Dear All, 

As we evolve through our yoga practice, we heighten awareness of and appreciation for all aspects of life, within and without. Our seasons, by their very nature, help us to understand what this means, and how we become more attuned, not only to the self, but to all things universal.

The summer season radiates the full power of regeneration that is engendered by increased daylight and hospitable weather conditions, both of which encourage expansion within the body as well as in the garden, where we can clearly see the outer effects of this expansion and light. We can safely assume our yoga practice gives us these internal benefits with our breathing, stretching, and meditating, diffusing us with expansive light.  

Fall follows and recognizes the zeal and energy expended by summer and realizes the need to create a universal balance. Fall slows down this frenetic flow of luxurious growth, and as the climate cools everything and everyone, the Earth prepares to rest, repair, and reclaim its expended energy, much as we do in savasana, the asana of rest and closure in our yoga practice.

Winter brings in the “big sleep," a time to go within, much like our vegetation and certain species of wildlife that hibernate. This time is used to deepen the rest and repair process.

Although these 3 seasons mirror their diverse attributes and can be astutely understood within the yogic concept, I think spring epitomizes yoga's greatest gifts. Sensory awareness is promoted by the coming-to-life activities, both in the body and the garden. The gift of surrender is so obvious as the winter energy weakens and the senses begin to strengthen, encouraging the gift of unfoldment. Slowly, but surely and strongly, the sap of life, in our trees and in our beings begins to flow, returning us to full sensory awareness of the cycles of all life on the planet.

Our yoga practice offers us a way to better identify, understand, and appreciate our moods, seasons, and cycles. The awareness awakened by our practice goes a long way to make our lives more fruitful, abundant, and purposeful. This month of April, the beginning of spring, reminds us of the importance of the senses and their impact on our well-being. We too unfold, strengthen, and develop as we respond to the increasing light. The gift of surrender slows us down, resulting in greater appreciation of the hum of our inner voice of consciousness, the flow of the sap of life, and to take the time "to smell the roses."

Our YTA workshop, held monthly on the second Saturday, offers presentations by awesome presenters to add energy and light to our work, be it teaching or seriously practicing. Spring into action and join us. 

Yours In Yoga,
Paula Renuka Heitzner

YTA is looking forward to welcoming Vandita Kate Marchesiello on April 14, for Transform, Relax, and Rejuvenate: A Brief Retreat with Lasting Results.

Long before there were yoga mats, my mother knitted me a white woolen blanket to use for my yoga practice. As described in the Indian tradition, this or a tiger skin rug was what one used to sit upon for meditation. It was 1974, and I had just discovered the ancient traditions of yoga. Now, the way this discovery came about and the years that followed still put a smile on my face …

Marty, who owned a bar and had a great interest in sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll, turned me on to a book by Jess Stern titled, Yoga, Youth, and Reincarnation (after all it was the 70s …). I read the book, attended a free yoga class at a Catholic church in Schenectady, New York, and the rest is history.

Signing up for a series of ten classes after the freebie was a no brainer. I loved how I felt (without drugs) during a slow yoga flow, deep yogic breathing, and the icing on the cake … yoga nidra. I faithfully attended all ten classes and signed up again for another series with my teacher, Rupa, a devotee of Amrit Desai. Each week I entered the little house that also served as a yoga center and mini ashram and was soothed by the nag champa incense that burned on the alter next to photos of Paramahansa Yogananda, Gurudev (Amrit) and a variety of saints and sages from many traditions. Fresh flowers brightened the clean room as lovely music played and invited me in to sit quietly before class began. Dressed in all white, Rupa was the epitome of a yoga teacher:  knowledgeable, kind, and open-hearted. After a year of study with her, she suggested I do a yoga teacher training with her and help her at the little studio and teach in the community. I was so flattered and humbled by her invitation that I accepted immediately. The training lasted about nine months and was an amazing experience. With such an emphasis on character development and the health benefits of yoga, I gained more than imaginable that impacted my daily life.

During this time Rupa took me to Sumneytown, Pennsylvania, to meet Yogi Desai. We attended an Inner Quest Intensive and spent ten hours a day for three days sitting with the question: “Tell me who you are.” Like peeling the layers of skin from an onion, this experience revealed some deep-seated resentments, feelings of abandonment, and ecstatic bliss. Over the years I participated in approximately seven of these intensives. Meeting Amrit at the end of this long weekend experience was joyful. He entered the room as if floating on air and had such a compassionate perspective for all the suffering we had experienced that weekend (imagine 20+ people crying, weeping, screaming, and punching pillows). He spoke eloquently about karma, dharma, and human nature and the power of love and left us all feeling good about our exhausting yet exhilarating weekend.

Returning home I started teaching at the yoga center and a variety of community centers. I also began contemplating a yoga teacher training with Amrit in Pennsylvania. In 1977 I took a leave of absence from my clerical job at General Electric to attend the month-long training. The property at the Summit Station location where the training would be held was nestled among cornfields and farmlands of the Pennsylvania Dutch. Long walks on country roads and hills revealed a patchwork of colors from the various crops that were planted on this ideal land. This city girl was in her glory, as I had longed for a place like this to call home.

Just a short time after I arrived for training I was busily preparing to welcome Swami Kripalu from India. This was a major and long anticipated event. Swami Kripalu was Amrit’s guru, and Amrit had been pleading with him for a few years to come to America and witness the interest in hatha yoga and the love and hunger hundreds of us had for these particular practices. The day of Bapuji’s (Swami Kripalu) arrival was unforgettable. A couple hundred of us all dressed in white with little marigolds in our hands and hair welcomed Swami with song and music that we chanted in Indian tradition. Bapuji, who spoke briefly after his long journey, said he felt so welcomed and loved and looked forward to spending time in satsanga with us soon. He spoke in Gujarati and Amrit translated. After being at the ashram for the month of training, I decided I wanted to stay longer and so quit my job and moved into the community that became my yoga family.

Well, here we are now and I’m still serving at Kripalu Center. The years from 1979 to 2018 have been full of teaching, training, presenting, coaching, directing, mothering, and now grandmothering!

I hope you will join me on April 14th for more stories and heartfelt experiences. See you soon!

Learn more about Vandita at yoganowandthen.com.

     

    

We are thrilled to be bringing Shari Friedrichsen back to the YTA community. Here are her thoughts about the Yoga and the Heart workshop she will be leading for us on March 10. Hope to see you there!

The practice of Yoga is based on Sankhya philosophy, which is a top-down philosophy stating that we evolve from the Light of Pure Consciousness. It further says that the cause (consciousness) is always in the effect (us). And yoga is a practice that is bottom-up, meaning we start with where we are in the body/mind and practice to experience and perceive our true inner nature, which is that light of pure consciousness.

This means that within this body/mind that light exists, not just anywhere but everywhere. The body cannot exist without it. Furthermore, through the continued study of yogis and yoginis before us and the sharing of their experiences, we understand that the most concentrated area of that light is in the heart space. This concentrated light is the essence of pure wisdom, pure love, pure compassion, unalloyed joy, and abiding intelligence. Yet we often don’t get to experience that in our life, or it comes and goes, seeming quite random. The haze or cloudiness is too thick. What the Yoga Sutras tell us is that there are ways to capture that experience and to maintain that level of joy and light within and at the same time live in the world with our work, our relationships, our desires, and our intelligence.

The key is to keep our bodies strong and resilient and our minds free from anxiety, worry, anger, angst, and doubt. As yoga practitioners we have had some success in maintaining or increasing the health of our bodies. Yoga has given us many tools and practices to support us in this. We have been able to reduce back pain, alleviate some of the aches in our joints, decrease our anxiety, lower our blood pressure, combat heart disease, and in many other substantial ways we have strengthened the functioning of our bodies. This is a necessary and foundational step in helping us relieve mental and emotional pain and enhancing the quality of our life.

To go further, we need to understand a bit more about the relationship between our body, heart, and mind. The body supports the healthy functioning of the organs, including the brain and heart, the locus for concentrated areas of prana and light. If the physical functioning is compromised, the movement of prana can also be compromised, or even decreased. And we may not even be aware of it, but slowly over time it drains us of our will, our determination, our body’s intelligence, our joy, and our vitality. To keep a healthy body, the foundational step is asana practice.

From here we can look at the mind. As we know from our practice, the body and mind are intimately connected. We do our practice and our mind is more at peace. We don’t, and we’re more apt to be reactive and doubtful about our lives, our experience of ourselves.  After establishing a stable and comfortable body, relatively free of discomfort or disease, yoga gives us the tools and practices to further calm the mind. This is vital to the connection of the deeper regions in our heart. If the mind is wandering here and there, worried about this and that, the light and joy of the heart are quite difficult to access. We are stuck with our senses moving outward, catching hold of any thread of entertainment or relief or external habit we’ve cultivated. This kind of mind does not have the ability to experience the sublime aspects of the vishoka, joy untouched by sorrow or angst, or jyotishmati, supreme light of the heart, both of which are the subtle building blocks supporting the creation of the heart itself and concentrated in the heart area. Without a quiet mind, guided by inward moving prana, we miss out on this grace that is, always exists, and flows within.

The YTA workshop on March 10 will focus on practices that strengthen, stabilize, and turn us inward to this heart center. Through specific postures and breathing we will increase access to the four gifts that come with a body: rupa—beauty; lavanya—tastefulness; bala—vitality; and vajra samharanatva—the inherent healing power. Once we have ease and stability in the body, we will use specific pranayama practices to turn the mind peacefully inward. With a calm mind, we will be able to access the deeper stillness of the heart, where we can touch upon and rest in our true nature of unobstructed joy and light.

Participants of Saturday's Ayurveda and Yoga workshop with Deirdre Breen were treated to a taste of this delicious elixir at the close of the day. Here is Deirdre's recipe.

Ojas Nightly Tonic Recipe
1. Add small amounts of these to one cup of milk as you slowly bring it to a boil:

Chopped dates (1 tbsp)

Chopped almonds (2 tsp)

Coconut meat or flakes (1 tbsp)

Saffron (1/2 tsp)

Ghee (1–2 tsp)

Cardamom (1/8 tsp)

2. Add ojas-building herbs to the milk (1/8 tsp or one 500mg capsule of each):

Shatavari (Strength of 100 Husbands, sometimes spelled Shatawari)

Ashwagandha (Strength of Ten Horses, sometimes spelled Ashwaganda)

3. Optional: Once the milk, herbs, foods and spices are cooked and off the flame, add 1 tsp of raw honey.

Drink one cup each night for 3 months to rebuild ojas levels to support sleep, immunity, and overall well-being.

Enjoy!