November 2023 When big things happen both in our life and in the world around us, we might struggle to...
A couple of weeks ago, I returned from a 7-day silent meditation retreat. “7 days of silence?!” people ask, stunned...
The longer I teach and practice yoga, the gentler my teaching and practice become. I tell my yoga friends, “pretty soon we will just be doing Savasana for 90 minutes!” That might be an exaggeration, but for me (and for many teachers I know), there is a broader movement towards...
Photo courtesy of Liz Gill Where can you pause? For me, it started in the fall. I had just dropped...
I completed my first yoga teacher training in September, 2000, at Ghost Rach, New Mexico. This was an intensive training,...
This Monday, I dropped my daughter off at her first day of kindergarten. Weeks before she stepped into her new school, and all the way up until that morning, she was telling me in no uncertain terms that she did NOT want to go to Kindergarten, and that another year...
Normally, I’d be all about the homework. I am one of those people who’s ridiculously happy to be a lifelong student. I have 2 grad school degrees, for goodness’ sake. I miss taking classes besides yoga. But I have to admit that the MBSR homework is a struggle.
November 2024 CARING FOR OURSELVES AND FOR EACH OTHER Well, it’s been quite a week. How are you caring for...
April 2023 “This is one way of speaking about mindfulness, or being present: coming home to ourselves. When we bring our mind back to our body, we come home. We could consider this state as our true home. This home inside of us is a home no one can take...
When we first begin to meditate, we might notice that there is very little space inside our minds. It might...
April 17, 2025 “Meditation helps us defuse stress, experience greater tranquility, find a sense of wholeness, strengthen our relationships,...
Only a week later, my inner yoga teacher shows up again; she too, has gone on retreat. She reminds me of the definition of the word mindful, as used by Jon Kabat-Zinn, the originator of MBSR in the West. Mindfulness is about paying attention in a non-judgmental way. I can pay attention mindfully, I like to think. I have a much harder time paying attention without judgment. So my inner yoga teacher says: What if your discomfort isn’t something for you to analyze away? What if you don’t need to do anything about your discomfort? What if you just noticed it?
