Cleaning, sharing, and still smiling

Up early. Time for cleaning: hot shower, hot water and lemon to drink, floor to sweep. My friend comes over for yoga. Can I guide her in practice? I somehow do, though the words come out wrong and I don't know how to read another's body. Am I teaching or are we just practicing together? I... Continue Reading →

August 31, 2015 2

Simple smiles

It's a long weekend in the UK. That in itself is enough to make me smile. Just a bit more time to do whatever presents itself. A feeling of a bonus day. It's been a day full of things to make me smile: Surprising sunshine on my way to class this morning. I felt properly... Continue Reading →

August 29, 2015 4

What does two years of yoga look like?

Round about this time of year is my two year yoga anniversary. And I just found out it's four years since my yoga studio set up business (hence their lovely give-away of 4 free passes to bring friends and rellies to class). It feels like it should be a good time for a thoughtful and serious... Continue Reading →

August 28, 2015 5

Taking a beginner’s brain to yoga class

I was talking over dinner last week with a friend who's new to yoga. I rather provocatively asked her what yoga was for her right now. I was curious to know. I've been trying to define my yoga for myself since I started and some of my earlier notions now strike me as surprisingly naive.... Continue Reading →

August 26, 2015 2

Compassion for the skeletons in the closet

Compassion is a topic I keep coming across in blogs at the moment (picking up the idea of serendipity from my own blog recently!). Yogis often talk about cultivating compassion towards others, but receiving compassion is also an art that's worth practicing. I read a great post recently about handling compassion, how to confront one's vulnerability and... Continue Reading →

August 24, 2015 6

Well, hello aching muscles! You haven’t been around for a while!

I totally surprised Hubby the other day (and I mean surprised to the point of speechlessness) when I ventured that I don’t really think of myself as ‘sick’ anymore, more as someone pretty well, but just being careful. [If not you’re not a regular reader, I was diagnosed with ME (aka Chronic Fatigue Syndrome more... Continue Reading →

August 21, 2015 5

The universe offers…

I was feeling glum on my walk in to work this morning. The weather didn't help -- the meteorological joke that is an English summer. It was low grey skies with a hint of rain. I had a definite hankering for Greece. For the climate, the landscape, the hospitality of people. For endless frappés (Greek iced coffee),... Continue Reading →

August 20, 2015 2

The yoga of redecorating

We've been redecorating recently, and are now on the way to returning to normal living. It's been very disruptive for several weeks, because we have a small apartment so there's only so much juggling room when we need to move furniture out of the way. This has forced us to live rather differently (that's a... Continue Reading →

August 19, 2015 0

Comparing crows and seeking contentment

I came across some photos just recently that I took of myself about two years ago, near the start of my yoga journey. I wanted to record how particular poses looked so that I could understand what I needed to work on. It was a learning exercise. I didn't understand how to interpret the sensations in my body to have much of a... Continue Reading →

August 15, 2015 9

What am I really hearing?

I recently read the expression 'a teacher's teacher' and I've been wondering what this means. And who it's meant to appeal to. Teachers presumably. So that they feel they're somewhere on the yoga teacher hierarchy (even non-judgemental yogis presumably have a sense of hierarchy) and are getting some superior level of teaching? I can only... Continue Reading →