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Yoga of Breath and Heart Kripalu/Hatha Yoga with Sarah D. Meredith
OPENING
A PATH TO BEING. BEING
A PATH TO OPENING.
BEGINNER CLASSES Tuesdays in Brooklyn: 5:30-6:30 PM @Shambhala
- See Full Schedule Below MONTHLY CHAIR & MAT CLASSES @Women's Health Program of Interfaith
Medical Center MAT
CLASS Thursday August 12th 6-7PM CHAIR CLASS Tuesday August 3rd 1-2 PM& Wednesday August 25th 5-6PM Check for a 2nd Mat Class starting
September!
Women's Farmhouse Yoga Weekends, Gilboa, New York: ALL FULL for August
6-8 Contact
Sarah for Details on the next one!
Choose to explore your full range of motion
- with breath and heart to support you - and find freedom.
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| Springtime Farmhouse in Gilboa |
CLICK HERE to visit Sarah's Blog: Seeing Inside Out
Recent Topics Include: * Tapas-the Niyama of Heat, Cleansing & Discipline * As the Sea to the Shore Love Is * Nobody's
Perfect - Really? •
Boiling the Water • Investigate
the Structure that is You • Finding the Jelly Beans •Catch & Toss that Curve Ball
* Breathing In a Large Body * Yoga &
Weathering the Storms of Suffering * Connecting in the Dark * * On the Mat As It Is In Life * Going Deep - the Exploration * A Night at the Opera * Step Away from the Trap *Less is More - Make the Suggestion * De-Stressing:
Let Yoga Be a Way Out & A Way In * Accepting Wholeness * The
Path Between Ignorance and Certitude * Grateful for the Wet Wind
* Ordering Onions & Setting Intentions * Finding
Drishti - A Good Seat With Obstructed View... * Standing the World on Its Head – Mine
* Limitations
= Stories We Tell Ourselves * Accepting Not Knowing * Words, Meanings &
Silence - Pause Mode/Talk Mode * Everything Co-Arising In This Moment
* Paying Attention to Suffering * Sending Metta to Haiti * Releasing My
Aching Heart * Retreats: "Wherever You Go There You Are" *
Setting The Whirlwind Aside * Responsibility & Fragility * Signing Up and Signing
In
A Kripalu Yoga class: start right where you are,
no prerequisites, no judgments. Yoga is an essential inquiry that brings you into the present moment,
allowing you to focus your attention and cultivate awareness. Amazingly this path leads to infinite transformations. I enjoy
offering yoga as a way of enabling people to experience themselves as they are with compassion, and encouraging their journey
towards radical self acceptance (the core of Kripalu yoga). Using asana, alignment principles, meditation, pranayama, vinyasa
flow, exploration of various texts (including poetry, sutras, etc.), props, mats, chair yoga techniques, mudra and chants,
I offer yoga that allows freedom from mental chatter and physical pain. My yoga sessions encourage healing and reduced stress,
thus opening possibilities for a deep sense of wellbeing, engagement and fulfillment. I believe this is available to
each person who has the courage to practice yoga, at any age or at any point in one’s life history. It is a privilege
for me to teach yoga, making this experience accessible.
Yoga is your BODY, MIND and SPIRIT - releasing stress and chronic tension
- stretching and toning the body
- cultivating concentration
and mental clarity
- encouraging self-acceptance and calm
- inviting growth and self-awareness
- deepening understanding
and capacity for joy
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BROOKLYN 2010: SHAMBHALA YOGA & DANCE
718-622-9956 348 St. Mark's Avenue @Washington Ave. INTERFAITH MEDICAL CTR Women's Health Program 528 Prospect
Place, Brooklyn Registration REQUIRED: 718-613-6811
Visit Women's Health at Interfaith Website
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TUESDAY BEGINNERS CLASSES Weekly 5:30-6:30 PM
Mat Yoga - All Levels 6-7 PM Thursday August 12 2nd class/month coming in
September!
CHAIR YOGA
- Every Body! Tueday August 3 1-2 PM Wednesday August 25 5-6 PM NEW TIME
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Out of Town/Other Places Gilboa, NY (Schoharie County) Contact Sarah for costs and details
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Weekend Retreat
August
6-8, 2010 FULL
Check back for upcoming retreats! Friday 4 pm -Sunday
2 pm
Yoga,
Meals, Meditation, Accommodations
Family style, Nature Walks, Star Gazing!
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Click to Visit Sarah's Blog: Seeing Inside Out
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Contact Sarah Meredith for
fees and availability: - Individual sessions
- small group classes
- Tailored workshops and courses
It is no surprise that
sitting on a yoga mat can be much more than a physical experience. Discovering that your neck is stiff, or that one hip is
crankier than the other is one way of getting to know yourself with more honesty and attention than usual, but something else
happens too. The stillness we allow on the mat in order to pay attention to that hip is often uncomfortable in and of itself.
In that space, with attention focused on breathing, we begin to see ourselves in vast and discrete ways simultaneously. All
the efforting to adjust the hips, the stream of judgments about the tensions in the breath, the constant remembering to release
the seemingly continuous tightening of the neck muscles and the realization that attention has wandered yet again to the person
next to us... provides an unfiltered experience of our own being. So much energy goes into making ourselves over, wishing we were different than we are,
covering, editing or erasing parts of ourselves we don't like or can't figure out. This way of operating creates layers and
patterns, puts some of our most authentic qualities and understandings out of reach, and makes it hard to connect deeply and
honestly to other people. So often even in intimate relationships there is a sense of not being known, or of disbelief when
it comes to accepting appreciation or love. If we can not see and accept ourselves, we cannot believe anyone else can know
or love that self either. Often our self acceptance is with reservations and exclusionary clauses that we have come to consider
part of the self. There is
something uncanny, magical and simple about training our attention on the breath. When we soften our physical effort around
the breath, we set aside some of the basic resistance to being who we are. Not concerned with what our faces are doing, letting
go of preconceived ideas of what that hip can or cannot do, we can approach our own inhaling and exhaling with curiosity.
We develop more acute observational skills as we discover things about its texture or length, seeing the variety of efforts
we make to control or direct it, and accepting quite basically that it is just what it is and that the breath, as itself,
can be trusted. Trusting the breath is a profound step towards accepting oneself and finding a safe space, in some ways a
very sacred space, in which to explore just being. We find that there is no need to judge our breathing. Letting that idea permeate us for even a moment makes
space to let go of judging ourselves generally. Curiosity about the breath leads to a genuine awakening of curiosity about
the self: exactly how is this rib cage situated around the inhale, moving on the exhale, releasing and empowering a sense
of being. Centering attention, maintaining focus without judging, directly nurtures a sense of well-being. It is remarkable
to discover that we, along with every other living being, are breathing and being in each moment. We make space for ourselves
on the mat and this space goes with us off the mat. If we open to finding ourselves as we are - breathing, being, curious
and whole - we have the ultimate freedom to accept ourselves (and others) as worthy of happiness in all its forms. Without
judgment and with awareness, we no longer need to manipulate ourselves into being worthy, we find that we are naturally worthy
of being. 
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Visit www.kripalu.org
Yoga practice is for every body, mind
and heart, as long as there is breath.
| Let your breath be your guide. |
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And
When Its Tough? It Takes Practice When
my legs begin shaking in utkatasana (chair or fierce pose) I deepen my breathing. I draw my attention to my feet and notice
where my weight is resting. I let a little ease open my upper back, relax my shoulders and open my heart with my exhale. The
intensity of heat in my thighs begins to scream at me and I take in a longer inhale, pressing out my exhale with deliberate
evenness. I might roll my wrists, or lift my toes. The shaking does not stop, but my panic has left me. The shaking does not
stop, but my body understands that this is a moment of possibility. I am not hurting myself. I will feel no ill effects. I
am simply breathing through the hard stuff, to strengthen and to help release my tendencies to effort where I do not need
to exert energy, like in my shoulders. The
gratitude I feel as I fold into uttanasana (standing forward fold) is a combination of amazement at the flood of sensations
from the physical change of pose, and a deep rush of joy that I am able to be in utkatasana and to shift into uttanasana.
I can clearly remember that when I began
practicing yoga even holding utkatasana for 3 breaths made "fierce pose" an apt name for the asana. Teachers would
say, sit back as though you were resting in a chair, and I would reach desperately at the word "resting" and "chair"
as if they would save my wildly aching leg muscles. The concept of resting in a posture that is strenuous was quite new to
me. It still amazes me, every time. I may feel the shaking after a longer period of time, but I will always continue to have
those moments on the mat that ask me to reinvent myself, to investigate how I approach my own life in that moment.
The breath illuminates the moment and brings awareness into my life off the mat. A friend recently gave me driving instructions,
saying, "Now remember this is a country road and it will wind, there will be turns and pieces that go off in other directions.
It is a simpler way. Just stay on the road and when it feels confusing, just breathe into it, and you will get to where you
see the signs. The signs are large and clear." How well that describes the practice! The fear rises, the legs shake, the worst
appears in the mind, the emotions ask for sympathy, the mind doubts and portrays all the obvious shortcomings or devastating
consequences. Breathing in and breathing out I can let all that go and see the signs, so large and clear. Yes the path will
turn, will twist, will splinter off; and I continue to explore this "simpler way." Give it a try and find
your self, right there on the mat and off!
| Allow your heart to open, leaning on the breath. |
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