Journal
Here you'll find writing on mindfulness, neuroscience, mental health, physical wellbeing, and yoga.
These topics often overlap: attention, behaviour and embodiment are all part of the same ecosystem of experience, and the aim here is to explore those connections in a thoughtful and practical way. Some posts draw from research, others from lived experience and teaching. The intention is to share ideas that are useful, considered, and occasionally a bit different from what is typically said.
April 2, 2020
With slow, breath-guided movements, explore the joints and soft tissues of your body, disentangle tension, and settle your nervous system.
April 2, 2020
Sahana vavatu is an invocation to inspire open-minded, community-based, cooperative learning. It connects us to timeless wisdom, and the history of teachers who support and inspire us. Together, we open ourselves to nourishment, protection, inspiration, and support of each other in community.
April 2, 2020
This is a gentle yoga class that uses a chair to sit on and as support while standing. This class will strengthen and stretch your body. Let Heather, who is truly passionate about chair yoga, guide you to softly connect with your body.
April 2, 2020
Loka Samastha Sukhino Bhavantu is a mantra in Sanskrit wishing peace and well-being for the inhabitants of all worlds. Join Chris and Karen to chant it 108 times as japa practice, a meditative repetition of sounds or syllables to help connect to the meaning and power of the mantra.
April 2, 2020
Strong glutes help you stand and move with confidence and stability. They promote good standing balance, and support your lower back. Stretching out your back body (including your glutes and hamstrings) helps to decompress your spine, and calms the nervous system. In this class, you will be guided through movement- and alignment- based postures to stabilize and open your glutes, hamstrings and lower back.
April 2, 2020
Chris will guide you through four breathing exercises called the Four Purifications, with less instruction and longer practices; making it is suitable for those with some experience with them. The Four Purifications are a complete series of pranayama practices to wake up your bodily processes, regulate the nervous system and focus your attention.
April 2, 2020
The front of our hips and torso can get tight and weak from extended periods of sitting. In this therapeutic yoga class, you will learn about the primary movers of hip flexion, and practice yoga postures to release tension and strengthen the iliopsoas muscle.
April 2, 2020
For the health of your spine and whole body. This short video will move you through the six basic directions of movement of your spine to ensure you're not stuck in one position most of the day.
April 2, 2020
The Gayatri mantra comes from the oldest sacred text in the Indo-European languages: the Rigveda. In this chant, we connect to the sunrise principle Savitur, the primary mover of daily existence. We open to the gift of this precious life; with humility we honour the ancient, the present, and the future.
April 2, 2020
Whether from chronic posture imbalances or injury, our upper back, neck and shoulders can become tight and weak. In this class, you will practice yoga exercises to reset your posture, release tension, and decompress your upper back and neck.
April 2, 2020
In this practice you will be guided through stretches to release compression in the lower back, hips and knees; joints that are impacted by running. You will also explore the range of motion of your joints, to develop mobility and balance out habitual alignment patterns brought on my repetitive movement.
April 1, 2020
An all-body alignment-based practice with precise guidance, giving you time and space to breathe into the subtler levels of experience. Through lunges, twists, and hip openers, you will warm your body, release tightness, and return to mental steadiness.
March 31, 2020
Sun salutations, known as surya namaskar in Sanskrit, are a warm-up sequence of breath-guided movements that increase your circulation, release compression in your joints, stretch out your body, and awaken your mind for the day. In this 10-minute practice, you will be guided through three styles of sun salutations.
March 30, 2020
This practice is inspired by our watery nature, our ability to move fluidly, to show our strength in adaptive intelligence, to carve new paths when we encounter hindrances, and to be relentlessly creative. Prepare to move, to breathe deeply, and to develop flexibility and strength as you expand the borders of flow.
March 28, 2020
When we feel happy and at ease, meditation flows more smoothly. On days where we feel restless, sad, angry, frustrated, apathetic, or any difficult emotion, it is more difficult to sit, to be without our distractions and coping mechanisms for a little while. Whatever is going on in life, such is meditation. Today, we practice some preliminary tools to work with difficult feelings. We recognize that it is courageous to sit with difficult feelings.
March 28, 2020
In this class, we work with our connection to earth through grounding postures, and tap into the earth element in our bodies in a dynamic flow of expansion and release.
March 27, 2020
For the first time in Kushala history... Chris practices the infamous POWER HOUR with you! Expect to move and sweat in this potent yoga workout (he certainly did).
March 27, 2020
Our meditation practice is a simple ritual. It is the intention-in-action to do less and experience more. But within the practice itself, there are small rituals that help us create safety, arrive in our bodies, and remind ourselves of this present experience. In this style of meditation, mindfulness, we keep the rituals simple (in terms of form); but the power of ritual is in the contemplation of these questions, to start: where am I? what am I doing (or not doing)? what does this feel like?
March 26, 2020
In this meditation, we will practice techniques to work with the thinking mind, in a friendly way. "Think" is a funny word. It rhymes with "blink"... which is a good reminder because thinking is even more involuntary than blinking; thinking is an inseparable part of the mind's function. The thinking mind serves consciousness with opinions, ideas, imaginings, concerns, narratives, associations... it's endless. But in meditation, the hard-working mind can feel like it's obscuring the act of meditating, producing feelings of frustration and discouragement. But herein lies the heart of mindfulness practice itself: observing the workings of the thinking mind, and getting intimate with the way the mind naturally is, allows us to step back from the minutia of thought and into more expansive wisdom.
March 26, 2020
This class is about expansion! Open wide through your limbs, release tension in your chest and heart space, create room to breathe and shine. This is a dynamic class, with some playful balance on your feet. We build towards camel pose, an expression of courage and receptivity.