Leap Of Faith

Dear Yogis.

Well! We’re in Lock Down again. How do we keep an even keel? Many people used the last house arrest to achieve something, start something, change something, take stock, review direction… any or all of the above. No? Me neither! Well, we have a second chance. By coincidence, I came across the idea of a Vision Board (or Dream Board) which could be the way forward! You collect inspirational images, words, quotes or phrases, pictures and affirmations to draw you forward to your goal.

Yogis have lots of paths to find inspiration. We have the physical practice which leaves us with endorphins. We have mental relaxation which doesn’t take long to see the value of. (One yogi told me after just a few classes that he shouts at his children less!). Yogis tend to climb up the posture ladder and collect harder and harder postures so it’s quite addictive to set a posture goal and quite exciting to achieve it.

We also have myth and storytelling to help us into postures. These stories are always fun! Here are two examples. The inspiration behind Warrior pose is Virabhadra, the superhero who was created from the fury of Shiva. The shape of the posture represents him bursting up through the crust of the earth to enter (specifically uninvited) his father-in-law’s party… in the shape of Warrior 1! To cut to the chase, the posture is meant to bolster us in doing battle with the limiting tendencies of our minds.

What about Splits Pose, named after Hanuman the monkey god? He sprung over to Lanka from India and wasn’t entirely welcome! The multi-headed demon king of Lanka, Ravana, set his tail alight. Hanuman felt no pain but jumped all over the island setting it alight before leaping back to India, in splits pose! The point about that leap is that 'many of us shrink before an impossible task... We easily forget that there is part of us that is also divine and can accomplish the impossible'.

I love introducing people to Crow Pose… I’ll write about that next week. It’s a perfect posture for Lock Down; it teaches us about balance when there is chaos, loss, grief, or any condition that causes extreme imbalance. B. K. S. Iyengar said that the study of yoga is not about mastering posture; the posture is your entry point to understanding and transform yourself.

Zoom Classes 

Join me at 4.30 this afternoon for some Ashtanga. I’ve been asked for a stretchy class so we’ll do the seated postures today. You can book/click here. See you later. 

Website

I’ve been mulling over creating a new page on my website about being a career of someone with dementia. It would be a resource page but nothing heavy; anecdotes, observations, impressions, recollections, anything like that. Please send me a little paragraph if this might be relevant to you.

Yoga in the news 

The Mirror has: Miriam Stoppard: Could yoga help old people avoid falls? The stats are scary. ‘So what about yoga? Well, for starters, it will improve the quality of life in older people and, importantly, old people like it’.
The Independent has: I am a white meditation and yoga teacher, so am I guilty of cultural appropriation? ‘The commercialisation of the word “mindful” or “mindfulness”, however, which has been labelled on everything from pants to colouring books, may be partly to blame. When we steal or appropriate a word and attach it to objects without relevance, this can be damaging and disrespectful’.

POPSUGAR has: There Are 7 Types of Rest According to a Therapist — It's More Than Physical and Mental. Nice article, full of tips.