Make the Time & Space to Practice Gratitude

Welcome as we enter into the Season of gratitude. Let’s practice the gifts of being alive in the abundant energy that arises when we make an effort to nourish our inner light. It’s the harvest season of gathering and celebrating our bounty.

In our troubled world today, we are seeing the struggles of conflict and the collective distraction of feeding fear and anger. Now my teacher would remind me that I am just being foolish to hold on to my habit of worry. Clinging to worry and doubt, I just deplete my nervous system, which leads to exhaustion and loss of my joy. It takes great effort to move inward and link to my breath when my little mind is distracted by all the noise around.

My inner mantra today is to thank myself for making the time to share these words, “today, focus on what is beautiful. Free your heart from judgment, live simply, give more, expect less, and notice the light in someone’s eyes. Smile and offer to listen with the intention of being present.” These are just words to the mind of intellect that is wired to protect the self-preservation of one’s identity.

We are human beings moving too quickly as the adrenaline pushes us to do more. Pause, put your hands on your heart and just observe the beating. Is the pulse too fast? Slow your breath and just feel the air meeting your nostrils. Notice a simple shift and how it changes everything. Maybe not in the outer world, but something internal has shifted. Now add a thank you. Inhale and say to yourself, “thank you,” and on the exhale, again whisper, ”thank you.” This is the small, conscious choice of welcoming in gratitude for your life.

It is not what you do that defines your self-worth, but living in the awareness of an appreciation for who you are. Being kind and being your own friend opens your heart to the world. It takes effort:

• to move in the direction of the heart,

• to focus the mind in the direction of observing the feeling of the breath,

• to meditate on the profound wonder of being present in life itself,

• to make an effort to move away from the habit of creating distractions,

• to make time and space to celebrate a practice on a daily basis.

The collective energy to make a commitment to go inward on a daily basis is a great offering we can do for humanity. It is not easy, and we need a collective community to cultivate these tools.

YAF, together with all our teachers, is sharing in the abundance of this life energy as we say “THANK YOU” for being a part of our collective journey. The path of healing and nourishing the inner light is in all of us. May we come together this Season by sustaining these thoughts, as my mentor, Joseph Campbell, would inspire, “Be the JOY in the sorrows of the World.”

Blessings,
Laura Jane

Say Yes to Life with Year Long Meditation

We know that our breathing is the inhaling and exhaling of air. Air is all around us, and when we take the oxygen into our lungs we are saying, YES to life. The lungs that lie round the heart, with the air passing through them, envelope the heart. Thus, breathing is a natural way to touch the heart.

And so, having collected your mind within you, lead it into the channel of breathing through which air reaches the heart. With this inhaled air, force your mind to descend into the sweet space where your true self rests and to open the gateway to something more profound than your intellect. Open to love, your intrinsic true nature. This is the gift of meditation!

Meditation is the conscious refined mind linked to this true nature. Bringing our roaming overactive thoughts into direct awareness of the grace of breath opens the door for wonder. To go beyond our daily habit of linking to all the distractions of mindless noise and instead link to the breath, which allows us to enter into a sanctuary of inner peace. This is the greatest tool of practicing yoga. —Yes, yoga offers the tool of meditation. It is a primary tool; and yet, everyone just believes it’s all about asana.

I am amazed when students call the studio and ask if we teach meditation. All yoga is bringing the busy mind into a refined steady place of focusing. it’s a practice which takes time and commitment. We can all benefit from great physical practice of strong postures, but that’s not the goal of yoga. The intention is for the agitation of mind to be able to move into a direct focus, and be able to sustain that focus, by first relaxing the tensions from gross to subtle. The beauty of practice offers a shift in the nervous system so the physical body is not being driven by the adrenals and the ego’s learned habits of avoiding being present.

In today’s busy and over extended world, we need all the tools we can gather to create a lifestyle that is not moving us into more suffering. Tools to help us ease our stresses and find more joy in being our best self. As a community of like minded souls, I am concerned that we are moving into directions filled with negative thoughts. I know that fighting or arguing with the outer world can only lead to more frustration and we lose the sense of feeling empowered to make greater changes in the world for kindness and inspiration of hope.

Therefore, Yoga Among Friends is thrilled and honored to be included in the year long commitment of meditation and joining of intentions for a better global world view with The Himalayan Institute and my dear teacher, Pandit Rajamni Tigunait. Whether you are just beginning a meditation practice or have been a dedicated student for many years, I’m passionate that our combined contribution of making a daily practice will have a huge ripple effect that will extend pass our small community.

The Year Long Meditation initiative is a global endeavor, and the shifting consciousness from hate to love is what must be felt as possible. I want to invite you to join in. If you are inspired to join on your own please sign up here and you can start tracking your own practice. You can also learn more here.

We can bring positive change by our collective consciousness expanding and benefiting all of us with a mutual understanding, wisdom and compassion with unconditional love. I know this to be true! And I am so passionate that we cannot stop hatred with anger, but with the light of bringing our hearts into a greater positive direction.

Meditation heals and let’s start here. Marina offers the Meditative Flow class as her Sunday offering, and Lisa teaches Meditation for Adults and Teens on Tuesday evenings. But know that all our classes bring us into reflection and breath awareness. I will also be starting in September a meditation class on Monday nights at 7:30pm in the small studio as my commitment offering.

In addition to meditation, I am excited to announce that on Wednesday, August 14, we will be participating in the first Global Yoga Therapy Day! I and three other C-IAYT yoga therapists will be on hand from 9am-4pm to offer FREE one-on-one yoga therapy sessions of 30 min each to those who have never tried yoga therapy. Each participant will gain a better understanding of and experience first hand the work of a yoga therapist. You’ll learn how we help assess and create a healthy practice to remove pain and suffering from physical injuries, emotional mood imbalances, and the suffering from autoimmune diseases. Please sign up for free sessions on our website. If you can’t make it, check out the live event on Facebook.

All of us at YAF extend our heartfelt appreciation to all of you for continuing to support us as a place of healing hearts. I personally know that we need community now more than ever in this ever-changing landscape of technology and corporations that leave us without the feeling of belonging. As we journey together on the path of promoting better thoughts, let’s rejoice that we are fortunate enough to be able to help the sweet earth. Together we are the service of intentional consciousness, and we are even more dynamic together.

Thank you and blessings for saying, YES TO LIFE.

LJ