Category: General

Imaginary Tea Party

March 9, 2018
Posted by Sharon

In my memory, a significant part of my childhood was spent in imaginary play.  From a quick review of photographs, I spent a lot of time in a leotard with a tutu.  I was either dressing for the job I wanted or I just liked the fancy feeling that comes along with wearing anything tulle.  Since it is also itchy, my guess is that I REALLY wanted to be a ballerina.  I also liked to have tea parties.  This week, for bibliotherapy Friday (if you read my blog regularly, you will soon realize that there is never just one day of the week to enjoy book therapy), I’d like to invoke both my imagination and the spirit of planning parties I will likely never host.  Will you be my guest?  Better yet, I highly recommend checking out these cookbooks and planning your own imaginary feast.

The ultimate tea party cake is most definitely the Coconut Princess Birthday Cake with Almond Filling, a 3-layer cake that looks like something I’d LOVE for you to bring over for tea at my place.  We would need plates and forks and, lucky for us, I have those.  In addition, I would provide some Earl Grey tea as I believe the bergamot scent would complement the almond filling.  You can’t buy this cake, but you can make it by following the three-page recipe starting on page 107 of “Tasting Hygge: Joyful Recipes for Cozy Days and Nights” by Leela Cyd.  I have to be honest with you that just the idea of trying to make this cake causes a bit of anxiety to arise in me…..especially the little “note” on page 109 about making my own marzipan.  But, in my heart, I feel how delightful this cake is.  In my mouth, I can feel how the soft white frosting would shock my mouth with sweetness on the first bite.  Then, I can feel the flavor develop as the almond enveloped the initial sugary sweetness and I know I’m going to giggle.  I’m going to sit back and enjoy that bite.  Sip some tea.  If  frosted three-layer cakes aren’t your thing, then delight in all the other treats in this fabulous book that is perfect for your next tea party—-real OR imagined.  Some of the other recipes that caught my attention were the Swedish Tea Ring with Berries and Crushed Cardamom (pg. 60), Pea Dumplings with Mint Sour Cream (pg. 26), and Avocado Yogurt Dip with Vegetables (pg. 75).  So, put on your tutu, gather the fairies, sit down with this sweet little cookbook, and have the best little tea party your mind can imagine in the most beautiful garden you can conjure.

Tea party not your thing?  No problem!  Meet me at the Chinese night market of our dreams where the scent of five spice and curries mingle with noodles and mysterious meats (don’t ask, don’t tell).  There isn’t much I don’t want to learn to make and nothing I wouldn’t love to eat right now in Danielle Chang’s “Lucky Rice: Stories and Recipes from Night Markets, Feasts and Family Tables”.  As if the food and sweet treats weren’t enough, Chang also has some very unique alcoholic drink ideas including the “Afternoon Gin Tea” which includes anise, Kaffir lime leaf, peppercorns, smoky Lapsang Souchong tea, ginger, honey, and gin.  So, I guess I’ve come back around to the tea party theme after all.  But, how can you resist the Nasi Goreng (Indonesian Fried Rice, page 157), Chicken Tikka Masala (page 135), Zha Jiang Mian (Spicy Pork Noodles, page 104), or Chanko Nabe (Sumo Wrestlers’ Stew, page 86)?  For some reason, many of us lose our ability to imagine or dream as adults, or it makes us feel foolish or silly—-what a waste of time!  But, a cookbook like this offers eye candy and I can smell the deep aromatics of these delicious meals.  In my mind’s eye, I can wander the night market, alone or with other adventurous friends and experience a wonderful evening under the stars with a belly full of my favorite Asian comfort foods.

The soups and stews are what appeal to me in “The Easy Vegan Cookbook” by Kathy Hester……but, I have to admit that the only reason I pulled this one off the shelf is that the title made me think of my best childhood friend from Brooklyn, Jen……because, as pre-teens, we both enjoyed and were perplexed by a pop song at the time called “Easy Lover” by Phil Collins.  Memory can be an important part of imagination because we can pull from the remembered to make a collage of an experience in our mind that brings the best of the past into this present imagined moment.  Now imagine Mr. Collins singing about his “Easy Vegan” and then think of being 11-years old and hanging out with your bestie listening to the radio and trying to figure out song lyrics.  There is a lot of giggling.  In this cookbook by Hester, there are also some variations on common vegetarian favorites that are worth a glance and likely worth eating too if you are inclined to take these imagined parties out of the mind and into your kitchen.  For example, check out the Pumpkin Hummus (pg. 152), Black Eyed Pea Quesadillas (pg. 143), or the simple, yet flavorful Cauliflower and Rice Soup (pg. 50).

If you need a bit of help with your imagination muscle when it comes to tea, dinner, or other gatherings, then look no further than that fantastic “Salad for President: A Cookbook Inspired by Artists” by Julia Sherman.  Sherman travels the world to have delicious salads crafted by amazing artists that we can only imagine having meals with.  Have a leftover salad breakfast taco with Alice Water, Persimmon Caprese with Master ceramicist Yui Tsujimura in Nara Japan, and enjoy dipping fresh garden herbs into Laurie Anderson’s Roasted Eggplant Dip……It’s easy to imagine because these fantastical gatherings actually happened and Sherman provides the pictures to prove it.  Close your eyes and imagine yourself there, with the people in the picture.  It’s not cheating, it’s like using a block when you practice yoga….just a visual tool for sparking your imaginative power.

Meet me in the woods at never o’clock for some pea dumplings with mint sour cream and a hundred bites of frosted almond cake….I’ll be the one in the turquoise tulle tutu with a flower crown and the fairy entourage.  Just follow the song birds.  You can’t miss me!

Unicorn in the Sky and Other Magic

February 24, 2018
Posted by Sharon

Hello there dear!  It’s Bibliotherapy Saturday  and I decided to start today’s exploration with a magazine I don’t usually read.  Ever.  I decided to start with February 2018 issue of Astronomy magazine.  Why you might ask?  Good question!  It’s because there was a hook on the cover that suggested that I could “TOUR Monoceros the Unicorn” on page 60.  I love unicorns.  How could I resist?  Monoceros the Unicorn is the 35th largest constellation out of the 88 constellations and the figure lies within the “Winter Triangle: the stars Sirius, Betelgeuse, and Procyon.”  The short article then has some pictures of and features of the area around the constellation and notes what is special that you can see either with the naked eye under a dark sky or what kind of telescopic enlargement is required.  This kind of night sky exploration is what I had been hoping for when I signed up for a basic astronomy class in college.  Instead, I got a whole lot of physics and math that I didn’t have the background to do and wasn’t sure what any of it meant.  I don’t know about you, but I feel kind of excited about this Unicorn dancing around the Winter Triangle of our night sky!   Recently, I have also come across a number of books and articles that refer to star bathing, which is just like sun bathing, but under the night sky.  While it may be difficult, or even impossible, in urban areas to isolate from other light sources, I have to believe that, with intention, one can go outside in the night to absorb the light of the stars and receive some of the benefits.  And, if those stars happen to be in the shape of a unicorn……..that HAS to be some extra special and nourishing star bathing.

When I was designing the curriculum for my new Buddhist meditation and nature focused yoga teacher training program, I felt called to pull ecospirituality into my yoga and meditation practice and work.  I also read an article in the November 2017-January 2018 Womankind magazine today called, “The Gardening Effect” by Lucy Treloar that quotes a biologist by the name of E.O. Wilson:

“…nature holds the key to our aesthetic, intellectual, cognitive and even spiritual satisfaction.”

Wow!  Go ahead and read that a few times and think about how much time you spend outdoors, about the quality of water and food that you consume and make a part of your body. I love an essay/memoir in this magazine by Katherine Scholes about her time as a child following her father, a physician, on his travels through Tanzania before independence when it was called Tanganyika.  The memoir is called “Home in the Open Savannah” and there are fabulous pictures of the author and her siblings as children.  In many of the pictures they are holding up dead birds with huge smiles on their faces.  I think of my children all stressed out about school schedules and homework packets and spending too much time on their iPads and how different their lives will be for not having had this kind of adventure in childhood that the author describes, but also how different they will be for having the ones that they are having.  Because, it’s all an adventure.

Also in this magazine, Womankind (11/17-01/18) on page 93, there is a Tanzanian proverb:

“A wise person will always find a way.”

This proverb is interesting to me, especially completely out of context, as it brings to mind my knowledge of the Tao….which is a certain kind of “way”.  Perhaps a wise person always finds a path to the flow of spirit?  Finds a way to a path, any path that will accept their feet and they walk it until the path unfolds and things seem more clear.  Or, maybe it is an invitation to the power of intention, that once we are determined, we relax around that determination so that we can be creative about how to manifest our desire?  It would be interesting to use this as a positive affirmation when I feel like something is impossible to remind myself that there is, in fact, a way.  There is always a way.

Here are some other books that made it to the reading pile:

Attracting Songbirds to Your Backyard
By Sally Roth

Did you know that some songbirds won’t ever consider a bird feeder, no matter how well-stocked, to be a food source?  This book is filled with interesting projects for making and providing food sources for song birds to diversify the birds that come and serenade you in your yard.  I also learned a lot about birds that are native to other places other than the Eastern parts of the USA where I am most familiar with bird populations.  Invite the birds to sing to you this spring and summer!

The Art of Stopping Time: Practical Mindfulness for Busy People
By Pedram Shojai

I like this meditation book a lot. There are lots of little tricks and exercises for finding ways to be mindful through your day.  I especially appreciated the suggestions on learning how to relax your neck, learning animal tracks, and taking five deep breaths every thirty-minutes throughout the day.  Sometimes, a little shift in attention can make a huge difference in your quality of life.  This book offers a lot of suggestions on how to make little shifts.

The State of Mind Called Beautiful
By Sayadaw U Pandita

Well, this is a vipassana meditation book with a very interesting name.  But, the perspectives and techniques offered are inspiring and a great way to either begin a personal meditation practice or to inspire and enhance an existing practice.  I find that this book has a very unique discussion on the challenges that come up during practice, such as pain in the body and a wandering mind.  The suggestions offered for working with obstacles within and around practice are very helpful and creative.

Flavor: The Science of Our Most Neglected Sense
By Bob Holmes

Just fascinating!  I’ve always thought that flavor and taste were synonyms, but, it turns out, they are not the same thing at all.  This is a very easy to read book and I found the discussion on what gives vegetables their flavor, or makes us believe them to have flavor, especially interesting.  It turns out that sometimes, what we taste as being a very sweet tomato isn’t sweet because of sugar content necessarily—its the hundreds of volatile aroma molecules.  And, cheap wine tastes better when people are told it is expensive even when, in a blind taste test, most will think the cheaper wines taste better anyway.  So, pour that $10 bottle of wine into a carafe and tell your guests it’s a $90 bottle of wine…..to enhance their enjoyment!

What’s in your reading pile this weekend?  Please comment below.

 

Opening to Enchantment

January 31, 2018
Posted by Sharon

“Do not weep, life is paradise, and we are all in paradise, but we do not want to know it, and if we did want to know it, tomorrow there would be paradise the world over.”

― Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov

en·chant·ment

inˈCHantmənt,enˈCHantmənt/

noun

  1. 1.a feeling of great pleasure; delight.

    “the enchantment of the mountains”
    synonyms: magic, witchcraft, sorcery, wizardry, necromancy

  2. 2.the state of being under a spell; magic.

    “a world of mystery and enchantment”

Enchantment in Yoga and Meditation

A few years ago, I purchased a copy of Rose Taylor Goldfield’s book, “Training the Wisdom Body: Buddhist Yogic Exercise”.  I’m delighted with the book, but the best part was that a card fell out of the book printed with the Foreward  by Khenpo Tsultrum Gyamtso Rinpoche in poem form and it starts like this:

HA HA HA! HEE HEE HEE! HO HO HO!

When you practice yogic exercise,
Know your body is not solidly real—
It is appearance-emptiness.
Your body is like a dream body.

Wow!  Think on this for a moment……the foreward to this book of yogic exercises starts with laughter and the suggestion that your body is “like a dream body”.

I know that this is true for myself and I imagine that it is true for you, no matter how advanced you are in your practice, that it is easy to sink into the heaviness of a practice.  This heaviness can be a result of a desire to do it right, to have a certain outcome like losing weight or getting stronger or becoming more flexible, or to try to work with serious problems in body, mind, or spirit through practice.  There is the heaviness of our lives that creeps around the edges of even the brightest yoga mats.  While I sometimes feel the weight of my body lighten as I release long held physical tension towards the end of a practice, the truth is that I am very aware of my relationship to gravity during asana.  As I become more committed to my practice, I feel that the commitment itself can seem a little heavy with burden.

But, clearly, this is not necessarily the design of the practice and this laughing mentor pushes us to consider how hilarious all this is.  Dream body!  Ha ha ha! So I thought about what it might be like to practice in a way that invites us to lighten up, to create space for magic, and to open to inspiration that might be lurking at our door that we could open if we weren’t feeling too heavy to get up and see about all that knocking.

A Feeling of Great Pleasure

We put ourselves through a lot that has nothing to do with pleasure…….we wake up before we are fully rested and put on clothes that may not fit comfortably, throw down a cup of mediocre coffee without even really tasting it before running to catch the bus where we squease into the aisle and hang on for dear life as someone who doesn’t smell all that “fresh” presses into our exposed back.  At work, we have a cubicle and it is piled with papers and reports with post-it notes accenting the hopeless piles of to do and should have dones.  And, ok, maybe you love your clothes and have a fabulous office covered in pink peonies and tropical birds……but, admit it, feelings of great pleasure aren’t what you have come to expect from your daily  life.

But, why not?

Suggested Readings for Enchantment

Books for Adults 

Beauty: The Invisible Embrace
By: John O’Donohue

Finding the Blue Sky: A Mindful Approach to Choosing Happiness Here and Now
By: Joseph Emet

The Spontaneous Fulfillment of Desire
By: Deepak Chopra

The Heart of the World: A Journey to Tibet’s Lost Paradise
By: Ian Baker

Nineteen Hats, Ten Teacups, and Empty Birdcage & The Art of Longing
By: Cooper Edens

Letters to Anyone and Everyone
By: Toon Tellegen

Tasting Hygge: Joyful Recipes for Cozy Days and Nights
By: Leela Cyd

For Sharing with Children or Adults who Are Open to Such Adventures

Wishtree
By: Katherine Applegate

Starbright: Meditations for Children
By: Maureen Garth

Hiding in Public

January 17, 2018
Posted by Sharon

It is only recently that I have learned that I am an introvert.  More precisely, I am an extroverted introvert.  I don’t not like being around other people and do not have trouble in crowds or social situations.  I can introduce myself to strangers and make friends with relative ease.  But, being with other people doesn’t nourish me the way that being alone is soothing and refreshing.  I don’t just LIKE being by myself……I NEED to be by myself, probably a lot more than many other people do.  I have no fear of loneliness as the idea of being all by myself is rather enticing.  But, as an extroverted introvert (or is it introverted extrovert?), my favorite place to be all by myself is the library.  It’s how I go and be all alone with others.  Perhaps it is because I grew up in an urban environment, but I like to have people “around”, but not engaging with them.  Combine being alone in public with unlimited access to books?  Heaven.  Perfection!  And so,  every Tuesday I give myself the gift of bibliotherapy in heaven…..the Carnegie Public Library in Oakland.  I’m here to meet Chinese students in Oakland who might want some help with language and culture issues, so don’t be shy if you see me and want to chat…….but in between, I’m enjoying all the nourishment that hiding in public has to offer a book lover like me.

So, what’s on the bibliotherapy pile today?

Crochet Taxidermy: 30 Quirky Animal Projects, from Mouse to Moose
By Taylor Hart

Ok, how could I resist this cutie pie of a book?  While I may never actually crochet the sweet cuttlefish, adorable crocodile head, or magnificent hen and rooster duo, it kind of made my day to look at these little projects.  Because, it’s just too easy to get too serious about things sometimes.  This book reminded me today that it’s good to play, that having a crocheted squid dangling from your wall might not be such a bad thing, and that taking the time to imagine the possibilities is as good an investment of time as anything.  Don’t take my word for it.  The next time you are feeling like a stuck in the mud cranky pants, go ahead and browse in the craft section of your library and either find this lovely little book or grab another and just allow yourself to enjoy the colors, the silly things you can make, and imagine what it would be like to have your living room walls transformed into a collection of colorful crocheted animal heads.  Sure, your kids would come home from school and know for certain that you had finally truly lost your marbles, but…..uhmmm….so what?  Sure beats coming home to find you in your cranky pants (another word for yoga pants that you’ve never actually done yoga in) with that crease across your brow and bad attitude.  Make a purple elephant head and staple it to a board and hang it on your wall instead!  Then, invite some other people over to have chips and salsa and enjoy your elephant.  That sounds like fun!

Cats I’ve Known: On Love, Loss, and Being Graciously Ignored
By Katie Haegele

If you’ve known me from the years when I was, oh, say, 23-43, then you know that I had two cats that I “rescued” in Philadelphia that were my constant companions—Mushuk and Guzel.  If you can do math and know anything about cats, you know that 20-years is a long time to be blessed with two magical and unique cats and you also know that they are no longer alive.  Through some strange twists of fate, having lived in Philly, Seattle, and Brooklyn….they are both burried in a backyard in Pittsburgh, PA.  Knowing this about me, then you know that I couldn’t NOT read this book by Haegele about the Philadelphia cats that she has known and cared for.  If you are a cat lover, then you will appreciate how these stories highlight the different personalities, behaviors, and presence of the many cats that Haegele has related to in her life.  I especially like the story of the cat that belonged to the nun that was the librarian at Haegele’s elementary school.  But, all the stories are a reflection on how we are inspired and connected to many living beings and that we can allow ourselves to be enriched and nourished by the animals that we come to know in surprising and significant ways.  If you like cats, then this is a gem that will bring you into the world of another cat loving kindred spirit.

I Hate Everyone Except You
By Clinton Kelly

I scooped this one up because it has a colorful bird on the cover and the title made me laugh when I read it.  I had no idea who Clinton Kelly was, but it turns out that he is the former cohost of the makeover show What Not to Wear.  His bio says that the show is “wildly popular”, but I’ve never heard of it.  This likely says more about me than it does about this television program, but maybe not. For the most part, I didn’t find anything particularly unique here and thought for the first 100-pages or so that the best part of this book was the title and cover image.  But, there was one part that was so insightful, almost painfully so, that I did read the whole book and it seems my initial feeling that it wasn’t unique diminished the view of life that Kelly quite artfully reveals in his personal stories.  It happens on page 103, at the start of a chapter called “The Switch”.  In this chapter, Kelly talks about how there are times in our lives when we recognize that nothing is the same, that something significant has changed, but that it is impossible to put our finger on exactly when the switch happened.

“…click–the track you’ve been traveling on is no longer your track.  The old track just disappears behind you, as irrelevant as yesterday’s train schedule.  Click.  You’re going somewhere else now.  Click.  There’s no reverse. Click.  Your reality will never be the same.”

On page 104, Kelly talks about the “switch” in his life when his parents divorced and he became a new kid in a new school.

“My track had changed.  My parents changed it, obviously, but when?  I can’t pinpoint the precise moment–and the moment had to be precise because one person can’t ride on two tracks simultaneously.  At one point, I was a ten-year-old boy in a two-parent family.  At another point, I was not.  The switch occurred, but I missed it.  Perhaps if I had been a little older, more attuned, less sad, less frightened, I would have felt it.  But I didn’t.  I had felt no switch, but I knew I was headed in a different direction.”

This really made me think about transformation in relationship to a yoga breathing practice that has always been my most successful way of bringing complete focus to the in and out quality of my breathing.  Go ahead and try it, it’s impossible, which is why it is such a great technique for full focus.  The idea is that you become aware of the precise moment when an in-breath becomes an out breath and an out breath becomes an in-breath.  It’s not hard to know whether or not you are breathing in (inhale) or breathing out (exhale), but it is very difficult to identify the exact moment when the switch occurs.  Maybe it is because the exhale is inherent in the inhale?  And perhaps this is what is missing from Kelly’s concept of the “switch”….that being a child in a two-parent household is inherent in being a child in a single parent household.  It was there all the time.  His parent’s divorce was there in the marriage, the whole time.

Rants from the Hill: On Packrats, Bobcats, Wildfires, Curmudgeons, A Drunken Mary Kay Lady & Other Encounters with the Wild in the High Desert
By Michael P. Branch

As someone interested in nature, the environment, and who would like to believe I have a relatively good sense of humour on most days, this collection of essays provides some creative reflections on the relationship between humans and their environment.  This includes the complex relationship between humans and other humans in their shared environment.  I randomly opened to a chapter called “Lawn Guilt” (starts on page 63), which I loved because, in my estimation, lawn care related noise polution is pretty much the worst thing about living in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood of Pittsburgh.  From spring to late fall, the sound of blowers makes it impossible to enjoy any time with the windows open.  Each person, with their postage stamp sized lawn, hires a landscape company that arrives with enough equipment to manage the lawn at Versailles—and they arrive every week.  The blowers, weed whackers, the lawn mowers made for acres create sound polution so profound that we might as well be living in the New York City Subway  station at 42nd Street at rush hour when the Peruvian wood flute bands compete with the plastic can whacking percussionists as the subway roars in and out of the station and thousands of people yapping on their phones whiz up and down the corridors.  It drives me so crazy that I consider it a good reason not to live in Pittsburgh, even with all the other amazing things about this City.  In this essay, Branch quotes an 1862 essay by Henry David Thoreau that he wrote on his deathbed, called “Walking” and, apparently, in this essay, Thoreau refers to the American lawn as “…a poor apology for a Nature and Art.”  I like these essays.  I like them more for what they aren’t than what they are.  I don’t mean that in a bad way.  Actually, it’s an amazing skill on the part of the author……he finds a way to tell a relatively short story, but pulls in quotes or references or personal introspection that makes the idea big and dynamic even if he doesn’t use a lot of words to explore it.  Most of the exploration happens in the reader after being “sparked” by the essay.  It’s really a thought-inspiring book and while I’m glad I don’t live in a place where mud season occurs, or I don’t have to worry about my kiddos finding scorpions and rattle snakes while doing cartwheels in the yard……I do see the value in becoming aware of how all the small things and events of our lives are genuinely the big things that make up the quality of our lives.

Rhett & Link’s Book of Mythicality: A Field Guide to Curiosity, Creativity, & Tomfoolery
by Rhett McLaughlin and Link Neal

These guys are “YouTubers”, which is a profession that was developed while I had my back turned and I’m not really sure what it is.  My son wants to be one.  So, I picked up this book because I thought it might help me understand, but I’m still confused.  It does seem that these two men spend their lives coming up with ideas of things to do on camera, or do off camera and talk about it later, or do on a live web feed and then they wrote a book about their “process”.  I guess the truth is that I don’t find much of what they are doing or thinking amusing or entertaining or even very thought provoking.  I guess you could make the argument that it is art because it has caused me to have a reaction.  All this to say, maybe if you are a twelve year old boy, then this book would be amusing to you or help you understand more about how to become a YouTuber when you grow up, if, in six-years when you are “all grown up” this profession still exists and hasn’t gone the way of Laser Discs.  But, you know, there is something very endearing about these guys…..there is a whole section on how they met their wives, which they did a long time ago, and they did some very sweet things to seal those deals.  The name of this chapter, which is hands down, my favorite in the book (or, the only thing I really liked about this book), is “Say ‘I Love You’ Like It’s Never Been Said”.  Cute.  It’s really CUTE!  It’s so adorable and sweet that it makes me really glad that this otherwise confusing book made it into the bibliotherapy pile today.  I just hope it didn’t give me a cavity.

Checking Out

If I’m not careful, I’ll check out hundreds of books at a time from the library and then no one will ever see me again.  Part of the genuinely therapuetic process for me on library hiding days is that I just enjoy all that I can read while I am there and leave everything at the library.  I allow myself ONE, singular book to check-out each Tuesday.  Lately, they have been science leaning non-fiction that comes home with me, or a cookbook or global fiction gem.  Keep reading to find out what book made the “check-out” cut this week……..

What did I end up checking out?  I checked-out a book titled “Tides: The Science and Spirit of the Ocean” (2017) by Jonathan White.  I started to think more about “waves” while lightly reading through a book about the discovery of “SuperWaves” by Irv Dardik.  Also, I’ve been pulling the “Ocean” oracle card out of my angel deck quite often in the recent past and it seems that my guides would like me to be thinking about water, the ocean, and waves.  I intend to read these books side by side to think about waves, in general, from a physics perspective and tides, of the ocean, specifically.  What I come to understand, I will share with you in a future blog post.  Until then, I will share with you a small tidbit of information that I randomly opened to in White’s “Tides” book (page 152) that was all that I needed to read in order to know that this book was THE ONE I was going to take home from the library for Bibliotherapy Tuesday.

The bottom of the page talks briefly about Pierre-Simon Laplace who called the tides “the throniest problem in astronomy” (White 152):

“In Laplace’s five-volume masterpiece, Mécanique Céleste, he introduced equations to address the complicated interactions of tide waves on the real earth.  He recognized that there was more to the ocean tides than a simple wave progressing around the planet.  Instead, he described how each ocean might have its own response to the tide-generating forces and that that response might be defined by many factors, including the size and shape of the basin, the depth of the water, the ruggedness of the bottom, temperature, and so forth.  Using calculus and trigonometry, he developed several highly sophisticated equations to account for this, equations that turned out to be nearly impossible to solve without modern-day computers, which wouldn’t be in use for another 150 years.  He never fully solved them himself.”

It is nice to be reminded that having questions can be just as important as having answers.  When we think about how our lives can have infinite inspiration into the future, long after our physical bodies have gone to dust and even if no one knows our name, it is interesting to think that it may not be the conclusions we arrived at in this lifetime, but the questions we asked that are our most lasting contribution to humanity.

Written by Sharon Fennimore, MA, E-RYT, RPYT, YACEP
Please note that I am not a therapist of any kind and my  reference to “bibliotherapy” is a  cheeky reference to open stack browsing at the library that I do on a weekly basis as a way to choose joy, relax, and expand my creative boundaries.  If we do work together, I’m likely to suggest that you read a book, because I am constantly reading and can’t help but make recommendations to my clients and friends.  There IS such a thing as Bibliotherapy and I find it fascinating!  

Happy (?) Holidaze!

November 3, 2017
Posted by Sharon

Whether you feel like this is the most wonderful time of year or you’d prefer to go into hiding until it’s all over, I’m offering some services unique to the season that can help you find some relief or just create more time and space for you to truly enjoy all that this magic season has to offer.

Guided Relaxation

I am offering a package of twelve recorded audio guided relaxations that can be downloaded through this online course that also includes three 45-minute online workshops (webinars) that you can watch live or at your convenience that will include breathing, meditation, and gentle movement that can be practiced while sitting in a chair.  The cost for this package of twelve relaxation sessions is: $35.  If you wish to give one as a gift, please contact me and I can easily arrange for this.

If you are in Pittsburgh, I am offering a special holiday package of three private relaxation sessions for  $180 (this is a $45 discount on my regular private session rate).  Each relaxation session is 45-minutes.  All sessions must be scheduled by March 2018.  You can buy a package for yourself or as a gift for someone who lives in Pittsburgh.  Please contact me directly to purchase and schedule.  

Clutter Busting and Cleaning

Sink over flowing with dishes?  Guests coming and you need someone to clear out the guest room, put on clean sheets, put out clean towels, clean your bathrooms, deal with THAT closet……..whatever it is, just let me take care of it.  I am a NO JUDGMENT cleaning service. I will just come in, do what needs to be done, and leave.  No lectures, no guilt, no shame and then, it’s just done.  I have a four-hour minimum and charge $30 per hour for work scheduled between 9:30 am and 3:00 pm on Mondays through Fridays and $50 for work scheduled at any other time or weekends.  I bring my own natural cleaning supplies that are safe for all the living beings in your house and a mop.  You provide the vacuum cleaner.  Please call to schedule as my week fills up FAST: 412-855-5692.  If you know you are having a party or guests or if you have multiple-days of work you need to have done before an event, please call as soon as possible to reserve your time.  For all reservations, I require a 50% non-refundable payment of the hours reserved.

Personal Assistance

You buy the gift cards, and I’ll do the shopping!  I’ll gladly head to the store of your choice for groceries, gifts, dry cleaning pick-up or whatever you need.  Do you need me to make appointments for the hair salon, massage, restaurant reservations or other event planning?  I’m happy to do it!  Meal planning?  I’m here for you.  All of my errand running, shopping, scheduling, and other personal assistant work is $30 an hour with a three-hour minimum.  Just think about how happy you are going to be when you get home from work and everything you needed from Target is right there in your dining room and you didn’t have to deal with the crowds, the lines, or the hassle!  I do gift wrapping, thank you card writing, invitations, post-office runs………Please call to schedule: 412-855-5692.  A non-refundable 50% payment of all reserved time is required upon reservation with the balance due at the time services have been completed.

Clutter Busting, Seasonal Clothes Swapping, Laundromat

Is your family room or kid’s play room a wreck?  What are you going to do with all the new toys that are about to arrive?  I am hapy to clean your family room, living room, play room or child’s room and organize all the toys, clothes, and other items that will make that space more usable and pleasant.  Are you trying to deal with putting the summer things away and take out the winter things and feeling overwhelmed?  Let me take your summer items to the laundromat and fold everything so it is clean and safe until the sun comes out again next summer.  I can also take coats to be cleaned and help sort out what still fits and what needs to be donated.  I take everything that is to be donated out of the house when I leave and then take it to Goodwill for you.  I provide a receipt for your tax donation records after I drop off the goods.  Please call to schedule: 412-855-5692.  A non-refundable 50% payment of all reserved time is required upon reservation with the balance due at the time services have been completed.

Pets, Parties, and Infants

Do you need someone to pop in and feed your cat, give the dog an extra walk, or take care of your infant while you host your guests?  I take care of all living beings and am delighted to help you out this season with the little extras that you usually manage yourself just fine, but are the hair that is breaking the camel’s back this season.  Rates depend on the service, so just call and let me know what you need: 412-855-5692.

SERVICE AREA

I prefer to work with individuals and families that are in the East End of the City of Pittsburgh.  My online courses and audio and video downloads are available to anyone who has an internet connection all over the world.  Payment balances and payments for “regulars” can be made by personal check, but all reservation deposits and other payments can be made by credit card.  I use Square invoices or PayPal.  If this doesn’t work for you, just let me know how you like to make payments and I’ll work with you.

 

Tibetan Yoga Classes

January 31, 2017
Posted by Sharon

Tibetan Yoga on Wednesday Mornings 10:00 am

In my personal practice of yoga, in the past five-years, I have started to bring more and more of my meditation into my yoga and more of my yoga into my meditation.  Essentially, it is now one practice.  This is possible because the type of somatic meditation that I practice (somatic meaning “of the body”) is rooted in Vajrayana Buddhism.  This is one of the major schools of Buddhist practice and thought that is based on the idea that we all already possess Buddha-nature in ourselves and that enlightenment is just the recognition of our true nature.  The practice has more to do with learning techniques that access much more than the physical body and bring us into a state of open awareness to things as they are.  It is in this “space” where all potential and opportunity exists.  We don’t need to make anything, improve on anything, get more flexible or strong or change anything.  Rather, we use our tools of somatic awareness to enter into an open space.  It’s the difference between being shown a seat at a table where there are bins of colored markers, feathers, glitter, paints and multicolored paper and being shown a seat at a table where you see some used lined paper and a worn down pencil.  It isn’t that you couldn’t make something happen with that lined paper and pencil, but when you get seated there, you have to really work to think of the possibilities.  At the other table, you see all those supplies and your energy is uplifted and you feel like there are endless things you could create.  These tantric practices are about entering a space that feels like you just got a seat at the table with all the colorful art supplies.

I don’t know, but I guess it is possible that you might become more flexible over time or that you might get stronger or lose weight.  But, really, what kind of “goals” are these in the face of the idea that you could live every moment of your life like you just won the creative supply lottery?  No matter how much yoga you do, you are going to get older (We hope! Right?), sometimes you may get sick or be tired or get an injury or disease.  What I am realizing more and more is that you can’t get better at yoga or meditation, but you can find your way into this delicious state of awareness and find yourself able to stay there for longer and longer periods of time.  It isn’t some fantasy location or a vacation place that you have to, eventually, leave.  The more you practice, the more life feels like a seat at the table of infinite glitter and less like you are stuck trying to make magic with a worn down pencil.  We use the body, but it isn’t ABOUT the body.

This being said, the movements and physical exercises of Tibetan yogas are very much like the asana you are already familiar with from Hatha or Indian yoga traditions.  I start these classes with a very simple energy sequence that you can do at any time if you feel like you need to get your energy moving in the right direction. Then, we set an intention of metta (compassion, or loving-kindness).  Whatever your own intention is for making your practice a priority, that is up to you.  But, as we join together, we recognize that our practice is for something outside of ourselves.  We practice to improve the quality of life for all living beings.  Again, maybe you will feel better in your own body after practice, but we don’t practice just for this purpose.  Then, we take nine cleansing breaths to clear the major energy channels of “drip” (low energy or blocks).  Starting out with free flowing energy and clear of any drip, we loosen the joints, practice some asana (physical postures), use techniques such as sound, visualization and hand postures to build our life-force and then we meditate and relax.  While some of this may seem familiar, the effect is profound.  I personally feel liberated, grounded, and inspired after I use these practices.  I love this open feeling-place and the fact that I can access it no matter what is going on in my life or whether I have an injury or physical challenge to practice.  When I mostly practiced flow-style yoga, if I had a hurt wrist or ankle, I felt like I couldn’t “do my whole practice” or practice for “real” until the injury healed and I could go back to it.  Now, I feel like I can do my whole practice and get the full benefit even if I have to do the whole thing lying down.

I’m happy to share these techniques as I understand and practice them and hope that you will use them to enhance your own home practice.  No matter what other kinds of yoga you like to practice, learning these simple techniques can add more options to your tool box for whenever you need to create space around a problem or concern or just find a sweet spot to relax that you know is yours to enter into whenever you like.

Wednesday mornings at Samira Yoga from 10:00-11:15 am.  I’m starting with a six-week series (February 1-March 8, 2017) and we will see if there is a group that would like to continue.  

Professional Development for Yoga Teachers

January 10, 2017
Posted by Sharon

In April 2013, I closed my brick and mortar yoga studio, Yoga Matrika, located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and pioneered yoga and meditation studies through distance learning.  In the process, I tried a number of different platforms for holding classes and teleseminars and worked with hundreds of very patient yoga teachers who agreed to work with me to provide constructive feedback while also getting high quality continuing education.

yacepI am really delighted that Yoga Alliance has recognized the potential of distance learning for professional continuing education for Yoga Teachers. They permit up to 25 of your 30 required CEU credits to maintain registration to be earned with non-contact hours.  I am honored to be a YACEP (Yoga Alliance Continuing Education Provider) and have a number of online courses just for yoga instructors.  These courses allow teachers all over the world to learn more about Buddhist philosophy, Tibetan yoga practices, meditation skills, subtle body anatomy, women’s health and yoga, and prenatal yoga and meditation. I have put over 25-years of practice, teaching, and research into all of my training courses.  Most of the courses have rolling enrollment and you can join at anytime.  The video and audio resources are yours to download and use forever.

Follow this link for my CEU Course Listings and more information

 

Rejected Miracles

December 15, 2016
Posted by Sharon

I’m a doula—a woman who nurtures other women during pregnancy, pregnancy loss, labor, delivery, and all the transformations after birth that sometimes feel like magic, but other times just feel like poop.  A lot of poop.  So, it seems appropriate to me that I feel very drawn this time of year to the idea of Mary, in labor, looking for a safe place to give birth to baby Jesus.  Except, there were no ultrasounds, so we didn’t know it was Jesus and she was rather adamant that the father was God.  Let’s be honest here, there was a lot of Mary’s story that was unlikely to be believed by most.  I imagine that Mary was making some noise and no one wanted her in their hotel—this single Mom in labor accompanied by some guy who wasn’t even the father and likely to be releasing all kinds of mucus, blood, and groans long into the night.  Let’s face it, Mary was a hot mess.  She was going to keep other guests awake and it’s not like they could just allow her to sit in the lobby because she was, uhmmm, having a baby!  In my heart though, while I wish so much when I think of this narrative that someone would have given Mary and Joseph a warm and safe place to welcome their baby, it’s not Mary and Joseph that I feel grief for.  The real sadness in this story are all the people that rejected the potential of being a part of the miracle of the birth of Jesus.  This laboring woman made them uncomfortable and the owners of the hostels used logic to reject the miracle.  We have no space.  We are not able to accommodate you.  We have other guests that were here first.  In the story, the people who got creative were the people that had the least amount of resources to work with.  Can you imagine the profound faith that gave Joseph the courage to stay by Mary, to help her labor and deliver her baby, while all the while knowing that he was not the father?  In this story, Joseph said yes to the miracle.  Never mind Mary who allowed her body to be the vehicle for the birth of Christ!  It just doesn’t get any more courageous than THAT!

We all say no to potential miracles each and every day.  I’m not a hypocrite.  I’ll be honest that I get uncomfortable.  I get really scared and I can feel myself fade away and then I get very logical about all the “reasons” why I can’t be open to whatever it is that has challenged me.  As soon as I start making mental lists of “reasons”, that’s when I know that I have closed a door on something that may have been the best thing that ever happened to me.  Some of you who know me know that I also say “yes” to things.  I say yes to a lot of things.  This has, on a number of occasions, gotten me into some hot water.  But, on many more occasions, it has changed the trajectory of my life in the most beautiful and fantastic ways.  The week of Freshman orientation at Penn, I was assigned to a nuclear arms specialist, Dr. Deudney, as my initial advisor.  He had never met me before and I would have never picked a nuclear arms specialist as my advisor, so we were even.  He looked at my schedule and saw that I was taking Level 1 French.  He said, “Have you ever taken French before?”.  I nodded my little hung over noggin and explained that I had taken French in both middle school and high school.  He replied, “And you still don’t know any French?”.  I replied, “No, after seven years of French classes, I tested into level one French.”  He said, “Well, you know, if you ever really needed to know French, you could learn it in a month, but right now is the last four-years of your life that you will ever have to just focus on something and I suggest you focus on learning an Asian language.”  Just typing this gives me CHILLS!  I had no intention of studying an Asian language.  None. At. All.  He made the suggestion, looked at the class guide and said, “Chinese works with your other classes.” And, I said, “YES! I’ll sign up for Chinese.”  I had no reason to believe I could learn Chinese and, just a mere five minutes prior to this stranger making the suggestion, I wasn’t going to be learning Chinese.  Then, my life changed.  My life changed because I said YES to the suggestion of a nuclear arms specialist.  What has followed has been the most soul-full adventure that I would not trade for anything.  Without Dr. Deudney, I would not have purchased a Shanghai Flyer bicycle in Beijing, or met and fallen in love with Mike while dancing at the Kunlun Hotel to The Cure, or spent the night talking with Rick along the waterfront on Shamian Island, or met my lifetime soul friend Clara who was the best friend I ever had for everything from jumping fences to drinking caipirinha’s in New York at the Coffee Shop while flirting with Germans (They WERE German….right?).

This isn’t a post about all the wonderful things that happened in my life, or the handful of really difficult things, that happened because I said “yes” to what turned out to be some excellent advice from a stranger.  This is about encouraging us at this time of year to think about how much we say “no” to.  It’s a perfect time to think not just about the light and hope that comes from remembering the miracles of this season, but also holding some compassion for the darkness of the season—for all the people who said no to Mary and Joseph and, in doing so, also said no to hosting the miracle of the birth of a savior.  They didn’t STOP the miracle from taking place, but they turned their hearts closed to the potential of being a PART of the miracle.  In what ways are you, dear reader, rejecting miracles due to discomfort, fear, or a list of logic that even Judge Judy couldn’t argue with?

A little less than a month ago, I received an email from my landlord in which she informed me that all but one of the other tenants in the building that I live in had complained about noise that my children and I make in the building.  She asked us to leave.  She said that she didn’t want people with our “lifestyle” (i.e. single mother with two children kind of lifestyle) in her building.  She said that she didn’t want people like us ruining her relationship with “good tenants” and possibly causing her to lose these “good tenants”.  The “good” (i.e. adult) tenants of my building were frustrated with the sound of my children’s feet on the stairs.  Not only that, but the tenants of my building didn’t like my “yelling”.  My “yelling” is me asking my kids to put away their iPads, to come to eat dinner, to do their homework, to take baths….but the walls are thin and my neighbors, apparently, could hear me.  Hearing us, it seems, was not tolerable to my neighbors who felt entitled to using the space as they wished and they had no desire for the sounds of children or families.  I’m no Virgin Mary, but I pretty much got turned away from the inn.  I know, your blood is boiling when you read this because you know that it isn’t legal to discriminate in housing against single moms with young children.  Maybe you know and care about me and my children, so you feel sad or even concerned for us?  Maybe you don’t know us at all, but you are a regular reader of my blog and you feel a sadness knowing that this type of thing happens every day to women all over the United States.  We are going to leave.  I’m lucky because I was able to secure housing with family where we will not be so easily dismissed or rejected.  But, what about my neighbors?  For them, of course, there is no guarantee that the new tenant will be silent.  I assure you that my neighbors are not silent.  I hear their dog barking, kitten crying and scratching at the wall and door, the podcasts, movies, dinner parties, coming and going at all hours of the night, their sex, their middle of the night showers after their sex, their fans and air conditioners, their conversations and their snoring.  Yes, the SNORING.  I was woken up one night by your SNORING.  Did I call the landlord and suggest that you were not respectful because I was woken out of a perfectly good sleep because of your snoring?  No, no I did not.  And, I’m not the Dalai Lama, so, yes, yes I’m angry.  But, at the same time, there is a missed miracle here.  Imagine if any of my neighbors had heard my children coming down the stairs to catch the school bus and instead of seething in anger over the sounds of their little feet on the stairs, opened their doors and said, “Have a great day kiddos!”.  What would have happened if they had a cookie or a kind word for us when we came up the stairs after a long day?  We could have been friends, maybe I could have watered your plants when you went away on business or perhaps we could have shared a drink or a conversation or a meal?  Maybe we would have become good friends?  Maybe you would have drawings from my children on your fridge?  Instead, you called the landlord and complained.  We will leave, but there is no guarantee.  Trust me neighbors—-I hear when you pee.  The problem isn’t my kids, it is the paper thin walls and your inability to open to the possibility of friendship and relationship with the people you live with.  Instead of sitting with the discomfort of the noise of children and a family and leaving open a space for the miracle to happen, these individuals closed off to the potential.

This holiday season, as we approach the darkest and longest night of the year, I invite you to examine the places where you feel most challenged and see if there is a small space that you might be able to create for miracles to happen.  Is there someone at work that frustrates the bajeebus out of you?  Do they love Star Wars movies?  Just go out and get them a Star Wars mug and tell them that you know how excited they must be about the moving coming out next week.  Just do it.  Just reach out and do something nice for that challenging person.  Yes, yes please, you can have my room to labor and birth your child.  Yes, yes please, you take the cubicle closest to the window because it seems to mean a great deal to you.  Yes, yes please, hold my hand as we walk down the street because I want to make space for love.  Please touch my face when we kiss and say my name—often. Make cookies for someone.  Reach out and make a date to have coffee, to listen, to be present for someone that you don’t know all that well.  Make eye contact and say hello.  Go buy some crayons so the next time your co-worker has to bring her child to the office because her childcare fell through you can make a kind connection with a child instead of complaining that there really isn’t enough room for three chairs. Help a mom trying to get a screaming toddler into a stroller while balancing a coffee in one hand and an infant across her chest–without judgment.  Reach out, offer to hold her coffee and tell her that you think she is doing an AMAZING job.  Ask if there is anything else you can do.  Listen to a story told even if you kind of wanted to be doing something else.  Tell someone how much you love their glossy hair, red coat, Christmas pin, or the sound of their voice.  Say out loud that your life wouldn’t be the same if you couldn’t smell their hair or press your face into their neck. Spoon your love at night and be grateful for company when you dream. They won’t always be there, so don’t wait until they are gone to say so.  Hold the door, let it be OK that they kind of cut in front of you in line, forgive your friend for being human, let someone know that they did something that changed your life for the better. If anyone says, “Let’s go dancing!”, JUMP at the chance even if you now that you have two left feet and you will look like a fool!   Say I love you, even if it makes you feel small because it is the only way you will ever be big.

A Special Note to My Neighbors

To my neighbors, who will never read this because you don’t even know my last name and I don’t know yours because we never even met and so you don’t know that I write a blog and I have no idea what you do for fun or for money.  But, just in case you do one day accidentally read this and realize that you personally caused housing instability for a single mom and two very young children, please know that I forgive you.  Know that many days I would gladly sell my children to gypsies because they drive me crazy too and I am sure that the noises we made were, at times, truly unpleasant and disruptive.  I understand.  Really.  I also hope that the next person to move into my apartment is a circus professional who gets drunk daily and practices juggling with glass dishes all night long while listening to ACDC and misses catching the dishes every time and then has screaming arguments with their mother in Hungarian over SKYPE so you can hear both sides of the arguments and not understand a word of either.  But really, I forgive you.  I’m going to take my miracles and go somewhere else and maybe next time you will see the possibilities in your challenges. Maybe. Maybe you’ll get free circus tickets?  You just never know people—-you just never know.

 

 

Attitude of Gratitude? Not so much.

November 23, 2016
Posted by Sharon

While we all know that cultivating an attitude of gratitude is a part of living our most joyful life, how can we authentically do this when we are less than grateful?  Feeling ashamed or guilty about the “real” nature of our feelings, or pretending to be thankful for what we would have very much preferred to say “NO thank you” to in our lives gets in the way of happiness and creativity.  What if your heart is broken?  What if you are in terrible pain without relief in sight?  What if you have received terrifying news that has changed your life in an even more awful way?  Even with all the joyful self-help gurus and happy, shiny, advanced yogi specialists beaming at you from their glossy magazines promising peace and abundance for all your expressions of gratitude, and even as much as you wish to crawl into their tie-dyed yoga pants and bask in the bliss of all that they proclaim and stand for, the truth is that when your life is going to Hades in a hand basket…….well, no matter how thin you slice it, it’s still baloney.

But, if you are reading this, you DO have something to be grateful for.  This something does not, in any way, diminish however awful things are for you right now.  As the Buddha taught us, suffering is a part of the human existence.  We suffer because we desire things to be anything other than what they are right now.  We suffer because we are afraid, when things are wonderful, that we will lose that fabulous feeling.  Therefore, we know that our suffering can exist at the same time as our one thing that we always have to be grateful for.  What is this one thing that is ever-present?  Breath.  Yes, if you are reading this or even aware enough to listen to someone else who can read it to you, then you have this one thing that you can be grateful for in this moment.

You don’t have to pretend that all the suffering isn’t there.  Well, at least, don’t pretend on my account!  I don’t even own a single pair of tie-dyed yoga pants for you to covet or crawl into. (Although, if anyone reading this is inclined, I would absolutely LOVE a pair!)  I’m suggesting that there is a way to cultivate gratitude even when all hope is lost.  The beauty of observing the breath and being genuinely thankful that it is with you, of you, and through you, is that you create a little hope and space where there just didn’t seem like any could be found or made.  No, all your problems aren’t solved.  But, the subtle shift may be just the little miracle you need.  If not, you were taking those breaths anyway and so nothing gets lost through your effort.

I was recently reading a book about the subtle body by Tias Little.  I randomly opened it to a page with a breathing exercise that described the lungs as an upside down tree with the branches (lung tissue) towards the earth and the roots in the upper palate/roof of the mouth. I love this visualization because, in Chinese subtle body mapping, the color of the liver energy is green.  In Hatha yoga chakras, green is the color of the heart-chakra.  Therefore, when we breathe in, we can grow green leaves and fill the branches of our respiratory tree making it more and more lush with each in-breath.  As you exhale, you can feel those roots reach towards the crown of your head and pull up on the roof of your mouth.  There is actually a pleasure center of the brain that is located right above the upper palate of the mouth.  When you exhale, the palate lifts and stimulates this center.  Thinking about this tree helped me stay focused on the breath in a very powerful way.  When I am very upset, using a strong visual tool like this helps me stay present with the breath.  Otherwise, my mind tends to wander and feed my sadness, fear, or pain.  Sure, when times are calm and good we can be aware of the in-breath, breathing in, and aware of the out-breath, breathing out. But, in times of chaos and confusion, using visualization can mean the difference between a nourishing and a frustrating practice.

Please do not feel that accessing these few moments of peace require that you deny the reality of your sufferings.  Feel all your feelings, know what is true for you, and be authentic in your expression and communication!  All the while, know that you can also create a sanctuary of peace and beauty through the practice of breath awareness.  Although the in and out nature of the breath happens without your explicit effort, you can still find some gratitude in the presence of breath.  How lovely to feel and hear the breath coming in!  How amazing to be able to feel the release of the breath and all that is no longer needed!  It is happening right now.

Posted by Sharon Fennimore, a yogini, teacher, and writer based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.  Find out more here.

 

 

Forward Folds and Bending Over Backwards in Nature

November 9, 2016
Posted by Sharon

The number one thing that adults say when I tell them that I am a yoga teacher is:

“Oh, I can’t do yoga!  I’m so inflexible and I can’t even get close to touching my toes.”

For about twenty-years now, I have tried every socially acceptable way possible at these moments to try to explain that yoga isn’t about being flexible, that anyone and everyone can benefit, that one may or may not become more flexible through yoga, that flexibility is, truly….besides the point entirely.  As soon as I start talking, I see the recipient’s eyes glaze over.  They are no longer paying attention to me, mostly because they only asked what I did for a living as a social pleasantry in the first place. Now, they are filled with regret for having ever made eye contact in the first place.  I can almost see the thoughts of escape to the cheese platter or, even better, the bar, cross their mind.

A couple weeks ago I was on a walk with a friend when t he concept of “tensegrity” came up in conversation.  (As an aside, you know you have a pretty wonderful friend when “tensegrity” just pops up in casual conversation.) It made me think about the relationship between tension and flexibility.  Every once in a while I will have a naturally flexible student.  Believe it or not, it is the most flexible students who struggle the most in yoga poses.  The lack of tension or pull to push against makes them feel floppy and un-centered.  It’s hard to focus when there is a lack of effort.  These students need to learn to engage muscles in a different way in order to feel into the shape of the pose and create sensation, effort, and release.  For the least flexible student, the evolution of a posture, simply by holding, exploring, and breathing, appears profound.

When I organize a yoga class plan, or a practice for myself, I try to make sure that, during the practice, we take our spines in all the directions it can go in: forward-back, forward fold, backbend, side bends, and twists.  It feels really beautiful to release tension around the spine and to unwind the habitual movements of the day through the practice of asana.  So many of us start to get stuck through our daily lives as we hunch over desks, lean into the back seats of cars to insert children (sometimes not willingly) into their car seats, and fail to remain curious and open to all the movements that are possible, even when they aren’t probable. If you watch a 6-month old baby, just put them down on the floor in front of you and see, for even five-minutes, you will see that they practice about five to ten recognizable asana during that time.  Yoga poses (asana) are natural for the human body.  These shapes and movements reflect our inherent desire to take ourselves in all the directions we can move in.  We can slither, slide, press, release, squease, lift, drop, shimmy, shake, hum, reach, collapse…….there are infinite movements available to us.  Just watch a video of Michael Jackson dancing and you will realize that it is likely you are only using about 20% or so of your human body capacity for movement.  Yoga asana are the natural movements and shapes of the human body.  Me, hunched over a desk all day?  There is absolutely nothing natural about that.

10-28-16-fall-continues-032In nature, there are many examples of trees and plants that bend.  Most obvious, of course, is heliotropism–movement towards the light.  But, if we look closely, we see that the cellular structures of plants and trees organize in circles, spirals, twists and forward folds and back bends in response to tension, gravity, and other forces.  Take, for example, the pattern on the trunk of this tree.  This intricate mapping of circles, swirls, and criss-crossings, is only possible because of the tension inherent in those spaces.  The inside of each enclosure maintains the integrity of the inside, while, at the same time, defining the space that is outside.

bikram-back-bendAny potter or architect will tell you that space is an important element of design.  Space is not synonymous with empty.  When you pick up a bowl, the space inside the curve represents the potential for holding.  It may, at that moment, be empty, but there is still space there.  Let’s say we fill that bowl with peppermint candies.  The space is filled with the candies, but it is still space.  When we practice yoga asana with this perspective in mind, we can get curious about the space that exists in our bodies and how to create more space.  What are the spaces that are empty?  Where are the crowded spaces?  What can be moved or re-distributed?  What are the solids providing something to push against?  Where are the natural bends and folds?  Look at the women in extreme back-bending postures.  These are extreme examples being used here not to suggest that your back-bend should look like this, but because these images invite us to examine the space around the body more easily.  Where is the space?  The space is actually beneath the spine.  While many of us refer to back bends as “heart-openers”, the anatomic reality of these shapes are that our hearts are pressed up into the chest cavity with the spine rising up to meet it.  The space underneath the spine is expanded and opened.

forward-foldIn a forward fold, the space for the heart expands and the spine rises above as it pulls back and away from the heart.  To give the heart the most room, we allow the spine to round, creating the space at the heart center.  We can breathe there, into the space, and feel the opening from the heart to our legs, and even further into the earth.  Experiment with this space you create in front of and behind the spine. Where does the space go when you release the yoga pose?  Actually, it is always there, but your shifting the contents of the space allows you to play with what is the container and what is contained.

I invite you to not only think about the shape that your fold or bend takes you in, but how the space around you shifts.  Explore these images of bends and folds in nature, not just the way that the shapes appear, but how the shape both creates and consumes space.  Whenever I guide students through savasana, the final relaxation at the close of most yoga classes, I always suggest that students release any tension that they might be holding in the space directly around their body.  It’s amazing how much release happens after that suggestion!

Written by Sharon Fennimore, a rogue anthropologist, yogini, and global doula based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.