Happy New Year's Resolutions 2019

Dear Yogis

Season’s Greetings! I hope you had a nice time this week. Just a few days of not teaching and I miss you! However, it’s so important to take time off to rest and reflect. It’s what makes the New Year the right time for resolutions and aiming for a higher version of yourself. Not for nothing people try to stay dry in January (alcoholically speaking) and Veganuary has been going since 2014 and looks like it’s here to stay. Here are some non-alcoholic drink recipes and/or, for Veganuary, you could join me for a cooking course by Yuuga Kemistri. And if you live in East London you have your very own M*lkman doing rounds with his nut-milks of joy.

What about a yoga resolution! Do you need one? Just enjoy classes! Maybe you could try a class you wouldn’t normally take. Triyoga has end of year special packages: 5 class festive pass for £65 (£13 per class) 8 class festive pass for £96 (£12 per class). Try something different!

Home Studio

I’m really looking forward to starting up again next week. Only two classes next week; the Ashtanga classes on Wednesday and Thursday. Updated bookings and spaces left can be seen on the booking page of this website.

Training

I’m signed up for a few things this year and I hope you’ll join me. Teaching Yoga in Sport is a course that takes place over six weekends over the year with Sarah Ramsden. In February you’ll find Day Christensen in Winchester. She’s a favourite teacher of my friend Lisa and you can register interest here. I’ve signed up of Ty Landrum in April at Triyoga. Whatever you do, try a workshop.

Yoga in the news

GQ Magazine is promoting meditation with this: ‘Before you swear off meditation for good, try a gong bath’. ‘Leo Cosendai is a gong meditation teacher who believes sound baths are the way to meditate if you don't like the mainstream approach.’ He says: ‘“I think meditation can seem really abstract and complicated and reserved for certain people. Really a gong bath – or a sound bath or sound meditation – makes meditation accessible. It makes it an experience rather than homework or something on your to-do list.’

This is one for cricket fans. Sky Sports tells us: Cameron Bancroft 'nearly quit cricket for yoga' following ball-tampering ban’. He says: ‘"Until you are able to acknowledge that you are Cameron Bancroft, the person who plays cricket as a profession, and not Cameron Bancroft the cricketer, you will not be able to move forward.’ How yogic!

Happy New Year!

Shimmering Silvery Sound of Silence

Dear Yogis

Are you ready with your New Year Resolutions? Get your ideas together so that you can get excited by them. Yogis are great at resolutions. We know exactly how to set our focus and intention. I found my main resolution for next year when listening to an interview about the recent climate conference in Poland. The studio guest said that he converted from shower gel in plastic bottles to bars of soap. I’m stealing that idea. I can’t even remember why I stopped using bars. I’ll also add laundry liquid refills to my resolution list.

I keep meaning to make meditation a more regular practice but I hesitate to make it a resolution in case I fail to keep it. I’m adding it this year because a cure to my hesitation came when I read a booklet by Ajahn Amaro, Abbot of Amaravati Monastery called ‘Inner Listening’ (downloads and pdf here). Maybe this little extract and the one attached will spark your interest.

Inner listening “refers to attending to what has been called ‘the sound of silence’, or ‘the nada-sound… a high-pitched inner ringing tone. When you turn your attention toward your hearing, if you listen carefully to the sounds around you, you’ll hear a continuous high-pitched sound, like a white noise – beginningless, endless – sparkling there in the background. See if you can detect that gentle inner vibration... We can use it, just like the breath, to dominate our attention”.

“It becomes like a screen on which all other sounds, physical sensations, moods and ideas are projected… It helps to sustain objectivity and untangled awareness, an untangled awareness in the present.”

I have to tell you, when you first hear that shimmering silvery sound, it’s magic and there’s a feeling of a voyage-of-discovery about to begin. It’s about time I made this resolution!

Home Studio

Can I tell you what a joy it is to teach you here! It amazes me how lucky I am that you come week after week or that new yogis pitch up for a class after a Google search for yoga in Ealing. What everyone has in common is that they want a small class. Hurray! And it’s always a joy to teach you. However, the studio turns into a bedroom and playroom for the Christmas week and there’ll be no classes till 2019. Classes are booking up for the first week in January. There are classes on the Wednesday 2nd and Thursday 3rd. You can see what’s available on my website. Also attached on this email.

Training

Valentina’s last Aerial Yoga class of the year is tomorrow, Saturday 22nd, at 10.30. I’ll be there to do my assisting session which is part of the course. Come along. Book here.

In 2019 I hope you’ll join me for some classes and workshops with the phenomenal teachers who come to this country and give us the best of their years of learning and teaching. It’s always such a joy to train with David Swenson or discover phenomenal teachers like Gregor Mahler. London is a blessed place to be a yogi!

Yoga in the news

Yoga exponent Geeta Iyengar, daughter of B.K.S. Iyengar, passes away, reports the Hindu.

“Like her father, Geeta Iyengar kept ill-health through much of her childhood…This caused her father great consternation, as he was not able to afford the high cost of medication; he instead recommended that she practice asanas to improve her health, spurring her lifelong devotion to Yoga.”

Happy Christmas, Happy holidays, Happy Kwanza, Happy Eating with loved ones.

Yoga Christmas Presents

Dear Yogis

It’s time to think about Christmas Presents. There is usually a funny top you can get someone. Here’s a Namasleigh T-Shirt! Here’s a Namasleigh sweater and lots of other top ideas there. For Christmas leggings there are lots of ideas here. I might have to succumb to that website. 

Back when we were in Kapsali on retreat I made a mental note to tell you how important a heavy mat is for outdoor practice! A light breeze turns a light travel mat into a flag. I have four sturdy mats in my home studio for sale at £55 - the LOVE MAT by Lāal. They’re similar to the Liforme mat but half the price! On the other hand, if you do want a beautiful mat topper, Destination Karma’s mats feature inspiring scenes from Bali, The Greek Islands, and Cornwall and other gorgeous places. The company also donates a percentage of profits to charities from those countries. You can also design your own.

Home Studio

If you want to try the Destination Karma mat, let me know and you can use it here. I have a beautiful one that reminds me of Kythera. Some classes next week are filling up fast but Tuesday 6.00 and Wednesday 8.00 are crying out for yogis as people start going away or skipping yoga for office parties! Can you imagine! You can see whats available on my website.

Training

I’m half way through Aerial Yoga teacher training and I have to recommend that you have a go; you will find that it compliments mat yoga and works muscles that you can’t possibly use on the mat. If you don’t know what aerial yoga looks like, there’s a ‘hammock’ from the ceiling, pegged to the ceiling at a little more than shoulder distance apart and the material falling down to your hip level. First of all, there’s a lot of joy in the practice, from floating in the hammock, from giving your weight to the hammock and moving with speed and grace and lightness. Everyone can achieve inversions. It’s a democratic practice; there’s no drama, no-one has to move their mat to the wall, everyone can do a handstand and get the benefits of lengthening the spine.

Valentina’s last class of the year is on Saturday 22nd. I’ll be there to do my assisting session which is part of the course. Come along. Book here.

Yoga in the news

Today is the centenary of BKS Iyengar’s birth, 14 December 1918. Newsd celebrates the day with: BKS Iyengar: The Father of Modern Yoga and says ‘we bring to you some lesser known facts about the yoga guru’. The paper claims this: ‘he taught an 85 year old Queen Elizabeth to stand on her head’.

This article from Deccan Herald has pictures of mass yoga sessions celebrating his anniversary and a couple of interesting details about the great teacher: “After suffering a spine dislocation in a scooter accident, he began the usage of props to help disabled people practice yoga”

Gu Ru - Darkness To Light

Dear Yogis

During the weekend with David Swenson recently he gave details about his life that he has apparently never given before. In his search for the purpose of life he studied philosophy, astrology, palmistry and past life regression. He joined the Hare Krishnas where he got up at 3.00am with a cold water bucket bath, studied scripture, did deity worship and chanted on the streets. His CV jumps from yoga to Hare Krishnas to salesman to homeless yogi. How can I encourage you to seek him out next time he’s in this country?

Here’s a definition he gave of the word ‘Guru’. Guru, he says, is made up of two words; Gu and Ru. It means ‘from darkness to light’. To illustrate the word he said this: imagine you’re in a dark cave, you have a candle but no way to light it and you’re stumbling around. Deep in the recesses of the cave you see a glow, a person with a candle. They extend their candle, yours touches it and you get light. ‘From darkness to light’. It means passing on knowledge. No demands are made, no drama.

That’s what he’s like to learn from. He simply gives you light. This is more remarkable when you think of the strictness of the old school teachers including his teacher Pattabhi Jois who’s own teacher Krishnamacharya was known as the ‘Lion Guru’. He would bark and yell and injure. He had three famous students, his brother-in-law BKS Iyengar, his son Desikachar and Pattabhi Jois. Iyengar was fierce and had a stick to hit people with! Pattabhi Jois would show his students a deep scar from Krishnamacharya. Desikachar refused to learn yoga because his dad was so mean. When he was a child, he would hide in a tree so that he wouldn’t have to practice yoga. When he came down, Krishnamacharya would tie him up in a posture, tie his hands to his feet, and leave him for three hours in the yard. Desikachar didn’t practice till he was fifty!

Home Studio

There’s only mild tying up in my home classes. No sticks! And there’s plenty of room in all but the 7.30 Tuesday class next week. And you’re welcome to bring your asana requests to class and I’ll be your DJ. One yogi this week wanted Mayurasana -take a look at the link – it’s me a few years ago with David Garrigues! It’s doable. You can see what classes are available on my website. Also attached on this email.

Training

I’m wondering what to book for 2019. Let me know what you’re doing.

Yoga in the news

The Business Standard in India tells us: Yoga exposition in Pune to mark BKS Iyengar's birth centenary. 1,000 people from 50 different countries are expected to attend over a week of celebrations.

The New York Times gives us: How to Relax With Yoga. Not an article but give a little 3 minute routine which is nicely filmed and edited. That’s all!

Reuters tells us: ‘Yoga, acupuncture might ease menopause hot flashes’. Women tested acupuncture, attended yoga sessions or took health and wellness education classes. Not surprisingly, their health improved. This would improve anyone’s health! It’s not news!