Fall Session

We had our first class last night. It was good to see folks after a wee break. I am hoping to see more folks tomorrow and Thursday and then again next Monday, as some of the folks who took the summer off wander back in. Come Back! We miss you! It is getting chilly out and the time for golf and gardening are coming to a close! Time for some rockin’ yoga.

And rockin’ it will be. I am very excited about this fall and about this whole year in fact. There are just more and more opportunities to study great Anusara Yoga with fabulous teachers in out region this year. Noah Maze is coming 3 times within an 8 month period. Desiree Rumbaugh twice. Christina Sell will be back to our lovely little town next year. Also a few others like Todd Norian and I think the Kirks will be back too. And you know, as remote as we are here in Viroqua, we are very well placed for workshops in Minneapolis, Madison and Chicago. Really not a bad shake. Especially if you enjoy the occasional city weekend.

Last night was a great class, even though we all took pause when it was dark by the end of class! We worksed on some great shoulder and upperback opening, working toward Urdhva Dhanurasana. We will be working on this in particular much more this fall. Fun! The theme we played with was to praise Shakti. To praise the beauty and the goodness in ourselves and eachother and to do so actively. This is a very primary teaching in Anusara Yoga and part of why we are so into the use of themes in classes. Essentially, Shakti, or the great creative force of being, loves to be praised and glorified. In fact, she loves it so much that she expands when we do so. And it is also just such a good practice of self love and acknowledgement. Christina wrote a great entry a few weeks back on her blog on this very topic- I may bring it in to class to share.

Now, however, there is a wee toddler waiting for a story and some snuggles for bedtime.

Love.

Last Week of Summer Classes

Interestingly enough, I taught 3 times this week after teaching only once a week all summer. We had our make-up class on Tuesday, I taught up at Keewaydin on Wednesday, and then class on Thursday. It was fun and to me really felt like a party. But then again, yoga often feels like a party to me. I love seeing everybody so much, I love the asana, I love really endeavoring to believe in myself and to help nurture that in others. There you go. A party.

I am trying to remember what we did on Tuesday, but I am having a pregnant moment. I know that we worked on pinca, but we have been working on that a lot lately. And also Vasistasana. Oh yeah, my car didn’t start that day and I had to track down Chris to come home and give me a ride in. I was 20 minutes late, which would never happen if I lived in town. Right Val? But then where would my goats be?

Wednesday was farm yoga, which it has taken me 3 years to really understand how to teach out on the farm. It is not one of my usual classes. It is uplifting stretching and breathing for people who are doing physically demanding work all day long everyday. We are not trying to balance on our hands and grab our foot behind our head in this environment. But I do get to introduce people to yoga sometimes and that is really fun. There were 2 people there on Wednesday who really do not speak any english at all and it was their very first time. They did great and it was so fun to see that little spark ignite. I really try to give folks on the farm a few stretches that they can do any time that are really applicable to what they are doing with their bodies.

On Thursday we did a standing pose and arm balance sequence from Christina Sell. It was a good time and hopefully Shelia’s guests were not too freaked out by what is surely not a typical level one class. In general, I seem to attract physically fit, tenacious and willing students who like to work hard. So we do and it is great fun and sometimes we surprise ourselves. In fact the theme that we worked with was fun, and how chit ananda equals fun for the yogin. We love to know and we relish the experience of that knowing. Like I said, a party. The highlight of class was that we were introduced some variations of sirsasana. Parsva Sirsasana went very well. And it was fun to think about parsvaikapada sirsasana and how to kepp working on that.

On a personal note, I am feeling a bit better and have been on my own mat a little more. I do spend a least 10 minutes in a very supported supta virasana and I do very little in general in a relatively long period of time. But it feels good and i am very thankful for my body and all of its knowing. An amazing gift, and yet also something that I have worksed on diligently for over a decade.

I hope to see everyone that I have missed over the summer when fall classes start up in a week. It is going to be a great fall and a fantastic year. Mark your calendars now because October 2nd Shantala, an amazing kirtan group form Oregon (and also really old friends of mine from the Anusara world) are coming to Madison for an evening of beautiful music and chanting. Then November 7-9 in Madison Noah Maze will be teaching a weekend workshop not to be missed. I am thinking full weekend and joint hotel room for anyone that is interested. Nothing better than a weekend of great yoga and yummy food and dare I say a little bit of shopping…. And then looking ahead in 2009, we have Christina Sell coming back to Viroqua at the end of April and we had such fun last time that we expect and even bigger turn out of folks from all over the state and maybe then some! And then in the beginning of June, John Friend is coming back to the midwest, to Chicago, for the first time in 3 years! Not to be missed.

It is stacking up to be a great year. And somewhere in all of that I get to have a baby. Whoa…

Almost Fall

Wow, so this is the last week of summer classes and then we are on to the fall schedule. I have been totally out of commission this summer, and glad to have only been teaching once a week. In fact, I am only just now gradually crawling back onto my own mat. I do have a great reason however. I am pregnant with #2, and much like with Maple, I have been overtaken with pretty amazing nausea. And a headache. Thats new. It is a little different the second time around because there is not the opportunity for rest that there is with #1. That is pretty rough. So I have pretty much been using any time that I do have for oh so precious sleep.

Hopefully in the next few weeks I will update the schedule for fall. But here it is for now:

Monday: 6-7:30pm mixed level

Wednesday: 9-10:30am level 1 continuing

Thursday: 9-11am open studio practice

So this is radically different, but I am happy to have as much to offer as this. Chris is on the road now for his new job and I am still working out childcare for some of the times, but this is what it looks like. I am really quite excited about it. My intention for this year is really strong and is basically this: to teach really solid Anusara classes (I am doubly excited about this because I am going to the level 2 teacher training in Boston with John, and I am working more closely with a mentor), and I am really clear on wanting to progress peoples practices- I am thinking really about those of you who have been in class for a year or two now and who are planning on coming to class more than once a week.

Which brings up another point. There is no Basics class on the fall schedule. This is for a variety of reasons but really, most folks that want to come to a Basics class are really fine to come to a mixed level class or even the level 1 continuing if they have some prior yoga experience. Just be prepared to work a little bit harder. Fun. The only folks who I ever see in Basics who this would not work for are the elderly or those with any major physical limitation (i.e. ” I am fine, really, oh and by the way I have a 6 inch iron rod in my back” you catch my meaning). These folks should be seeing me privately anyway. Everyone would be better served.

The other major difference on the fall schedule is the open studio days on Thursdays. I am super psyched about this, because not only do I get an opportunity to practice, but those of you interested in building a home practice have the opportunity to work by yourself or in groups in a supported environment with someone on hand to answer questions. Great! And it is a great opportunity to work on the poses that challenge you and build some group momentum. Darren Rhodes in Tucson has an open studio three times a wee, and that was really where I learned How to practice. It is really an opportunity to go into the laboratory of your practice and dive in.

So, hope to see you all soon.. Check back often. I promise to be more diligent in the ol’ blogesphere.

Summer Session: July 8th

So the summer session started up last week. We are running just the Thursday morning class for the summer. We could not quite get the numbers that we needed for the Monday afternoon class, but we have a great, very dedicated group on Thursday mornings so it should be great. In the fall the class offerings will be back up to 3 or 4 but for the summer the leaner schedule is nice. In the flow. It is very hard to get Wisconsinites to commit to spending any part of the warm weather indoors on a regular basis.

This summer we have the opportunity to be a little bit of a focus group, which is very fun for me (hopefully the class too…). We are going to be looking at the 6 attributes of the Supreme as John Friend lays them out in Anusara Yoga philosophy. This is great because it is specific to our method but also is so universal that everyone can really relate to each attribute on a personal level. Last week was Essential Goodness, which in my mind is such a good place to start as it is so aligned with the 1st principle: Open to Grace. We begin by simply remembering that the essential nature of life is one of goodness, that there is a Divine order or flow that we are all a part of. This week we will talk about Chit, Consciousness or Knowing. We will get more into it in class, and probably after in another blog post.

Another approach that we are taking is to ask more questions and take time for deeper answers. I love teaching like this because it is so fun to see what people have questions about, even if it is a curiosity about a specific pose or the relationship between certain poses. Fun. Also, I just really love when people gain a deeper understanding of the yoga. Anusara is a system, and at first it really takes a lot of mental energy to engage with that system. But after awhile, it really does become cellular and peoples understanding becomes more graceful and eloquent and less effortful.

OK. That it for now. See you soon.

Post Weekend Workshop: June 24

So, it is my post weekend workshop with Christina Sell resolution to post more on this blog. Yippie. Things are in super fast change mode around these parts, but all of that is very fun and very worth sharing about.

The weekend was amazing! We had an intimate group, 12-15 people per session, so everybody received a ton of personal attention. Christina is just such a brilliant teacher, in my opinion, really one of the best. She does such a skillful job of leading people through a lot of yoga AND also getting a lot of teaching done concurrently. Does not always happen like that. We focused a lot on the difference between pelvic loop and outer spiral and did some great work really deeply rotating the leg in the socket and taking it all the way down to the foot. This led to some great, deep hip openers, hanumanasana and some fun arm balances. She also taught so clearly on the difference between opening the shoulders separate from the upper back, really fun hard work that we will be focusing on more in class in the weeks to come. There were also so many wonderful anecdotal little pieces that she shared throughout the weekend, little quotes that would spontaneously occur to her that really served to deepen everyones understanding of the yoga, from the UPA’s to the Grand Purpose.

My friend and fellow inspired teacher Tammy,from Port Washington, Wisconsin made the trip with a few of her students and that was great. She is such a light and so it was so fun for me to have her meet Christina, who I also adore. It was amazing to realize that I have been practicing with Christina for about 9 years and there is just such a wonderful depth to our relationship. She is forever my teacher, my mentor, and my dear, dear friend. We were able to spend a bunch of great time together, even had 2 fantastic practices together, which is really my favorite way to spend time with her. She is absolutely my favorite person to practice with! What a treat to not have to fly across the country to so it! (Well, that is not entirely true, as she actually had to fly across the country…)

At any rate, she will be coming back at the end of April 2009 to do another weekend workshop with us, and hopefully sometime in November as well. It is just so awesome to have my favorite teacher teach my students! I really saw it this morning in class. Pretty much everyone that had been there this weekend was in class this morning and to see how everyone has shifted already… very cool.

Summer session starts up next week, Monday 3:30-5 and Thursday 9-10:30. Again the classes are not going to run this session with less than 10 people, so be sure to sign up. I will know for sure on Thursday how it is looking and let folks know at that point. Also, I am hoping to teach a workshop toward the end of the summer, just a 3 hour deal on how to create a home practice. Should be great.

OK. That’s it for now. Go check out Christina’s blog!

Love.

June 13th

Maybe I will get into the habit of putting up the date until we are in the new format so that we can at least have a sense of how far apart these entries actually are…

So, the workshop is in 1 week. Holy Cow! We have an official venue and that is Carol Anne Kemen’s studio, actually down the hall from my own in the Landmark Building, 500 e jefferson street, viroqua, wis 54665. So the motto must be better late than never as registration forms are finally beginning to come in and it is looking like we will have a nice size group.

Also, registration is open for the summer session, running june30th through the end of august, 8 weeks with one week off. There will be a level2 class on Monday afternoons from 3:30-5pm and a level 1 class Thursday mornings from 9-10:30am. There is a 10 person minimum per class so please, sign up soon! It would really be sad to not have a class run!

I hope to post again over the weekend about recent themes etc… For now, I am off to enjoy the sunshine.

Love.

Too Long, Again....

While I am waiting for the website to be launched I am not posting as much. I apologize for this, but I just cannot be sure where the posts will land.

At any rate, summer is here (with some torrential rains) and things are certainly picking up as far as yoga goes. Align with nature is hosting its first workshop ever the weekend after next with Christina Sell. This is so exciting as she is a dear friend, my first Anusara teacher and really and truly in my opinion, one of the best Anusara Yoga teachers out there. She is so clear, precise and devoted, in all areas. Her understanding of alignment is unparalleled and her experience as a practitioner is readily apparent and accessible in her teaching. We are so lucky to have her and I hope to see many of you there. We are still a little bit up in the air as far as the venue is concerned, but that will all be worked out in the next few days.

As far as public classes are concerned, I have been sick off and on for much of May and the beginning of this month, and that has affected classes a bit. I have not been posting sequences which I apologize for and I hope to get back in the swing of that this next week. There are only 2 weeks left of this session but due to some cancellations, the Tuesday and Wednesday classes will meet again the following week. In other words, the session will be extended one week except for the Thursday class. If you have any make ups that you need to do, you essentially have 8 classes left to do them in. So come to class! It is actually really fun to drop in to a different class and just feel the way that the energy is a little different from your regular class.

Registration for the next session begins this next week. The schedule will be a little bit different for the summer, and the session is shorter, 8 weeks as opposed to 12, and $70 as opposed to $100. I will have the new schedule up on Tuesday. I am going to be a little more strict about classes running with a minimum of 10 students. That means that if you want your class to run, make sure you and your friends sign up.

As for other news in the region, Desiree Rumbaugh will be at Yoga View in Chicago on Thursday and at Yoga Werks in Barrington Friday through Sunday. Chad, who owns Yoga Werks says that this will be her last visit for awhile as her schedule is really full all the way through 2009. I know it is a bit of a trek, but very worth it. However, if 2 consecutive weekend workshops is a little too much for you, I would really recommend staying in town and walking to class with Christina all weekend. I cannot say enough about what an opportunity it is to have a teacher of this caliber in our own town. I literally fly all over the country to attend events like this, which is so much more time consuming not to mention expensive. And just think, for $170 you can attend 10 hours of world class yoga, then go eat in your own house (or at your own co-op), go swimming, spend time with your family, and basically share the vibrancy of your experience in class with your immediate community. How cool is that!

OK, no more sales pitch for now. I can’t wait to see you all in class this week. For now, stay dry and enjoy the fullness of the season.

Love.