Sound Practice

Sound Practice: An Early Morning Intensive w/Jill Manning
Space is Limited


Wake Up Yoga Fairmount

Monday, October 4th - Friday, October 8th

6am - 8am

Contribution: $108.

Wake Up Yoga teachers/TT grads receive a 15% discount

There are over 25 definitions for the word sound. They range from the intensely scientific to a softer qualitative expression. This week we will explore the many meaning of sound in conjunction with our ever-expanding experience of practice.

Practice means repeat, repetition builds strength...what are you repeating?

Along with a week that is chocked full of breath, and bandha. There will be an opportunity to go deep with commitment and consistency in the asana exploration. Perhaps the most exciting element of the week will be the practice of Shruti parampara. Shruti parampara is the practice where one hears and then memorizes in their heart for further retention and dissemination. This is they style in which we will have daily study of the yoga sutras from Pada 1.1 all the way up to and including Patanjali's own definition of sound practice.

Calling all Rhodie Yogi's

photo by Michael Mergen

No experience, no transformation

Be transformed

SHABDA SUNDAY

Sunday, August 29th
5-6:30pm
Shri Yoga Studio, Pawtucket, RI


"The way of yoga is not a simple, linear path. Rather it is a complex method involving radical change in the way we experience the world and conceive the process of knowing ourselves."

Barbara Stoler Miller

Blog Flashback

What a difference one year makes


August 19 2009

This is not a vacation. I am not coming home Philly. I will not be resuming the Saturday and Tuesday yoga time slots anytime soon. I am not preparing for Teacher Training. This is some weird stuff.

I am trying to find my way. Reestablish a real relationship with myself and the practice of yoga. Providence has a quiet way about it, and its authentic silence, its off the grid-ness, is allowing me, and I can hear Micheal Carroll in my head even as I write this, to drop the cape. Even more so I am asking myself to drop the costume.

You know what I am talking about!

I have been reading from my notebooks before I start practice. Trying to find those gems that make their way into yoga classes that I teach. Trying to inspire myself. This morning I read something that I wrote boldly in the margin. It said, "You've got devotion, now what?"
Now What?

I woke up this morning with a clear vision, and an urgency, an energy to begin the exploration of just that question. I hope that this begins a daily blog of this very interesting journey. Finding myself in Providence, and exploring the action of devotion. I have said this in yoga class and I am repeating here, where bhakti (devotion) meets shakti (energy) that intersection...that's abhyasa...that's practice, and as always..that's the juice.

Transmission

Manorama wants each student to announce what is the ONE thing that they take away after spending time with her. She knows that her workshops are an ocean of information and inspiration. She wants the thought process to begin and the distillation of massive informative to be chanted in your own voice.

After spending the week in Philadelphia teaching and practicing I spent the weekend with my main influence, teacher, mentor for nearly the last five years. What I took away was the transmission.

the act of passing on wisdom or enlightenment from a spiritual master to a disciple

Back to Home Practice

‎"Yoga practice transforms the mind and body; it purifies, strengthens, and heals. A troubled mind has a reduced capacity for understanding and a diseased body will always cause distraction and trouble to the mind. Through asana practice, the body is healed and the mind is progressively purified and refined, and becomes more capable of grasping subtle truth." -Guy Donaheye, "Guruji"

Tired...happy, but tired

Lynda Benglis

This is what happens when you work in a Museum...inspiration is everywhere.

Shabda Sunday

WHO: Shabda Sunday is for anyone who has a yoga practice or is thinking about starting a yoga practice. SS is for all beings everywhere. No babysitter? No problem Jayashree would never keep kids out of the experience. If it is OK with you it is OK with me.

WHAT: Shabda means sound. Sunday is the day of the Sun. Yoga asana's are like the outline of the yoga practice Shabda Sunday starts to color in the picture adding detail and meaning.

WHERE: Shri Studio located at 21 Broad Street Pawtucket, RI
http://shri-studio.com/

WHEN: The last Sunday of every month. The next meeting is August 29th from 5pm-6:30pm.

WHY: "When we chant in a group, we also breathe together in the same musical pauses, creating a unified field of breath and laying the foundation for the experience of the communion of sound." ~ Robert Gass

A Second Session Has Been Added

for the Ashtanga Yoga Intensive at Motion Center in Providence, RI.

August 16th-20th
Space is limited to 8 students
7:45am-9:30am
Register at Motion Center
http://www.motioncenter.com
111 Chestnut Street
Providence, RI 02903
401.654.6650

"repetition builds strength...what are you repeating?" ~me



"A daily practice brings about a gauge in your life. For me, it’s been a way
to know who I am in the moment. And it’s the only thing in my life that
is something I do every day; it’s the same practice. So no matter what
else I’m doing—I’m traveling, if I eat differently—every day the practice
being the same repetitive practice gives me a way to judge myself in a
nonjudgmental way, a way of seeing. “How am I doing? How am I holding
up to the stresses of daily life?” It’s also the only time for me that I
can take my mind out of my daily life and become free in a spiritual
sense to investigate myself, my true Self."

Nancy Gilgoff

Morning Practice

Morning Poem

Every morning
the world
is created.
Under the orange

sticks of the sun
the heaped
ashes of the night
turn into leaves again

and fasten themselves to the high branches ---
and the ponds appear
like black cloth
on which are painted islands

of summer lilies.
If it is your nature
to be happy
you will swim away along the soft trails

for hours, your imagination
alighting everywhere.
And if your spirit
carries within it

the thorn
that is heavier than lead ---
if it's all you can do
to keep on trudging ---

there is still
somewhere deep within you
a beast shouting that the earth
is exactly what it wanted ---

each pond with its blazing lilies
is a prayer heard and answered
lavishly,
every morning,

whether or not
you have ever dared to be happy,
whether or not
you have ever dared to pray.


~ Mary Oliver ~

Home

This morning I drove to Boston for practice. It was like coming home. After I returned from India in January I was committed to finding a larger yoga community in Providence that I could be a part of. I tried going so many places. I surrendered to teachers new, and those with many years of experience, some with their own yoga spaces. It often felt like I was trying to push this square peg into a round hole. This morning felt like a home coming. The room was quiet. There were just enough students to feel like part of a tribe but not so many that is felt like a tribe of sardines. Practice was steady and sweet.

Today marks the one year anniversary of arriving in Providence. What a year! Do I feel at home here?

I thought I'd share some pictures today from Providence's West End. That's were Mike and I make our home (at least for now.) This is where we walk the dogs, hang with friends, grab a coffee, and sometimes a dinner out...Broadway Bistro is our favorite.