May 17, 2010

Kripalu - Yoga Therapy Intensive

If you are considering a trip to Kripalu, either to study or for a holiday, I highly recommend it.  The grounds are beautiful, the food delicious & nutritious, people friendly and diverse(!), yoga classes safe and creative.  You can apply for a scholarship to study there if it is beyond your current means. I went for the Yoga Therapy Intensive, a week long study with Yoga Therapists: Judith Hanson Lasater, Gary Kraftsow, Mukunda Stiles, Nischala Joy Devi, and Larry Payne - among others.  We looked at using yoga to work with trauma, transforming pain, evaluating musculoskeletal imbalances, aruyedic yoga therapy, prime of life yoga, yoga for anxiety, shoulders, hips, sacrum, and low back issues.  It was a lot to absorb and will take time to integrate - but some gems were immediate "If a pose feels safe for your body you'll be able to take a full comfortable breath.  Breath is your gage."  "Provide inquiries to your students so they can explore and become experts on themselves." "When opening the heart; open the front, the back, the sides, the skylight of the heart, and the basement of the heart."

May 2, 2010

meditation

"Meditation is not about feeling a certain way.  It's about feeling the way you feel.  It's not about making the mind empty or still, although stillness does deepen in meditation and can be cultivated.  Above all, meditation is about letting the mind be as it is and knowing something about how it is in this moment.  It's not about getting somewhere else, but about allowing yourself to be where you already are."
Wherever You Go There You Are by Jon Kabat-Zinn