Spiritual Yoga

Dear Yogis

If yoga - or more yoga - is your New Year’s Resolution and you’ve made it this far, congratulations! If you’re new to yoga you may still be worried that you can’t touch your toes. If you’re old to yoga you may be worried that you can’t hold a headstand. There’s always something! Yoga is a great challenge for the rest of your life. It never stops being interesting. At first the challenge comes from new postures, endurance, or memorising the sequence but that will change.

Yoga doesn’t care about the toes or the headstand. Yoga cares about your spirituality. It cares that you de-clutter the mind. And it really doesn’t matter if you are brutally insistent that you’re not the spiritual type. Like cars that come with various things ‘as standard’, the yogamobile comes with meditation and, therefore spirituality, ‘as standard’! Your goose is cooked! At some point you realise that you’re not learning about postures, you’re learning about yourself, and the proof of yoga happens not on the mat but out in real life. Cool trick, eh!

What does ‘spirituality’ mean? I resisted this description for ages. I only did yoga, at first, for the physical practice. Nothing appealed to me less than being spiritual! But ‘spirituality’ not a new identity strait-jacket. It’s just a calmer mind, ability to ‘let go’ in the midst of chaos, challenges, hurts and slights. Buddhism talks about freedom from suffering but that isn’t possible for normal human beings. However, a decrease in suffering is totally possible. It comes with meditation. That comes with yoga!

Yoga Retreat

My beautiful friend Lisa Maarit Lischak with whom I started this whole retreat adventure, will be co-teaching the workshops this year on our magical Kythira Yoga Retreat. Lisa is ambitious for you. Even if you can’t imagine getting the intended posture in this life or the next, Lisa has a way of coaxing you into the steps that will get you there. She’s our Mission Impossible Guru.

Training

Charlie Merton has her gorgeous “intention to rebalance: a winter yin yoga + gong bath” at Triyoga Ealing this evening. Please come! It’s such a treat.

Home Studio

There’s not too much availability next week but there is a little bit. Come and have fun. Come and try new postures. Come and have a stretch. Just come! See attached for the week’s class availability.

Yoga in the News

Edinburgh News has: Britain's oldest yoga teacher is a 90-year-old Scotsman with 'no intentions of retiring'. Tom Allan is packing classes! He took up yoga at 55 because he didn’t fancy jogging. "I was looking for some form of exercise, I was looking at people in all sorts of weathers racing around trying to get fit and that didn't appeal to me at all”.

Time Out has: There are free laughter yoga sessions happening in east London on Blue Monday. “It’s January. You’re broke. All your clothes feel that bit too snug ... you’re slowly slipping into a joyless hole while quietly asking yourself what’s left to live for”. Good intro, even if it’s made-up bleakness. The answer is laughter yoga at Benk + Bo in Spitalfields.

OZY has: Is Mindful Running the New Yoga? “Asics launched a “blackout track” in 2018 to explore how lack of sound, technology, scenery and a finish line can enhance mental focus and performance. Nike partnered with Headspace in 2018 to create Nike Run Club and Nike Training Club apps, which take listeners on audio-led mindful runs. And mindful running retreats are cropping up from the Mediterranean to Moab.”