Faires Farms

I love farmer's markets. I love all of the fresh produce. But I'll be the first to admit that in the summer I don't always make it to the farmer's market. Sometimes they conflict with my teaching schedule, but mostly I find time just gets away from me. I make it some weeks, but not others. And because we have several farmer's markets I have to decide which to attend.

Another idea: the weekly box from Faires Farms. A home delivery program with 24 weeks of fresh veggies, fruits and herbs.

I thought long and hard about whether I would subscribe to this program. It was exactly what I was looking for. But this year my mom is trying to grow a lot in our yard. We put in the greenhouse last year and she's expanding the garden beds. Without knowing how many fruits/veggies we might get, I have to pass this year, but I did want to let others know about this fantastic program.

Week 8 Challenge - Questioning My Beliefs

This year I decided to challenge myself to reflect on various Yoga and Buddhist aspects throughout the year. The challenges come from a variety of places including readings in Deborah Adele's Yamas and Niyamas and Thich Nhat Hanh's Heart of the Buddha's Teaching and Happiness.

Last week, I spoke about self-indulgence vs. self care. And, as usual, I published my post before reading up on this week's challenge. And when I did I started laughing. This week's challenge was to look at the ideas and beliefs that once served me and no longer do. Ha! What a perfect follow up to last week.

I loved this challenge. It really got in my face.

Food is one of the major areas in my life where my beliefs send me veering in wild directions. And I keep looking for answers. As if when I find that magic answer, all will be right with the world. A belief that I need someone to tell me what to do, a belief that I am not in control. And those beliefs are definitely not serving me. Mid-week I had a great moment where I thought "I don't need someone to tell me what to eat. I know exactly what to eat. My issue is learning to listen to the guidance I receive. Acting on it."

Sunday's are my only day off of work. And I typically spend them primarily in self-indulgence (TV and food). I spent some time this week thinking about what would actually relax me and the answers were more along the lines of a mini-retreat: silence, restorative Yoga, meditation, reflection. My belief that relaxation is doing nothing is definitely out-of-date.

Interestingly, the concept of a mini-retreat, and particularly the aspect of silence, challenged my beliefs as well. I was trying to find a way to take some "retreat time" at home, or without wandering far. But where would I find silence when I live with someone else? I thought about going to the library to find some quiet or looking at noise-cancelling headphones. Then I thought about it. I have the house to myself sometimes, and what do I do with that time? Usually watch some TV. Instead, what if I took advantage of the opportunity for silence then? I'm often looking for a complicated answer while the real answer stares me in the face, ever so simple. Living with the belief that I don't already know the answer. Definitely a belief that can go.

I look forward to continuing to challenge the beliefs that shape my thoughts.

Animals Did Yoga First

When I teach kids Yoga, we do lots of animal poses. And many of them definitely come from the animals:

Animals Did Yoga First

Eating for the Body, Mind and Spirit

I am trying to listen to what my body wants and what my spirit wants when it comes to food. And what do they want?

My body wants light, simple food. Nothing too heavy. Nothing with unpronounceable ingredients. Not too much at one time.

My spirit wants local, vegetarian food. Food with a small ecological footprint.

That seems pretty simple. But then there's the mind that is wedged in there with the body and spirit. What does the mind want?

My mind seeks comfort from food, as it learned to do when I was young. And the comfort it seeks is in meat, heavy food, junk food. Food with a huge ecological footprint.

So I continue to work on finding non-food comfort for my mind to allow my body and spirit to have the food they want.

Week 7 Challenge - Doing It Right

This year I decided to challenge myself to reflect on various Yoga and Buddhist aspects throughout the year. The challenges come from a variety of places including readings in Deborah Adele's Yamas and Niyamas and Thich Nhat Hanh's Heart of the Buddha's Teaching and Happiness.

This week's challenge was to do it right the first time. To not have to go back to apologize or make it right. To face the hard things head on. This week's challenge was about the Yama Satya (Truthfulness).

Truthfully? Didn't do so well this week. I spent a fair portion of this week in self-indulgence. And when I'm in self-indulgence I tend not to be very mindful. And to me mindfulness is the key to doing things right the first time.

It's not that I was making mistakes all over the week. I was still authentically me. I wasn't doing things that required me to go back to apologize, make things right. I was still doing the hard things. So why didn't it feel like I was?

For me, the hardest thing is to choose self-care over self-indulgence, so it felt like a miss that I was choosing self-indulgence. I wasn't facing the hard thing face on, I was deferring it for another day.

What do I do now? Learn from this experience and move forward with self-care. Stress gets the best of me sometimes and that's okay, but I want to continue learning to be more at peace in each moment.

Corporate Meditation

I love this article. I'd like to see more companies bring meditation to their employees. Reduced stress, better thinking, more happiness. Seems like it helps the bottom line to me!
10 Big Companies That Promote Employee Meditation

February Love List

20 things I'm loving right now:

1. Running, I love the feel of moving swiftly over the ground.
2. Spanakopita, I tried a new recipe and it's delish!
3. Early nights and early mornings.
4. My daily meditation practices.
5. Banana grapefruit smoothies.
6. Seeing my schedule fill up with classes to teach.
7. Walks in the dark with a good friend.
8. Watching cooking shows with my mom.
9. Fig newtons (only the more natural, whole grain, fruit juice sweetened kind).
10. How my cat has become friends with another cat without ever leaving the house.
11. A new Janet Evanovich book.
12. Trying to find the happiness that I don't have to work so hard to attain.
13. Yogurt with mandarin oranges.
14. Deva Premal's version of Om Mani Padme Hum
15. How my hair has now grown so long I have to put it back during class.
16. Trying to eat more meatless meals.
17. How accommodating my mom has been since I've been using the car so much.
18. Walking meditation.
19. Lots of TV on the PVR for when I want a break.
20. Lots of cooking and baking.

Week 6 Challenge - Self-Expression

This year I decided to challenge myself to reflect on various Yoga and Buddhist aspects throughout the year. The challenges come from a variety of places including readings in Deborah Adele's Yamas and Niyamas and Thich Nhat Hanh's Heart of the Buddha's Teaching and Happiness.

This week's challenge was to spend the entire week in self-expression. Okay, I admit, I felt this was almost a week off. I already spend so much of my time in self-expression.

Not everyone gets to do what they love for a living. In realizing how often I am able to express myself fully, I found myself intensely grateful this week. Grateful I live in such an amazing country where I have so many opportunities and so little hardship. Grateful that I have loving friends and family who support me in all I do. And deeply, profoundly grateful that I get to teach Yoga asana and meditation for a living.

I was asked to look at the difference between self-expression and self-indulgence and it was interesting to watch. I admit I spent some of the week in self-indulgence. It felt like I was still expressing me, just not the best me I could.

Interestingly, when I did find that I might not be self-expressing it came down to a feeling that I needed to be someone different than me, which took me quickly back to the Week 4 challenge, and I left myself be authentically me, regardless of the consequences.

How did I feel? I felt "me", fully at home in my body and spirit. And how did others react? I feel I connect with people better when I connect with myself better and that was what I continued to observe this week.

In Its Own Time

I often have students say to me "I want to meditate (or do Yoga) at home, but I just don't make the time for it." And I always say "it's frustrating, but things happen in their own time, not ours".

And I've felt that way about my own practice (and my own life) for ages. I've had a regular meditation and Yoga asana practice for years. By regular I mean that I was usually doing it daily but sometimes I wasn't. I found this frustrating, but...see my note above. I could have forced myself, but that's not the type of practice I was trying to develop.

I always found that when things got too busy, too stressful, my practice would wane. But something has shifted.

This week I have been really busy with contract work (and expect to be for at least another couple of weeks). On Tuesday, I had to choose between lunch and meditation. I chose meditation. On Wednesday, I had to choose between supper and meditation. I chose meditation.

I feel like my subconscious has finally recognized the value I get out of meditation, allowing me to embrace it during stressful times (rather than run from it). Since I don't get to choose how these things go, I don't know if this shift is permanent, but I'm loving it.

And in case anyone worries that choosing meditation over meals isn't healthy, I had more than enough calories in both of those days (another coping mechanism when I'm stressed). I just didn't actually sit down for those meals when planned.

Wellness Symposium - Free!

Check out this online Wellness Symposium from Feb 20 to 26:

http://www.learnitlive.com/symposium.php

The sessions are free, but you do need to register. There are a lot of different presenters and topics. I'm excited to check out a few myself.

Week 5 Challenge - Nice or Real?

This year I decided to challenge myself to reflect on various Yoga and Buddhist aspects throughout the year. The challenges come from a variety of places including readings in Deborah Adele's Yamas and Niyamas and Thich Nhat Hanh's Heart of the Buddha's Teaching and Happiness.

This week's challenge was to observe when I was being nice and when I was being real. I'm not sure what I expected out of this week, but it was interesting to see what came up for me.

One thing I've observed for quite a while is that I have a tendency to be self-deprecating in an attempt to help others feel more comfortable. That is probably the thing that came up for me the most this week in the "nice" vs "real" category. And it helped me to avoid being self-deprecating and just be there for the person. Which is neat because it also stops me from making it "all about me". But, this wasn't a big change from last week, because I had run into the same thing when I was practicing not being more or less than I am. Therefore, in this way, it felt like the same challenge.

Another thing that nice vs real brought up for me is boundaries. There is a commitment I made through the last half of 2011. I was doing it out of obligation and nothing more. I was doing it out of guilt that I didn't want to dump this commitment into someone else's lap. However, I've decided in the past few weeks that I need to do what's right and real for me, which is to get out of that commitment. As part of this week's challenge, I am officially stepping away from that obligation and leaving it in other's capable hands.

I'm not one for resolutions, but one of the things I've been working on this year is to not always need to be right. In certain longer term relationships (at the office, at home) I sometimes correct people over absolutely trivial matters. And the result is that I feel bad and it seems they do as well. However, this week when I asked "nice" or "real", it would seem I was choosing nice by keeping my mouth shut. However, my perspective is that I was also choosing real because I was valuing my relationship over my ego.

I do believe it is better to be real most of the time, but also to evaluate what real is. Sometimes my reality is skewed by perception (or perhaps that is all of the time), so I want to ensure that the reality I'm making choices based on is more of an objective one.

February Newsletter - Breathing, New Classes and a Great Book

My February newsletter has been posted: click here.