|
Namaste Yoga Center is happy to announce that as of November 1st, we will be sharing our space with the Integral Yoga Institute. We are renovating the front studio to house their classes and treatment rooms for energy healing, massage therapy and other holistic wellness services. Integral Yoga is a synthesis of several styles of yoga as taught by Swami Satchidananda. Their Hatha classes are gentle and they embody the sacred teachings of the yogic tradition. In order to make this shift, we have had to eliminate a few classes that were held in the front studio. We have tried to retain as many as we could. Please remember that your class cards are good at all of our centers: Life in Motion, Bodystrength, Flow, Park Slope and Devi. Life in Motion is only a five-minute cab ride away. Integral Yoga will have their own class cards. Our new schedule took effect October 24th. We sincerely hope this integration of yoga with healing and wellness gives you the information, the inspiration and the support you need to change your life for the better. In these tumultuous times, we need the benefits of yoga more than ever. We need to be strong and to form strategic partnerships that support our ever-evolving potential. Swami Satchidananda says it best when he speaks of the goal of Integral Yoga but it is also the goal of humanity “to realize spiritual unity in diversity and live in harmony with all creation.” With Palms Together, Elizabeth Andes-Bell Bruce Bell Owners Namaste Yoga Center |
|
New Class Joining Yoga and Meditation with Richard Allon Wednesdays 1:00-2:30pm Beginning November 16th Yoga is a practice of synchronizing mind and body. It is a path of continual self-discovery where we create physical forms and shapes which relate to wide open space, out of which all things originate. If asana practice is about inhabiting our bodies, relating to our physical form, consciously breathing and directing prana; then sitting meditation, taming our mind can be seen as a return to stillness and silence, a place out of which these forms arise and return to... Of course in working with the asanas We are also working with our minds. In sitting meditation We are also working with our bodies. The two activities naturally inform and enrich one another. We will explore this play of form and space in stillness and in movement, through classic yoga postures along with sitting meditation cultivating a bigger view. Big Mind. Big Body. Both, with Big Heart. Richard is an architect who began practicing yoga about fourteen years ago. In 1991, he went to Kripalu Center and was introduced to a meditative form of asana practice. He completed a one-month intensive Teacher Training certification at Kripalu in 1992 and has since done the Rasa Yoga Teacher Training Level 1, studied the Shambala and Sacred Path Levels and done a number of extended retreats with various teachers including Pema Chodron and Tsoknyi Rinpoche. He has taught since 1993 at the Rasa Yoga Studio, at the JCC in NY, and at the Lincoln Center Film Society. His teaching integrates asana, pranayama and meditation and weaves mindfulness and awareness into daily life. “...This is the most important teaching: not two and not one. Our body and mind are not two and not one. If you think your body and mind are two, that is wrong: If you think that they are one, that is wrong. Our body and mind are both two and one.” Suzuki Roshi Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind New Class Hatha Open, Katonah Style with Elizabeth Beginning Sunday, October 30th 10:15-11:45am Same Katonah style you know and love but an open level, meaning the class moves a bit faster and you know how to pace yourself and modify the class to your needs. |
THE AUTUMN PRACTICE
The Taoists call this the season of Metal. The Hindus speak of it as Air. Think of air infused with life force energy and the potential, especially now, to increase and fortify your vitality, your clarity and your sense of purpose.
The archetype of this season is the peaceful warrior. In your asana, pranayama and meditation set an intention to develop inner and outer strength. Hold a focus of a calm center and a radiant awareness that helps you to read the meaning of experience free from the filters of personal preference. The one who reads the experience is not your egoic self. It is your cosmic self. Autumn is the season of the lung. This is the organ that takes in the prana of the universe. It is, in many ways, your direct physical link with the Archetypal Father whose creative force gives you life. You can see how all sorts of issues can arise around a sense of worth, the ability to receive and give, what part of you is doing the giving and receiving ( your reason, your will, your need, your True Self) etc. Life is a learning process for the soul. Inevitably, issues arise. When they do, the challenge of the peaceful warrior is to stay present and stay centered. It is perfectly natural to deny the feelings or rationalize them with a story. Notice what happens with your breath when you do this, how you somatize the feeling. Then, presence yourself in the fullness of your life force ( this is the heritage of the summer practice) and let the feeling be present. Its meaning will shift. Your energy system will not battle it any longer. This is what Jesus means when he says "let the dead bury the dead." You will be able to let go of old issues that divide you and enter into Autumn's rest. You will be free to create something totally new. Look around you this Halloween season and see the images of death as symbols that all forms, even painful ones, pass and leave us with an opportunity. Our personal challenges are sacred journeys, archetypal myths about an evolving universe that is remembering itself as Divine. The One works in all things. |
|
Asana of the Month – Virabhradrasana 1 (Warrior 1) 
This pose strengthens and stabilizes and is a good pose for building stamina. Turning the back foot can create problems if it is not firmly rooted. Weak abdominals and lordosis ( a tilted pelvis) can create problems in the lower back as well. Taking the time to set up the pose from a Monkey position ( back foot parallel with the heel lifted) and aligning the front foot straight with a right angle at the front ankle and knee will set you up safely. Now explore opening the pelvic floor. Stretch the back heel, calf and thigh and the coccyx back. Lengthen the pubic bone forward. The pelvic floor is the foundation to build your warrior pose on, not the arching lower back or the gripping front quadriceps. Once you have opened the pelvic floor, you can turn the back foot. Press your chest against your front thigh and reach your arms forward, fingers on the floor. Rotate your pubic bone ( the front of your pelvic floor) so that it faces front. The back foot needs to root down and spin inward, toward the big toe. Now, relax the back so that the emphasis of the flow is forward out the crown and backward out the root (pelvic floor). Lift your upper body so that the shoulders come over the hips. You will have to work the back foot down and in while you spin the pubic bone front and center, leveling your hips from side to side. Make sure the rising does not displace the front knee ahead of or behind the front ankle. Remember, you are creating a matrix of energy, lines of force that support the pose. You want to work with your intelligence not your muscle. Then find your weight evenly placed on both feet so that you are centered. Once all of this is in place, lift off your pelvic floor to find the backbend that climaxes the pose. Remember to keep your ears level with your arms so that your head does not fall behind the vertical axis. The axis is your sushumna. This is the current of calm energy you ride when you open both poles at either end (root and crown chakras). Be attentive to the natural phrasing of your energy flow and let your practice reflect the music of your soul. |
|
|
Top |
Home |
Unsubscribe |
Events |
Classes |
Contact Us ©2005 life in motion |
Life in Motion PO Box 649 Cathedral Station New York, NY 10025 |