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Healing Into What You Are with Laura Jane Mellencamp

Healing Into What You Are with Laura Jane Mellencamp

On Season 1, Episode 37 of the Strongoo Podcast, Laura Jane is a guest and sits down to chat with Joe Donar. Calling her one of his most amazing teachers, they discuss how we can activate more vitality in our lives by listening to that kinder voice inside us. And how painful it is to accept all of who we are so we can heal by building the tools we need to put our pieces back together again.

Listen on Apple Podcasts here.

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Joe Donar’s intention for the Strongoo podcast is to help individuals to create action by opening up, being vulnerable, getting uncomfortable, and having hard conversations. “To learn how to act, we must first learn how to feel. This gives us the emotional resiliency to overcome any challenge that stands in our way.”

The inner light, our Prana Shakti

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The inner light, our Prana Shakti

Waking today and lighting my pilot light. The inner fire of passion becomes the illuminated light of the soul shining. I have been asked why there is so much anger in the world now. We are wired for self-preservation, our mind is always roaming, looking out for our survival.

Fear of NOT having is the motivator for life which turns on the fire for survival, doing, getting, striving, and it never turns off. Anger keeps people alive, but it never allows for resting and cultivating a quality of peace or ease.

Living in a wildfire of anger blinds the mind from seeing clearly. Exhaustion follows, and fatigue will also blur the mind in an emotional haze. We call it “depression,” as the desire for life fades. This dullness of existence paralyzes the soul. To constantly feed the mind lack is fear. To be full of life, to be enough, and actually experience life as a true feeling is to cultivate the awareness of Prana Shakti.

If we constantly feed the mind the fear of not having enough, then we only keep spinning in a rage of competition, harming each other. We have learned to get more, hoard more, and defend the ownership of superiority over those that have less. We can feed the anger of survival and continue to shame ourselves and others.

For thousands of years, mankind has defended its existence by fighting the inner demon of fear. It is not until we embrace it and honor our fear, that we find the desire to move in another direction. We need to be willing to move the mind inward and take that ember of fire and breathe it into our life force and slow down the panic in our systems.

The flow of breath can shift our nervous systems and create a profound shift in healing. The actual pranic flow of our life awakens the soul. Light the flame of passion and desire for being present to love. This is our pranic shakti, our life force.

Yes, it all sounds so ridiculous to the small mind that doubts. It takes profound courage not to react to what is being witnessed all around with the same biting and spitting of human anger. But the integrity of something greater is to move into another direction and cultivate a response that is healing.

What is healing humanity at this moment? We must cultivate the ability to pause and acknowledge our fear and yet not fall into its trap of anger. Respond with compassion and hold all beings with honor and respect. Experience a shift in the chemistry of the mind and feel the body relax. I am more passionate than ever about teaching and sharing the tools of yoga for our health.

The harming that is happening is learned, and its patterns of self-loathing are being taught through our thoughts, words, and action. Self-loathing is fear which moves into anger. Anger manifests in the moods of frustration, agitation, and feeling of being overwhelmed. To have a mind of doubt, worry, and confusion is the smoke from the fire gone wild.

Healing is to shift the mind into a focused state of balance. Observe the constant movement and let go of fixing the thought.

Yoga is not to fix anything. It is simply the ability to learn tools that can balance the mind/body and inspire a positive shift in attitude in all moods. This takes practice, a teacher, and the desire to thrive and enjoy life for the beauty and the wonder that is always being presented. Light the flame of love and have the enthusiasm and the passion to live it. This is humanity at its best. Be alive and celebrate health.

We are a healing yoga center; this has been my passion as a mental health provider for over 30 years. When I saw that individuals were not connected to the somatic experience of their breath, I decided to become a yoga therapist and leave my role as a marriage and family therapist in CA. I knew the work of somatic healing was yoga. My relationships with students must be based on deep trust, which is meeting each person where they are.

Yoga is a deep philosophy of profound, subtle experiences. In our world of biased opinion, yoga became more of a body attachment to how one looked. I believe, it is how we feel.

We are starting a new teacher training this September, and I hope to inspire health practitioners to learn the actual methodology in which these deeper tools are used to maintain their own well-being and then to inspire others suffering from the illnesses that our society is seeing today. Consider joining us on Saturday, July 22 for an information session about this transformational program.

Our community is based on healing and awakening the soul’s desire of being the light in the world. This is our passion at YAF. Let us light our pilot light today and be willing to shine.

With Love,

Laura Jane

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Summer Ease at YAF

Summer Ease at YAF

Welcoming summer is a celebration of the light. Oh, how I love taking all those layers off and walking freely outside, feeling the warmth of the summer sun on my skin! The Midwest is not my first choice for ideal living conditions, but no one does summer better than us.

Celebrating the long days and the glory of those sweet nights on my front porch. Feeling the ease of life’s pace slowing down and enjoying the outdoors. Living my yoga off the mat but always coming back to my mat as a reminder that everything of gratitude starts with my yoga practice.

Starting this Sunday, June 4, we will be hosting a weekly summer class, Sunday Yoga in the Park, from 9-10:15 am, weather permitting, in Washington Park. What a great way to enjoy being in nature and breathing in the sweet morning air! An outdoor practice can be a resource for nourishing your creativity and resilience. I encourage you to adopt an attitude of curiosity, and join us to explore this new practice environment with all five of your senses.

This summer we are also offering new and exciting classes taught by experienced, talented new teachers who are sharing their vast wisdom. We are so honored that they want to teach at our studio since many travel from Chicago, the north shore, and the northern suburbs. They know our students want to go deeper and move into healing all layers of the mind.

We have added a Tuesday evening Iyengar class for beginning students. And have new series classes which will continue throughout the summer weeks, including Yoga for Kids 6-12 years and a book study on the Yamas and Niyamas with movement. We are also hosting some exciting workshops to offer more ways to connect with our deeper intelligence, including Saturday’s Guided Sound Bath Meditation, Sunday’s Gua Sha Facial & Restorative Yoga , Neurogenic Yoga on June 13 and Yoga Nidra on June 18. Lastly, we are excited to be offering yoga classes specially designed for plus-size students, a new multi-style class where a variety of yoga postures, breathing exercises and meditation techniques are taught, and an asana-based class, Meditation in Motion, that includes breath work, aromatherapy, mini guided meditation open to all levels.

Yoga Among Friends (YAF) is known as the studio for delving deeper and refining the practice to truly balance our physical, mental, and emotional systems. In the world today, we all seek community and safe places to feel nourished. With 5 certified yoga therapists and 7 certified 200/500 level, professional yoga teachers on staff, I feel YAF is turning into a true place for healing yoga. Click on a photo above for more info about each teacher.

In a world struggling to find balance, I am forever blessed to remember my breath and appreciate being human. Summer offers me gentleness, time to read a good novel, catch up on the daily gardening, learn new ways to prepare healthy meals, reflect on the many ways life is beautiful and people are good, and practice yoga with summer ease. Please stay in the light, knowing we have a choice. Keep safe and cool, and appreciate the ways you are moving forward through the heart. —And we hope to see you join us for these classes and find your summer ease!

Let me know in the comments below what you are looking forward to this summer at YAF and elsewhere.

The light in me honors the light in you,

Laura Jane