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    Parama Shiva Tattva (playlist from class)

    ByElizabeth

    Per Pam’s request, here’s the Shiva-themed (with a little Ganesha {son of Shiva} and Bhuvaneshwari {Adi Parashakti inseparable from Shiva} included)  playlist from Saturday’s class:

    • Om Shiva, Chloe Goodchild, from Sura
    • Hey Shiva Shankara, Dave Stringer, from Japa
    • Shiva Shambo, Bhagavan Das, from Now
    • Son of Shiva, MC Yogi, from Elephant Power
    • Om Mata, Ragani, from Best of Both Worlds
    • Dancing with the Goddess, Atman, from Eternal Dance
    • Namah Shivayah, Krishna Das, from Live on Earth
    • Hara Shiva Shankara, Jai Uttal, from Spirit Room

    Enjoy.  Practice.  Dance.  Sing.

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    Found Exhortation

    ByElizabeth

    I prefer the exhortations: be careful, be mindful, pay attention. It is good to heed what is around us, being open to the optimal next step on the unfolding path.

    But if we get too wary or fearful, if we spend too much time watching out for and guarding against danger, then we may well miss opportunities to enhance our lives and those around us.

    Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.

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    How Not to Wreck Your Body

    ByElizabeth

    The New York Times just published a lengthy article on “How Yoga Can Wreck Your Body.”  The response of one of my fellow certified Anusara yoga instructors was “duh!”  This conversation greets me as I am about to offer a free gentle and therapeutic yoga class at Willow Street Yoga to invite new and continuing students to discover the power of the Anusara alignment principles to heal and transform challenges of embodiment.  If I were not highly confident in the power of Anusara yoga to heal when practiced mindfully, I might be worried that the article would keep away potential students.  Instead, I welcome the “news” as a way to broaden the invitation to discovery.

    As I have blogged about before, at an intensive, John Friend once compared advanced asana to digitalis–depending on dosage and circumstances of the individual digitalis is at once the deadliest plant in the garden and one of the most powerful medications to heal the heart.  We don’t read much about digitalis in the news, but we are constantly bombarded with contradictory news flashes about the health risks and benefits of lots of things — coffee, red wine, vitamins, running, anything that has been either held out as either a cure all or an evil that is ubiquitously practiced or imbibed.  Why?  I think it is because we in this society are hungry for panaceas, for effortless solutions, for the latest thing, for something to save us from emptiness and ill health, without actually having to work at it.  It is newsworthy that yoga bears risks precisely because we (the general societal we) wanted it to be a perfect solution without actually requiring any change how we live the rest of our lives (including diet, exercise, relationship to others) and to bring to yoga the mindfulness, determination, and steadiness that it requires to bring the peace, harmony, and healing it offers.

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    Ephemera Around Town

    ByElizabeth

    This morning I saw a pretty feather on the sidewalk while I was walking to work past the Senate office buildings.

    I squatted to take a close up photo, but a breeze sent it flying before I could snap the shutter.  I went after it, replaced it in a sunny patch for best light, and then tried again.

    While I was still low to the ground with my camera phone out, a police officer on a bicycle came up to me and said that it was a pretty feather; I could have it if I wanted.

    I said I would leave it there for someone else to enjoy. Taking and sharing the photo on my yoga blog would be enough. We agreed that it looked like a robin may have encountered a hawk.

    The officer smiled and continued down the sidewalk on bicycle patrol. I resumed my walk to work. 

    I wondered whether the interaction would have been so pleasant if I hadn’t been a decently dressed (i.e, evidently middle class), small, middle-aged, white woman.

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