Tattooing Yogini

Photo: Erico David. Pexels. ​“Greet each day with a breath of fire.” Maude  With the passing of Bud Cort, who played Harold in the movie, Harold and Maude, one of my most favorite movies of all time, I have had a lot of the quotes from that movie come to mind. Today, I thought of Maude’s quote, “greet each day with a breath of fire,” which she says while making oatstraw tea for Harold in her train car house.  I love Maude, she’s a Sage of Knowledge. When I grow up, I hope to be like Maude. She lived in a train car, stole a Volkswagen Bug from a priest, posed nude for her sculptor friend, and dated a twenty-something who she also taught how to live. She’s Divinity wrapped up in a tiny “eighty-year-old-on-Sunday” body.  She reminds me that each day is a gift, even the hard days. You see, Maude spent time in the German Concentration Camps and yet she lived her life with such voracity and thirst, and FEARLESSNESS - something I lost along the way in my late twenties and throug...

​ In the last few months, I have been offered 3 opportunities to teach yoga at studios outside of Cynthiana and I am planning to accept one in Lexington. I am grateful for the opportunity to learn from other teachers and to share my passion and devotion to Yoga with others.  I have also been asked a few times if I might use my RYT500 certification to train other teachers and while I am open to leading workshops for CE credit to certified teachers, I am not interested in training new teachers at this time.  I have only been teaching for 4 years - that is not enough time to feel I am in any position to train a new teacher. Krishnamacharya says that a Yoga Teacher should have firm knowlege on the Sutras (generally memorized), the Upanishads, the Bhavagad Gita, and the Vedas before teaching other teachers, lest we “bring a bad name to Yoga and the teacher.” While I have read and re-read the Sutras each of the last four years since my YTT, I do not have them memorized. I have read ...

​Recently, I have been thinking about how Yogis say that what most of us (especially in the West) experience when we think we’re experiencing a Kundalini awakening is actually a less intense Prana awakening; still important, but not the same thing. They say that of the few people worldwide, who have experienced a Kundalini awakening, few have survived it. They liken a Prana awakening to a 100volt of electricity and a Kundalini awakening to 220 volts of electricity being channelled into a 110 volt wire…the result is that the wire melts. It’s unable to hold the charge.  The few who have survived the experience needed assistance with every day life: eating, drinking, hygiene, and more. They became dissheveled, neglecting any aspect of self-care.  Most humans are unable to hold the charge and yet all over Facebook, one can find Kundalini experiences, certifications, retreats, and more.  What Is Kundalini?  Kundalini is the dormant feminine energy (Shakti) that lies, coil...