Ellen Elphand Wellness at East meets West Holistic Center

03/19/2020

I hope everyone is staying safe and therefore staying home not just for you but for all of us. You've heard all the recommendations from the CDC https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/ so I wanted to post something I found healing. A "poem", and I wanted to share it.

Remember at every moment it all boils down to two choices... love or fear.

"And the people stayed home. And read books, and listened, and rested, and exercised, and made art, and played games, and learned new ways of being, and were still. And listened more deeply. Some meditated, some prayed, some danced. Some met their shadows. And the people began to think differently. And the people healed. And, in the absence of people living in ignorant, dangerous, mindless, and heartless ways, the earth began to heal. And when the danger passed, and the people joined together again, they grieved their losses, and made new choices, and dreamed new images, and ways to live and heal the earth fully, as they had been healed." ~Kitty O'Meara

02/22/2018

Looking very serious while learning from Master MDH Breathing Coordinator (Robin DeHaas)

Level 1 Practitioner Training in Los Angeles, with the amazing Robin De Haas.

02/17/2018

Very excited to be studying with Functional Anatomist Lynn Martin (the M of MDH Breathing Coordination) who knew that the alignment of the the ankles can affect your ribcage! Day 1. MDH Breathing Coordination

10/14/2017

So excited to be a "Level 1 Trainee" for this groundbreaking way of working with the breath & respiration. Here is a french language news report showing both singers and respiratory patients benefiting from an MDH Breathing Coordination session. Contact me if you'd like to experience a session. Especially recommended for athletes, singers, respiratory patients, anxiety, depression, neck or back pain.

Plus d'un million de personnes en Suisse souffrent de troubles respiratoires. Dans ce contexte, un vaudois a mis au point une technique pour mieux respirer.

01/23/2017

If you don't know about this you should. http://www.sci-hub.ac
This site creates public access to tens of millions research papers.

The first pirate website in the world to open mass and public access to tens of millions research papers

11/21/2016

The start of a year long focus on dermatology with master dermatogist Mazin Al-Khafaji. My colleague Aydin Bengisu and I are 21 hours into all the aspects of psoriasis and we didn't even finish the subject! Going deep is very important and exciting.

09/30/2016

Very excited about this new magazine which promotes a healthier self image and attitude for young girls! http://kazoomagazine.com

A print magazine for girls that inspires them to be smart, strong, fierce, and, above all, true to themselves.

09/25/2016

HONESTY

is reached through the doorway of grief and loss. Where we cannot go in our mind, our memory, or our body is where we cannot be straight with another, with the world, or with our self. The fear of loss, in one form or another, is the motivator behind all conscious and unconscious dishonesties: all of us are afraid of loss, in all its forms, all of us, at times, are haunted or overwhelmed by the possibility of a disappearance, and all of us therefore, are one short step away from dishonesty. Every human being dwells intimately close to a door of revelation they are afraid to pass through. Honesty lies in understanding our close and necessary relationship with not wanting to hear the truth.

The ability to speak the truth is as much the ability to describe what it is like to stand in trepidation at this door, as it is to actually go through it and become that beautifully honest spiritual warrior, equal to all circumstances, we would like to become.

Honesty is not the revealing of some foundational truth that gives us power over life or another or even the self, but a robust incarnation into the unknown unfolding vulnerability of existence, where we acknowledge how powerless we feel, how little we actually know, how afraid we are of not knowing and how astonished we are by the generous measure of loss that is conferred upon even the most average life.

Honesty is grounded in humility and indeed in humiliation, and in admitting exactly where we are powerless. Honesty is not found in revealing the truth, but in understanding how deeply afraid of it we are.

To become honest is in effect to become fully and robustly incarnated into powerlessness. Honesty allows us to live with not knowing. We do not know the full story, we do not know where we are in the story; we do not know who is at fault or who will carry the blame in the end. Honesty is not a weapon to keep loss and heartbreak at bay, honesty is the outer diagnostic of our ability to come to ground in reality, the hardest attainable ground of all, the place where we actually dwell, the living, breathing frontier where there is no realistic choice between gain or loss.

…

‘HONESTY’ Excerpted From
CONSOLATIONS:
The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning
of Everyday Words
© 2015 David Whyte and Many Rivers Press

Monastery Door
Ittingen, Switzerland
Photo © David Whyte
June 16th 2013

04/15/2015

Working with your pain, pain of any type, can be so challenging...

04/08/2015

THE KNACK OF REFRAINING
Many of our escapes are involuntary: addiction and dissociating from painful feelings are two examples. Anyone who has worked with a strong addiction—compulsive eating, compulsive s*x, abuse of substances, explosive anger, or any other behavior that’s out of control—knows that when the urge comes on it’s irresistible. The seduction is too strong. So we train again and again in less highly charged situations in which the urge is present but not so overwhelming. By training with everyday irritations, we develop the knack of refraining when the going gets rough. It takes patience and an understanding of how we’re hurting ourselves not to continue taking the same old escape route of speaking or acting out. From the book: Living Beautifully by Pema Chödrön

Here's a photo of Ani Pema standing in front of the The Great Stupa of Dharmakaya from the summer 2010 when I was lucky enough to study with her at the Shambhala Mountain Center.
On that day I took many pictures of the Stupa and the strange cloud formations that seemed to emulate the shape of the building. It was a magical day in many respects!

09/11/2014

07/15/2014

SAY CHEESE PARKINSON'S
In eastern medicine we connect dampness to things like MS & Parkinson's and certainly dairy is a major source of damp but this is a very interesting western dietary perspective on the subject.

Low levels of neurotoxic chemicals in cheese may explain the connection between dairy product consumption and Parkinson's disease.