connet to your fullness from within

Summary…. This week I taught a private to a husband and wife, a group private for faculty teachers, and three public classes. In all the classes (in different ways) we focused on rooting the femur bones back, and inner spiral.

In one class I talked about the full moon and how it reminds me of purna which is Sanskrit for perfect fullness. Recently the moon. I look at the full moon and think of purna, perfect fullness. I encouraged students to be perfectly content with where they are in life, in the moment, in the pose, and that that contentment will allow them to feel full. Full of the divine essence that fills us all in such abundance.

I wanted to connect with the idea that we are all ready full as we worked with rooting the thigh bones back and inner spiral. When we are looking for fullness we only need to turn within our self and we will find that our fullness is there. It is an act of remembrance. So many times we strive and we reach and we try to acquire more so that we can become full, this is the mistake because we only need to look within to see we are already full. So when our femur bones move forward toward the psoas this is like us reaching to the material world to find our fullness (which is the mistake) instead we need to root, femur bones back toward the hamstrings, this is a looking and rooting into our self to remember that we are full. That we have everything we need inside of our self.

I also connected this to inner spiral. Inner spiral is the expanding spiral. One of my teachers Jen Hecht says that inner spiral is like opening the doors. That is what we need to do to experience our fullness. We need to open the doors to our self/heart/soul to see we our full. The opposite of inner spiral, of opening the doors is slamming the doors on the idea that we already our perfect and full within our self. Slamming the doors is saying that we would rather look outside of our self to find this fullness. This will only lead to more and more unhappiness.

So that’s what we did...lots of hip stuff, really working inner spiral and rooting the femur bones back and remembering that we are perfect and full as we are! It can be hard just like asana practice can be hard but it is so worth it when we remember our own goodness and fullness!

When you realize you are perfect just the way you are and that you are always full of spirit and are an expression of Grace, you feel perfect and full (Purnatva). One mantra I use when I feel like I am not perfect, not full, or I feel defeated is….”I am perfect and whole”...A simple mantra/affirmation but it helps shift my mood and energy tremendously.

Dana Faulds, Perfect Emanation:

"The perfect emanation is

alive inside each one of us

right now. I'm not denying

my imperfect translation,

my stumbling fits and starts,

or my dark side.

Yet look at what is

manifesting! Witness how

the thread comes off

the spool without tangles,

how the tapestry of life

weaves itself

using me a loom."

:) private client

A few weeks ago a husband and wife came to my class at The Yoga Center. They then contacted me and told me how much they connected to my teaching and asked if I would offer them a private. I was so flatter. One thing I have noticed just in the few years I have been practicing and teaching is how much the community of yoga teachers is increasing, and how many styles of yoga are being offered. This is great because each teacher has a unique way of teaching, and there are so many teachers offering so many different styles. This is great for students because if you are patient you can DEFINITLY find a teacher that you connect with so much. I definitely have taken classes where I am not ‘feeling’ the teacher so much, and I have teachers that I just love and my heart feels connected to their energy and their style of teaching. Because there are so many great yoga teachers it can be intimidating. But it is always nice to get feedback, to know that you are connecting to people and that they are enjoying what you are putting out there.

the Yoga Convo

I am SUPER EXCITED about this.... Check it out....http://yogaconvo.blogspot.com/

Two of my faovorite certified teachers Christina Sell and Elena Brower both are passionate, and honest. Christina and Elena are thrilled to bring their conversations to you.


Yoga Convo is dedicated to helping people access an authentic connection to the truth of who they are through thought-provoking conversations about yoga and yoga practice as it pertains to all aspects of life.

how can you look into your diamond

In Thursday’s yoga hour class (only $4 at the Yoga Center) I talked about looking for the good. I introduced this theme by talking about a diamond. Imagine a big diamond with lots of different angles/facets. Scientists have discovered that if you look at a diamond under a magnifying glass in the center of the diamond where all the facets intersect they form the shape of a heart… How cool. I also talked about how we can get used to things for example, patterns, habits, people… For this example I talked about the weather. We get used to looking into one part of the diamond, looking at just one facet. For example we have been used to nice sunny weather. I know I personally have connected to this part of the diamond. I knew how to look through this angle of the diamond (sunny, warm weather) I could experience the heart and see the heart. We get used to this facet. We get used to the sunny weather angle to see the heart. We get used to looking at this angle of the diamond to experience the heart. However sometimes the diamond shifts. For example the weather changes (less sun, colder, and darker). It is like we are being shown another part of the diamond, this can throw us off. But we need to remember that even this new angle that the diamond is facing, no matter which facet we are looking into there is still the potential of expiring the heart and Grace. But we need to be sensitive, optimistic, and willing to do the work. The weather changing is just one example that I think is easier to identify. I think the message of this story is that we need to look for the good in all things. In every situation, just like on every angle of the diamond there is a heart that can be seen and experienced. Sometimes it might be harder to feel./experience but it is always there. We can move through our asana practice today with thus in mind.


Can you see the good in every pose? Even if you fall down.

I asked throughout the class what color is their diamond, what form does it take...

sequence
AMS
Lunge curl back twiat version
1/2 moon stretch
mod. parsvak, v2
1.2 moon, v2
low lunge quad stretch
shalabasana + dancer
Shalabarsana + ardha chand. chap.
utl twist
pigeom
janu
bridge
savasna

shine the light of the heart

Quick summary of the call I taught at the yoga center wednesday 540-7. It was a really fun class.


I wanted to continue to talk about the change of the seasons, about how we are entering the phase of dissolution or destruction. I pointed out the Nataraja (we have a beautiful Nataraja/the dancing siva in the studio). I pointed out that in the statue of the Nataraja, in his upper right hand he holds a damaru(drum). This drum represents creation. In his upper left hand he holds fire. This fire represents destruction. This destruction is what we are seeing in the seasons. How the trees leaves have shriveled and fall to the ground (destruction) in order for the tree to eventually create new bud and blossom (creation). This destruction and creation are part of the pulsation (spanda) of life. We need to recognize that this pulsation not only happens in nature but that it happens in our self. We need to recognize that there is a time when we need to shed out old habits/patters/behaviors/people so that we can create new ones that serve us better and more fully. When we refuse to let go what we end up doing is contracting in on our self, and we get hard. When we do this we smoother our inner light so we can’t see it, experience or share it with others. When we contract around our old habits, this doesn’t put our inner light out because this light and Grace is always available to us but it does make it harder to experience. What we need to do is let go of what doesn’t serve us. When we do this we become soft and open. When we are soft we can feel, hold, and shine the light of our heart out. At first when we drop some of these patterns that we have identified with for so long it can be scary and we can feel vulnerable. But this vulnerability creates space for our inner body to expand naturally with joy, wonder, strength, faith, and love.

That’s what this practice is all about to me. It is a way to let go of what doesn’t serve us so we may hold our light with more joy. Open to grace!

I have recently re read a yoga journal and in the back I came upon an interview with Aadi Palkhivala where he says “90% of yoga asana is a waste of time. The asana must be done to hold the light of the soul. Most people just want all of the stuff the ego likes: a firm body and ways to impress people. We should ne striving to find a real connection with the divine”.

I love this. Especially the idea that asana is done in order to hold the light of the soul/heart. Today I wanted the students to feel that through their asana practice and through fire (like the fire that siva holds as he dances) we can destroys old habits/patterns/behavior’s/and people so that we may align our self so we can hold, shin, and experience the light of our soul/heart.

100th blog post...thoughts = powerful

WOW! I was about to post this post and I realized that this is my 100th! Blog post…very cool.


That is pretty awesome. Our thoughts are very powerful! Our body can’t distinguish between a thought and reality. There is an evolutionary lag. So… If we think about getting cut off and about crashing into a median while driving our body while naturally respond as if that was the situation, as if that were where we were. There has been lots of research, setting up people to bio mechanical machines and monitoring people’s blood. One study asked people to think about a traumatic event when they were young and their blood chemistry actually changed! We constantly damage our self by just our thinking process. The first drug we use is thinking. The first way we disassociate with reality is thinking! We are born. When we are born we naturally breathe into the abdomen. But through the stresses of society most people by the age of 2-4 years old switch from abdominal breathers and become shallow breathers. When you are breathing in a shallow way you take in half a pint of oxygen when you breathe from the belly you take in half a gallon.

So…The first way we disconnect from reality is by thinking, whenever we are thinking we are not feeling, and whenever we are not feeling you are disconnecting!
What we need to do is get out of our head. Now, more than ever we are using our brain. For example think about how much were use our brain now more than two hundred years ago. We probably read more now than some people will read in their entire life. As helpful as our brain is, as I said above, our brain and our thinking process can cause our body to physically harm its self by stimulating the flight or fight response. Before our brain and our technology got so advanced we use to use and trust our gut. Our gut used to be the original way of intelligence. You have neru-peptides, and neurotransmitters just like the ones in your brain. We need to learn to trust our gut feeling. It takes a while. We actually have the capacity to feel in our gut. So feel in your gut, as things get crazier and things happen faster and faster start to listen to your gut. Feeling the body is really important.

Isn’t this cool! I wrote something similar to this in my precious post. By bringing our awareness into our body, by feeling what is actually happening inside our self we can help make real changes. It is intersting how much we can practice. But at the same time how much do we spend re thinking about bad situations or imagining bad situations. Because even if we arnt actually experiencing if we are thinking about them in the mind then the body IS actually experiencing them. I think this is super COOL! By just our thoughts we can affect our body!!!

exhale fully

The breath is super important. I was listening to a podcast from Abdi Assadi (this is someone I have recently gotten very interested in he does lots of shadow work). In this podcast Abdi talked about how one of the problems that happens when we breathe is that we are not exhaling all the way. I thought this was fascinating. I do different kinds of pranayama every day and the thought that I might not be exhaling fully when I practice pranayama and on a throughout the day really intrigued me.

This means not only are we holding old energy (prana) in our bdoy but we are then inhaling on top of that stale air. When we exhale all the air out it helps slow down the speed of the mind. First we need to work on exhaling. Right now pay attention to where the breath is. It is probably in your chest, start breathing with more awareness. Notice how the breath shifts toward the belly. Now as exhale and toward the end of your exhale start to count with moving your tongue (I even whisper the letters out loud). What that does is allow the lungs to exhale the air without forcing the lungs to tighten. Continue to do this, breathe into the belly, breath out..1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18… Repeat this for the next few minutes. Lengthen the spine, relax your shoulders and relax your jaw.

Can you feel the difference in your body! Say something out loud just a word or two and see how deep your voice is. That is the relaxation. This is free, no vitamins, no diet, no belief system needed! The breath just works.

Sit back practice and enjoy.