TANGKA
The Yoga Place
532 Main St.
Bennington, Vermont 05201
(802)447-0101, 447-0393(real person)
www.benningtonyoga.com
The Yoga Place Newsletter
IN THIS ISSUE
YOGA NIDRA
CLASS SCHEDULE
RECIPES
INDIA
INDIA: SERVICE
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YOGA NIDRA
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WHEN:  SATURDAY APRIL 10, 17 AND 21, 1030AM-12NOON
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The literal translation of Yoga Nidra is Yogic Sleep.  It is an ancient form of meditation that will take you into deep levels of relaxation while still remaining fully aware.  When practicing Yoga Nidra your brainwaves drop into the alpha and theta state.  As you progressively enter deeper and subtler brain waves you become more relaxed, integrated, expansive and present.  Eventually, you completely shift out of identification with the body, mind and ego.  In this deep state beyond ordinary waking consciousness, you naturally re-align with spirit, allowing you to effortlessly disengage from restrictive physical, mental and emotional patterning.  Here, you are free to create a life that is an expression of higher consciousness, rather than acquired conditioning.

Yoga Nidra addresses the root of all problems.

Yoga Nidra awakens your inner healer, helping to eliminate stress, induce restful sleep, prevent premature aging, reduce high blood pressure and boost the immune system.  It is effective in helping people with stress, addictions, sleep disorders, nervous conditions and in releasing long-standing behavioral patterns.

SCHEDULE
lorie on plane
MARCH/APRIL 2010
YOGA PLACE SCHEDULE

CLASSES

Monday 

830AM  Pilates - Donna  Menneto

 1030AM  Multi level Yoga /Jane
500PM   Very Beginner Yoga/Jane
615PM  Meditation/Jane FREE

NEW!!
Tuesday

930AM  ASHTANGA PRACTICE with Rebecca

Wednesday
830AM    Pilates
1030AM  Multi-level Yoga- Jane
545PM    Vinyasa Flow-Donna Myers

Thursday
930AM    Hatha Flow - Rebecca Healy
615PM    Beginner Yoga-Donna Myers

Friday
830AM    Pilates
1030AM  Multi-Level Yoga - Carol Steinmetz

Saturday
900AM  Pilates
1030-12NOON ON APRIL 10, 17 & 24 YOGA NIDRA
INTEGRATIVE RELAXATION

Sunday
1030AM  Flow Yoga-Tracey Forest

FEES :  Single Class/Drop-in  $15
 1 Beginner Class per week:  $90/9weeks
 2 Beginner classes/ per week, $170  
   9 Class Pass:  $99.
 18 Class Pass:  $180.
   4 Class Pass: $55.
All passes are only good through the end of April.

 
RECIPES
GET HOOKED ON HEALTH!
donna sits front porch
Basic Green Smoothie recipe
from Donna & Rebecca

frozen or fresh fruit
strawberries 3 or 4 big ones
Blueberries  1/4 cup
pineapple 4 chunks
Banana 1 med-small
pear med-small
orange pealed whole seedless. med-small
 
Greens (good sized salad portion)
spinach
Kale
Dandelion greens
various lettuces'
 
Place fruit in blender with a little water pulse until chopped then blend thoroughly.
Add greens and blend again.
Enjoy!

MEDITATION

Sit quietly in a comfortable position.  Relax.  Repeat any sound over and over to yourself. (such as a mantra or the sound, "Om").  Do this for up to 20 minutes.
Relax.

ASANA
Ardha Matsyendrasana
 Simple Spinal Twist
Lie on the floor.
Breathe and relax.
Draw your knees to your chest.
Breathe.
Extend your arms out in a T position on the floor, palms down.
Breathe.
Drop your knees to the left, look to the right.  Let your knees and feet flop onto the floor or rest on a cushion.
Be comfortable.  Breathe.
Rest here and breathe for 5 breaths.
Do this on the other side for 5 breaths.
Breathe.  Relax.
Good for your spinal health, for your organs, for your mind, your heart and for your soul.
Love your body well and it will serve you well.
News & Notes
April/May 2010
Greetings!

          We had a wildly successful Kirtan last Friday, Feb 12 with about 40 people attending!  Chanting and chanting the names of God is always an uplifting moment.  One chant I particularly loved asks us to "call in the divine - whatever that is to you", "call in the divine", "call in the divine" and then the second refrain is "I am the divine, I am the divine, I am the divine."  Get it?  Its all happening here, right now, in this present moment.  There is nowhere to go but where you are because, as Jon Kabat-Zinn's book suggests, Wherever You Go, There You Are.  So why not recognize and practice being the divine right now!?  Or as the Zen master says:   "WAKE UP!"

   MEDITATION:  COME.  IT IS FREE.  MONDAY NIGHTS 615PM -7.  Why meditate?  Well, wherever you go, there you are.  Letting it be so on the meditation cushion (or chair) allows you to actually step from a ground in the present moment into the next present moment as your full, glorious self.  Encounter the full you, in all your colors.  Lighten up.  Live the divine that you are.

     I hear lots of new birdsong when I'm walking so I know Spring is nearing.  But for now, I am really enjoying the white world of cold with snow.  Perhaps returning from the heated plains of Gujurat, I am enjoying the chill even more.

     This newsletter will bring you the new schedule (pretty much the same as last term) and a new 3 week class, Introduction to Yoga Nidra or Integrative Relaxation (What is that? Read the brief article in this newsletter) and a little taste of my time in India.lorie on plane

    I remain so grateful to all the teachers and students and guests who make up the fabric of the Yoga Place.  We are indeed a lucky lot.

   May your days be long and happy.  May you have physical and mental balance.   May you find yourself in right relationship to yourself and to those you love, those you are neutral towards and those of whom you are not so fond.  May you know the blessing of inner peace no matter what the outer conditions are.

Namaste
Jane and the Yoga Place
INDIA
lorie on plane
New Beginnings:  A trip with yogi master Amrit Desai and 19 yoga teachers

Very excited.  Leaving for India in 3 days.  Phwew.....have I packed everything?  What about snacks?  What about, wait, where is my passport?  Yikes!  Where is my eticket?

Lorie arrives.  We catch up.  Fly out the next day to Newark, NJ.  Meet up immediately with our group.  Yay.  We are on our way.  A lovely largish group of yoga teachers.  We are eventually 20, including Gurudev (Amrit Desai, founder of Kripalu and now the Amrit Institute), who is, well, the Guru;  Priti and Malay, the trip coordinators and Executive Directors of the Amrit Institute in Florida.  I am already totally confused as to whether this is an inward journey or an outward journey and of course it is both.  I guess that would be pilgrimage.
lorie on plane Lorie on the plane.lorie on planeJane.


  We spend the first few days acclimating at the Ideal Beach Resort near to Mammalapuram, Tamil Nadu, INDIA! and magically, Lorie and I are assigned the exact room in which I stayed 2 years ago when I was recuperating from hip resurfacing done in Chennai.  For me this is a most auspicious continuation to a deep journey of gratitude.  Two years ago I could hardly walk.  Today, I am practicing yoga and sightseeing and walking everywhere I want to with no pain.

Certain things are opening up in my understanding and in my heart as a consequence of this pilgrimage with Yogi Desai.  I will try to convey at least one here today and hopefully others as the next newsletters emerge.

INDIA
lorie on plane
SERVICE AS A WAY OUT

OR
LIFE WITH A DEDICATED HEART

We are traveling on the bus.  Gurudev opens a spontaneous talk on living in presence. He points out that we typically listen with ears of the past, hearing through a filter designed for us by our past.  We live conditioned by our past.  Therefore, he says,  we are always in reaction and often uncomfortable.  Some might call this gifts we have received from our past.  We can continue to live in these illusions, these gifts from our conditioned past, or connect to "prana" (life force energy) and live life as it actually is.

Connecting to prana.  Prana is our own life force energy that comes to us moment by moment, happens in the present moment.  Prana is so subtle, you may only hear it when you are in survival or crisis mode.  At those moments you naturally connect with the higher power within you and intuitively know what to do.  That is prana, life force energy, at work.  You might also become aware of prana in meditation, when you are highly focused and absorbed (like writing this article or making a painting, working in your garden) or when you are in the presence of a spiritual master.

Gurudev proposes that yoga is one vehicle for hearing prana.   Amrit Yoga teaches that there are two parts to a yoga pose:  The first part involves taking the pose - doing.  The second part is where you let go - being.
If you have the intention to be fully present during your yoga practice, you will find that you can step out of your conditioned past, step out of history and step into the present moment.

Gurudev continues:  "Enjoy the present.  If you don't enjoy the present, mind will step in and suggest various attachments or aversions.  Of course, mind, conditioned by past history is always telling us to crave this or dislike that."

Easily said I think to myself, but quite tricky to do.
lorie on planeGurudev pleased at his birthplace

 "Our lives are constantly changing in a multitude of ways."  Our bodies change daily, our external life changes, our joys, our loved ones...... life is not stable BUT our mind can be stable.  A stable mind leads to an ability to enjoy the present.  In this present we can witness our lives from the deepest source within rather than being distracted by ongoing dramas.

Service
     Gurudev speaks of the joy and merits of a life devoted to serving and giving.  I think to myself, Nice idea but I have that life.  I'm a mom and now a grandmom, a therapist, I run a yoga business, I cook dinner for others. I give to charity.  I'm all about others!  What about me?!  What does he really mean?

He says:  "Everything you do in time is for ego--for you.  Everything you do in the present is for liberation."  This is a subtle thought and I am not sure I grasp it entirely.  It must mean, for starters, that one has to be quite clear about motive when serving. 

     Bapuji (the affectionate name for Swami Kripalu, Gurudev's teacher) lived a life of nvritmarg -- liberation through renunciation." 
     Swami Kripalu, from a young age, meditated, spending most hours of most days in meditation practice, taking care of his spiritual growth.  Yet, although a renunciate, from him flowered Kripalu Yoga, Kripalu Center, Amrit yoga, Kayavarohan Ashram and School, introducing thousands to the benefits and liberation of yoga. 
     Pravritimarg is liberation through action or karma yoga (yoga of service) which has been more the path of Gurudev.

lorie on planeKayavarohan Temple at dusk

     I ask Gurudev to say a bit more about service.  He pauses for a long moment and then, "Service is rooted in the ability to see things from the point of view of the other." 
     Now I sit up and take notice.....where is he going with this?  It is not the answer I expected (reaction from my conditioned past). 
     "To be able to do this, one must nurture oneself first for it is only then that we are able to listen carefully to what is needed in any situation." 
     Pondering these words for several weeks now, I come up with
an aha,  of course.  In order to be truly useful to others we must be able to know what that means in ourselves.  If we are caring for self, then we will have that knowledge and be able to fully serve others.  If we are all stressed out or have secret motives for ourselves then that is all we will give, all we can give.  If our heart is closed or hurt, the self uncared for, then we will give and later feel resentment that perhaps our gifts were ineffectual or not valued, never realizing that they may have been wrong gifts.


lorie on planeSwami Kripalu in meditation

     Somehow for me this also connects with love for one's teacher.  Serving one's teacher is an act of devotion and one's teachers are, of course, everywhere.  So everywhere is devotion.  However, the place of the yogi master or beings who devote their life to the spirit is unique. 

   Swami Kripalu practiced most of the hours of his days and most of the days of his life.  We visited his practice room, in the basement of his home at the  Kayavarohan Temple.  lorie on planeSwami Kripalu's spacious verandah at his home on the grounds of Kayavarohan Ashram

     Sitting as a group in the spiritually charged atmosphere of Swami Kripalu's practice room on the grounds of Kayavarohan Ashram, Gurudev made a small prayer, asking for Bapuji's help in these difficult times.  At that moment, I realized that we all need to open our hearts and ask for help, from our guides and from each other.  We can no longer afford to wait or to be afraid to humble ourselves to ask.  It is a spiritual practice to ask for help.  It is a spiritual practice to care for self, so that the cared-for self CAN be accurately useful to others and IS empowered to ask for help.  We are all one and separatism and division will not serve us.  We need not be so strange to one another.  I am you and you are me.  Really.  We must now today call in the Divine and realize that it is I.  It is me.
lorie on plane
If you made your way through this article, I thank you and welcome your feedback.  We are all in this together.
The Yoga Place is dedicated to the health and well being of each and every one of us. Well being is contagious.  Our more peaceful and balanced selves move out into the environment creating peace, balance and well being in our homes and families, at our workplaces, in our play grounds, in all areas of our lives.  Join us in creating new healthgiving stories and lives.
Sincerely,
 
Jane Schaeffer and the Yoga Place
The Yoga Place