Elemental Rest: an Ayurvedic A...

Jan 15, 2012 by

Elemental Rest: an Ayurvedic Approach to Restorative Yoga

Regardless of training or lineage, teachers of Restorative yoga share a common language of ecology and mothering. We naturally gravitate towards the grounding and support of a restorative pose, buoyed up by props. We are sensitive to the flow of circulation, the glow of internal resolution, the rippling oscillation of breath, and the expansiveness of mind and heart. These common terms express the elemental powers of earth, water, fire, air, and space. They allow the bodymind, in rest and quietude, to understand and enjoy its coherence with the living world. Perhaps without knowing it, we’re using the language of Ayurveda.

read more

chanting into the cave

Dec 4, 2011 by

chanting into the cave

a brief reflection on grief and virility.

read more

press conference text for jenn...

Nov 28, 2011 by

press conference text for jenna and other casualties of a negligent machine

on 11/28 the families and friends of those killed in collisions with heavy trucks, staged a press conference at Spirit Wind Internal Arts to call on the federal government to make trucks safer for pedestrians, cyclists, and those who drive them. it was in support of bill c-344, tabled by Olivia Chow.

read more

filling the gap: beginning to ...

Nov 21, 2011 by

filling the gap: beginning to transform grief

On 11/19, Octopus Garden hosted a fundraising event for the family of Jenna Morrison: an asana class accompanied by music. It was...

read more

elegy for jenna morrison: yoga...

Nov 15, 2011 by

elegy for jenna morrison: yoga community leader

On November 7th, my dear friend and colleague Jenna Katherine Morrison was killed in a bicycle accident close to her home. She is...

read more

Mic Check: how the Occupy move...

Oct 14, 2011 by

Mic Check: how the Occupy movement is creating empathy through communication

Of the countless intersubjective graces unfolding in Zuccotti Park and around the Occupy world, the “human microphone” is recapturing something as old as human learning. This is something sacred: a repurposing of voice, ear, and content that may serve no less than the re-membering of a more coherent human consciousness.

read more

notes on bhakti: up the down s...

Sep 11, 2011 by

notes on bhakti: up the down staircase

The power of the 'divine'/'human' dream is that each perspective beckons the other. The micro is not broad enough, and the macro is too distant. The mind seeks pleasure in the transitional zone between the two, its pleasure deepening as its focus widens or narrows in a surge of learning.

read more

translating translating patanj...

Sep 1, 2011 by

translating translating patanjali

All that is needed for a religion to form is a book that no one can read, a priestly class to read it, and a general need for faith that reaches out of prehistory and childhood to challenge the angst of reason. This may not be what we want in modern yoga. But it’s certainly there.

read more

jack layton, the giving body, ...

Aug 27, 2011 by

jack layton, the giving body, the anatomy of empathy, the fire, the light

I am in awe at the ongoing sacrifice of being alive to each other. Now I am willing to pay, all in, to the bone. There isn't a choice, and I have nothing else.

read more

waking up remembering proust w...

Aug 26, 2011 by

waking up remembering proust waking up

The first thought, a tiny wind, is mental vocalese, a series of long vowels opened into through mm or nn, that mimic the breath and the sound of sensory doors opening. What is the sound of the eyes recognizing form? What is the sound of ambient sound dawning on the conscious mind?

read more