Yoga Sutra: 4 Keys For Peace
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 Awakening from a fever dream can feel surreal. Our lizard brains, wired for survival, can't yet accept the relief from gripping fear.
Everything the day before, or two frightening weeks before, feels like a parallel universe, but our bodies don't yet know which alternate reality we live in. They. don't. yet. know.
Like a collective, temporary albeit sub-clinical, PTSD.
Is there a Yoga Rx? Yes! Yoga and self-care can help! Pranayama, Vinyasa, Restorative Yoga, Massage: they all help.
Anything that moves energy through our bodies helps with release. Yes, that means novels and films to make us laugh and cry. Music to make us sway and dance, twist and shout!
Nature renews, too. Hiking or climbing, watching ducks, walking near trees, even indoor gardening. Our shy Peace Lily, above, surprised us with her rare, hopeful bloom, 5 days before Inauguration Day, and she continues to blossom, like a radiant young poet laureate.
 As we release our clenched, fearful reflexes, we may experience mixed feelings, recalling panic behavior whilst in the grip of fear, in ourselves or others. Things said, thought, felt, or done. Being human.
Science tells us the rage reflex, our evolutionary survival superpower, on perceiving threat shoots a 90-second powerful drug blast through our systems. However, our feelings of fury and blame, after those 90 seconds, require our conscious thoughts to sustain. Our thoughts renew our anger, and refuel that drug blast. In other words, the thoughts we choose feed our fury and rage. Or don't. Our choice. Being human, once again. And, here is Yoga again, with an Rx.
Yoga Sutra 1.33: "Four Keys to Peace"
By cultivating attitudes of friendliness toward the happy, compassion for the unhappy, delight in the virtuous, and disregard toward the wicked, the mind-stuff retains its undisturbed calmness. ~ Swami Satchidananda translation
 That 4th Key sounds surprising, counter-intuitive. But in practice, it can be tremendously freeing, and also surprisingly logical, and effective.
It is muy importante to note here that "Disregard" or "Indifference" does not mean compliance. It means releasing our own emotional entanglement. Declining to be a mirror of that which we would condemn, by reflecting it through our mirrored actions.
Disregard frees us from feeding our spite and resentment, along with their gangster brother, terror. Yoga Rx to heal us, from inside. Like so much else, it turns out, Freedom is an inside job.
"I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear." ~ Dr.Martin Luther King, Jr. love quotes
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Nidra/Restore/Reiki Trainings
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 I am feeling energized and blissful this weekend, at the halfway mark of the halfway mark of my online 100-Hour Restorative Yoga Teacher Training, 2021 Virtual Edition.
I don't know whether future trainings will be virtual, as all things (yes, even Covid snow years) do end. But I do know that the space-time transcendence of the airwaves has brough t extra special, powerful elements to this training, that are gifts I hope to distill and keep, even when we are once again physically present in our annamaya kosha bodies with each other for trainings.
Past Mother Mary TT Grads may join Levels 3 and 4 at 50% reviewer price, even though the Reiki Saturdays in Levels 3 and 4 are brand new for 2021. All Teacher Training details here.
Hours: Fri+Mon 5-8pm // Sat 1-6PM // Sun 2-7PM All EST
100-Hour Restorative, in 25-Hour Modules:
Level 1 Basics: January 15 - 18
Level 2 intermediate: Jan 29 – Feb 1
Level 3 Reiki I + Restore: February 19 - 22
Level 4 Reiki II + Restore: March 5 – 8
Yoga Nidra Teacher Training 25-Hours: March 19-22
 Restorative teaching experience or other trainings can also qualify you for L3 and L4, so reach out if you're feeling called or interested!
You will have the best time! And emerge a more confident teacher and yoga practitioner.
Single-day Reiki options available. Email with questions!
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My winter schedule continues with four weekly Zoom selections:
Monday Slow Flow Meditation 10AM-11:30
Wednesday RestoreMix 11AM-12:15
Friday YinFusions 3PM-4:15
Sunday Yoga Nidra 8:30-9:30PM
 And monthly subscriptions to just recordings, or recordings plus classes, for one series/style, or all, are available!
Equinox Eastside classes ~ let's hope for soon with Spring and healthier New York State and City numbers bringing back our group fitness classes and studios! If you read or watch local news, you will know as soon as I know!
Meanwhile, still, & always:
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul. ~ William Ernest Henley, Invictus
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 I honor your email privacy and do not share email lists! Thank you for being on my yoga journey and path! I look forward to meeting you under some big tent at a festival somewhere, or on a mountainside, or beside a beach fire, or, in a hot tub on a retreat!
Short of that, a local slackline or grassy meadow or fun yoga studio will do! Even one of my periodic yogic dinner or lunch get-togethers, to keep our hearts and souls singing!
Reply anytime; forward, subscribe, or unsubscribe anytime! You know where to find me.
OMMMMMMMary
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 Warmth, care, nurturing, and touch: do you have a friend, partner, or family member you would like to share these gifts with? Ask them for a date!
On Valentine's Day, you and a partner can share a sweet guided Thai massage exchange led by my friend Bassam and myself.
 We will lead two delicious, guided, Thai rounds. We will record the workshop, so folks can also purchase the 2-hour video to repeat whenever they want.
Best Valentine date ever! Early Bird ends Feb. 1st! Sign up here.
(Photos: Jeni Rogers
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Insight Timer is a free meditation app that I have long enjoyed and recommended to students and friends. I use the timer for my morning meditations, but it has grown hugely, with thousands of voices, music, and meditations, in so many categories!
 This month, I am proud to say Raul and I have recorded a Chakra Guitar 7-Meditation series ~ and they are live and available for free listening on Insight Timer!
They range in length from 6 to 22 minutes.
If you like them, please leave a positive review and comments! Share, Follow, & Listen more! My page is here.
I am especially proud of the talented musical stylings of my maestro partner Raul Aranas, who is also my photographer, above.
Headphones and Earbuds make for the best listening experience ~ I've linked these Carlos Santana wireless sounds that benefit his Milagros Foundation for kids worldwide.
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Jason Nemer and Alan Finger, two of my Yoga papas, both have signature books out that I want to recommend!
ISHTA Yogiraj Alan Finger's Tantra of the Yoga Sutras co-authored with Wendy Newton ~ a sweet, small, cogent volume, is highly readable, enlightening and pleasurable!
AcroYoga International co-founder Jason Nemer's new book, Move, Connect, Play is completed and due for a June 2021 release!
 Jason is my teacher and I am so excited and proud of all he has done to make this art that he and Jenny co-created, a worldwide phenom, not only as a sport, but as a bridge between people and communities! Jason and Jenny are a big part of who I am, as a people connector, today!
Thank you, my papa teachers!
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