Archives for 2019

Connection

Did you hear, as a child growing up, that as you get older the time passes more quickly? It seems to be ringing bells with me. My theme this year is ‘Connection’ and as the year has sped by I am left feeling that I am only just beginning to connect with my theme!

Last year my theme was “Extreme Self Care” and the year before was “Slow Living” and it’s entirely possible there was another theme in there somewhere too. The thing is they are all connected to each other as they bring me to this point of wanting to slow down, go within and connect more deeply than ever to the wisdom that is seeking to emerge.

During the last school holidays, I took the time to explore a daily yoga practice that I am considering turning into a therapeutic course in term one next year. Giving myself permission to do a daily practice that was very restorative had a lovely effect on connecting me to a deeper part of myself. I have reaffirmed that this is as important as the appointment in my diary that says it’s admin time, or time to balance the books and pay bills. As important as making time to stop and read a nourishing book or magazine, to stop and enjoy my freshly brewed tea.

It’s vital that in the busyness of life we explore making time to slow down, go within and listen. It is in that deep inner listening that we start to connect to an innate wisdom, a connection with our heart that brings us to the present moment. That is when time slows down. It’s those moments of connecting with ourselves and our deep feelings that are important in life. It’s taking time to be present in connections with family and friends, or connections to the things that make our hearts sing.

When we are caught on the treadmill of life, seeking more and more possessions that create more and more work, we get stuck in timelines. Timelines that push us to work a few more years to pay this off or to set that up for the future when the truth is no one knows what the future holds. While planning is certainly worthwhile, we also need to ensure that in the plan we have time for reflection and self care. It’s essential so that at the end of each day we can enjoy a peaceful night’s sleep because we have honoured our heart’s desire at some point in the day.

This all comes back to our connection with what is important to us: what are our values? Just as I find it vital to take time out of teaching so that I can work on my business, so too we need to take time out of our busy lives sometimes to reflect on how we feel about our one precious life right now. Spring is the season of new growth, of longer days and more sunlight as we approach summer. Now is the time to ask some deep questions to seek out what has been brewing over the winter months and maturing through spring so far:

• What is most important to you right now?
• Where do you want to be in twelve months’ time?
• What do you want to have achieved in five years’ time?
• What is the one thing you can do now that will make the biggest positive impact on your life?

Let the light in to shine on the dark places, expose your truth and start to live the life you want to live. We are living in extraordinary times and anything is possible if you set the course, have a clear vision and raise your vibration to suit your vision. Fly high and enjoy every moment.

Namaste
Sarah

If you need help with moving forward or figuring out your life path you might like to consider an Awaken Your Heart Song coaching package. Please contact me for details.

Homemade Guacamole

As served on the Soul Spa events and the easiest quick snack to prepare.

Serves 4

2 ripe avocados

1 lime, juiced

Sea salt

Freshly ground black pepper

Fresh coriander leaves

Chilli if you like a bit of zing

Finely chop chilli and coriander on a board, then add the avocado flesh (spoon or squeeze it out), juice of the lime, salt and pepper to taste. Chop everything together until desired consistency. Serve in a bowl with crudités or scatter some corn chips on the board and eat right away!

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Why do activations?

If you’re a regular at my classes you’ll be familiar with our ‘activations’: we start every class with some uplifting, upbeat music and we move to it, energetically, with lots of flowing movement and shaking all the stress out. Dru is pretty unique in this regard: not many schools of yoga do this. So why do we?

The concept of energy and that we are energetic beings is an underpinning principle of Dru Yoga. Dru Yoga classes are designed specifically to affect participants at all levels of their being as our energy permeates all layers. Let’s look at the energetic principles of Dru Yoga as this will lay the foundation for how and why activations work and the importance of them at the start of a class.

Energy becomes blocked in the spine and in all the joints of the body. From the joints the blockage can go deeper into the muscles and eventually into the internal organs. Dru’s energy block release sequences deal with this in depth but that is a topic for another day! Any gentle flowing movements can help release energy.

By locking our joints we are blocking energy flow so therefore you are encouraged to slightly flex your joints during a Dru class. By doing this you begin to build strength in the muscles that support the joints. The most common is locking knee joints so learning to unlock these is really beneficial on so many levels. Unlocking joints allows energy to flow assisting you to be fluid and flowing instead of rigid and stuck.

Our spine is the backbone of our whole being on every level, a dynamic pillar of living information that supports our koshas, or layers of being, from physical through to bliss. All movements in Dru originate from the spine. Stiffness in the spine is the main cause of energy blocks and therefore we encourage as much segmental spinal movement as we can.

Every posture and movement comes from somewhere and goes somewhere. Consider every posture as a sequence and notice how empowering your practice becomes.

We aim to activate all the bodily systems during an activation as this enhances circulation and increases our awareness of the physical body. Many people starting their yoga journey are quite disconnected from their bodies with little or no body awareness. Activation prepares the body for better yoga movement with increased blood flow and helps prevent injury as it brings awareness to any points of tension or vulnerabilities.

By activating we also access our vital life force, or prana, which often lies dormant from too much sitting, making us feel tired and lethargic. Activations reawaken life force energy and wake you up! Activating also brings in more prana that stimulates the energy pathways known as nadis, increasing the flow of fresh prana into specifically connected organs and systems within us. This movement work also starts to stretch into the fascia, the connective tissue found all over our body beneath the skin. Fascia surrounds all our organs and muscles and becomes sticky from being still for too long, restricting movement and energy flow.

In summary, activations:

Are a great warm up to prepare the body for the yoga movements to follow,
Connect us back into our bodies if we have become a little disconnected,
Assist with proprioception, the awareness of our body moving through the space around us. This helps in many ways, balance being one of them, and
Are fun and easy to do! Everyone can do activations and they can be great ice-breakers to bring the class together and establish a sense of belonging to the group.

I hope that is helpful and if you have any questions or comments please leave them below, or share your own experience with activations.

See you in class or somewhere soon.

Namaste
Sarah

Homemade Hummus

1 tin organic chick peas – drained

1 clove garlic or more if you like

2 Tbsp organic tahini

Juice of large lemon

1 tsp sea salt

2 Tbsp cold pressed olive oil

3 Tbsp chopped coriander

Place all ingredients into a Thermomix or similar and mix to desired consistency. If you need to add liquid to make thinner you could save a little from the chick peas or add a bit more lemon depending on the taste you desire.

Serve with vege sticks or crackers of your choice. Make a double batch and keep in fridge for lunches: it’s great spread on sandwiches, wraps or toast.

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Using light to bring inner balance

As many of you know I was recently challenged with the influenza type A virus that wiped me out for a couple of weeks. I took a week off teaching and would like to thank Nicky Smith and Allison Sawyer for stepping in and keeping Wednesday and Friday classes going. It was during that first week of lying and sitting around that I rediscovered the delight and power of candle gazing. I thought this would be nice to share as a tool of transformation that might work for you too.

One evening, having had enough of lying around in bed all day, I went into the lounge and decided to put a candle on the coffee table. Once lit I was instantly drawn to the flame, like a moth to a light. The effect was transforming as I let my eyes soften and absorb the candlelight. It was almost as though there was nothing else to do other than let this light flow in. Upon reflection of this it made me wonder if the profundity of this action, gazing at the light, was a result of having spent a few days inside out of the sunlight and my body craved light.

As I sat and gazed I felt a stillness within and found myself relaxing as this stillness calmed and soothed my being. It was as though an inner knowing was awakening to the power of the light to reach into my cells and restore balance and harmony. I had intended to watch a movie but instead I was transfixed by the flame and the feeling that was moving through my whole being.

This was a timely reminder of the simple things in life that are the best for us … the straightforward act of lighting a candle, stopping to take it in and allowing the light to be felt in every cell of my body. My invitation to you is to explore this for yourself. Sit with a flame, let your breath settle, then allow your breath take you in deeper and deeper and see what you notice. With no expectations be open to letting this light take you on an inner journey to peace and harmony.

I would love to hear about your experiences with candlelight so please share, comment and spread the message of light. As we take more light in we shine more light out and make this planet a lighter, brighter place to be.

Namaste

Sarah

The opportunities for self-care

By Kel Fox

Sarah’s offline this week, taking some time off teaching and writing to look after herself during a bout of illness. Since that in itself is an act of self-care, it seems like a good time to revisit last year’s theme, and perhaps see if there is a link to this year’s theme of ‘connection’.

What is self-care? It has become synonymous with luxurious relaxation, afternoons at the day spa, or weekends away from daily life, and since then been challenged: is self-care selfish? Is it necessary? Is it just about cutting out stress? Is it even something we should be worried about (especially since that does seem to defeat the purpose)?

Self-care is important. If we expand the definition beyond massages and holidays at the beach, it is, effectively, what keeps us alive. Self-care is – or should be – a daily engagement with yourself and your body, and it isn’t always easy relaxation. Actually, most of it isn’t easy. I suspect the real reason we have neglected ourselves and relegated self-care to the realms of day spas and float tanks and saying no to helping your aunt move house, then labelled this box ‘selfish and unnecessary’, is so we can avoid the work that is true self-care. It is far easier to take care of everyone else first, and then when our own bodies or minds start to fray, say it wasn’t our fault. But if you’re here, you know that isn’t true.

Self-care is your motivation to do well and be well. If your motivation for going to yoga is to keep up with the latest Instagram trends, that’s not self-care. But if your motivation is to engage with yourself on a physical, emotional and spiritual level, then it is. The latter is harder, of course. Real spiritual engagement is joyful, but it is also confronting at times. Real emotional engagement can be frightening when we uncover some unpleasant truths about ourselves or our relationships. Real physical exercise is difficult when we are pushing our bodies to do something new, or gain strength and flexibility. But with this unpleasantness and difficulty comes the wonder of opening our hearts to experience, and the fun of discovering what our bodies are capable of.

Self-care is eating (well). Self-care is exercising (safely). Self-care is your daily grooming (with healthy products), what you think when you look in the mirror, the way you respond to difficult emotions, standing up for yourself if you feel your soul is compromised. Self-care is about being connected enough to your soul to listen when it is talking to you. And it is talking to you all the time. If you haven’t heard it, it is because you haven’t been listening.

Say ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to things with the discretion your soul offers. The message this sends to yourself about how you value your time is self-care. If you choose to help someone, do it not to be selfless or to cross off your ‘good deed’ for the day, but because you understand that what you do for others, you do for yourself. This sends a message to your soul that you care for yourself. Then when you need help, ask for it. It will be there. Accept it. This sends the message that you value yourself: that you love your soul, unselfishly, knowing that the universe is reciprocal, and your soul is the universe.

Now we uncover the link between self-care and connection: self-care is nurturing your connection to your soul (thus also your heart, mind, body – every layer in between). The opportunity is this: everything you do in your life can be an act of self-care. Do everything with kindness, connected to the voice of your soul, and that is the best self-care you can find.

Adapted from original post on Kel’s blog.

Gratitude from my heart to yours

Gratitude for where I am right now.

Wow, wow, wow: I am so very grateful for where I am at this mid-year point.

I set myself some very significant goals this year and as well as graduating from the three-year, 650-hour Dru Yoga Therapy Course with my Yoga Therapy Diploma, I have also now achieved Senior Registered Teacher status with Yoga Australia.

The process of applying for this level of recognition is to collect evidence to support the following standards:

Minimum of 1000 hours specific teacher training
Minimum 12 years personal practice
10 years and 1000 hours of professional teaching
Ongoing mentoring both as a mentor and mentee
90 hours study on anatomy and functional physiology with minimum
20 hours application to yoga teaching
50 hours of yogic physiology i.e. koshas, nadis, chakras, gunas, etc.
70 hours of supervised teaching
300 hours specialties

The process of putting all this together was very rich. I was taken back to all the classes, courses and retreats I have run over the past eleven years as I gathered the evidence to support my application. I then needed to collect student testimonials to back up what I presented.

I put out a call for support from a number of students, both long-term and some more recent, and it is this that has opened my heart in gratitude for the depth of sharing and heartfelt appreciation that came back to me.

So many of you took the time to reflect and share your stories of transformation. Some I had no idea of how much you had gone through and how coming to yoga helped your recovery in times of need. I have compiled these into a document and sent them to Dru Australia as I thought they might like to know that the vision they hold, that of transforming the world by offering people the tools to transform themselves, is so powerful. Shared before me was a testament to the value of people working at what they love to do and sharing the wisdom worldwide.

I would therefore like to thank all my Dru teachers and teachers of other traditions whose work I have dipped into, who have contributed to shaping the teacher I am today. I would equally like to thank all of you who took the time to share your stories and open your hearts to me as you did so honestly and willingly.

Thank you from the deepest part of my heart. I look forward to continuing the journey as I work from a place of pure love to offer you the best I can in yoga, meditation, yoga therapy, transformational coaching and all things that support living a deeply rich and meaningful life.

Namaste

Sarah

Sweet Spiced Carrot Loaf with Maple and Peanut Frosting

I served this to my most recent Soul Spa participants after engaging in a delightful morning of yoga, meditation and deep reflection as we embraced the winter solstice. As always we enjoyed a leisurely morning tea where the cake quickly vanished! I think it’s the winner of them all so far and would love to share it with you here. (If you’d like to be part of the next Soul Spa, you can check dates and availability here.)

Gluten free and entirely plant based!

For the loaf

1/2 C macadamia oil

4 free range eggs

1/4 C honey

1 tsp vanilla extract

2 tsp bicarb soda

1 tsp ground turmeric

2 tsp ground cinnamon

1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

1/4 C chia seeds

1/4 C dates pitted and chopped

1 1/2 C grated carrot

1/3 C shredded coconut

1/2 C coconut flour

Preheat oven to 170°C and line a loaf tin with greaseproof paper.

In large bowl whisk together oil, eggs, honey, vanilla, bicarb and spices until creamy. Add chia seeds, dates, carrot, coconut and flour, mixing well to combine.

Pour into the loaf tin and place in the middle of the oven to cook for 1 hour. Check with a skewer after an hour and if it comes out clean remove from the oven. If the skewer is not clean then leave it in a bit longer (5-10 mins) and re-check.

Once cooked allow to cool in tin for 20 mins, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. While cooling, make the frosting.

For the frosting

2 Tbsp smooth natural peanut butter ( I used crunchy and very yum)

1 1/2 Tbsp maple syrup

1 Tbsp almond milk

Whisk all ingredients in a bowl until creamy.

Once the loaf is cooled drizzle frosting over the top, and if desired garnish with additional walnuts and coconut flakes.

Slice and serve (serves 8) or keep in the fridge for up to a week.

Print friendly version: Sweet Spiced Carrot Loaf

Notes

I choose to use all organic ingredients in my cooking. In the original recipe you have the option of using melted coconut oil instead of macadamia if you wish.

Recipe by Jacqueline Alwill from the Wellbeing Eat Well Autumn edition

Holidays – take your yoga principles with you

Oh no, it’s holiday time again! I get the feeling that most people in my classes would like them (the classes, not the holidays!) to go on for the whole year without taking a break. However, the breaks and alignment to the school term give my year a structure and framework to work with, which is something I need. I thought this might be an opportunity to give you some holiday ideas over the next couple of blog posts, and to explore what yoga means to you. Yoga is so much more than what we do in the class. Let’s look at the meaning of yoga and how we can use that to bring yoga to life in our everyday living.

In our fast paced Western world yoga has, for many, become an exercise class, something we do to keep fit and flexible. The deeper meaning of yoga is, in essence, union. Yug is the root word of yoga in Sanskrit and literally means ‘yoke or unite’. In its purest essence this refers to the union of your individual consciousness with the consciousness of the Divine. I would like to take this meaning further and explore how we can bring the union or connection of yoga into our everyday life. How can we be more yogic (connected) within our day-to-day activities and what would this look like?

Rainy day? Take an umbrella, wear a warm raincoat and feel the cleansing of the Earth around you.

Walking in connection with your body and breath

One of the things I like about the yoga break is the opportunity to step out of the cycle of routine and I guess this might apply to some of you too. It’s a chance to do something else in that time slot other than go to yoga. Take the opportunity to have a break from the class structure and do something meaningful. Weather permitting, it is always refreshing to get outside and go for a walk.

While you’re out, take some of the practice from our class with you: as you walk, notice your physical body and see if you can relax your shoulders and let your arms swing naturally. How is your breath? Can you breathe more fully as you walk and perhaps count your steps with your breath? For example, as you walk you could breathe in for the count of four steps, then breathe out for four steps. As you get more familiar with this you can start exploring the equal ratio breathing or sama vritti pranayama, the four stage breath that includes the pause at the end of the in and out breath.

If at any point you get out of breath, stop and go back to an easier ratio or count that worked for you until you can do that without getting breathless. Practice this walking and breathing for the first few minutes of your walk, then let it go.

Familiar feet! Sarah & Kel get their toes dirty on a winter walk. Actually, not dirty – earthy 🙂

Walking in connection with your heart and mind

Once you have walked and practiced some conscious breathing, notice how your heart feels and what mood you are walking with – just as we do in class when we check in with these layers of our being. Bring this awareness to your walk and acknowledge how you feel. See if, as you walk, you can notice more about the environment you are walking in. Bring in your senses and notice what you see, smell, hear, taste and feel as you walk. This will help if you have an especially busy mind. You may even like to choose a colour and notice all the things around you as you walk of that colour. This helps keep you present and you will be surprised what you notice that you may never have seen before.

Take an opportunity to stop along the walk and if you can, take your shoes off. Yes, that’s right! Take them off and get those divine feet in direct contact with our beautiful Mother Earth and let her feel you as you feel her. Stand and pause: a moment of reflection as you feel into your heart and notice, make a deeper connection with your sacred heart as you go a little deeper inside. Take the time to connect to a higher part of yourself. This doesn’t have to take long; a brief but potent pause to check in through your heart and maybe give thanks for the opportunity while being open to any messages that are waiting for this moment to get your attention.

Connection to a rich life

My wish for you is that you fall in love with being connected to nature and walking. That you fill your lungs with fresh prana, breathe out any stale and stagnant air and connect deeply to life and this precious day you have to enjoy in all its aspects of beauty, magnificence, rawness, messiness, happiness, sadness, and everything in between. It’s all these feelings that make life rich. Let’s connect deeply as we do in class, out in nature on a walk.

Namaste

Sarah

Living with awareness and being responsible

I start a class asking everyone to check in with their ‘koshas’, or layers of being. Specifically, I direct people to feel into their physical, emotional and mental layers so that they have an awareness of what they have walked into the class with. There is much written about koshas already and I see no reason to reproduce what others have done really well: here’s a great article if you want more detail on koshas. What I would like to use this space for is exploring how we can connect with these layers to make life richer.

Anamaya kosha

When I ask about the physical layer, anamaya kosha, I am asking you to feel into your body and notice where it is calling your attention. This might be a tight neck, aching shoulder, or sore foot. If you stop long enough to notice that’s a great start; next, explore what you need to do about it. Is there something you can do immediately to relieve the discomfort? If not, is this something you need to address as part of your overall health plan to bring balance back into your physical body? It could be a postural adjustment and by bringing your awareness to it you can easily adjust and get some relief. It could be you discover that your sleeping position causes you some discomfort upon rising and changing your pillow might help. Maybe it’s an ergonomic issue of how you sit at work, whether that is at a desk, driving a vehicle or standing for long periods on hard surfaces. It really is worth taking the time to feel, explore and hopefully fix some of the issues.

Pranamaya kosha

If we are exploring the pranic layer, pranamaya kosha, then we are checking in on our energy levels, how energised we do or do not feel. How are we breathing? How is our general energy level? By bringing our awareness to the breath, it changes and gives us the opportunity to breathe a little deeper and spend a moment connecting deeply to the breathing process. The benefits of this are so huge that it is well worth the few minutes of your time to practice. You could do this before you even get out of bed in the morning. Deepen your breath and feel like you are charging up your body for the day ahead, bringing fresh prana into all the cells of your body, oxygenating your blood, loosening up fascia (the connective tissue beneath the skin) and getting an overall kickstart to the day before you take a step.

Manomaya kosha

Then there’s the emotional layer, manomaya kosha, and it really is valuable to check in with how your heart is feeling. This incredible organ pumps continuously for us to keep us alive and would greatly benefit from some loving attention throughout the day. Check in with how you feel, your emotional state of being, so that you can respond appropriately. Again, by noticing, we get more in touch with our feelings and can then choose what to do about how we feel. For example say you got up and noticed you were feeling a bit low and you were aware that this was from a recent loss where the sense of grief comes and goes. On those days you notice this you may be able to be kinder to yourself, have an easier day and fit in something that you know nourishes you deeply. It is about honouring the ebbs and flows but if we don’t take the time to notice then we often charge on and numb out the feelings, which over a period of time will create problems.

Vignanamaya kosha

What about the mood you carry around with you? Are you aware of what mood you take to work, take to a meeting or walk into your yoga class with? This is the mental layer or vignanamaya kosha and you may well be unaware of what you are carrying around with you for the simple reason of not taking the time to inquire.

Raising your awareness of the koshas will evoke change and make your life richer as you make conscious choices of how to bring balance back into these layers. You will over time develop ways to change how you feel, to change your mood if you notice a black cloud hanging over your head. You’ll develop your own effective tools that will help you live life more fully.

Here are some quick tips for working with these layers:

Physical: move your body, stretch, walk and get a drink of water

Pranic: breathe deeply, take one big breath sighing the breath out and pausing at the end of the out breath. Do this three times and notice the difference.

Emotional: stop what you are doing and feel into your heart, notice the breath flowing in and out and imagine this is flowing in and out of your heart like a light bringing loving kindness to your heart.

Mental: notice your mood, name it and if you don’t like it change it by doing all the above! If you feel stuck and can’t change it then get out in nature, walk around the block, call a trusted friend who will let you have a rant then hopefully you will feel better for the release. Make a deal with yourself that if you have a story that keeps coming up, tell it, vent it and let it out but if after three story-telling sessions you still feel you need to tell it some more, seek some professional help – that way you can explore the situation productively and keep your friends!

The practice of regularly checking in with your koshas is a practice, and responsibility, worthy of your attention. Could you allow enough time upon waking to reflect on how you are about to start this brand new day ahead of you? We’re not talking about an extra twenty minutes out of your day, merely five to six minutes reflection before jumping out of bed to stretch, breathe deeply, notice and be aware of what you are about to take out and share with others. Then perhaps you could check in a few times throughout the day. If nothing else you will have stopped what you are doing, started to breathe more fully and maybe even stretch the body to see what is going on.

Enjoy the journey.

Namaste

Sarah