Look at these amazing Triangles!

Rooftop Yoga

Trikonasana

Time for Change!

Fall is a major time of change. Maybe you've noticed weird unsettling feelings or just an urge to purge your apartment. It's a great time for us to make some definite decisions and embrace the idea of just allowing things go through their cycles of change and transformation. Sometimes when we don't let go of the summer...we still walk around in shorts and end up catching a cold! Its important to move with the natural progression of the changes and also to find the places where you, yourself need to make these changes.

In other news...slight schedule changes in Yoga this week. There is no rooftop class Friday morning -bad weather! And for those of you planning to go to Jai for 4:30pm class on Saturday...I won't be teaching, but you'll be in for a big treat because Katherine, my sub is great!

San Genarro Festival

Ege tuning up his Sitar for Yoga class.

Ege and his Sitar

Tomorrow! Live Sitar by Egeman Sanli

I have taught class twice with Ege playing Sitar. UHM...totally amazing class! He is awesome. If you'd like to come its only $7 for your first class! Register to save your spot here: Jai

Nature is cool!

10 Beautiful things created by animals.

Find lightness without going to outerspace.

Sometimes we think ideas like Sattva or lightness as the place where we want to be. It seems so AMAZING! But it may not be in our path in life to...give up our material things and attachments and become a monk...right? Sattva is a natural state that we come to...just like Rajas -energeticness or Tamas -inertia. We all run through phases of life and environment that leads towards one guna more than the other but ultimately the world is made up of all 3 and its about finding the balance between them. There is a natural time and place for each one to dominate and when we're out of balance we can feel that the Rajas is making us anxious or manic...and too much Tamas can be excessively lazy or even depression. Many people think too much Sattva can't be bad! Its the goal we're trying to reach isn't it? No...too much Sattva is living in outer space, as I like to call it. Not connected to the ground and floating away from the earth. Its lovely to go up there but not a natural state for us to be there all the time. High on weed...ALL THE TIME. It maybe be a happy place but how does it fit in to the world around you? Don't get me wrong...there are plenty of people who this works for! But most of us...its just not the way to go. There

Its easy to think that the monk or whoever who has given up their attachments and lives in an ashram is experiencing this outer space like Sattva all the time...I don't think that's true. I think for them that is their path in life -their natural state of balance. And though in comparison to our regular lives it may look ultra Sattvic but I am sure to them its just every day normal and balanced.

I bounce between Rajas and Tamas in extremes sometimes...that I have to remind myself to seek a little Sattva. I find lightness in my rooftop yoga class at 200 Water Street. We're high up closer to the sky and we're only up there for an hour or so. :) If you're interested in class, we hold class on Wed and Fri mornings 8-9am $15.

200 Water Street roof top yoga!

Free Community Acupuncture at Pacific College

Pacific College-NY students will be offering

12 FREE COMMUNITY ACUPUNCTURE CLINICS
this term at Pacific College of Oriental Medicine
Through Auricular and Grand Rounds classes.

You are welcome to come have a treatment, and to invite friends,
colleagues,
and patients to join us on the 5th floor.

Ear Acupuncture for the Whole Body
Friday eve                Oct 12                        6:30-8:30
Thursday am            Oct 18                        9:30-11:30
Tuesday aft              Oct 16                        1:30-3:30
Thursday am            Oct 25                        9:30-11:30
Friday eve                Oct 26                        6:30-8:30
Tuesday aft-            Oct 23                        1:30-3:30


Body Acupuncture 
Thursday am            Nov 15                      9:30-11:30
Friday eve                Nov 16                      6:30-8:30
Tues aft                    Nov 20                      1:30-3:30
Tues aft                    Nov 27                      1:30-3:30
Thursday am            Nov 29                      9:30-11:30
Friday eve                Nov 30                      6:30-8:30

Free Ear Acupuncture for Relaxation and Rejuvenation will also be offered
at our Oriental Medicine Day Celebration on Friday, October 19th, 5:30-8:30.

Reservations Requested - RSVP to 212.982.3456 X226 starting September 20th


PASS IT ON!

Noise pollution

For anyone living in a big city like New York...have you ever noticed how much noise is going on around? We usually don't notice it, because we've learned to live with it. Part of me believes I don't hear it and therefore my body doesn't respond to it. But the fact of the matter is...our bodies respond to loud noises, especially the sirens, construction clanking and whatever else there is. Our bodies have a stress response to sound. Which will then affect our hormones and immune systems, especially if we're hearing it all the time! Maybe our outward sense just turn off to it..but our internal senses are still picking up the stress signals. Unfortunately, this is life in the big city. It only makes it even more important to take time and find quiet, meditate, read a book, sit under a tree in Central Park or listen to the sound of the water at the pier or beach.

This is why I love teaching my Sunrise Yoga class, having my own early morning Yoga practice and going for a morning run. It is so rare to experience the quietness of the city. If you're out an about between 2-4am you will still encounter the late night club and bar people.  By 7am there are many other joggers or people working out at the gym and even people on their way to work. That time between 5-7am is the perfect time to find stillness. The yogis that come to my Sunrise class come with untainted energy. They're so serene and receptive, as opposed to the yogi's I've taught at other class times when they come in carrying the weight of their entire day. Their energy is sometimes so intense. There is just something about getting up and going to experience that stillness, when the city is not buzzing and vibrating with all its happenings.

Gunas

The 3 Gunas
Sattva -balance harmony, higher spiritual potential
Rajas -energy, action, change, movement
Tamas -darkness, inertia, form and materiality

These Gunas exist in nature. They are the 3 main components of the universe. And as our bodies are a microcosm of that universe, they exist within our body's physiology. We need all 3 of these things in order to find balance in our minds and body. This is the goal of Yoga, to be in balance. When we are in balance our bodies can be in balance, thus the physiological processes our bodies need to undergo are at its most optimal functioning.
 
The relationship between Tamas and Rajas is like having an anchor or tether. This is such an important part of Yoga. In our alignment we have to be grounded or anchored -Tamas, in order for the rest of the body to have movement or to be free -Rajas. When both of these things happen we can feel our minds start to let go and we go into meditation. This is our Sattva. If we don't have Tamas, our Rajas would be out of control and chaotic. If we have too much Tamas it will weigh us down and we'll feel depression, our Rajas will not be strong enough to lift us up and thus be chaotic. It will be difficult to achieve our Sattva. I find that the relationship between Rajas and Tamas are interdependant, one cannot exist without the other and also opposite. As they oppose each other. Together they help create or maintain the Sattva. 

Thank you, rain, for holding out on my Yoga class!

Oh just a little navasana on a Wed morning at 200 Water Street.

Injuries and bad juju

Since the NYT article about Yoga came out, people think yoga can actually..."wreck your body". I know there already have been various "response" articles but I was just thinking about all the people I teach Yoga to. They already have injuries and they come to Yoga because they always say it makes their injuries feel better. I am one of these people as well. One of  my new favorite places to practice is Yoga Union. I always leave the class feeling 2 inches taller AND they even have Yoga classes specifically for Back Care.

I think people in general are injured from life. They have pain from life, their jobs or their bad relationships. We just hold these stressful, frustrating and painful emotions in our bodies and then we are injured. Its all just a case of bad juju.

Make your juju good:
Changing our brains changing ourselves
Meditate with Alan Finger

Don't have bad juju

Come and take my Yoga classes...this just in!

Roof top Yoga Wed mornings 8-9am
at 200 Water Street overlooking the South Street Seaport
Register for classes at Emerge Athletics.

And Live Sitar at Jai!