Welcome to U Can Yoga
My intention is to give you the space to nurture yourself as you breathe, strengthen and stretch your body and mind.
I encourage you to tune into your body and move safely, with awareness through your yoga asana (posture) practice as you find your own expression of yoga, access your true nature and come back home to yourself.
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Restorative & Yin Yoga at studios in Southwest London.
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The system isn't broken; it's functioning exactly as we've allowed it to.
The system isn't broken; it's a reflection of our individual and collective decisions and actions.
It is easier to project blame onto the people and systems that are outside of us than it is to engage with our own responsibility and accountability.
To be with what is (within + in our world) and ask ourselves "what now?"
There is a comfort in asserting that we must reform, dismantle, or abolish a system while also avoiding the questions that are most vital:
What is mine to do here?
What is my responsibility?
How are my decisions and actions upholding this way of being, this culture, this system that I say must go?
And what am I willing to do about it?
(More) Reflection prompts:
What decisions am I making (in my everyday life, work and relationships)?
How am I using my power (in my everyday life, work and relationships)?
How am I using who I am and what I have available to me?
What are the consequences of these decisions?
What now? 👀
You are the system and the revolution.
Adding more questions:
If you have the power to vote, how are you wielding that? What are the consequences? What now?
If you have access to money, capital, resources, how are using that? What are the consequences? What now?
If you have a certain type of privilege (white, beauty, passport, class, etc) how are you using that? What are the consequences?
What decisions are you making re: relating to the land, your body, children, resources?
Ultimately – are you getting what you want? If not, what now?
Reposting myself today:
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ORIGINS OF RESTORATIVE YOGA ••• “As long as you are maintaining that stable mind, in all the upheavals of the emotional life, for me, that is Samadhi (union with God).” - B.K.S Iyengar ••• In today’s post I would like to express deep gratitude to B.K.S. Iyengar of Pune, India (14 December 1918 - 20 August 2014) for his development of the practice of Restorative Yoga. According to Mr Iyengar, Restorative Yoga “...creates space inside the body and flushes out the impediments and clears the energy blocks and nervous system.” I never got to study with Mr Iyengar but I am glad I got to study with Judith Hanson Lasater who was a student of Mr Iyengar for many years. I really like this photo of Mr Iyengar - note the use of barbell plates here for extra grounding and the abundance of props for support and comfort 😊 (For more on ‘weighting’ see my post from earlier this week). This is a still from the film ‘Sadhaka - The yoga of B.K.S. Iyengar’ - worth a watch if you get the opportunity.
#FBF 365 SAVASANA ••• “Filling our own cup enables us to give our best to the people, work and causes we care most about.” ••• #fbf to my @omyogamagazine column from September 2014 when I wrote about why I decided to practise savasana for 20 minutes, every day for one year. Of course, you don’t have to do what I did, but can you give yourself 20 minutes today?
If you’d like to read the article in full you can find it in the link in my bio 💜
My upcoming yoga offerings are all about rest and helping you to fill yourself back up. Join me for in-person yoga today @embodyvauxhall Friday Flow & Restore 6-7.15pm (book at embodywellness.co.uk) 🧘🏾♀️ or tomorrow online for The Rest Sessions - my 2.5hr workshop grounded in restorative yoga (see link in my bio for workshop details and to book) 🧘🏾♀️
WEIGHTING ••• The events of the last 24hrs.... I will be practising this today - maybe this will be helpful to you too.
Black Lives Still Matter, even if this is no longer filling your social media feed. Ask yourself honestly: what are you doing beyond these squares?
In this video, filmed at @embodyvauxhall, I am using a bolster on my torso for weighting. If you have access to sandbags you can use those, but this can also practised with the aid of blankets.
Did you know that weighting poses has the capacity to be soothing for people with depression or lethargy, while for those with anxiety it can feel grounding? I first came across this during my first training with Judith Hanson Lasater in 2012. I have found weighting helpful as a tool in my own practice ever since. You can watch this video in full by clicking the link in my bio or here 👉🏾
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sZiwKw7pPp8
I will be back here at Embody Wellness this Friday teaching Flow & Restore 6-7.15pm when we will be using this principle of weighting poses in class.
This weekend you can also join me online for my 2.5hr workshop grounded in restorative yoga - The Rest Sessions. For more details and to book click the link in my bio.
DARK ••• WHY DO WE RECOMMEND USING AN EYE COVER IN RESTORATIVE YOGA? ••• Light can be an irritant and hinder our ability to fully relax in our savasana. Today I am sharing @boforbesyoga’s excellent, informative explanation on this subject. I have been fortunate enough to attend two in-person trainings with Bo, and if this area is of remote interest to you I would encourage you seek out her work. I always recommend Bo’s book, Yoga for Emotional Balance to trainee yoga teachers on @sallyparkesyoga’s 200-hr when I lecture on #restorativeyoga. Here are Bo’s words 👉🏾 #Repost @boforbesyoga
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Eye pillows have a reputation for being the new age version of snake oil: a little bit of flax, and a lot of money. Yet they may be one of our most powerful healing tools, especially when it comes to a balanced nervous system. Your vagus nerve is one of twelve cranial nerves that originates in the brain, travels down the back of the neck and into the chest and heart, and then moves down into the abdomen and digestive tract.
Light pressure on the eyeballs lowers heart rate, sometimes by quite a bit, by eliciting what’s called the oculocardiac reflex. It also stimulates the vagus nerve. The vagus nerve has an extensive resume: It regulates heart rate and digestion, and it’s the primary medium through which our belly brain regulates mood. It’s the main communicator to our rest-and-digest system, which helps us to relax more deeply. It also elicits our tend-and-befriend system, enabling us to reach out and connect with others. This is a critical factor in long-term stress resilience and, research shows, in happiness.
One quick way to stimulate your vagus nerve is through this abdominal massage. Another is to use eye pillows, which place light pressure on the eyeballs.
When to use an eye pillow:
Put one over your eyes or on your forehead when you lay down to sleep. This will help you fall asleep more quickly and stay asleep throughout the night.
Use one at the end of your yoga practice during savasana for ultra relaxation.
Pair it with your restorative yoga practice to deepen embodiment. (Also try my two restorative poses to combat effects of anxiety and depression.)
DO YOU DELIGHT IN STILLNESS? ••• #SAVASANASEPTEMBER - What do you associate with being still? Many of us grew up with the (false) message this was a form of laziness.
“Restorative Yoga teaches you to recognize what relaxation feels like. It teaches you that just because you’re doing nothing doesn’t mean nothing is happening. Your body is recalibrating, repairing and rejuvenating.” - @drgailparker
I downloaded Dr. Gail Parker’s book, Restorative Yoga for Ethnic and Race-Based Stress and Trauma as soon as it came out on Kindle in June and eagerly awaited the release of the paperback. I highly recommend this book. (Thank You Dr. Parker for sharing your important work! 🙏🏾)
I’ve been teaching restorative yoga since 2012 and practising for longer. I initially learned about teaching this practice from Judith Hanson Lasater who learned from B.K.S. Iyengar. Even more so this year I feel and see the importance of this practice. Thankfully more people are discovering it now.
This month I have been practising Savasana every day for 20 minutes, but in truth, restorative yoga (and yoga nidra) has featured in my days throughout lockdown (and prior). It is helping me to navigate the personal and collective grief of 2020 and this is just one of the ways I am taking care of myself.
Whether you are new to and curious about restorative yoga or an old hand, I’d love you to join me for The Rest Sessions online this Saturday 2-4.30pm (see link in my bio for details and to book). There will be a limited-time replay available if you can’t join live and there is a sliding scale pricing structure. In my bio you’ll also find more resources to support you in your practice.
Whatever your day holds l hope you can allow yourself some time to delight in stillness. Will you give yourself permission to rest? 💜
Helpful words for these times from Professor Aisha Ahmad ❤️
PRATYAHARA ••• THE WITHDRAWAL OF THE SENSES - the fifth limb of yoga can be one of the most difficult to understand and define, but it is possible to experience this state in a savasana practice of around twenty minutes. This time is needed to reach the second stage in savasana. Judith Hanson Lasater (who I studied restorative yoga with) explains more here... “The fifth step or limb is called pratyahara and is defined as the conscious withdrawal of energy from the senses. Almost without exception yoga students are puzzled by this limb. We seem to inherently understand the basic ethical teachings like satya which is the practice of truthfulness, for example, or pranayama, the use of breath to effect the mind, or the practice of conscious posture or asana. But for most of us the practice of pratyahara remains elusive.
One way to begin to understand pratyahara on a experiential level is to focus on a familiar yoga pose, savasana, the corpse pose. This pose is done lying supine on the floor and is the practice of deeply relaxing. The first stage of this asana is about physiological relaxation. In this stage, as one becomes comfortable lying on the floor, there is first an awareness of the muscles gradually relaxing, then the breathing slowing and finally the body generally letting go of tension. While delicious, this stage is only the beginning of the practice.
The next stage of savasana is different because it pertains to the mental sheath or level. In the second stage of savasana there is a sense that one is withdrawing from the external world without loosing contact with it. This is an experience of pratyahara. Most of us know this state; when one is in this state it feels like one is at the bottom of a well; the sounds that occur both in and out of the room where one is lying are registered, for example, but these sounds do not create disturbance in the body or mind. It is this state of non-reaction that I am calling pratyahara. The actual registering of input by the nervous system still occurs but there is virtually no interaction with that input. There seems to be a space between stimulus and response. In common parlance, one is in the world but not of it.”
I’m in the October 2020 issue of @OmYogaMagazine sharing my @Yogagise advice for ‘Building A Resilient #YogaBusiness’.
I hope this article is helpful for both yoga teachers & #smallbusiness owners.
https://yogagise.com/2020/09/25/building-a-resilient-yoga-business/
#OmYogaMagazine #YogagiseYoga #YogagiseTeacherTraining