Why is yoga so hard to do?
caption= “Well it’s certainly something to think about, isn’t it? I was idly checking Google analytics on Tuesday morning, and on a whim decided to look at the “organic” search terms. Those are the words that people type into the vast waves of the Internet hoping for answers from just about any source. So what […]
Five good reasons to stick it to your yoga practice
You walk out the door after yoga class, soothed, settled, and mysteriously both more grounded and lighter at the same time. A day passes, or perhaps two, and you have time to practice. So what was that preparation for reverse triangle that made the full pose so much more accessible? What sequence led up to […]
Life, Happiness and the Pursuit of Liberty?
So what comes first – freedom or happiness?I’ve been thinking lately of something B.K.S. Iyengar wrote in Light on Life, his summary of yoga wisdom at the age of 87. A great boon of yoga, even for relative beginners, is the happiness it brings, a state of self-reliant contentment. Happiness is good in itself and […]
Give me strength: a tale of three headstands
Those are some biceps. One of the best things about yoga practice is the way it brings up emotions and lets us examine them, the events that evoked them, and the thinking behind them. But there are times when emotions well up so strongly that we’re knocked off our feet, and don’t get to hear […]
How does the impossible become possible?
How does the impossible become possible? I don’t really know the answer to that. But I do know that in yoga it happens all the time. Take rope Sukhasana, for example, or Shirley’s rope trick – as I think of it. I first saw it two years ago, in an intensive workshop preparing for Junior […]
The Sniffley Sadhana
Summer Sadhana 2012, the fourth annual 10 days of early morning practice, has been a bumpy ride. Every day presented a new obstacle: one student had a family medical emergency; another’s dental surgery date moved ahead from July to two days before we started. There was a temporary crown that came out; a fall on […]