patients make the transition back to a normal life. When Bloomberg Businessweek picks up on the story , it’s real–in a stodgy, establishment-oriented, Western medicine kind of way. The study, performed at the University of Rochester , enrolled 410 early-stage cancer survivors, and found that after four weeks, those who did yoga regularly reported significantly improved sleep, reduced fatigue, and a higher quality of life. Lead researcher Karen Mustian, Ph.D., M.P.H.,an assistant professor in Radiation Oncology at Rochester, crafted a practice focused on breathing exercises, gentle asanas, and restorative postures. The video routine, YOCAS (Yoga for Cancer Survivors), is not yet available for one and all, but Mustian notes that any regular practice of restorative yoga is likely to yield similar results.   Your doctor might not yet be ready to jump on the yoga bandwagon; your insurance probably won’t cover it. But why wait for the system to catch up to this breaking news? This is one “alternative” treatment that’s perfectly safe to prescribe for yourself (or for friends and family who might be suffering in the wake of cancer treatment). Better rest, peace of mind, and an improved sense of wellness are a great buy at $15 a class. Or find a donation-based studio, and you can reap the benefits for even less. If you can’t manage to get out and about, dig out your VCR and get yourself a copy of the late Esther Myer’s excellent video, “Gentle Yoga for Breast Cancer Survivors” . Take a deep breath, stretch, and remind yourself that though Savasana might be helpful to you now, you’re not a corpse yet!

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Survive and Thrive

I was at a meditation retreat last week. Do you know what they’re like? Grainy, leafy food in portions your pet fish couldn’t survive on, no talking, no reading, no car keys, no wallet, no calling home. It isn’t Club Med. Just meditating, dawn ’till after dusk. It can be lonely. But some fantastic things happen.    Here is one very cool thing.  Picture this: 5am, maybe.  (No watches.)  Still dark out, anyway. I come out of my room each morning, slowly and silently, and head toward the meditation hall, dressed in pajamas. As I walk down the hall, every third or fourth door opens, and another person in pajamas comes out, quietly closing a door behind her.  We look like something from a zombie movie, except that some of the zombies have mats under their arms. We walk in bare feet to the hall where we each pick a spot on the floor. We begin our practice. All you can hear is breathing and the soft thuds of feet jumping forward and back. It’s impromptu Mysore.  No one organized or announced it. It goes on for perhaps forty minutes, people drifting in and out of the hall.  All of this happens before we begin meditating for the day. And, holy mackerel, even though we don’t speak, don’t even look at each other for the most part, even though we’re about to begin another grueling day of seated meditation, I am deliriously happy. I don’t want to leave the impression that meditating is awful from start to finish. Other very cool things that happen on these retreats are an empty, quiet head and a sense of peace that will knock you over if you let it.  I love it. Days later I can still feel it. I feel a need to express some thanks to these zombie yogis. They were my family away from home.  We showed up for each other first thing in the morning on days when it mattered. So to these men and women I don’t know, and to the ones I do know but didn’t say a word to: thank you, thank you, thank you.You made meditating a little easier, and you made me fall in love with yoga all over again. Thanks to yoga zombies for making me fall in love with yoga, and thanks to you for the conversation.

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Yoga Zombies

Yesterday I stopped into a coffee shop for my near-daily dose of hot chocolate.  It’s my only vice. (Well, unless yoga counts.) While there, I struck up a conversation with a woman who was stuffing straws and stirrers into her back pocket. She saw me looking at her and said, “If I don’t hide these from my daughter, she’ll make musical instruments or little plastic families with them, and I won’t be able to get her to take a nap!” We both remarked how little it took to spark a kid’s imagination. “I wish we could do that as adults,” I said, wistfully. She nodded in agreement, like adults do: solemnly and rationally. Then, straws firmly in pocket and adult caffeinated beverages in hand, she walked away. Later, as I walked down the street, I was struck by my statement. Had I really strayed so far from the path of adventure and childlike delight that I had to say I wished I could do that again? Here I had a hot chocolate in hand and yet I was drinking it like an adult: while I walked to work, instead of like a child, reveling in its yumminess.  Sometimes I feel that the older I get and the more responsibility I accept, the more chronic Boring Adult Syndrome becomes. I want to turn swizzle sticks into trumpets and stop and climb trees instead of just rushing by them on my way to a meeting. Though, really, the only thing stopping me from engaging in life in a fresh and exciting way is myself. The concept of an “inner child” is used in therapeutic parlance, for example, to designate such a hurt part of us that needs to be protected. But I’m in the mood to reclaim that concept and bring my inner child out to play. In yoga, we call this lighthearted and energetic dance of spirit lila , or divine play. It’s a call back to freedom, laughter, and the simple joy of living.  When we access it, we spark a delicious sense of aliveness that makes life that much more worth living. On your mat, are you so focused on getting through a challenging practice that you forget to lighten up and let your life energy flow through the poses? Do you pass by park swings without a glance, or sit down for 5 minutes of glee? Isn’t your office desk due for some bright purple flowers, just because? Opportunities for lila are found everywhere, even in the most somber or painful moments. This week I invite you to open your inner child’s eyes, see from a whimsical perspective, and allow yourself to take advantage of doorways into happiness wherever and whenever you can. Here’s a pose to help you find the way in: Core Pose: Breath of Freedom in Chair Pose Come into Chair Pose (Utkatasana) with feet and knees together. Bend your knees and keep the tailbone long and belly lifting. On your inhalation, open your arms wide behind you and arch your chest. On the exhalation, round in, chin to chest, and hug yourself with both arms. Repeat the movement as long as it’s comfortable. Try and go beyond the physical alignment to infuse the pose with vitality and a sense of gratitude for being alive. You’ll bring a sense of wonder and energy to it that will make it not just a pose, but a living experience of lila.

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Calling on Lila

We’ve talked a lot about helping provide access to yoga for under-served and at-risk youth. But there’s another population equally in need of yoga’s healing and meditative benefits: the elderly. Physically and economically challenged seniors often can’t swing $15 a class–or keep up with the vigorous vinyasa flow. Frank Iszak knows this. The 78-year-old yoga teacher and founder of Silver Age Yoga in San Diego has made it his life’s mission to get grannies and grandpas on the mat. He goes to them (in senior centers, libraries, and churches), keeps it simple, and tailors his classes to help offset some of their common health issues: osteoporosis, arthritis, diabetes, weight gain, and poor circulation. Best of all, his classes are totally free! Iszak, who escaped to the U.S. from forced labor camp in communist Hungary in 1958, lives for seva, tirelessly working to improve the lives of others. “Our basic goal is to make their lives better–for whatever years they have left on planet Earth,” he says of his students. Sangha, too, is an important part of the Silver Age formula: Lonely seniors get a chance to connect physically, mentally, and spiritually with a community focused on feeling better in the world. Want to support Iszak’s work? You can donate to Silver Age, a 501(c) (3) organization , directly. Or, better yet, you can sign up for one of Iszak’s online teacher trainings and get busy bringing yoga to the seniors in your hometown.

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Good Old Yoga

Lucien is two and a half.  He loves: Mommy, Daddy, Salem (our dog), his music teacher, the ukulele, Cat Stevens, Bob Marley, the playground, the library, art class, the backyard, playing pretend with his stuffed animal bear, and, yes, yoga.   While he was decidedly not a fan of mommy-and-baby yoga class as an infant, and hasn’t really liked the couple of toddler yoga classes I’ve taken him to either, he does love to “do” yoga at home.   I know that technically young children aren’t supposed to–or at least, don’t need to–practice yoga, so I haven’t tried to teach him asana.  But just from living in a house where mommy and daddy love yoga, he’s picked it up. He’ll go into my yoga space and stand on a wooden block, arms outstretched.  Or, more often, he’ll sit in Baddha Konasana (Bound Angle Pose) and say “this pose is called cobbler’s pose.” He loves to stand at a wall and do tree pose, and somehow he knows instinctively to do both sides! When he’s upset, I often sing him the invocation to Patanjali and he sometimes asks for it:  “Mommy will sing the yoga song?”  Along with the Beatles and Dan Zanes, we listen to Wah! and Krishna Das, and a couple of times he’s picked up his ukulele and started singing his version of Hare Krishna.  He pulls my yoga books out from the bookcase and pages through them, looking at the photos and asking questions about the poses. “This pose is called?” he says. (It’s ridiculously cute.)  More important, when he cries or gets frustrated or overwhelmed, I ask him to take a breath with me.  We’ll count “one Mississippi, two Mississippi” when waiting for an overdue bus in the rain, or om together to try and calm down.   Believe me, there are plenty of times when Lucien sees me not listening to my own yogic advice.  I forget to breath, I get frustrated, I check my email rather than focusing in on the time we’re spending together.  But I hope the times he does see me “doing” yoga–remembering to be present, practicing asana, attempting to live consciously, will stay with him when he’s older.   Will Lucien end up being a yogi?  We’ll have to wait and see.  But for now, when Lucien, without prompting, sits down and pretends to meditate (closing his eyes “like Momma” for a few seconds), I am grateful to have these teachings in our lives.   How do you share yoga with your children? Jessica Berger Gross is the author of enLIGHTened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer   (Skyhorse), she lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two-year-old son.

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Yogi in Training

We love Donna De Lory . The former pop princess–sidekick to Madonna, no less–has refashioned herself as a cooing, crooning kirtan chanteuse. Her sweet, ethereal renditions of “Om Namah Shivaya,” “Hare Krishna,” and “Aham Prema” leave you feeling that’s she’s an instrument through which flows the very breath of god. Tune into her good vibes on albums “The Lover and the Beloved” and “Sanctuary” . Better yet, catch her in person this summer at Lilith Fair , Wanderlust , or Bhakti Fest. Until then, tide yourself over with a music download, just for YJ Buzz Blogistas.

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Sonic Sanctuary

“Hold that for 5 breaths.” If you’re new to yoga, I’d like to give you some great advice: never believe this. It’s not going to be 5 breaths. It’s going to be about 27 breaths. It’ll go like this: The teacher starts out well enough: that’s one breath (then an adjustment to someone’s left hip and some encouraging advice), that’s two (if you just hold your shoulder back a little…ahhhh, that’s good), and that’s three already (I’m at twelve!), that’s four (and if you’d like a challenge, now, if you’d like to go a little deeper, try this) that’s four and a half–and now with a slight smile the teacher somehow manages to count: that’s five. It’s twenty-seven breaths for me. At first, I laughed at this. Then I resented it. Once I said out loud, “That isn’t three, it’s seventeen!” Today I see it a bit differently. Today I understand that it’ll take years, maybe five years for my shoulders to open. Maybe it’ll take seventeen years for my hips to open enough to do a full lotus. It’s more than that. Maybe it’ll take 27,000 breaths for me to relax into a pose without pushing and straining and achieving the whole time. Maybe it’ll take 270,000 breaths to enjoy the time I’ve been given in each pose and beyond: in each relationship, in each mouthful of food, in each hour at work, in whatever I’m learning today. You get the picture. It’s the new math. I wonder what you’re learning in your 27 breaths. I’d love to hear. Thanks to Rob and Cristina for yoga math (Bring it on!), and thanks to you for the conversation.

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New Math

Purple is a powerful color–it’s also associated with royalty, mystery, and even magic. Maybe the next time I need an extra boost to my own magical powers I’ll try wearing something purple. I think my favorite part of this outfit is the top. I love how it creates the layered look all by itself–like magic! the details: Breathe Easy Yoga Tank Top, Nike Bliss Cover Up, Nike Mynah Crop pants, Lululemon Yoga mat, Lululemon Flip-Flops, Old Navy Earthlust Water Bottle, Vickery Lotus Garden Body Butter, Pacifica Perfume

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Wish I was Wearing: Power Purple

It’s 7:30 in the morning, and my phone rings.  It’s my sister sounding like an undercover cop on surveillance: whispery voice, hand cupped over the phone, shifty eyes. “I really love yoga,” she says. “You have no idea how much I love yoga right now.” She’s a new yoga junkie. It happens. We arrive here from other sports, other pastimes, other loves, and we fall into yoga like matter into black holes. I’ll bet you’ve had these hushed conversations.  “What about running?” I asked a yoga friend when he first fell. “I dunno,” he said. “I don’t want to run as much. It doesn’t help my yoga.” This, from marathon runner to marathon runner. “I’m supposed to ride tomorrow, and all I want to do is go to yoga,” my sister continues. “I know,” I say. “I know the feeling.” “I can jump through to a seated position,” she says. “Learned that last night.”  “Oh yeah,” I say, knowingly. “That’s good.” “And I’m starting to get that thing about lifting my heart without sticking my front ribs out. You have no idea how good that is.” “Oh yeah?” I say. “Oh yeah,” she confirms. “And another thing: did I mention that my knees don’t hurt when I’m walking to work, now? Did I mention that?” Yeah, you did, but that’s okay. “You have no idea how good that is,” she persists. I don’t want to scare anybody, but this is the way you begin to talk to the people you love. You can go on running, cycling, and all the rest of it. No one’s going to stop you, but you might love this yoga thing more than you thought. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Thanks to yoga for the inspiration, and thanks to you for the conversation.

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Yoga Junkie

Photo: Blissed out in my favorite restorative.  It’s Lucien’s nap time, 2:30 in the afternoon, and the house is blissfully quiet. I’ve been going all day, in full productivity mode–writing, work emails, laundry, and a few hours of Lucien-care.  What I really want to do now, in this precious hour before afternoon playtime and dinner and bath, is curl up on the couch and watch Oprah. But it’s time to do yoga. (Lucien’s nap time is the only time of day I can consistently fit a home practice in.)  I wish I could say I bound off the couch and into my yoga corner every afternoon, but the truth is that most days I have to drag myself there. More often than not, my practice is a restorative sequence done wearing wool socks.  Some days I rally for standing poses and active back bends. Usually, though, I take a “yoga nap,” as my close friend Kristen Rentz Lewis, fellow mom and author of  YogaNap: Restorative Poses for Deep Relaxation,  calls it.   My absolute favorite restorative pose right now is Ardha Halasana , Supported Half-Plow Pose with a chair.  It’s helped me with everything from headaches to exhaustion, from anxiety to getting over a cold.  The catch is–I can’t get into the pose comfortably without doing several other poses first.  And so, I begin my practice.  Supta Baddha Konasana (Reclining Bound Angle Pose), Ado Mukha Svanasana (Downward-Facing Dog Pose), a headstand, a shoulder stand with the chair.  My baby monitor is on, and yes, I confess that at first I do check my iPhone in between poses for incoming emails!  But twenty minutes in, I’m always glad to be practicing.  Most days I manage to practice for an hour, and sometimes even more.  And then, if Lucien is still sleeping–fingers crossed–I get on the couch and see what’s on Oprah. Whether you’re a stay-at-home mom with a never ending to-do list, or at the office all day and need every moment at home to take care of your household and connect with your children, give yourself the gift of at least a few restorative poses done at home, in a quiet place, each week. Here are some great resources for developing a restorative home practice: The Woman’s Book of Yoga and Health: A Lifelong Guide to Wellness   (see the chapter on restoratives) by Linda Sparrowe and Patricia Walden Relax and Renew: Restful Yoga for Stressful Times   by Judith Lasater YogaNap: Restorative Poses for Deep Relaxation   by Kristen Rentz What’s your favorite restorative pose?  How do you spend nap time?   –Jessica Berger Gross Jessica Berger Gross is the author of enLIGHTened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer   (Skyhorse), she lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two-year-old son.

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Yoga Nap

I mentioned I was visiting Toronto on the weekend, going to a new yoga studio for the first time, and doing a class with my sister (and my nephew, it turns out). I was nervous about venturing away from my home studio, and I wanted to share a few things I learned from toeing my comfort line: 1. Sun Salutations are not so different from place to place. This makes me very happy. No matter where I travel–now–I can find a home. Makes me feel warm all over, thinking that. 2. Speaking of warm all over, the studio I visited was a few degrees warmer than my home base. It only mattered when I stood up from one of those hanging my head poses (just a second, I’ll look it up – aha!) when I stood up from Prasarita Padottanasana (Wide-Legged Forward Bend), and came the closest I’ve ever come to fainting. Maybe that’s peri-menopause. Maybe it’s a surge of some fantastic yogi energy. I don’t know; it’s a new yoga mystery. 3. The chanting was completely different in this class. And it was fast. It was like trying to sing the Italian national anthem. 4. Bandas. What are they? I think I understand the idea of Bandas, but I do not have any control over them yet. Foolishly, I asked our teacher Oliver to pick a pose for our photograph (see above). This pose (I’m not looking this one up. I’ll look it up when I’m 76, when I might be able to do it!) requires some Banda control. It’s his favorite pose. It’s my least favorite pose. I just sit on the floor and make faces. 5. Speaking of faces, my head was recently shaved for a theatre production. I look like a 13-year-old boy at the moment. It’s not my favorite look. It occurs to me that I may never end up on the cover of Yoga Journal. 6. I love my sister Tory and my nephew Stefano. There’s nothing like doing a yoga class with people you love.  7. I learned again that I adore yoga. Thanks to everyone and everything that brought me here, including Tory, Stef, and Oliver. I’d like to know who would you love to do yoga with, if you could do it with anyone? Thanks to yoga for helping me grow, and thanks to you for the conversation. –Kristin Shepherd

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Cover Girl

Last night I went to ninja school. OK, that’s not its technical name, but the ancient martial art of ninjitsu is one of the forms I will be studying each week at a dojo in New York City. I’ve been interested in martial arts since I was young, but it took me until now to sign up for a class. What does this have to do with yoga? Well, after 15 years of practicing asana, I wanted to shake things up a bit. Specifically, I am attracted to the experience of beginner’s mind that is foundational in every mindful-movement style. And what better way to do this than to become an actual beginner at something once again?  I can easily bring a sense of the beginner’s perspective in the form of curiosity and openness to even my most repetitive yoga poses. And I learn a lot that way. But it’s not the same as actually beginning a new process.  There’s nothing quite like the feeling of stepping into the complete unknown and confronting the real fear that arises from doing something that you never have before. But as I entered the dojo for my first class, I understood that what I was experiencing wasn’t fear as much as it was excitement. I also recognized that this would be another opportunity to practice saucha , or cleanliness. Now, I took a shower and came into the dojo without perfume, and with nails clipped and hair back as instructed. But the type of cleaning I’m talking about goes deeper than the outer form. By purposefully stepping into a situation where I had no idea what to expect, I was organically cleared of expectation. I didn’t have a historical context to compare this moment to or experience to draw from. So I just listened, and enjoyed the clarity that comes from finding oneself with a washed-clean mind, heart, and history. My yoga practice had actually prepared me well for the movement, alignment, and knowledge of balance I needed to get through the class. I learned to stand more solidly and fall more consciously, partnering with another center of gravity in a dance with my own. But the best part about the experience was knowing that I was capable of being cleaned out on all levels, creating the space to take in a whole new view of the world. If you feel like you’re stagnating, coasting on what you know, or if you are mentally cluttered with perspectives that aren’t serving your growth and fullness of experience, try becoming a beginner. It doesn’t have to be a huge commitment. Sometimes just breaking your routine, hiking along a different path, or listening to another kind of music can spark this saucha of spirit.  The relief from the weight of your experiences will be well worth it. Core Question : What can you do to move outside your comfort zone and try something you never have? Core Pose : Crow Pose I often use Crow as a way to bring students into the unknown, so they can play at their mindful edge and move into beginner’s mind with integrity. These three approaches should get you there, no matter what level you’re at now. Go at your own pace, and don’t rush into anything you’re not ready for. 1) Flying: Plant your hands on the mat, fingers wide. Lift your heels and hips, and squeeze your elbows and knees inward. Round through your back to access core strength then float your heart forward until your elbows stack over your wrists. Keep hugging in and up, and work on flying high. 2) Jumping Back from Crow: If Crow is a breeze, maintain the containment of elbows over wrists, then hop your feet back on an exhalation into Chaturanga Dandasana. Proceed through your vinyasa to Downward-Facing Dog. 3) Jumping Forward into Crow: From Down Dog, walk your feet together and take small hops toward you hands on your exhalations. As your belly pulls in to help you lift up, your knees will widen to touch your upper arms. Over time, you will refine this action to transition into the pose without touching your feet down at all.      

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Cultivating Beginner’s Mind

I know what you’re thinking… harem pants, really? Really! I love them and I know you can pull them off.  I also adore this yoga mat bag-finally a bag large enough to fit my yoga mat, towel, and whatever else I need to pack in there. the details: Carry All Yoga Bag, Prana Seamless Carefree Cami, Be Present Harem Pant, Athleta Inspire Bracelet, Fossil Harmony Yoga Mat, Jade Yoga   eQua Yoga Towel, Manduka   Tree Garden Curtain, Urban Outfitters   –Ali Zeigler

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Wish I was Wearing: Tangerine Threads

On Mother’s Day, I spent the morning at a workshop about the breath and spine taught by my mentor, Leslie Kaminoff. I thought it a fitting tribute to the feminine energy to hear about removing obstacles to our foundational balance, which is a very yin (feminine) journey; not one of pushing or over-striving, but of gentleness, introspection, and nurturing.   This is something my Type A side resisted for years.   When I first began studying with Leslie at the Breathing Project in New York City, I wasn’t interested in a deeper practice of pranayama. I just wanted to know what was the optimal way to breathe in yoga. Ujjayi? No Ujjayi? From the belly? With the bandhas? Which bandhas? Through the nose, the mouth, belly or chest? And how?   Like a master instructor would, he spent the next few months handing my questions right back to me without answering them definitively.   In fact, he actively tried to get me to experience my own breath in all its different forms, and let it be my ultimate teacher.   It was maddening.   However, once I learned to quiet my mind and stop controlling my breath, and allowed it to speak to me instead of always the other way around, I had my answer: There is no one perfect way to breathe in yoga.   In fact, there are innumerable ways to approach the breath. We can stop and start it, hold or release it, and send it where we want it to go. We can also do nothing at all, and simply let ourselves breathe.   When yogis don’t really understand pranayama, we tend to default to doing one breath–usually Ujjayi– in all poses. But a one-breath-fits-all approach is lacking. Deciding which breathing method you need comes down to this: “What do I want from this moment, and how can the breath support me to achieve it?” So, before the breath, even, we cultivate an inner attention. Svadhaya , or a process of inner inquiry must occur. Otherwise, it’s solely a respiration practice, which gives benefits, but is not the all-levels union of yoga.   From there, we learn to either do something ( tapas ) or surrender to what is ( ishvara pranidhana ), and in making the conscious choice, reflected in the quality of the breath, we actually can create more inner freedom instead of less.   Leslie always speaks of yoga as a process by which we remove obstacles to our true nature, like Patanjali’s parable of the farmer who must only open a dam to let the water flow and nourish his fields. We can do this every time we seek out a tight muscle and stretch it, or shift a belief that doesn’t serve our higher purpose to one that does. And you know what? I never thought I’d say it, but the art of pranayama has become quite interesting to me.   Breathing has become one way I practice the deep soul relaxation and loving kindness inherent in ahimsa (nonharming)–in this case, not causing myself injury. My pranayama protects me from dumping more anxiety, more “go-go-go,” more needing to know, more, well… more onto my plate. It’s a moving meditation where I can soften, listen intently, and just be taught for a while instead of always needing to be the teacher.   I’m curious–what has your breath had to teach you lately?   Core Pose: Tadasana (or Tadasana Samasthithi) with Breath of Freedom   I pay homage to Leslie Kaminoff by sharing one of his techniques that provides another perspective on high chest breathing. We’re often told in yoga that breathing into the upper chest causes anxiety. This is not necessarily true. Breathing short, fast, and into a limited portion of the lungs? Maybe so. But accessing the upper lobes of the lungs can actually bring you more space and relaxation, as the muscles of the neck and shoulders release from the inside out.   Stand in Tadasana (Mountain Pose) with feet sitting bone-distance apart. Ground your feet and lift long through the crown of the head.   Arms can lift and lower gently with the breath or remain at your sides.   Imagine you have two nostrils at the center of your shoulders just behind the center of each collarbone, and if you pressed down, you could contact the top of your lungs.   As you inhale and exhale, let the air flow through these areas, filling the lungs at their highest point and releasing it again through the shoulders.   Notice how this naturally causes your lower abdominals to lift and support the spine. For contrast, try taking a big belly-expanding breath and push out your navel. You’ll likely experience a drop of spinal support and ability to breathe.   Maintain the first pranayama and enjoy for 1 minute. Then begin your practice with a more spacious chest and heart center.   

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Learning to Breathe

I go to two yoga classes a week, but I do my own practice at home every single day. I adore it, and I wouldn’t miss it for much. It’s still dark when I get out of bed, I shuffle to the kitchen and make a coffee (perhaps when I am a real yogi I’ll drink something healthier), drink half of it, set the timer on the microwave, and begin. The first three Sun Salutations feel a bit tight, a bit creaky. Even my mind is tight and creaky. I’m thinking about getting my hands positioned correctly, thinking about rotating my thighs inward and pulling that lower belly in (something I have no idea how to do, still). Heels closer to the floor, shoulder blades down, etc. You know all of this. Then something or someone–some larger part of me, perhaps–begins to well up. The rabid thinking slows down. Something warm and delicious takes its place. I begin to feel more generous with my positioning. I feel happy all of a sudden, and light. Some days, about ten Sun Salutations in, this thing takes over and I go crazy, like a whirling dervish. My breath pours in and squeezes out, I’m warm from the inside out, I am strong, I am beautiful, and I am huge, somehow. Unconstrained. You should see my Warrior II pose. I fill the living room. I fill the house. I love those days. This morning was one of those days. I’d set the timer for 70 minutes and was so enormous by the end of it that I didn’t hear it go off. Best Savasana ever. Does this ever happen to you?  Thanks to yoga for making us huge, and thanks to you for the conversation. –Kristin Shepherd

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Some Days We Are Enormous

Photo: My son Lucien in Pacific Spirit Regional Park, Vancouver, BC After my failed attempt at mommy and baby yoga, which I described in my last post, I didn’t know what to do. I mourned and missed my yoga practice, but didn’t have the energy to try a class again anytime soon, and I couldn’t imagine getting a home practice going, either. What I could do?  Walk.  While walking’s obviously not the same as asana, they both involve moving your body in a kind of meditative way.  Before getting pregnant I’d gone on retreats where we’d practiced walking meditation. So why not try meditative walking? Walking is something I could do with just Lucien and a pair of sneakers.  And maybe my dog Salem would stop gnawing at the rugs in our Brooklyn sublet if she came along. And so Lucien and Salem and I began taking daily three mile walks in Brooklyn’s Prospect Park. The first time we went out I honestly didn’t know if I could finish the loop.  Sweat poured down my nursing bra.  The smallest incline felt like Mount Everest.  But I managed to finish. Each day the walk became easier, though I often had to stop and nurse on a freezing cold park bench in the middle of winter.  Some days Lucien cried during the walk. I’d sit with him, or walk and sing to him. Most days, thank goodness, he’d fall asleep.  I’d hold Salem’s leash in one hand, push the stroller with the other, and hold my phone to my ear (oops, not very meditative there) talking to my experienced-mom-of-three friend Katherine, or my just-about-to-have-her-baby friend Kristen. Some days I’d simply be. I may not have been on my mat, but during those sleep-deprived early months of nursing round the clock and learning how to care for a newborn, walking–alongside healthy eating–became my yoga. (By six months, I was ready to slowly start practicing asana again. In my next post, I’ll share that adventure and which poses helped to ease me back.) Lucien and Salem and I still walk together several times a week. Instead of taking nursing breaks, these days I have to stop and give Lucien his fair share of toddler run around time.  Here’s a photo from a walk we took the other day in Vancouver, where we live now. Where are your favorite places to walk with your children?  Jessica Berger Gross is the author of  enLIGHTened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer  (Skyhorse).

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Hitting the Road

Watch the latest news video at video.foxnews.com Yoga and mysticism: Not the kind of thing you see much of on Fox News. But, lo! Andrew Harvey appeared on the “Fair & Balanced” network on May 7 to speak about his new book, Heart Yoga: The Sacred Marriage of Yoga and Mysticism . The great teacher –former professor of religious studies at Oxford, epic spiritual quester, multi-dimensional mystic, and founder of the Institute of Sacred Activism–kept his eyes closed during much of the segment. Maybe this was to maintain inward focus while sharing his vision of helping anyone who practices yoga “taste and feel the divine energies in their bodies.”  Or maybe this was to shut out the cluelessness of his host, religion correspondent Lauren Green, who fumbled with her headset,  and mmm-hmm, right, mmm-hmmed her way through Harvey’s explanation of the chakra system, and bumbled every reference to yoga life (”Most of us in the West are used to a yoga that just helps us to lose weight…is it Brikum? Beerkam?). One wonders what die-hard fans of Newt Gingrich, Karl Rove, Sarah Palin, and Mike Huckabee must have thought of Harvey’s explanation  that all of creation is “a shattering white diamond light that is actually manifesting the whole cosmos” and that the human body itself is “dancing light consciousness.”  Once can only hope that those who tuned into the clip by accident were touched–if only a little–by the profound teachings of a modern master. Tune in by design, and you surely will be. –Hillari Dowdle

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Light on Fox News

Last week while on a trip to Japan with my husband, yoga teacher Jason Crandell, I got to witness the true meaning of yoga, or union: On a sunny Saturday morning, more than 700 yogis gathered together in a grassy park outside of the sleek Roppongi Hills mall in Tokyo to take part in the Yoga Aid Challenge. Now in its fifth year (and with events throughout the year in seven countries), the Tokyo Yoga Aid participants raised more than 1.2 million yen  for local charities. The reward for participating? Practicing together in the park while 12 well-known teachers led a two-hour class. As each teacher took 10 minutes to share their teachings with the crowd, I was struck by how beautifully diverse yoga is: Ms. Michiko Minegishi took to the stage with dramatic music and her inspiring students behind her, Duncan Wong got his groove on while sharing his Yogic Arts style, former San Francisco Bay Area resident and Anusara Yoga teacher Mark Shveima (he now resides in Kyoto) showed his hard-won skills by leading the crowd in Japanese. ”Lunge-en-a-pose-u!” said Shveima and the students obliged him with a High Lunge, arms extending skyward. American teachers (like my hubby) and Gurmukh Kaur Khalsa shared their portion of the practice via translators. Despite the teachers’ stylistic differences, the mixed class came together seamlessly. As the practice ended and all 700 of us put our arms around each other and sang with Gurmukh “We are the people, the people of love. Let us people, love today” I was not only feeling the love, I was feeling blessed to have experienced such a sense of union even though I was so far from home. The video I put together above shows just a few highlights from the day. –Andrea Ferretti

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It’s a Small World

I stare at my feet at the beginning of each class. We hang for a bit before we chant ohmm and get peaceful. It’s while we’re hanging that I look at them. I love my body. After ohmm, we spend a few minutes contemplating how we’re standing on our feet. Our teacher tells us to put our first toe down, then our fifth toe, and then try to lift the middle toes. I can’t do this. My middle toes head off toward the big toe–gripping the floor like drowning swimmers hanging to the side of a lifeboat for their lives.  So far, I am unable to convince them that we’re on dry land. Relax, I say to them. Ohmm, for God’s sake. I love my body. My right foot is in a brace. It’s a long story, but I’ll be in that brace for a while longer. It means I don’t hop anywhere on my mat. I shuffle. Underneath the brace my right lateral malleolus (the outside ankle bump) looks like Mr. Potato Head. I’ll paint eyes on it for Halloween. I love my body. The truth is that there are perhaps ten things about my feet that aren’t gorgeous and that don’t behave in the manner in which I’d prefer. And here’s the thing. I could easily say the same about my hips (What do you mean, open? Open my hips?), my arms (My elbows won’t turn that way unless I break them.), my hamstrings, which are shorter than short, even my face, which has completely relaxed about four times in my life. And on and on. Today, hanging over my feet, it occurred to me that love is a decision. Things are beautiful or not, loose or not, strong or not, potato-heady or not. So what. Love is a decision. I love my body. Thanks to yoga for helping me love me, and thanks to you for the conversation. –Kristin Shepherd

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I am a Beauty

Image by Wisdom 2.0 How do you reconcile your quest for inner peace with your Facebook habit? Can you stay mindful while dealing with the 200 e-mails in your in-box? These questions–and others like them–were pursued in lively conversation this past weekend at Wisdom 2.0, a conference in Silicon Valley hosted by Soren Gordhamer . A former technology junkie, Gordhamer believes technology and wisdom practices can work together for the well-being of humanity. “What does it mean to live wisely and also stay connected with technology?” he asked a series of panelists and speakers, including executives from Google and Twitter, as well as spiritual thinkers such as Zen Abbot Roshi Joan Halifax , and Yoga Journal’ s Editor-in-Chief Kaitlin Quistgaard . No one at the conference claimed to have the ultimate answers, but it was inspiring to see leaders in the technology industry deeply considering how the tools they create impact mind and soul. Should we Unplug? Attention is a finite–and invaluable–asset according to Bradley Horowitz , who manages Google’s communication products, including Gmail, and who speaks openly of his own 25-year spiritual practice. “You may not be able to turn Gmail off,” he said (although, he joked “in my case I can turn all of Gmail off!”) “But you can step away from the computer and create space for yourself.” Consciously managed technology offers positive opportunities for connection, says Chris Sacca , a venture capitalist and strategic advisor at Twitter. But, Sacca, who has 1.3 million followers on Twitter, chooses the time and manner in which he wants to be available online. Rather than responding to every message, he asks himself: “How am I going to be most useful in a macro sense?” Stay Connected, Stay Flexible Meditative practices are making their way into the offices of many of these companies. Twitter’s Chief Technology Officer Greg Pass leads a class at Twitter that he calls “Twittiokinetics,” where employees participate in a form of qigong. And at Google, Gopi Kallayil leads a weekly yoga class for a group of students he calls the “Yoglers.”  He suggests trying to meditate at least 20 minutes a day. But, he said–quoting Google’s Meng Tan, who leads the company’s personal growth classes–”if you can’t meditate for 20 minutes, do it for one breath.” The Most Important Connection While no one denied the marvel of connectivity that technology allows, the conference discussion underlined the challenge of staying present in this hyper-connected environment. No matter how many online friends or followers you have, Google’s Kallayil reminded conference participants, “The most important connection each of us needs to have is the one with ourselves.” –Carmel Wroth

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Wisdom 2.0: Seeking Authentic Connection

Photo: On the subway in Brooklyn, New York with a 6-week-old Lucien. As I posted the other day, practicing yoga was the furthest thing from my mind when I brought my son Lucien home from the hospital. By six weeks post-partum, though, I really started missing asana. The doctor who’d performed my c-section gave me the OK to exercise, so I gathered up my energy and my son’s overstuffed diaper bag and ventured out to our first mommy and baby yoga class. This was something I’d dreamt about for years. How fun to teach my baby yoga! Too bad Lucien didn’t see it that way.  He cried from the moment we entered the yoga center until we left an hour later. He pooped twice in the first 45 minutes–I spent half the class in the tiny Brooklyn-sized bathroom changing him–and the rest of the time he wailed while I tried to put him down on the mat long enough for me to get in a couple of poses.  I ended up leaving the class in tears and feeling like a complete failure. All the other moms and babies seemed to handle the class fine.  What was wrong with me?  With us?  I felt isolated. I felt like a freak. (And honestly, with twenty-five pounds to lose, I felt fat.)  Would I ever practice again? Would I ever feel like myself?  Would I ever get my favorite jeans back on? Have you tried Mommy and Baby classes?  How do you make it to your mat?

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We Flunked Mommy-Baby Yoga

I’m getting ready to go to Toronto to see my kids. My sister has lightly suggested we go to one of her yoga classes while I’m there. I’m nervous. I’ve been at my home studio for about seven months. It’s all I know. What if Sun Salutations are different in Toronto? What if I’m dying half way through the class, and I have to spend 45 minutes in Child’s Pose? What if my pants won’t stay up and my shirt won’t stay down? (Granted, this happens in every one of my own classes, but it’s different in a room I know.) Argh, it’s like starting all over. Holy Mackerel, the phone rings. It’s my sister: she says she just finished the toughest yoga class of her life. Her hair gel poured into her eyes, she was sweating so hard. A little ominous, perhaps? Ok, slow down, maybe try some yoga. I walk into my home studio and a woman puts her mat down beside me and says, “I’m new, and I’m nervous–is there anything I should know?” I almost cry. In this second I realize I’ve been at this yoga business for a few months, and that feels good. I am absurdly happy to welcome her and to assure her that she’ll be fine. I am a welcome-wagon maniac. I spent the first two months of yoga avoiding eye contact, too worried about my pants, my shirt, and my uncooperative body to let myself relax into things. I am shocked to see it can be done differently. So, this weekend I’ll try to go in this foreign studio as an aspiring yogi: breathing, present, willing to play with others. And I will humbly do Child’s Pose the entire time if I have to. I’ll let you know how it goes. Thanks to yoga for the lesson, and thanks to you for the conversation.

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Home Sweet Yoga

Photo caption: New mommy kale, tofu and rice When I got pregnant, I’d been studying yoga for more than a decade. I vowed to have a yogic pregnancy and birth experience. I attended prenatal yoga class faithfully. At nine months pregnant I was doing headstands and chair shoulder stands. I imagined my labor would be like a very intense weekend yoga workshop–really hard, but something I’d get through with breathing and the proper motivation. Afterward I’d leave the hospital with my baby, feeling like myself again in no time, ready to practice yoga at home while my son napped.  Could I have been any more naive? Of course, plenty of women do have wonderful baby-in-the-bathtub births, but my labor lasted for more than 24 hours, included an antibiotic drip from the beginning, and it was so excruciatingly painful that I couldn’t say no to the epidural. At the last minute, I had to have an emergency c-section. Recovering in the hospital, my baby spent 48 hours in the NICU, resulting in major problems with my milk supply.  And one day after returning home with my son Lucien I had to be rushed to the ER because of massive swelling in my legs. When I finally got set up at home I couldn’t feel sensation in my midsection, and my postpartum doula had to practically stage an intervention to get me to stop taking Percocet.  For the first six weeks, every ounce of my energy went to nursing Lucien, recovering from the surgery, and trying to grab some sleep when I could. I didn’t unroll my yoga mat once–and to be honest, given how much pain I was in, and how insanely tired I was, I didn’t really see how I was going to anytime soon. Looking back on it now, the most important step I took during those first few weeks was totally re-conceiving my idea of a yoga practice. Although I’d studied yoga philosophy, asana had always been at the core of my practice. As a new mom, I came to think about practice more broadly, in terms of self-care. Since I was breastfeeding, the most yogic thing I could do for my baby and me was to take several minutes three times a day to eat a healthy meal.  If I couldn’t sleep for more than a couple hours at a time, at least I could get energy from good food.  On mornings when my doula came over, she’d prepare me a protein packed salad with a sliced hard-boiled egg and chick peas. In the evenings, my husband Neil often made me a bowl of sauteed kale, baked tofu, and brown rice.  It wasn’t the same as a downward dog, but it was a start. Are you a new mom hoping to rediscover your yoga practice?  Are you feeling guilty because you haven’t gotten back onto your mat or dusted off your meditation cushion?  Why not start simply, by asking your partner or best friend or mom to make you a special, healthy lunch or dinner? Take a few minutes to eat in peace and quiet, away from your baby.  Definitely don’t nurse while you’re eating! Savor the prana from the food on your plate, and relish the loving way it was prepared for you. Know that with this small step you’re on the (long) road to recovering your yoga practice. Share your favorite new yoga mom meals here!

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The Yoga in Tofu

Jessica Berger Gross is one of our newest bloggers. Join her as she embarks on her yogic journey into motherhood: — Who has time for yoga? That’s how I felt when my amazing son Lucien was born two years ago. I went from having a daily meditation and yoga practice to losing both and starting from scratch.  In my new blog Enlightened Motherhood , I’ll chronicle how one mom (part-time writer, part-time college teacher, part-time stay-at-home parent) struggles and attempts — and sometimes  manages — to stay sane and live a yoga-inspired life in the real world of diapers, deadlines, and toddler meltdowns. — Jessica is the author of enLIGHTened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle Pointer (Skyhorse).  Originally from New York, she lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two-year-old son.

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Introducing Jessica Berger Gross

Kristin Shepherd is one of our newest bloggers. Join her as she takes on the challenges of yoga from the perspective of a newcomer in her new blog Beginner’s Mind : — I don’t know a hootkatassana from a pranayama. Yet. Although I have done bits of yoga over my lifetime, I only jumped in the deep end seven months ago, with regular classes and then my daily practice at home. What I do know is the deliciousness of yoga for a beginner (I can breathe! I can turn my neck in the car!), its frustrations (the clothes! the inflexibility!), and the way yoga becomes a part of everything else that happens during a day.  The way you drive your friends and family mad with yoga talk, the way half of them join yoga because of your ecstatic ranting. It feels as though i have come home after 48 years. I’ll bet some of you can identify.  I hope you’ll join me. — Kristin Shepherd is a chiropractor, a self-proclaimed theater freak and a yogi.  She’s a relative newcomer, and says she really, really knows how it feels to be 48, a bit tight, and a little wobbly. Kristin finds herself happiest, so far, in the back row of every yoga class.

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Introducing Kristin Shepherd

No question: The Gray Lady has gone ga-ga for yoga. Monday’s New York Times Sunday Styles section features an above-the-fold feature on the “yoga rock star” (not really) Greg Gumucio and his East Village studio, Yoga to the People , which offers classes on a donation-only basis.  These kinds of “dharma yoga” classes have long been an occasional offering at enlightened studios around the country–providing access to those who might not be able to attend class otherwise. The Times’ story, penned by Mary Billard, includes a running list of other New York studios that offer donation-based or reduced-cost yoga, including Strala Yoga , Yoga Vida , and Do Yoga and Pilates . But it overlooks Dharma Yoga Brooklyn , which opened in Park Slope in March.  Every class on that studio’s schedule is donation-based–even the mats and towels are available for whatever fee you care to offer, and a donation-based bookshop is in the works. Dharma Yoga co-founder Lily Cushman (her partner is Jeremy Frindel) has every confidence that donation-based yoga will continue to thrive in the outer boroughs, too–it may even shape the future of American yoga.  As is the case with Yoga to the People, higher class attendance means viable monetary yield even though some students may choose to donate nothing. “When people ask how we’ll make it, we just say we have faith–in ourselves and in our students,” says Cushman. “It’s so nice to spread the teachings and give back to the people.”  What do you think of donation-based yoga? Is dharma yoga available where you live? Is this the yoga wave of the future?

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Dharma Initiative

I’m back from Sedona after shooting my new DVDs, resting up from the wild ride that was last week. And when I say “wild,” I mean it. To be transplanted from the concrete jungle that is Manhattan–where the closest I get to flora are the bouquets sold in front of every deli, and my fauna sightings consist of dogs on leashes and the occasional subway rat–was quite the experience. When I arrived at the location, a plateau in Red Rock State Park overlooking a basin and surrounded by rust-red mountains, it took my breath away. I took a big chance and decided to film the whole thing using a live microphone instead of adding in the sound later from a studio recording. Alas, the wind, sun, and occasional rain didn’t care that we were shooting a yoga video. Viewers will hear and see it all, just as it naturally happened. The light shifts, the dust swirls, and at one point I felt like I was in the middle of a Harry Potter -esque duel of elements. At one point, I was blown right off the mat in a Warrior Two–something you might usually only see on a video outtake. I came to the location thinking everything would be peaceful, leaving us to our Zen creation. Once I’d been there for 5 minutes, however, I knew I’d have to shift my expectations and transform how I would approach the experience. Yoga teaches us that the inability to go with the flow, instead trying mold the outer environment to suit your inner needs, is the greatest cause of suffering. This week I want to return to the idea of aparigraha , or nongrasping, and show you how to use it to your benefit when situations arise that you don’t expect. There are two choices whenever you find yourself in a state of duhkha , or suffering, because something’s not going the way you’d hoped. You can hang onto your expectation in a state of stress and strain, or you can shrug your shoulders, turn towards the new information, and say, simply, How can I turn this to my advantage? The great thing about aparigraha is that if you’re holding on too tightly to one perspective, you’re just as capable of picking up another, more empowering one, and holding it instead. The transition from “this cannot be happening” to “this is my teaching” is a hard at first. But like anything, with practice, it gets easier. Just as every yoga pose that challenges you and feels uncomfortable is another call to learn to move from a state of resisting intensity to using it to serve your ultimate goals. For me, it all comes down to not needing to control everything and thinking I know what needs to happen for me to be content. Instead, when I stepped on that mountain and things started getting crazy, I didn’t. I looked around, took a deep breath, and thought, “Here we are. Now, what are we going to do with it?” I heard from the directors that the footage we shot looks incredible, and that the wind adds to the teaching instead of detracting from it. But I still made sure to mention at the beginning of the video that we were in for quite a ride, and used it as a way to show that I was practicing what I teach. Even if it hadn’t turned out so well, I would have embraced that, taken it inside, and turned it into a learning experience to help me become wiser, stronger, and more prepared for the next time. We can all do this, no matter how easy or challenging the teaching that shows up may be. Remain watchful, open, and resilient. And when the opportunity arises for you to alchemize a disappointment or fear into something wild and free, grab onto it with both hands. Core Pose: Poet’s Pose (also known as a variation of Half Moon Pose, or Ardha Chandrasana, variation) This pose presents a wonderful way to experience the ebbs and flows of balance while striving to remain inwardly centered even when you topple over from the strong winds of change. As you approach it, remember to keep your breathing even and your drishti , or gaze, on the ground beneath you. Stand toward the front of your mat, feet sitting-bone-distance apart. Bend your knees and place the fingertips of both hands a little wider than shoulder distance in front of you. On an exhalation, bring your left knee into your chest and activate your lower abdominals and natural low back curve in and up towards the ribs. Maintain a long tailbone and open heart as you begin to open your left hip to stack over the right. With your core engaged, begin to lengthen your left leg out behind you at hip height, and unfurl your chest and left arm to the sky. Keep looking down as you play with bending your right standing leg and lifting your right fingertips off the floor and into your chest. Contract your topside waist as you press firmly and evenly into the floor with the right foot. Straighten your standing leg in time. Hold for 3-5 breaths. Return to Standing Forward Bend and give a sweet exhale through the mouth, releasing any tension you were holding inside. Repeat on the other side. 
    

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Embrace the Unexpected

I’m in Sedona this week filming my next two DVDs. I’d heard that this area is ideal for spiritual quests and uniting with your source energy, which is why I wanted to shoot here.  In addition to completing the videos, I have a goal: To find my spirit animal. On my time off, I’ve kept my eye out for the symbol of my spirit in animal form, something that the indigenous North American cultures hold sacred. The first two days, all I saw were ants and flies. I began to wonder if it was possible to have a spirit insect instead. Then today, while I was out walking, two jet-black ravens suddenly appeared and stood in my path.  One was tearing apart someone’s old sandwich and the other stood silently looking at me. We studied each other for a long moment, and then the sandwich-free Raven flew away, gorgeous and free, and the other remained to finish its dinner. I was both disgusted and awed by these creatures, and though I’d been hoping for something cool like a wolf or a scorpion, I realized how perfect these spirit guides were for me. Ravens are believed to be keepers of wisdom and secrets, and one of their jobs is to help those they are linked with become better teachers. Plus, since my take on yoga is that it’s found everywhere, both in the ugliness and the beauty of life, these two ravens taught me to remember to not only seek my lessons in comfort and ease, but also in times of discomfort and even when I don’t make myself proud. Like anything, spirit guides may or may not be “real,” but anything that leads us into a deeper awareness of ourselves is a tradition I can get behind. In yoga, we say that self-recognition in seemingly external sources is another way to practice svadhyaya , or study of the sacred and of the Self. Whatever leads you to directly contemplate your highest inner nature and use your actions to create a lifestyle of integrity is sacred study. Your svadhyaya might be a rock song, a Pablo Neruda poem, the Yoga Sutra, or a quiet walk in the woods. My ravens are only me, introducing myself to who I really am. Today, I invite you to keep your eyes open for your animal spirit and your ears tuned for voices of wisdom that may come from any and all directions. Maybe you’ve already got one speaking to you or maybe your guide will meet you along your path in an unexpected way. When we walk with presence and an open ear, we’ll receive our teachings that much more easily. So, who’s whispering to you–from you–right now? Core Pose: Eka Pada Galavasana (also known as Flying Crow) It’s as close as I could get to the raven, and it’s a great pose for teaching svadhyaya in action: moving from Earth to sky using your deep core connection. At any step along the way, if you find yourself losing integrity, back off, check in, find the pose variation that brings you to your personal edge of transformation, and play there.  In time, you might go farther physically. But either way, you’ll be accessing your source of presence and wisdom right where you are. 1. Come into Utkatasana (Chair Pose) and cross one ankle over the opposite knee.  Bring your palms together at your chest. Stay evenly grounded on your standing foot and begin to hinge forward from the hips. If possible, place your elbows in front of your standing leg’s shin, lift your belly in and up to lengthen the spine, and breathe. 2.  Bend forward and plant your hands on the floor shoulder-distance apart. Spread your fingers wide and parallel your wrist creases to the front of the mat. Dig deep to hook your top foot snugly around the opposite arm, and press your knee into the same arm. Lean from your heart and gaze forward as you align your elbows over your wrists. Root down through your hands, press your arms into your shin, and lift through your belly as you raise the standing foot off the floor. 3.  When you can hover in step 2, float the heart forward and simultaneously lengthen the back leg for a full flying variation.

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The Animal Within

this today: Welcome to Yoga Journal’s Wish I Was Wearing Wednesday! Every Wednesday designer and yogini Alexandra Zeigler will share her favorite yoga outfits or eco-friendly streetwear looks. Here’s what Ali has to say about this week’s outfit: Nothing says spring like petal pink. Actually, I’ve never been much of a pink girl, but I’m coming around to it, especially when I’m dying for spring to bloom. Hopefully it will soon be time to bust out our yoga shorts! By the way, how much do you love the 100% organic cosmetic bag by Sukie? It’s so cute I’d use it to stash my wallet, keys, and cell phone on my way to class. Check out their other adorable designs too at the link below. (And check out Ali’s blog for more design and craft inspiration.) the details: Seamless Anjali Cami, Athleta Fusion Short, Athleta Organic Cotton Cosmetic Bag, Sukie Vegan Babylon Flat, Olsen Haus (available at Vickery )  Heart photograph via Blow Bigger Bubbles

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Wish I Was Wearing

This weekend, I’m leading a three-day Core Strength Immersion in New York City. After writing my post about respecting limitations while still seeking transformation, I decided to make a public statement, not only to the 60 students in the room, but all the future yogis who will watch the Immersion (it’s being filmed): Let your poses be imperfect. That’s right; I’ve hit a tipping point in my teaching where I am becoming much more interested in what a student can do to be more honestly themself in a pose, and I care much less how straight they can get their front leg in Triangle. For an instructor who doubles as an anatomy geek, it may seem unusual to hear me say this, yet nothing could be more my style. Symmetry, or perfection as we sometimes think of it (the “perfect” body, relationship, or handstand), is what you get in a office building, with its level surfaces and, straight lines. Balance, on the other hand, is what nature does, and it’s wild and free, yet comes to find its own equilibrium after all. Think of a river, which meanders here and there but ultimately reaches its source.   In your yoga poses, and your life–have you been remaining sensitive to your state of balance, or straining for symmetry? If it’s the latter, this may help give you perspective: There is not one thing in the human body that runs in a straight line. Our bones, blood, and breath all move in a spiral motion. Our nerves, spine, brain, joints, GItract? Not linear either. Yet so often, we strive to attain linear poses that our bodies are not made to reach. We want to be in alignment in a way that’s healthy and balanced, but it’s easy to let symmetry-seeking creep into the process. The end result can be a hardening of the outer body, layering on more and more  tension as we try to grip and force ourselves into pre-conceived geometry. Instead, there is a way of balancing this sthira (strength) with sukha (ease). A way to allow our spinning, waving, spiraling selves to soften enough to find the true edge, dissolve areas of tension, and still move forward into what is our unique optimal alignment. I speak from experience, because I used to be militant about doing every pose “right.” In my quest for the perfect body on and off the mat, I developed an eating disorder as well as a ton of yoga-related repetitive stress injuries. Along the way, I did reach my goal of handstand without the wall. What I did not attain, however, was any sort of happiness or joy. Therefore, in my opinion, I wasn’t practicing yoga at all, but dukha , or suffering. A focus on perfection will always circle back to the big D. Later in life and yoga, I got so sick (literally) of forcing myself into a box, that I began to seek out studios and teachers who advocated mindful, individual adaptation over form. I noticed that most of these teachers were over 40, many of them much older. Their physical asanas were very different than mine, yet the message is so freeing: Take this practice, poses, lessons and all, and make it yours, without apology or regret. Approaching 40 myself, I can tell you that a relaxation occurs after a certain amount of time struggling and failing to reach absolute symmetry. You see it in the attitudes of certain grandparents, and it shows up in the practices of longtime yogis.  The amazing thing is, once I let go of my quest for the unattainable, many of the poses, like the hovering jump-forward that I could never before master, became available to me. Yoga, ultimately is a path of personal transformation, not perfection. Reclaiming this aspect of your practice gets you into direct connection with your core, and asks that you express your truth to the world in the way that’s best for you. When we remember that our growth and spiritual awakening happens only to the extent we can get present, get close to our inner nature, and take actions from integrity–none of which have a thing to do with a false ideal of perfection–life becomes wildly, strangely, perfect after all. Core Pose: CAT/COW VARIATIONS Sometimes, I feel like anything not on the the mat is forbidden territory–or “hot lava,” as we called it in my childhood. Yet venturing outside the rectangle can be just what you need to find pockets of tension, and then move and breathe to release them. Come onto your hands and knees. Take a few arches and curls of the spine, then begin to move creatively as you listen to the cues of your body. Move your head, your arms, and even legs to serve your goals of equalizing support and freedom. Spend a few minutes in this pose, adventuring in your own way!

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A Better Balance

Photo by David Lauridsen for The New York Times Did you see the story about Demi Moore in Sunday’s New York Times Arts & Leisure section? It was a stylish, if perfunctory, update on her career. (She’s back! She’s better than ever! But now she’s playing the mother!) But what drew our eye was this aside, in which writer Jennifer Steinhauer explains a fallow period in Moore’s career, a time in which the actress disappeared from the Hollywood radar to focus solely on family: “It was not that she retired, as was widely reported, she was just resting, a career Savasana.” End of sentence. No long-winded explanation–or short-winded one, for that matter–was offered. This surely is a cultural turning point–we have reached such a level of yoga saturation that Savasana has become a common-usage term, in need of no definition, no parenthetical aside, no translation–even in a mass-market newspaper of record. Will the moment be memorialized by Ben Zimmer in an upcoming On Language column? We can only hope so!

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Corpse Bride

I was leading a Core Strength Vinyasa Yoga practice for a group of yoga teachers the other day, and one of them asked me afterwards why I prefer to cartwheel out of an overzealous handstand rather than drop over into a backbend. Poses that require lumbar movement are a real challenge for me, not because of a lack of flexibility or strength–my lumbar spine has hardly any curve. It’s a bone compression thing, one I won’t be able to change no matter how hard I try. And, believe me, I tried WAY too hard for years. I’m more than slightly competitive by nature, so naturally when I began my yoga practice, I coveted all the stately, arching poses I couldn’t do. From the first Sun Salutation, I rushed past Cobra in favor of Up Dog. To me, Bridge wasn’t a pose, just an impatient pit-stop on my express lane into Wheel. I held a death grip on my ideal pose: Forearm Stand Scorpion … and I wouldn’t let it go, until it became the straw that (literally) almost broke my back. One day, spine be damned, I forced myself past my healthy edge. The result was a herniated disc that pressed right into my sciatic nerve, and for 6 months, I was regressed to prenatal Cobra Pose. One day, while grumbling through the tiniest seed of low Bridge Pose while the rest of the class was in full Wheel, I realized something amazing: This backbend actually felt good!  It was well-supported and my heart was able to expand from the strong root underneath. My newfound awareness of how backing off had actually helped me find the equilibrium I’d sought, opened my eyes to the fact that grasping for external success at the expense of internal balance wasn’t just my tendency in the yoga pose, but also in my life. I looked around me and saw jealousy showing up everywhere. My inability to be confident in my own skin was causing all my relationships–and me–to suffer.   If my partner spoke to someone I thought was better looking than me, I would feel immensely insecure. I had a hard time feeling truly happy for my friend who got a sudden financial windfall because I didn’t have as much. Whether on or off the mat, I wanted more, to be better than everyone, to have nothing left to want or attain before I would be satisfied. Yogis call this parigraha , the yogic term for “grasping at externals,” or being unable to let go of the ego’s desires and access your own inherent satisfaction. It’s one of the biggest causes of dukha , or living in pain. As I progressed in my yoga studies, it became crystal clear that I was wasting a lot of energy looking outside of myself for my center. Getting conscious meant I had to surrender my grasp on the fantasy and step into the reality. I began to let go of my idea of what I “should” be able to do, and started owning who I was and be where I needed to be. The happy result of this practice of owning my truth is that I relaxed at a deep core level, and chronic jealousy disappeared from my life. I can honor my friends and students for their accomplishments, because I’m just as fully at work rocking who I am. When we practice aparigraha , or releasing the death grip on externals as our only source of happiness, we actually create another kind of hold–this time a powerful merging with our own core connection. We unite with our natural wellspring of self-created joy and can truly become a positive part of our community. My body may not backbend beyond a cranky full wheel, but it is made for poses that require core strength like handstand and arm balances. Since we teach what we know, I’ve made this strength into my style. I’m so glad I finally saw that who I was would serve me better than who I wasn’t. I encourage you to do the same, in any aspect of your life where you perceive something (or someone) outside of you as the thing that controls your confidence, empowerment, and peace. The power of yoga, or unity with one’s truth, is that coping and co-dependence dissolve in the light of your self-generated OK-ness. It’s an old cliché, but to do this, you have to decide to believe that you’re enough, just as you are–and then take actions that mirror that view.   In time, this shift from parigraha to aparigraha will become your new truth. Now, when I teach, I make sure to give multiple variations, and encourage the students to find and play their own unique edges. “No matter what your level or ability, your poses are all equally valuable as your personal vehicle of transformation,” I say. And I notice that if I don’t grasp at their practices, or enforce attainment of the more advanced poses, it tames the green-eyed monsters in the room to hear it. Do I still covet the effortless rainbow spines of my fellow yogis? Sometimes. But now I know it doesn’t define me. I listen to my body in any given moment, let my ego take a backseat, and say with an inner smile, “This is my pose … and I’m sticking to it.” Core Question: Where in your yoga practice have you been letting something external define your happiness? How about in your life? What will you do differently to practice aparigraha in these situations? Core Pose: Heart-opening Sukhasana variation into Crossed Boat. This is one of the poses I do to prepare for backbends. It gives all the chest-opening and upper back and core strength needed without diving too far, too fast into the lumbar curve. Come into Sukhasana (Easy Pose). Inhale and stretch the chest and arms up as the shoulders and tailbone lengthen down. Exhale, rock back onto the sitting bones, firm the lower abdominals, and bring fists to the outer hips for a core strength mudra I call Fists of Fire. If possible, lift your knees and/or crossed ankles off the floor. Whatever variation you choose, make sure it’s one where you can maintain the natural curve of your lumber spine. It must draw in as you lift the legs to counteract the movement of the front body. Repeat 5 times.

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No More Grasping

I’ll admit it: I’m an Ayurveda geek. I think you should be, too. Ayurveda is the healing wisdom of yoga, a profound technology for carrying the balance you’re achieving on the mat out into the rest of your life. And even if you never get into the super-detailed nitty gritty (it is a science after all), even the most cursory of explorations is likely to expand your self-knowledge, and may even lead to an AH-HA! Now’s a good time to delve into Ayurveda, especially if you live in the San Francisco Bay Area: The seventh annual meeting of the National Ayurvedic Medical Association (or NAMA) takes place in San Mateo this week. If you’re nearby, consider nabbing a day pass–there will be yoga (of course), meditation, panel discussions, seminars, and even shopping. And there will be the chance to hear from and hobnob with the greats of American Ayurveda: Robert Svoboda, David Frawley, Vasant Lad, Yogini Shambhavi, Mark Halpern, and David Simon, M.D., among others. Even if you can’t get to the physical space, taking a virtual tour of the conference schedule can give you a good feel for what Ayurveda is, and how it might be useful to you as you work to deepen your practice, heal your body, and expand your spiritual vistas. (At the very least, it will give you plenty of fodder for further Google exploration of the subject.) In many ways, this “science of life” is life–completely relevant to you whether you choose to use it or not. But then, an Ayurveda geek would say that.

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NAMArama

Whenever yoga makes it into the mainstream media, it tends to look like one of the following: 1. A daffy trend story, the main thrust of which is, “Gee, this yoga thing is really catching on!” 2. Overt mockery. Or 3. A prescription for an awesome workout! So we were surprised last week to see–on CNN Headline News–a beautiful little story about Sue Jones and the YogaHOPE foundation. Part of the channel’s “Breakthrough Women” series, the focus was on how Jones used yoga to overcome her own severe depression and suicidal thoughts–then founded a nonprofit organization aimed at extending a lifeline to other women grappling with mental health issue. Boston-based YogaHOPE brings yoga into drug and alcohol treatment centers, halfway houses, homeless shelters, and other places where “at risk” women tend to congregate. As Jones told CNN’s Robin Meade, “It was a desire of mine to teach yoga to women who I felt might be at a crisis point in their lives, and might be on the verge of making a very self-destructive or dangerous decision.” We know, of course, that practicing yoga leads to self transformation–but that’s news to women lost in the woods of addiction. Good news, a Jones says. Learn more about the program–including how to participate or donate–at YogaHOPE.org .

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There’s Always Hope

Yoga on the White House lawn? Yes! For the second year in a row, First Lady Michelle Obama turned the once prim and proper White House Easter Egg Roll (now in its 132 nd year) into a fitness party for kids, with dancing, hula-hooping, tennis, soccer, football–and yoga. Under the flowering trees of the stately White House gardens–downplayed as Mrs. Obama into “our back yard”–families from all over the country rocked their best Tree Poses on Monday.   I even talked the Cat in the Hat into giving it a try with me! In flouncy, floral print Easter dresses and tights, stiff trousers and ties, as well as jeans and shorts, eager Down Doggers lined up on their mats. And yes, all day, there were gentle choruses of “Om” drifting up from the White House Lawn! It was a pretty powerful moment–some 30,000 families, from all 50 states, got a chance to learn about yoga, with a presidential seal of approval. It seems evident that yoga is a perfect match for the First Lady’s Let’s Move! Initiative, which aims to curtail our childhood obesity epidemic by inspiring Americans to live healthy, active lives. Hats off to the organizers and the small crew of yoga teachers who came in from distant states (Ohio, Texas, California, New York, to name a few) to lead 10-minute mini-classes and even conduct “privates” for kids who wanted a taste of yoga as they passed by the White House “Yoga Garden.” I heard more than one parent try to lure their child off to other activities–Easter Egg Roll anyone?!–only to learn that Camel Pose was the priority of the moment. With endless entertainment options– President Obama reading Green Eggs and Ham; teen pop star Justin Beber, the cast of Glee, and Yo Gabba Gabba performing; famous chefs helping kids learn to cook–it’s a wonder anyone had time for yoga. But yoga they did!  

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Posing at the White House

This week, I’m preparing to teach at the Yoga Journal Conference in Boston. (I’ll share my experiences with you next week!) This is the first time I’ll be presenting during the main conference, and I’m thrilled by the new direction my teaching is taking. But I didn’t always feel this way.     I spent the majority of my career telling people (and myself) that I had absolutely no desire to become “one of those touring yogis.”   I don’t know if this attitude came out of my belief that it would never happen, and so I thought, why pursue it? Or that I was daunted by the work it would take, so figured, why begin it? Perhaps it’s that I’m a Scorpio and like to hide out under my self-created rocks and write. Who knows?   Regardless of the reason, I was 100 percent sure that the way my life looks now would never be my reality. Then one day, I got the call. Or, rather, I made the call.   I was speaking to someone at Yoga Journal about an unrelated matter, and we began discussing my interest in leading a Friday evening, pre-main conference class at the New York City event. As soon as I was asked to do it, my heart and mind leapt at the chance.   Now, I had no idea I would want to do this, much less really, really want to do it. I was as surprised by my reaction as I was by the 98 beautiful people who showed up to my workshop on the appointed night.   But at the moment of invitation, I clearly saw that my highest satya , or truth, was not that I wanted to live a quiet, hermetic life and never be inconvenienced by travel. It’s that I want to serve and share the healing modality of yoga with as many people as possible. And so my lesser resistance was broken by the simple power of my Dharma uprising.   In the year that followed, I was nearly inundated with offers to present at other conferences and at healing centers and studios. Before I was open to accepting this aspect of my teaching life, very few opportunities appeared. Yet the moment I said yes, they opened to me in the most rewarding and exciting ways. I have now become “one of those touring yogis”– and I’ve never been happier.   As I take this next step along my teaching path, I’m struck by what the simple removal of resistance can do. It also occurs to me that in order to break through the walls we erect that block our life’s path, we can’t just stand by passively and do nothing. We have to meet resistance with Resistance.   I capitalize the word “Resistance” to distinguish between the constructive actions that serve us and that push back against the destructive resistances that don’t serve us. Another name for this is satyagraha , or way of truth. Gandhi made satyagraha the focal point in his life through positive, or nonviolent, Resistance.   In your own life, both on and off the mat, I invite you to look at where you’re hitting up against resistance to what might actually serve you. Kids do this when they refuse to try broccoli. Adults do it when we choose an unhealthy meal over a yoga class or self-criticism over confidence.     Don’t think for a minute that I’m free of the push and pull of limiting behaviors and beliefs. Every one of us experiences the drag of resistance. But as yogis, it’s what we do from there that can either transform us or keep us stuck in the mud.     So the next time you stumble upon a personal roadblock, take an action from satyagraha: Instead of turning to old habits, use your spiritual stubbornness to break through.   I’ll see you on the road!     Core Questions : Where are you meeting resistance? Are you afraid to release your old stories, to adopt healthy habits, or to form nourishing relationships? Most of all, do you exist in a consciousness of lack or thrive in a mindset of abundance? Share your struggles and victories with us. Core Pose : Lakshmi Kick I designed this pose to release old, stagnant energies; tone the lower body; unlock the hips; and literally kick down the doors of inner resistance. It’s named for Lakshmi, goddess of prosperity, abundance, wisdom, and beauty–attributes that can only be achieved through the practice of satyagraha.   Come to the front of your mat, feet slightly apart. Fold forward and plant your fingertips a few inches in front of your toes.   On an inhalation, draw one knee into your chest. Exhale the sound “Ha!” as you mindfully and strongly kick your leg up behind you. The sound not only firms your abdominals to support the kick, it’s a mantra to the Sun as well as to your individual brightness and your possibilities.   Repeat 5-10 times; then switch to the other side. Rest in Child’s Pose when finished.         

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Breaking Through Resistance

(photo by Jon Ewing ) Salutations to the Washington Monument and 1,700 people enjoying the freedom of yoga. Rising up into Warrior I, my eyes took in the tip of the Washington Monument piercing a cloudy sky, and I offered my Sun Salutations to independence, freedom, and all that makes me proud to be American. After a couple of days in Washington DC brushing up on our national history at the American History Museum (seeing an Edison lightbulb, the flag that inspired “The Star Spangled Banner” and President Lincoln’s top hat), it’s hard not to feel a little patriotic. And after seeing the sea of yogis stretched across the National Mall on Saturday morning, it’s hard not to feel ecstatic about how our nation is embracing yoga. The event, organized by Lululemon Athletica as part of Washington’s National Cherry Blossom Festival, drew a great crowd–the unofficial count was 1,700 people. It was a site to behold! And so cool to be a part of this moment in history, when yoga is becoming as American as apple pie. In an hour-plus class led by Peggy Mulqueen , we breathed together through everything from Hanumanasana (Full Splits) to Bakasana (Crane Pose) to partner Navasana (Boat Pose). Onstage, local teachers, including Yoga Journal’s May cover model Faith Hunter , and a few guests like Ashtanga yoga teacher David Kyle treated the crowd to an impressive display of power and grace. Beneath giant American flags, and on top of a rainbow of sticky mats, there was a spirit of freedom–and a lot of free spirits!–in the air. 

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History in the Being

Yoga on wheels. No, not spinning. (So 2005!) Think rollerblades instead. The latest unnecessary but totally fun yoga-exercise mash-up, Mobile Yoga has inline skaters turning all their favorite asanas into balancing poses by performing them on wheels. Think of a floating Fierce Pose, a wind-whipped Warrior III, or a gliding Garudasana and you’ll get the picture. Founder Kris Fondran is an inline skating instructor with a masters in exercise science; she’s also a certified yoga instructor with some serious cred (trained in Satyananda Yoga, she received mantra diksha initiation from Paramahamsa Niranjanananda Saraswati in 2004). You can see the threads of her practice emerge in her instruction, which is as much about breathing and awareness building as it is about getting a great cardio workout. And though her Web site looks totally L.A.–she’s pictured posing against a background of blue skies, beaches, and palm trees–Fondran is based in Cleveland, Ohio. Silly or sublime? Strap on your skates and decide for yourself.

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On a Roll

I arrived home from the Toronto Yoga Conference yesterday minus one important thing: my voice! Fortunately it didn’t happen until the very last minute of my last class. The students had to do the OM on their own, leading to a rousing rainbow of notes, but they got all the information I needed to offer. The key for next time I accept a conference position, is not to talk less. I’m a very verbal instructor, and what I hear from my inner teacher, I translate in its entirety for my students. The solution is to do slightly fewer classes. This is hard for me to admit. I’m the type of person who will stagger into my house carrying eight grocery bags to avoid two trips. I would rather power through my day than take a nap, and I’m more likely to give a massage than to get one. Whether I’m doing a six-hour Core Strength immersion or a one-hour private, I tend to give everything I have to help steer people toward their Source. Sometimes, in my quest to open them to center, I neglect to hold my own. No matter who you are, there is a particular shiny object in your life that tends, like a bluebird decorating her nest and seeing only the glint of silver on the ground–but not the wolf waiting in the bushes–to draw one’s attention away from the predatory dangers of misalignment, depletion, and suffering. For me, the shine, my utter passion, is helping others to remember themselves, to contain their prana, and then send it out into the world in ways that reflects their deepest truth. To do this, I share my personal path: the realizations, actions, and type of yoga practice that helped me to empower, self-nourish, and stop a vicious cycle of chronic fatigue and dysfunctional relationships that were causing me a world of hurt. I know that this important message is a positive way to use my energy. However, even a positive can become a negative if it begins to drain the offerer in favor of the offering. In yoga circles, we refer to this process of striking personal balance as the daily see-saw between sukha and dukha. The words translate to mean “good space” and “bad space.” We can also interpret them to mean ease and suffering. In fact, we tend to invite experiences into our lives that appear as repetitive drama cycles, like getting into the same struggle in your romantic relationships over and over (’Haven’t I dated you before?”), or running into the same problems with different business partners. These seemingly external experiences don’t have to be seen as random. They can be our teachers, illuminating the lessons of how not to take the road of craving and instant gratification, but rather to make the more intense, rewarding choices that help us come back into our natural state of equilibrium, self-respect, and peace. Today, as I rest, cuddle with the cats, and let my voice return, I’m aware of my own responsibility to myself and my students not to be a hypocrite–I have to both talk the talk and walk the walk. Now that I’ve received my teaching, I will use it to tip my balance back in favor of giving in enough, rather than giving out too much. From here on, I’ll set better boundaries and let workshop organizers know what I can offer (12 hours or so should be win-win for us both), and make sure that I don’t let my zest for teaching override my personal nourishment. After all, if I’m to lead by example, then what better way to do it than by sharing my own learning curve? And, even for teachers, it’s sometimes steep. Core Question : What’s your biggest energy drain or repeating drama, and how can you come back into balance around it? Core Pose: Anahata Twist Your mid-back is the first place twists can freely occur, so sometimes we get stuck in our more hyper-mobile spots. This pose will bring your twist higher–into the upper spine, shoulders, and neck in a variation designed to nourish the area around the heart and throat. Lie on your side in a fetal position, place both hands on the mat, and spin just your heart to the floor–legs stay like they were. Place your arms on the floor, elbows bent, forearms, and palms down in a cactus shape. Turn your head away from the direction your knees are pointing for the most spinal rotation, or to the same side for less. Breathe into the back of your heart and higher for one minute or more, then repeat on the other side.

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Coming Into Balance

On Saturday, Seane Corn came to teach at my home studio: YogaWorks in SoHo, NYC. I’ve taken one workshop with her before and really enjoyed it. Plus, we see each other around on the conference circuit. So, since she was right in my ‘hood, I decided to enroll in her weekend classes on vinyasa sequencing. When I arrived on my mat, multiple people, some of them my regular students, came up to me with baffled looks on their faces. “Why are you here?” someone said, as if I had nothing left to learn. My answer was the same as it always is at moments like this: “I know what I know. I want to find out what I don’t know yet!” And I learned a lot, or as Seane might say, I remembered more of what I already know in her daylong sessions. I’m proud to show my students that my role as a teacher doesn’t mean that I’ve stopped being a student. Knowledge is fluid and always evolving, just like I am, and my teaching will mature and shift as I do. I refuse to hide my process of studentship for fear that my students will think I’m less of a teacher. I’m confident in my abilities and my unique perspectives on yoga, so I rest in my truth, and let others think what they will. It reminded me to remind you that life gets so much easier when you stop seeking approval from those around you and instead focus on accessing your deepest truth, or satya. If you lose your center the moment someone else has an unfavorable opinion of you, you’ll become everything for everyone, but very little of yourself. When I began teaching yoga, I would change the way I taught based on every student’s critique. In one month, it led me to teach faster, teach slower, talk less, talk more, make it easier, make it harder, and on and on. It was maddening, and my truth was lost in the quest to please everyone. Nowadays, I come into a workshop, speak my truth (which is not the only truth), give them a million percent of what my spirit is directing me to offer, and then I go home. Most people love it, a few think it’s pretty good, and there’s almost always one who can’t stand me.   And you know what? That’s OK. It used to bother me for days if I got negative feedback from someone. But as I teach more, I see that will always be the case, no matter how I change my message. So I stick to my core. Finally, I’ve learned to go into any classroom with one intention: I’m not here to cater…I’m here to teach. In your life, you can spend all your time and energy shape shifting to accommodate everyone’s needs or you can focus on living from your center. This is the exact moment when taking it personally transforms into the practice of giving it personally… …and you need no one’s stamp of approval but your own to do that. Core Question: Have you ever over-compromised your truth to please those around you? What happened when you decided to be fully yourself? Core Pose : Crossed Navasana with Fists of Fire This is one of my signature Core Poses. It’s meant to draw you out of your head and down into your center. Come into a cross-legged position like Sukhasana (Easy Pose). Place one foot in front of the other. Inhale, roll forward as you reach up, and lift the hips a few inches off the mat. Exhale, roll onto your sitting bones, engage the navel and low back in and up as you lift knees and feet higher. Repeat 5 to 10 times, then end in a forward fold from Easy Pose.

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Living Your Truth

Everyone’s favorite supermodel, Brazilian beauty Gisele Bundchen, practices Anusara Yoga. She talks about how yoga kept her fit during her pregnancy in the April issue of Vogue. You can read part of the article here . In it, you’ll learn that her son Benjamin Rein Brady was delivered at home in a water birth, her new line of natural skincare Sejaa (“seja” means “to be” in Portugese) is launching today, and that

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Supermodel Gisele Bundchen loves life and yoga

According to Malcolm Gladwell (whose book “Outliers” I’m devouring right now), the people who are most successful in their fields, like Bill Gates, Canadian hockey stars, and top NYC lawyers, to name a few, all have one thing in common: They have each spent over 10,000 hours involved doing their craft. This isn’t the only indicator of what we in yoga would call “mastery,” but it’s a big one. Now, before I stumbled upon my first yoga class all those years ago, I was pretty close to reaching master status–in dysfunctional relationships. I’m certain I put in nearly 10,000 hours dealing with them, before yoga taught me to get clear about–and steer clear of–toxic partners. I spent the next 15 years quite differently, focusing most of my time and energy on comprehending what yoga meant to me, then clarifying how I could best share my Core Strength message with others. Whenever drama arose in my life, I used it to deepen my practice, not take me away from it. After reading the book, I calculated that I’ve spent about 32,000 hours practicing, translating and teaching yoga. I’m not seeking recognition, though that seems to be a byproduct of making myself accessible through mass media. To me, true success means that one has attained such a deep level of integration with what they’ve practiced that it becomes a part of them, and they can use it to more powerfully share their talents and voice with the world. But, just like the polarities of ha-tha or the sun and moon energies of yoga, developing a deep identification with an activity can become a negative samskara, (ingrained habitual actions). In other words, mastery can have a dark side. Those 10,000 hours can either help you attain your greatest goals–or hold you back from them. It all depends on what you’re practicing. Are you practicing health? Or misery? Today I invite you to notice where focusing the majority of your time, energy, and perspective and start a full-time job of mastering the thoughts, actions, and worldview that will serve you best. Core Question: What are you in the process of mastering? Anxiety? Negative thinking? Or maybe empowerment? Your life’s work? Crow Pose? Abundance thinking? Share your process, and inspire us by your example! Core Pose: Breath of Freedom Lunge — To throw off the weight of old, limiting habits and welcome in the new, come into a High Lunge. Inhale, reach your arms back, palms facing out. Exhale, curl your back and tailbone, tone your navel in, and embrace yourself for a job well done! Repeat 5 times or more, then switch sides.

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Mastery or Misery?

Actress Chloe Sevigny must really love yoga because she is talking it up all over the place! We aren’t sure what style she practices or where she places her mat. But this winner of a Golden Globe award for best supporting actress in a TV series graces the April cover of Elle UK and talks about her new three-times-a-week yoga practice, which makes her feel “strong” and “limber.” (She also credits yoga with boosting her libido.) In a recent interview with NPR , Sevigny talks about how yoga helps her with her scoliosis so she feels straightened out. Check it out: Our friends at YogaDork found some morsels of the interview here . Which celebrities have you noticed taking up the practice of yoga?

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Chloe Sevigny Loves Yoga