Araiza Yoga & Ayurveda

16/10/2022

It’s in holding both the form and the formless, the abstract and the personal simultaneously that we transcend, validate, affirm, and revel.

The practice of recognizing thoughts as energy becomes particularly juicy if you take the step of looking at thoughts as the sages of Kashmir did: by revering them as manifestations of the divine dancer, of Shakti, or Goddess Consciousness.

One of the most significant facets of Indian metaphysics is its understanding that spirit is both utterly formless and impersonal—and at The same time totally capable of taking a personal form. Because the old sages understood this, even the most anti-dualistic of them could relate devotionally to the divine. When we think of the world-creating energy, the Shakti, as an abstract force, it might seem awesome but never approachable. Think of that same energy as a goddess, however, and suddenly the whole situation becomes more personal, more playful. You can pray to a goddess, talk to her, honor her, and love her. When you think of the energy of the mind as a divine “person,” you can have a relationship with her. In fact, a relationship becomes imperative.

Try this for a moment: Think of your mind, your extraordinarily powerful mind, as a glorious feminine entity, a goddess who has forgotten she is a goddess and is going around collecting rags and bottles from the scrap heap of thoughts, piling them up and obsessing over them, chewing them like bones and spitting them out at you.

She acts a bit wild, but who can blame her? After all, even though she has forgotten who she is, she still knows she is someone pretty important, and she doesn’t understand why she is not being treated with the respect she deserves. Can you imagine how such a great divinity feels when you get impatient with her, when you angrily shove your thoughts away, when you treat her as your enemy? Or when you behave like a limp victim of every vagrant thought-let or fantasy? Naturally she gets outraged at your harshness, and naturally she runs wild when you meekly give in to her. Both these attitudes toward the mind simply encourage the goddess to demonstrate her creative power in all sorts of unproductive ways.

Find out more in 'Meditation for the Love of It' (https://www.sallykempton.com/books-and-audio/)
**ra

30/09/2022

Tuesday, October 4: 5-6:30pm Pacific / 8-9:30pm Eastern US Time Celebrate the goddess of enlightened activity on the final day of the autumn Durga Festival. Duhserra, also known as Vijaya Dashami, is the culminating event of Navratri, the annual celebration of Goddess Durga and her powers of action,...

23/07/2021

Happy Guru Purnima! ✨🌝✨

12/11/2020

From Kalavati Devi:
“On the first day of Diwali, we honor the divine healer Dhanvantari. His gift is the ambrosial nectar which holds the secret to immortality through Ayurveda. May you be granted health, well-being and longevity on this auspicious day. Today we clean our altars and offer mantras of praise.

Jai Dhanvantri 🙏🏽”

Provided to YouTube by CDBaby Dhanvantri Healing · Christie Smirl Sacred Healing Mantras ℗ 2016 Christie Smirl Released on: 2016-04-28 Auto-generated by YouT...

10/06/2020

Finding our grounding in this time of upheaval can be challenging. Christie has written a beautiful piece here about how to get oriented, how to start, how to stay centered. Thank you Christie! https://healthiervibrations.wordpress.com/2020/06/07/faith-in-upheaval-call-for-change/?blogsub=confirming -blog

On the battlefield there are thousands of roles, seen and unseen, sung and unsung that create a united force. Act upon the changes you are capable of making towards a world you want to see.

06/05/2020

So beautiful! Enjoy. 🌓🌲💧🌿🌗

01/04/2020

A wealth of kriyas, meditations and yogic wisdom here, curated for these crazy times. Good stuff! 🧘🏻‍♀️

Yogic Living: Kundalini Yoga to Alleviate Anxiety & Fear

As yogis, we strive to respond to life with mindfulness, courage, and compassion. Our practice gives us the capacity to go beyond our habits of reacting to challenges with fear and insecurity.

Kundalini Yoga graces us with an almost countless variety of kriyas and meditations that work to calm our fears and anxieties.

As we transition to the Aquarian Age, we can go through these times with the strength and steadiness they demand. Keep calm and keep up so together we can be a light in the chaos and look to the future with hope and tranquility.
See the April kriyas >> https://tinyurl.com/uphwlbm

19/03/2020

So many wonderful resources are being freely shared these days! 🙂

Transform yourself, transform the world. Register now!

27/01/2020

I’m so happy to share that the wonderful Riki Wolf, Jajiwan Kaur, will be taking over my Monday 11am Kundalini Yoga class at Claremont Yoga until at least the California primary election in March, while I work long (and joyful) hours at my new job. Riki is an experienced Kundalini Yoga teacher and healer, and it’s great to know that our class will be in great hands. Thank you so much Jajiwan! Wahe Guru! 🙏🏽🤗🧘🏻‍♀️

30/12/2019

Well friends, the light is returning and the new year is almost here! Changes are afoot, including my foot (ankle)🦶 which I sprained last Friday taking this picture of our spectacular winter mountains! So, I won’t be teaching tomorrow (12/30) at Claremont Yoga, and will likely have a sub on Jan 6, the day I start a new job! My 2020 teaching schedule may be changing, and I’ll keep you posted. In the meantime, meditate on the breaking dawn of a new year, fresh with possibilities, and envision your intentions for your life fully lived, celebrating the daily victories with compassion and peace. Here’s to 2020! 🥂💫🎈✌🏽☮️🌅

23/12/2019

Reframing your story, finding rhythm, relishing comfort, seeking adventure, relaxing into kindness - 5 guideposts to embrace contentment for the new year. Enough with the perfectionist judgement! Let the little joys be enough; find the bliss in comfort & kindness. I like that New Years Resolution! (Thanks Kathy!)💕

https://www.elephantjournal.com/2019/12/joy-bliss-are-overrated-5-ways-to-settle-into-contentment-for-the-new-year-kathy-bolte/

If I'm not feeling joyful, I feel like I've underachieved. If I'm not dwelling in waves of bliss, I feel like a failure. But contentment? Now that's something I can get behind.

16/12/2019

Plunge into the dark waters of transformation. Reflect on the inner landscapes on the journey to Self. Surrender to the Mother and discern poison from medicine, and let the celestial chemists inlay gold in the broken human vessel of divine light. Light yoga, pranayama, meditation, ritual release, & soundscape & deep gong relaxation. Register at https://thtstudio.as.me/schedule.php?appointmentType=12357124 with Christie Smirl
Shareable event here: https://facebook.com/events/657612954770977/?ti=icl

11/12/2019

The last full moon of the DECADE occurs this week on 12/12 at 12:12! 12 symbolizes the cycle of reincarnation. 12 is at the very end of the numerology spectrum, and it offers those who see it in their daily life the opportunity to turn over a new leaf by giving them a chance to wrap up a certain life stage and situation before moving forward to bigger and better things. this number is like a curtain call that allows you to get your affairs together so you can benefit from the windfall that the universe is about to bestow on you.

TAMPA (WFLA) — The next full moon occurs Thursday, Dec. 12 at 12:12 a.m. This means December’s full moon, called the Cold Moon, will be at its peak on 12/12 at 12:12. Twelve has signifi…

30/11/2019

The real deal - self-care as acceptance and discernment of truth, grounded in self-love to sacrifice what is needed for true balance and deep happiness.

“Self-care is often a very unbeautiful thing.

It is making a spreadsheet of your debt and enforcing a morning routine and cooking yourself healthy meals and no longer just running from your problems and calling the distraction a solution.

It is often doing the ugliest thing that you have to do, like sweat through another workout or tell a toxic friend you don’t want to see them anymore or get a second job so you can have a savings account or figure out a way to accept yourself so that you’re not constantly exhausted from trying to be everything, all the time and then needing to take deliberate, mandated breaks from living to do basic things like drop some oil into a bath and read Marie Claire and turn your phone off for the day.

A world in which self-care has to be such a trendy topic is a world that is sick. Self-care should not be something we resort to because we are so absolutely exhausted that we need some reprieve from our own relentless internal pressure.

True self-care is not salt baths and chocolate cake, it is making the choice to build a life you don’t need to regularly escape from.

And that often takes doing the thing you least want to do.

It often means looking your failures and disappointments square in the eye and re-strategizing. It is not satiating your immediate desires. It is letting go. It is choosing new. It is disappointing some people. It is making sacrifices for others. It is living a way that other people won’t, so maybe you can live in a way that other people can’t.

It is letting yourself be normal. Regular. Unexceptional. It is sometimes having a dirty kitchen and deciding your ultimate goal in life isn’t going to be having abs and keeping up with your fake friends. It is deciding how much of your anxiety comes from not actualizing your latent potential, and how much comes from the way you were being trained to think before you even knew what was happening.

If you find yourself having to regularly indulge in consumer self-care, it’s because you are disconnected from actual self-care, which has very little to do with “treating yourself” and a whole lot do with parenting yourself and making choices for your long-term wellness.

It is no longer using your hectic and unreasonable life as justification for self-sabotage in the form of liquor and procrastination. It is learning how to stop trying to “fix yourself” and start trying to take care of yourself… and maybe finding that taking care lovingly attends to a lot of the problems you were trying to fix in the first place.

It means being the hero of your life, not the victim. It means rewiring what you have until your everyday life isn’t something you need therapy to recover from. It is no longer choosing a life that looks good over a life that feels good. It is giving the hell up on some goals so you can care about others. It is being honest even if that means you aren’t universally liked. It is meeting your own needs so you aren’t anxious and dependent on other people.

It is becoming the person you know you want and are meant to be. Someone who knows that salt baths and chocolate cake are ways to enjoy life – not escape from it.”
-Brianna Wiest
https://ko-fi.com/donate_nepenthe



[Illustration: Yaoyao Ma Van As Art ]

10/11/2019