A Lived Spirit!

My father training horses.

This is the year of the Fire Horse in Chinese astology. When you think of horses how do they speak to you? The word that comes to me is "Devotion". When the hearts commitment, training, study turns to devotion. A personal Yoga practice over time, little by little, showing up just as you show up to feed your family or tend to your home. Personal practice becomes devotion to presence. It's not perfect, but it's starting again and again. I have always loved the way Tapas, a fiery discipline, to burn, to purify, becomes devotional over time. I would have never guessed that my practice of Yoga would have become such a foundational part of my wellness; learning to live in a body with a mind that is always pulling and pushing inside. I thought when I started practicing Yoga that I was learning how to do some movement better, stronger, more flexible, and in fact these were great intentions that as I continued gradually shifted to something else. They turned to listening, to responding with care and coming back to the basics over and over again. I was learning relationship. The returning to the process of connecting and relating to the body, to following and feeling the breath and to listening to the stories of the mind as a friend has turned this practice into devotion to loving myself and to the life I inhabit. The returning over and over to the start, setting it up again and again in different ways, observing over and over again how the body, the breath and the mind respond has brought me closer to my heart. The practice itself is a devotional act of loving myself, to loving how I am part of life and devotion to the sacred role I play in and among the rest of the world. That place is perfect and not perfect. I always want more or something different, but the practice holds me to the fire and keeps me listening to heart of those desires, not to restrict me or deny my desires, but to yoke me to the heart; pulling back the reins of the ego's drive to be better, faster, be more, to collect all the badges and rewards. The heart says you have nothing to prove and because you are loved just as you are if you do nothing you are perfect. And because of this you can do just a little bit better without letting it be about worth or lack.

The fire horse is this heart of spirit, of showing up, of moving forward even if its not perfect. My dad would always say that it was the horses that had heart that made the difference in winning or not. I suppose that is a universal truth for humans as well, but it's not a quatifiable its a sense and a feeling. We forget to check in here if we live in our minds and in the quantiifiable too much. Practicing Yoga keeps me in touch with my heart, anchored in the universal truths. I wish for you this year that you find the fire horse in your heart and tend to it with what ever practices keep brining you back to this place.

My place will be in continuing this practice forever in what ever way I am able. It will never look the same and yet it is the same, it is turning inward to tend to the softness within and the courage, to the voices as though I am the most loving parent, friend, partner to all that exists inside. It is this tending that I hope to continue to learn to turn outward to the world and participate with a life that is full from the spirit of Fire Horse.

Practice with us in group, grab a Vedic Thai Yoga session, private Yoga study, astrology reading, special meditations & sound baths, or join us on a trip to Italy October 4-10! We have such a great foundation of practices to share with you in chadds ford, Pa.

Next Events:

Friday Feb 20, 6-7pm. Sound Bath & Breath Experience with Melissa

Sunday Feb 22, 9-10 am on Zoom Only Italy Informational Session, RSVP from web link.

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