YOGA & MEDITATION
New classes are upon us soon! Check out details on price, time and location here.
In September I am adding a meditation group back to the schedule, for 7 weeks only. If this is a class you missed out on in January 2014 then please feel free to join us: if you join it along with one of our yoga classes you will also receive a small discount on both classes.
What will we explore during meditation?
- Breathing techniques
- Gazing
- Walking meditation
- Connecting with intuition or higher self
- Connecting with our energy body
- Yoga Nidra
- OM circle and Silent meditation
What will we explore during yoga?
- Breathing techniques
- Deep body awareness
- How gentle movement releases tension in the body (vs. how movement can cause tension in the body)
- Deep relaxation
- How our thoughts create tension in the body, and using breath to help focus the mind and release surface tension from the body.
WE ARE ALL LOVE
My last blog ended asking for advice or opinions on what love is. I had some amazing responses, however only one survived on WordPress. I guess the rest disappeared into the black hole of the internet, along with the blog link.
Monetta shared “I’ve learned that if I accept the hurtful and malicious actions of others then I am not loving myself. Then I can’t be my best self. Taking care of my needs first is not selfish… Once I realized that all the conflict I had about standing up for myself was resolved.”
Many other comments followed a similar theme: the need to love ourselves, to nurture and care for ourselves, and being able to not feel guilty for taking care of ourselves first. Which makes sense, since when we are depleted how are we of any benefit to others?
Personally, I keep returning to this belief that we all are love. We all search outside ourselves looking for something that is within us all along. When we don’t receive the love we want or expect, our mind and emotions reek havoc on our peace. We feel angry, bitter, depressed, sad, lonely, and we want to blame others for the misery in our life. Sometimes we do things that even make it worse like push people away, set people up against each other, or fight with those we care about. It’s wild, this thing called love!
I have written before about the layers of artificial selves we create during our life, it’s the result of how we are raised, the people who influenced us, the society or culture that molded us… but this isn’t who we really are deep down inside. Inside there is a deep, undying, love and peace. It is up to us if we are willing to peel back the other layers to return to it, to share it, to live it.
- Open Your Heart
- Love and War (working with the heart chakra in yoga)
- Just Love
- No Human Being Is Worthless
Gentle Hatha Yoga | Jenni Burke 
I heard a comment last week; “Love is everywhere; where there is love, there is misery.”
The comment was exploiting “family” relations, exposing families that are, by turn, painful, destructive and competitive theatres, as opposed to what “family” conjures up in our popular culture.
Our culture tells us in song and verse that love cures us- provides a healing balm. A reminder; love inevitably brings pain.
When my beloved vanishes, I grieve. And when love is focused on me, it exposes my frailties, weaknesses and defects as much as my strength and purity.
Our world is certainly that of duality! What you write makes me think of Kahlil Gabran’s The Prophet “As love crowns you, so shall it crucify you.”