When I turn around and look at 2014 I could easily only see loss. Loss of habits, fears and tears. Although this year had a lot to do with letting go, I am very grateful what this tough tough year had taught me.
Funny, 2014 I spent many hours traveling on the train.....
I have started 2014 with the White Tantric Yoga Day in London. The last time I participated in a course I was half way through my first pregnancy and faced all sorts of things in this Psychosynthesis course. I was thinking, this might be the last chance of doing something for myself, so I grabbed it. Wow that was challenging.....
So this time, the first time after a quite intense new motherhood, I was looking forward to doing something for myself again, working on my subconscious, and actually never prepared myself for any sort of challenge. And this was an error. Wow, I thought I was fit and disciplined, and wow, I was wrong. And still, this one day changed so much and was the best way of starting the year! Thanks for organizing this magic event every year!
Then straight into the next adventure.... Not sure how but one day in the summer of 2013 I found this link and it felt right after 15 years of Yoga practice to sign up for the Kundalini Yoga Teacher Training which would influence and change my life so much. And I must thank my boys of keeping up with me during this challenging time and most of all supporting me to do it and finish it!!!!
Kundalini Yoga passed my life several times before that, even a teacher moved to the remote island I was living on for a while and I could appreciate the benefits of it for quite some time. But finding a teacher and spending an entire year of intense practice made an enormous change in a very short time. So also a big thank you to my teacher Hari Har Ji!
Out of this grew the habit of taking a cold shower every morning. And I don't believe I am writing this but I really would not want to go back to having a hot shower again. It is very hard to shower in ice cold water every morning, and I admit some days it was rather more towards lukewarm than ice cold. But this freshness it brings is very hard to put into words. Thanks Hydrotherapy!!!!
I would also like to appreciate lemons at this point! Whether starting the day with a hot lemon, soothing various bugs the kids brought home from school or doing the moon/lemon fast every month, this yellow fruit is very special to me and I really started to appreciate it this year. The moon/lemon fast really changed a lot in my life. I have been following a diet or fasting plan all my life but this fast is the easiest and best way to integrate in my life, so far. There are 3 days in the months that support cleansing the body, full, new moon and the 11th day of the moon. While one of those 3 days means spending a day with water and lemon only the other 2 days are fairly easy to go through. So it is still challenging but the effects are so worth it. Again hard to explain but my attitude towards food changed so much and my body did as well. It seems that this short break is enough to lose a lot of waste products stored in the tissue and this feels great!
Who would think that designing this Valentine Cardigan would influence so many following designs throughout the year. I especially appreciate my woolly orange coat which is so warming and the boys christmas presents - a jacket and 2 nightgowns.
Although a lot of people still do not understand that it makes a big difference wearing clothes that are entirely made by hand without using a machine, this year, some did try and ordered hand stitched clothes by i can c u. Thanks to all my new and old customers and supporters!!!!
And: there might be arguments against spending that much money and effort but it just feels so different to the body, whether because it looses tension or the organic material just embraces you like a second skin :) And I love making these clothes, how great to be able to work and meditate at the same time!
And last I would like to mention and thank the Gregson Institute. I just happen to find it at the right time and it made Liverpool shine in another light, which was really needed.
But most of all I started teaching Kundalini Yoga there and this was a magic event in this year. Thanks.
Mmmmh if I spend more time reflecting I might find a hundred more things and people to appreciate but I think they will only end up in my diary.
So this year only highlights. Love Peace and Light!
It has been a while. Life was in the way! And then when I think there is more time, life brings something else, even worse.
I guess there is never a right time. Or a wrong one.
I want to share my latest 40 days set. It is really hard to choose a set to commit to for 40 days as there are so many nice ones.
On a train ride home after having finished my course I had nothing better to do than thinking about a new set and I was also asking myself the question "What now?" so I thought I will choose a set to face my fears. In general I find it uncomfortable and blocking to feel dragged down by fears especially ones that don't seem to have a reason. Not sure why I was thinking of fears, I guess I was feeling some sort of uncertainty as a chapter had finished. Back home I also found an interesting set and was looking forward to starting it. And really interesting, 2 days later I was confronted with very bad news, so facing my fears made actually sense.
The set is called Relax and Release Fear and is found in Youth and Joy and in the I am a Woman Manual. This set is quite long and intense. Even after a week I still ached and some of the exercises seemed almost too hard to endure.
But funny enough every morning I am looking forward to doing my set. I am on day 20 and I can tell that I am more relaxed. I can see it in how I react to the kids or generally in situations.
The first exercise, Cat Cow in a forward bend is very powerful and if you do it right it hurts. Exercise 2 and 3 are great. (in exercise 2 it is important to really keep the legs in place and only rotate the torso from the hips)
And then there is exercise 4. Oh wow. This generates the feeling for me that says, how much longer? But as always it feels wonderful having persevered. I guess after this exercise it all gets a different perspective. In exercise 10 it is easy to get lost in thoughts but it is a nice meditation when you keep the focus and rhythm. And then the last exercise seems so easy but if you keep the pressure applied throughout you come out really refreshed and the relaxation comes easy.
I love this set and find it interesting that working on fear involves a lot of rhythm and dancing. I chose the tracks from Chardikala Jatha and they are so great to go within.
I am looking for a shorter set already, so I have more time to spare for mediation for the next 40 days. I probably did not make Relax and Release Fear very attractive. But it is a great set or I would not write a post. And how great is a life lived without fear.
Mama?
I tried to explain to my kids that doing my set means: don't disturb me!
This goes really well. As soon as I am up and ready to start I can set the timer and about 30 minutes later I have at least one boy sitting on my lap. This is not dependent on time. I tried 4 am and variations up to 8 am.
If they are up already they might watch something and I think YES! but again the demand for breakfast or a fight and it is really important that I react and now.
In the beginning I was very upset, taking it personally. But it does not really make sense to be upset with a crying 3 year old that begs for breakfast at 5:30 am. I still try to make them understand that this is my private time, as they request it for themselves and my oldest gets it already a bit...
So I have started Sodarshan Chakra Kriya and I am at day 20 or so of my 40 days and I discovered something.
In this meditation the breath is hold in for about 25 seconds while the Navel Point is pumped and a mantra is chanted mentally. And then it is really essential to time the exhale and inhale right afterwards to make it to the next exhale and be able to pump 48 times before that.
It is not a hard meditation but I really have to concentrate a lot - on the timing of the breath, that the pumping is at the Navel Point and not anywhere else and that the chanting happens there as well and to keep the eye focus on the tip of the nose and what to do with my hand before and after breathing - and it might happen that I lose one or the other focus. But still, because it is already very dear to me this meditation, I insisted while inhaling that I can do things after my set or I just signed a no. But only a few days.
As soon as I got used to all the elements and focusing seemed easier, I was not really here anymore, I was within and there was no reason to react on anything anymore.
I might get one or another attempt but my eyes are almost closed, so no eye contact and the breathing must look like I really cannot talk because it became quieter around me.
And you might think that is what meditation is but believe me I never focused that fast within and could keep it for the entire 31 minutes. The mind can still run but everything else is perfect to stay focused within, I guess that is why it is an easier meditation
If I would have more experience with meditation I would commit to 120 days or maybe longer, but there are so many interesting meditations already waiting, that I might have to come back to it, as Bound Lotus has already part of my daily routine since last October and that for at least 1000 days .......
Learning how to meditate in a tent...
I mentioned that we just spent some time camping in the Inner Hebrides. And I must say it is not my favorite to stay in a tent but I had good moments. One of them was to realize how calm it can be.
It would have been beautiful to do my set outside watching the Burg and the sea but the midges and rain did not let me. I sat in a separate compartment of the tent, heard my kids playing but really noticed and felt the silence. No distraction, being on a remote Scottish Island, the phone had no signal, the closest building was our friends caravan and the sea just there by our feet.
This nothingness is amazing. I forgot that I used to live like this for 4 years. People ran away because they could not bear this nothingness.
It was weird to sit in a white space, white all around me. But it is so nice to have the full support of this incredible silence to meditate.
Obviously thoughts turn loud and I am all over the place but additionally there is this feeling that there is something bigger out there and I am of it. It feels good.
I do not remember having felt that close anywhere lately, living in a city.
I read so often, Choose a place you won’t be disturbed, feel vulnerable, or get distracted. And I understand why and what. But I don't think I really did understand until I experienced this.
My room is still messy enough and there are a lot of distractions around me but I remember this calm silent space and try to go there whenever I sit down.
And the best part of it is to pretend to have no signal and concentrate on one point.
1st blog post - 1st of August - 1st day of a New Set
That was a funny moment this morning when I had the idea of starting a new blog - a Kundalini Yoga Blog. I was in the middle of my kriya in a separate part of the tent while my kids where asking their dad to draw a superman and Ben 10.
The wind was punching the tent as my youngest son had noticed and I wondered how to accomplish a front bend in this confined space...
I just smiled.
Sometimes I am really puzzled when and how things happen to come into my life.
I have started Kundalini Yoga about six years ago or better a teacher passed my life on a course we visited together in Scotland and she invited me to a morning sadhana. I remember her enthusiasm while I lost my breath doing breath of fire. It was 5:30am and I thought we are mad.
But it seemed really special to me then, maybe too far to reach? Or I just did not know anything about Kundalini Yoga or where to find people involved. But I found a book and started practicing by myself. Time past by, I returned once again back to Scotland to do a course, traveled to an island during this course, met my husband and moved to the island.
After a while another Kundalini Yoga teacher moved to the very same island and we started to practice together! This was very special living so remote. I learnt a lot and am very grateful for this. And I could continue my practice during and after 2 pregnancies. We left the island after 4 years and we live in the big city now ...
So here we are again, visiting this very corner of Scotland and I remember all this. I am in the middle of my Kundalini Yoga teacher training and today I have started a new 40 days kriya and meditation which I was allowed to choose by myself.
While I looked for a suitable set I had a conversation about Kundalini Yoga music and misunderstanding my friend I found a Wahe Guru track I really liked. It said Sodarshan Chakra Kriya, so that is how I found this new meditation I started today as part of my 40 days set but that might be another blog post ......
