New World Library

Having a child means that life as you know it is over. Or at least that is what parents tell expecting couples who nod politely, never really knowing what that means until they are knee deep in dirty diapers, breast milk, and burp cloths. Even the most conscious yogi is not immune to the trials of parenthood, least of all author Brian Leaf, who explores the ins and outs of co-sleeping, circumcision, and the art of discipline through unconditional love in his latest memoir Misadventures of a Parenting Yogi.

The book is as much a primer for new parents seeking alternatives to traditional parenting approaches as it is an amusing journey through mishaps and tiny victories that only a caregiver can experience. Leaf dives into the pros and cons of many decisions facing new parents. With humor and compassion he explains the choices he and his wife settle on, inserting insight from various experts.

Leaf explains it best when he says, “Parenting young children is not unlike serfdom. Except that you’re madly, wildly in love with your feudal lords.” Indeed, Misadventures of a Parenting Yogi is a chronicle of one man’s Bhakti yoga practice and the lessons learned along the way.

Reviewed by Jazmine Aluma, who writes, blogs, and practices yoga in Los Angeles.

Jazmine Aluma

The post Book Review: Misadventures of a Parenting Yogi appeared first on LA Yoga Magazine - Ayurveda & Health.

Art & Soul Yoga has popped up at Art Share L.A., a nonprofit space that houses 30 artists-in-residence, performance and gallery spaces, and offers art and music classes. With a modest schedule of four vinyasa classes a week — held Thursday through Sunday — they hope to unite a community built on going against the grain. Laura Maly, Art Share boardmember, explains, “I want to bring in anyone who wants to practice in a fun, creative atmosphere; anybody who wants to be a part of a yoga community and doesn’t have the means to do it.” Classes are offered with a recommended donation of only $5 per person.

With so many new businesses opening up in the neighborhood, it’s easy to imagine this collective moving to a shiny new studio where they can ask students to pay more for classes. Yet they have no desire to leave the space. Maly asserts, “The primary mission is to bring people into a space that is weird, unique, funky, and has great things going on all the time.”

Art & Soul Yoga

801 E. 4th Place

Los Angeles, CA 90013

artsharela.org/yoga

(213) 687-4278

by Jazmine Green, who writes, teaches and practices in Los Angeles: jazminegreen.com. 

Jazmine Aluma

The post Art & Soul Yoga appeared first on LA Yoga Magazine - Ayurveda & Health.

Yoga has a knack for finding its way into our lives at pivotal moments; like the book your neighbor lends you that you hesitate to crack open but once you do, it changes your life forever. Yoga crosses the paths of memoirists with auspicious serendipity, inviting them to stare their most formidable enemy straight in the face: fear. These writers all saw fear, came so close they could smell it. Armed with Yoga mats, they stepped forward on to the path of unknown: paved with self-doubt, imperfection and uncertainty and began their journeys.

Claire Dederer, author of Poser, My Life in Twenty-Three Yoga Poses, found Yoga when nursing her baby daughter caused her back pain so severe that she couldn’t even sit straight in a chair. At the urging of everyone from her doctor to her neighborhood grocery checker, she sought out Yoga simply to end the pain. Dederer ventured past her initial apprehensions and the practice became easier, more comfortable. She embraced all that seemed to accompany being a yogi: the gear, the look, the peaceful approach to life. Yet surprisingly, a mountain of self-exploration lay ahead, “I did Yoga because of an idea I had of who I wanted to be: serene, fit, spiritual. I bought a pair of Yoga pants and grew my hair longer so it would stay in a ponytail…I did Yoga, and I was a mess. The Yoga was supposed to reveal me as perfect, and instead it did nothing but reveal my deepest weakness.”

It’s natural to step away (or run like mad) from this kind of discomfort. For those who keep on, as Dederer did, there is no choice but to come face to face with one’s taunting weaknesses. She found herself having relationships with the poses that led to conversations; sometimes angry and frustrated and other times emotional. Pen in hand she worked through these conversations and musings, which eventually evolved into a memoir that is honest, funny and real.

Suzanne Morrison, author of Yoga Bitch, hesitated to even admit her fears. In search of inner peace, she begins her practice in Seattle. Dazzled by the outward appearance of serenity her teachers exuded, Morrison joins them for a 200 hour Yoga teacher training in Bali. She hopes her teachers will teach her “how to live.” Still, she struggles to embrace a yogic lifestyle, questioning everything from her teachers’ approach to chanting, to their strict adjustments and holistic remedies for Balinese maladies (which include drinking one’s own urine!). Indra, Morrison’s yoga instructor, interprets her refusal to fully accept their teachings as a deep rooted fear and calls her out, “You see death everywhere you look, so you’re afraid to act…You look ahead and see traps and pitfalls, you look behind and you see loss and death.”

Morrison considers dropping out of the program, leaving Bali, and returning home to the comfort of her family, cigarettes, and all that is familiar. Yet, she stays, journaling her way through the days of asana, meditation, and contradictions. With each entry she comes a tiny bit closer to uncovering the core of her true self. Eventually, the journal she keeps becomes the backbone of Yoga Bitch, a laugh-out-loud hilarious account of her adventure in self-discovery in a foreign land. While few readers can relate to the outrageous lengths she must undergo to maintain health in Bali, many yogis can empathize with the major life questions she tackles on the mat.

Witer Bruce Black felt so sure of the usefulness of the pen while sorting through the well-spring of emotions that meet yogis on the mat, he wrote Writing Yoga, a book to guide readers through the art of keeping a practice journal. Black first took up Yoga at the urging of his wife as an alternative to running, a fitness routine that was taking a toll on his body. Black found his work on the mat to be both meditative and challenging. In Writing Yoga, he shares his confrontations with darker emotions, “This uncertainty, this new fear, was an unexpected gift. It forced me to look deeper inside myself for support. Each time I felt anxious or nervous, I had to listen harder to my inner voice—the one that was warning me to be careful, suggesting that I might be taking too great a risk—and evaluate it.”

With regular practice and considerable patience Black learned to listen to his inner voice with such attention that he was able to decipher the difference between his “alarmist’s voice” and his true voice. Journaling played a significant role in guiding him through that learning curve and to this deeper understanding of his inner voice. Writing Yoga is an insightful and beautiful guide for both beginners and long-time yogis. His writing exercises encourage yogis to dig inward, using our experiences on the mat as a basis for overcoming fear and understanding the blocks we encounter every day.

Yogi and teacher, Michele Hérbert, left her home and community in San Francisco in the 1970s to embark on a spiritual journey with her guru, Walt Baptiste. In her book, The Tenth Door, Hérbert recounts the many events that led her make such a brave leap followed by a period of rapid spiritual growth. The heart of her experience occurrs in the jungles of El Salvador where she studies with Baptiste. A surprise turn of events leaves her in charge of his retreat center with very specific instructions for the care of the land and her body and soul. Hours of Yoga practice and meditation in solitude lead her to a profound realization, “Through these intense periods of practice, I came to see that each moment truly is a crossroads…It was my choice to buy into the tricks of my mind or to practice staying present and conscious with each passing instant, each passing thought. Which way does thou goest? Here, on my own, I would have to continually choose.”

The transformation that matured while Hérbert studied in near isolation brought her closer to intuition and consciousness. Though she published her memoir earlier this year, more than three decades after her experience in South America, it is a story no less pertinent or compelling. It is a tale of personal strength in the face of doubt, conflict and fear to which many yogis can relate.

Dayna Macy’s book, Ravenous, is an exploration of the author’s obsessive relationship with food. In her quest to understand her compulsive food choices, she seeks the council of food gurus and artisans. Each encounter gives her further insight to her physical and emotional connections with her favorite bites. It isn’t until she takes on a strict Yoga routine that she becomes intimately aware that “we continue to act and think in habitual ways, without ever really challenging these patterns, they become a part of us, making it difficult for us to behave or think differently. The only way to get out of the rut is through diligent practice and attention.”

Macy’s investigation over the course of a year teaches her that the connection between body and mind is an intrinsic one; each relying on the other for wellness. Also, continuous care and action nurture the growth of this connection. While often light-hearted, her memoir shares insecurities that are familiar to many readers.

This year has brought yogi readers beautiful, funny, raw and real experiences that reflect our own inner journeys. We want to read stories that tell us we are not crazy, that other yogis have felt similar emotions, have encountered blocks just as challenging. We want to hear from people just like us. We want to laugh and cry a little along the way. These recent memoirs allow us to connect to voices that sound like ours; real voices that share relatable fears.
With luck 2012 will bring us more inspiring stories of strength, spiritual growth and transformation that reflect our own inner journeys–stories we can laugh with, cry with and connect to; stories that may lead us to find that the yogic experience is very much a universal human experience.

Side Bar:
Yoga isn’t just flooding the world of memoir. It has crept into popular fiction in the form of light-hearted and funny reads to accompany you on your holiday vacation.
Rain Mitchell’s novel, Tales from the Yoga Studio takes place in a fictional Silverlake studio where a familiar cast of yoginis meet to share their practice and their lives. Mitchell warmly pokes fun at stereotypes frequent Yoga goers come to know while crafting complex characters that must navigate through depression, betrayal, friendships and loyalty.
Downward Dog, Upward Fog follows the fast-paced life of thirty-three-year-old Lorna, a career-minded woman who begins to explore her inner workings with the help of Yoga and a few enlightened characters. Author Meryl Davids Landau intimately acquaints the reader with Lorna’s demons as she wrestles with a disconnected boyfriend, meaningless job, and family trauma.
Light and playful, Yoga chick lit is a budding trend in fiction in which readers journey along with characters as they learn key truths about the world, others and most importantly, themselves.

Author Bio:
Jazmine Green teaches yoga at the Yoga place in Downtown and Yogala in Echo Park. www.jazminegreen.com

Jazmine Aluma

The post Yoga and the Written Word appeared first on LA Yoga Magazine - Ayurveda & Health.

Infinite

Push down to melt your

heart into the earth where

all good things flower and

grow don’t you know you

are just waiting to blossom

Rise up and reach for

the sky lift so high to

fly free of your burdens or

worries fears they only

hold you back if you let them

Reach out to unite your

body mind and soul just

flow as one like the ocean

like a vinyasa like something

you only dreamed of being

You are Infinite in essence

*2007 Word Is Born

Dylan Barmmer is a writer, poet, performance artist and yogi living, laughing and playing in the stunning San Diego surf enclave of Cardiff-by-the-Sea. Dylan also serves as Raconteur for creative copywriting consortium Word Is Born (wordisborn.net) and outlaw oratorial outfit Random Acts of Poetry (youtube.com/wordisborntv), and authors the Mad Yogi Poet blog on ElephantJournal.com (elephantjournal.com/author/dylan-barmmer). Motivated by creativity, driven by passion and defined by heart, Dylan has often been called “a real piece of work.”@wordisborn

By Dylan Barmmer

Jazmine Aluma

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