Teachers’ Cabin

Anxiety-Relieving Asana Series – Marla Apt

For many of us, what inhibits us from reaching our full potential and effectiveness in our day-to-day life isn’t a visible and readily apparent handicap, but is the built-up mental and emotional stress that can manifest in the physical and mental body as pain and anxiety.

A Passage: Stepping into Luminosity – Connie Reider

Last month, I celebrated my 65th birthday. As I cross over into this new territory, I intend to see this 65th year as a new beginning, the beginning of my time as an elder with the opportunity and responsibility to share what knowledge has been imparted over these many years of living.

A Divine Doorway to the Heart – Karen Chrappa

When we are riding turbulent waters from the breakdown of all that we know, when the ego itself is deconstructing, the waters can feel terrifying. We do not know when the shore will arrive. What do we hold on to when all we feel is lost at sea?

Vaidya Lakshana: The Qualities of a Healer – Kaustub Desikachar, Liz Bragdon, and Chase Bossart

Not everyone can become a healer. Collecting information about the healing process from books and workshops is not necessarily going to bring about the transformation. It is not solely a matter of knowledge – even if a person studies for years, he or she may not become a great healer.

Until We are Ready… – Kira Ryder

I remember attempting to engage with the Bhagavad Gita and Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras as a new yogi…I could barely get past the first few pages. I was totally blocked, uninvited to proceed. Too motivated by achievement to be humbled and curious, I felt embarrassed and ashamed.

Coming Home… – Mark Stanton Welch

Feathered Pipe is an invitation to grow inwardly and express outwardly. The grounds call for more from anyone who comes here. They pull the old out of you, almost forcing you to remember that you are far beyond what you thought you were.

Trusting the Teacher Within – Carie Garrett

If we really want to see wholeness restored in our own lives and on the planet, we need to apply the healing salve of our own gifts onto the collective wound. What’s needed is for all of us to step up to the plate and be who we are, to let our true colors, our true gifts, shine through.

Harnessing the Power of Peace – Joe Weston

In order to successfully arm ourselves with the strength, courage, wisdom and skill to address the prevailing state of apathy, fear, confusion and cynicism, we must use the metaphor of the warrior to activate the power of love, compassion, understanding, respect and inclusiveness.

Why Retreat? Realizing the Essential – Christian de la Huerta

“And you who seek to know Me, know that your seeking and yearning will avail you not, unless you know the Mystery: for if that which you seek, you find not within yourself, you will never find it without.”

Sharing the Gift of Yoga with our Veterans – Rob Schware

When I first began studying yoga seventeen years ago with Thom Birch and Beryl Bender Birch at the Omega Institute, I could not imagine the words “yoga” and “military” used in the same sentence…

“Be the Light you wish to see!” – Lanita Varshell

So many of us cannot handle change, yet that is the only constant in our life. That everything will always be in flux, ever evolving and changing. Yoga teaches us how to “flow with the river of life,” and in that learning to let go and flow, we find peace.

On the Question of Who Am I: Samyama (Perfect Concentration), a Practice – Kira Ryder

As yogis, one of our primary questions is Ko ‘ham?, or Who am I? We are called to ask this with earnest sincerity and penetrating discernment as Vedic scholar & philosopher, Ravi Ravindra does in his profound articles from yesterday and the day before.

The Spiritual Quest (from “Whispers from the Other Shore”) – Ravi Ravindra

To live, work, and suffer on this shore in faithfulness to the whispers from the other shore is spiritual life. To keep the flame of spiritual yearning alive is to be radically open to the present and to refuse to settle for comforting religious dogma, philosophic certainties, and social sanctions.

The Yoga of Healing (Pt. 1) – Kausthub Desikachar, Liz Bragdon & Chase Bossart

Where a pill or even surgery may fail, the will, i.e., the focused and deliberate exercise and retraining of the mental muscles, may prove successful. Yoga is, at its root, a science of the mind – a philosophy of healing through the conscious focusing of the mind.

The Principles and Practice of Yoga Nidra – Richard Miller, Ph.D.

Impressions, experiences, thoughts, feelings and emotions are problematic only because we refuse them. We judge our experience and try to control what we perceive. In Yoga Nidra we realize that everything is made of the same substance. Refusing anything is refusing who we are.

Just Being Present – Marc Lesser

A Zen teacher from the 9th century in China could sometimes be heard having a stern conversation with himself: “Master Zuigan!” he would call out. “Yes?,” he would inquire, “Are you here?” “Yes!” He responded to himself…

Detachment, Discrimination, and Mindful Yoga – Baxter Bell, MD

Vairagya, or detached awareness, permits a yogini to have some space with which to apply another essential component of yoga, viveka, or discrimination, in order to chart a beneficial course of action for all involved.

The Left-Hand Turn: The Journey Into the Ranch – Carie Garrett

Then we come to it: that hallowed left-hand turn off the highway that has become so very special to me that it brings tears to my eyes now just thinking about it. We turn left, leave the highway and the outside world behind, and begin our inward journey to the ranch, into ourselves.

Keeping Blood Pressure in Check – Marla Apt

Yoga, when performed mindfully, can reduce stress-induced hypertension…While a general yoga practice has a pacifying effect and can bring the nervous system into balance, some asanas work better than others for actually lowering blood pressure – and simple modifications make others more beneficial.

A Story of Sufficiency – Jennifer Cohen

Here was a moment in time when it really did look like there was not enough money. In fact, if we did not do something fast, there really and truly would not have been enough to cover our expenses due.

5th World Conference of Women Update – Dr. Jean Shinoda Bolen

Sunday, February 26th… Global Call to Participate in Five Minutes of Prayerful Silence on the eve of the opening of the 56th Session of the UN-Commission on the Status of Women…

It’s Time…Are You Ready? – Lissa Rankin, MD

It’s time, Ladies…Time to stop hiding in the shadows and step into the light. Time to share ourselves truly with the world and, in the process, transform it. Time to heal ourselves, that we might have a greater ability to affect healing in the world.

The Gift of Deep Connection – Connie Reider

In 1995, I was a 48 year old, active, independent, accomplished woman, focused on taking care of others. When a diagnosis of breast cancer turned my world upside down, I needed the support of others, but was concerned about the repercussions of asking for it…

Yoga in Everyday Life – Lanita Varshell

Having patience with all the little details of life that seem to take forever to complete – learning to surrender to these things, and be present with each piece of paper or each little project, mindfully present, not frustratedly presently – this is often times my most spiritual work.

Tending Love’s Fire – Christian de la Huerta

What is the foundation of your fire? Is it steady, balanced? Can it hold the weight and keep the flame of love going or will it come crashing down?

A Lasting Peace Movement – Joe Weston

I still believe that congress, business and especially the Occupy movement must find ways to overcome the anger, prejudices and past “hurts” and figure out a way to communicate with respect and honor…. I am excited for the possibilities. 2012 is going to be an amazing year!

Bhakti Moves – Carie Garrett

Somewhere along the line, we were told that our dance looks silly, that our singing isn’t pretty, that our story doesn’t fit in with what other people are saying, that our ideas of fun are childish, rather than child-like. We throw water and sand onto our inner fires, squelch our uniqueness and our passion about life…

The Difference Between Healing And Curing – Dr. Lissa Rankin

We must reclaim the heart of healing, and it has to start with YOU. Changing the skeleton of our system, without focusing on the heart, defeats the whole purpose. When something lacks heart, the whole thing keels over and dies, which is what’s at risk of happening to our current system.

Yoga and the Risk of Injury – Baxter Bell, MD

Before getting into recommendations for modifying specific poses to reduce the risk of injury, I’d like to step back today, and look at what we know about key areas of the body that are at risk of injury from an unbalanced asana practice. What do I mean by an unbalanced practice?

Yoga in Daily Life (Part 2) – Ravi Ravindra

Thus our ordinary daily life can become a spiritual practice, a true sannyasa, not by renouncing the world, but by renouncing worldliness. It is a form of dying to the world, which in effect is a form of dying to our self, to the usual self which is thoroughly entangled in the forces ruling the world…

Yoga in Daily Life (Yoga Practice) – Kira Ryder

We often speak of the mind being in grip, yet it is more often the heart that refuses to let go. The heart does not like to experience the pain loss, even when it is the loss of our attachment to the small (asmita).

Yoga in Daily Life (Part 1) – Ravi Ravindra

Those who are freshly in love have no complaints about daily life. It is the lack of a love affair with life that makes everything stale and dull and uninteresting. We can be connected with the same quality of engagement while washing dishes in a kitchen, or praying in a monastery on Mount Athos.

You Are Enough Already – Jennifer Cohen

There is what I think I can do, and then there is what I can actually do…Simple as that. My ideas about what works for me, my family, and my work do not often match with what actually works. In those moments, I dig deep into my practices to walk the talk I teach, the truth of exquisite sufficiency – being enough already.

Balance: Gratitude in Being – Marc Lesser

Where is the line between meditation and not meditation, between paying attention, and not paying attention, the line between amusement and annoyance, the line between birth and death; these few delicious and impossible moments of time we call our lives. Just show up, fully alive.

Flowing With Transitions – Carie Garrett

Change… It seems like everyone I know is going through major changes right now. Big shifts are happening on our planet and many of us are feeling them, both on a global scale and within our interior universe, as well.

Yoga Bodies, Yoga Minds (Part 2) – Chase Bossart

Yoga therapy is not yoga therapy by virtue of its using yoga techniques or methods, but rather by virtue of its yogic understanding of how these tools are used. This understanding is based on yogic understanding of the human system, ideas that are very different from conventional Western medicine.

Yoga Bodies, Yoga Minds (Part 1) – Chase Bossart

Are we really practicing yoga for healing? Or are we just introducing yoga-esque tools into conventional, Western models of therapy and calling it “Yoga Therapy?” To answer the question, we need to look as closely as we can at the therapeutic application of yoga in its original context.

“Dear Creator…” -Tao Porchon-Lynch

So look to this day for it is life, the very essence of life. In its brief course lie all the verities and realities of your existence. The bliss of growth, the glory of action, the splendor of beauty. For yesterday is already a dream and tomorrow is only a vision.

Freedom Style Yoga: Meditation in Motion – Carie Garrett

Freedom Style Yoga is an intuitive approach to living…The practice is about listening inwardly for guidance about what to do or not do, trusting what you find yourself knowing, and being brave enough to let yourself give expression to it in the world.

What We Need to Practice – Baxter Bell, MD

Yoga posits an intriguing paradox that we each have a perfect, eternal quality already within us, sometimes referred to as the purusha or atman, and at the same time, we have a personal dharma or path to follow that requires active engagement in this lifetime.

A Myth for Our Times – Christian de la Huerta

We are the imaginal cells, awakening now to our full potential, no longer willing to live lives of frustration, lies and mediocrity, or to hide our light under a bushel. Once we find each other and come together, we can no longer be destroyed.

Teaching a Man to Fish – Baxter Bell, MD

Yoga is a treasure chest of options, techniques and tools, some of which have developed over thousands of years. And these days, when people in my classes and therapeutic sessions present with difficulties that are the direct result of aging, I feel like I can truly offer something of benefit.

Finding the Right Balance – Sherri Baptiste

Yoga can be a most rewarding and relaxing discipline and form of exercise, but many who wish to try it are scared to enter a yoga class for the first time. Going to your first yoga class can be exciting and scary.

Raja Yoga: Yoga’s Royal Road – Michele Hébert

“Raja Yoga picks you up where you are and sets you down a remade human being.”

-Huston Smith

Reap the Benefits of Yogic Breathing – Sherri Baptiste

Breath is life… Whether we pay attention to it or not, we are always breathing. While we may be fooled by how simple the breath seems to be, it’s actually a phenomenal resource we can draw on to help our lives.

Ardha Chandrasana – Marla Apt

Ardha Chandrasana (Half Moon Pose) is a great asana for learning how to balance and grow awareness in what can at first seem a disorienting position. The pose can also ease lower-back problems, relieving sacrum pain, sciatica pain, and lumbar aches.

Salamba Sarvangasana – Marla Apt

The benefits of practicing inversions are vast. Salamba Sarvangasana (Supported Shoulderstand) is thought to promote good blood circulation, calm the nerves by stimulating the parasympathetic nervous system, decrease depression and anxiety symptoms, ease fatigue, and improve immune function.

Malasana – Marla Apt

Unlike sitting in a chair while hunched over a desk, squatting in a pose like Malasana (Garland Pose) can actually improve your posture, stretch your back, elasticize your knees and ankles, and help improve your digestive function.

iRest® Yoga Nidra Certification: Level III – Gemma Adams

What makes iRest different? As someone familiar with the study of mindfulness once said, “iRest is like mindfulness on steroids!” Therapeutically speaking, iRest is different to other mindfulness practices because it proactively addresses specific emotional and cognitive experiences, leading to a dynamic “moving through” process.

Letting go of the Reins – JJ Gormley & Laura Tyree

Ever feel like you are just beating your head against the wall? There is something that has to happen, and from your clear vision, it’s going to have to happen this way and only this way, or the whole thing’s just going to fall apart? Yeah, me too.

Utthita Trikonasana – Marla Apt

Utthita Trikonasana is one of the first poses yoga students learn. Ideally you feel firmness in your legs, a lengthening of your spine, fullness in your chest, and freedom in your neck and shoulders. Trikonasana also increases the flexibility and strength of your legs and lower joints.

Power Walking with Power Breathing – Sherri Baptiste

Power Walking is all about building strength, staying fit, burning calories, and building confidence and energy. This type of walking has been around for decades, and has recently taken on a new and dynamic interest in the fitness world, because of its quick and steady results.

Ascent to the Summit – Patricia Walden

“The blending together of the intelligence of the brain and the intelligence of the heart is yoga. The rays of the sun cannot radiate when it’s covered with clouds. As clouds move away through the practice of yoga, the sun shines. Distractions and anxiety are removed and we see the self.”

iRest® Yoga Nidra Training: Levels I and II – Samantha Kinkaid

We are put in touch with our authentic nature almost immediately in iRest protocol. And it is from this place that we are skillfully guided to learn and teach. It is elegant in its simplicity and sophisticated in its application. It is a whole-person approach to health and well-being.

Two Minutes a Day to Real Change – Sherri Baptiste

Meditation connects us with the essence of our being, inviting us to slow down and make our moments vital as they unfold. This process affects the quality of our days and thus our lives. When we meditate, we get in touch with the richest essence of our beings.

Aligning Your Chakras – JJ Gormley-Etchells

The way we’ve habitually patterned our bodies to move over the years has created the energy blockages or openness at particular chakra areas. Until we are able to balance our body and release the old patterns and stuck energy, we may chronically continue facing the same concerns.

“We are Alright, Right Now” – Lanita Varshell

How can we help ourselves and others when the heaviness of life has perhaps gotten to be just a little too much to handle? One thing we can do is to make sure that we keeping healing yoga centers open so that we all have a “safe place,” to not only release tension, but to be with like-minded people wishing to focus on gratitude and appreciation instead of fear.

The First Lady of Yoga: Lilias Folan – Joy Kraft

“If you don’t use it, you lose it,” she says. “As the body ages and birthdays go by, the connective tissue gets firmer, harder. We need to approach it differently, with kindness and awareness.”

Supta Padangusthasana – Marla Apt

Supta Padangusthasana (Reclining Hand-to-Big-Toe Pose) is my go-to pose for lower-back pain. Its actions help create traction in the lower back, which can relieve compression and tension.

Breath of God: The Breathing Practices of Pranayama – Judith Hanson Lasater

The highest form of pranayama is to remain completely aware of and at one with the breath without interjecting ego and thus control into the process. Try this practice whenever you think you do not want to control everything and everyone around you. It is an eye-opening and humbling experience.

Knowing When and How to Say When – Dr. Ann Louise Gittleman

Humorist Carl Ottavi once said, “The popularity of dieting proves that people will go to great lengths to avoid going to great widths.” But despite the myriad of diets and fitness info out there, worldwide obesity is on the rise. In fact, seven out of ten Americans are overweight or obese.

Discover the Practice of Breathing – JJ Gormley-Etchells

It seems curious that we should have to practice breathing. But many a yogi would argue that developing a breathing practice is one of the healthiest things we can do.

Get “Grounded”!!! – Dr. Ann Louise Gittleman

It’s the strangest thing I ever heard, but could our shoes be killing us? Synthetically-soled shoes, unlike the leather soles of decades ago, insulate the body from the natural healing energies of the earth—which is as basic to health as water, air, and food.

Salabhasana (Locust Pose) – Marla Apt

Some people look at Salabhasana (Locust Pose) and say it resembles a locust at rest, but it’s certainly not a resting pose. Just coming up into Salabhasana requires a great burst of energy, reminiscent of a sprightly locust’s leap off the ground to gracefully throw itself backward.

Paripurna Navasana (Full Boat Pose) – Marla Apt

You’ve probably heard that Paripurna Navasana (Full Boat Pose) builds core strength. But in yoga, the “core” refers to more than just abs. B. K. S. Iyengar says that practice leads you on an inward journey from the periphery of your body to the core of your being.

Stability Amidst Chaos – JJ Gormley & Laura Tyree

“Verily, birds are able to fly with their two wings: even so both work and knowledge together lead to the supreme goal of liberation. Not indeed work alone nor indeed knowledge alone can lead to liberation: but, both of them together form the means to liberation.”

-Swami Venkatesananda Vasistha’s Yoga

The Challenge of Gentle Yoga – Diane Ambrosini

When we look a little deeper, we begin to understand that slowing down, even just a little, can actually allow us to keep going for the long haul. Gentle Yoga gives us the opportunity to not only put Ahimsa (non-violence) into practice, but to grasp the deeper meaning of Santosha – learning to accept and find peace and happiness right where we are!

Pratyahara: Sensing the Internal Realm – Kira Ryder

Instead of focusing on the reduction of sensual engagement, I prefer to define the practice of Pratyahara as a turning of the senses inward and allowing these same magical skills of sight, touch, taste, hearing and smell to be employed for connection with the richness within.

Freedom from Affliction – Dean Lerner

Living in a free, democratic society is a blessing, yet how many of us are truly free – free from suffering, free from physical and mental pain or distress? To appreciate the extremes of our human condition, we need only look as far as the daily newspaper, or even closer – the mirror.

Mind Your Mind – Dr. Mehrad Nazari

What is interesting is that our brain is not being shaped by our environment/interactions, but rather by our perception, meaning our interpretation and experience of them. In order not to have a distorted view, we must continually clean and fine-tune our instrument…

Mantras: Use an Ancient Technique to Help Your Modern Life – Sherri Baptiste

Ever notice your inner voice driving you a little crazy? Hear yourself repeating an inner dialogue that makes you feel exhausted, on the edge and ready to give up? The good news is that you can use mantra practice to help replace negative thoughts with positive ones.

The Tenth Door: An Adventure Through the Jungles of Enlightenment – Michele Hebert

As I rested in this place, I became aware of what seemed like a field of moon glow encompassing my being. The teacher’s far-off words guided me. “I want you to realize the divine light of your own soul within you. Your own inner light will reveal your soul’s purpose…”

Chanting: Sound’s Inner Healing – Lilias Folan

I was reminded of a true story. It begins several years ago in a Benedictine monastery in France. A new abbot and ninety monks were involved in the mid-1960s changes ordered by the second Vatican Council.

The Art of Teaching – Judith Hanson Lasater

I could see the wake as far back as I looked; it seemed as if the wake widened out forever toward the distant shore. In a way, this is what happens when one becomes a teacher of yoga. What we share with students spreads out like the wake from a boat and touches people we may never see or know.

Microwave Ovens: Another Form of Radiation? – Dr. Ann Louise Gittleman

Radiation has sure been in the news a lot these days—and for good reason. But what about the radiation emitted from your microwave oven? Although they’re a popular way of reheating or even cooking foods, I’ve never been comfortable with them—even though a whopping 95% of the population owns one.

The Posture of Joy – Kira Ryder

All my favorite swamis slump. Take a look at Ramana Maharshi and Ramakrishna. So sweet, so open, so slumpy!! For the rest of us, a little alignment effort can help find the Source of their Joy within us.

The House that Zen Built – Tilak Pyle

In these days of social, political and environmental uncertainty and instability, there is a need, and we feel, an absolute necessity for this ‘turning inwards’. Stability is, and must be found within to weather the storms of our time.

Improve Your Inner Confidence and Posture with Yoga – Sherri Baptiste

Ever notice someone walking into a room who has wonderful posture? Good alignment conveys high self-esteem, good health and a powerful presence. Having the proper alignment is essential not only in yoga but also in daily living.

Why We Need Gentle Yoga Classes & Teacher Training – Lanita Varshell

Sixty percent or more of our population is now overweight or facing serious illness, from Chronic Fatigue, Cancer, FMS, MS, crippling Arthritis, and many other illnesses, diseases, and health challenges. There are now MORE people suffering than healthy. Yoga and meditation are the greatest healing tools there are, but…

Spiritual Nutrition – Michele Hebert

The spiritual path is our journey into greater awareness or mindfulness. It means making an effort to be in the present moment. When was the last time you sat down to a meal and tasted every bite that you ate?

Dealing with Fibromyalgia – JJ Gormley-Etchells

I have noticed an increasing number of my yoga students telling me that they have Fibromyalgia. Based on my growing experience with students suffering from Fibromyalgia, I’ve arrived at my own set of conclusions about this disease and ways of using yoga to help alleviate its symptoms.

A Picture of Asha Greer – Eliezer Sobel

Eliezer Sobel, acclaimed author, offers this account of his experiences with Asha Greer, co-founder of the Lama Foundation, senior teacher in the Sufi Ruhaniat International, artist, and inveterate traveler both within and without.

Yoga Sutra: Cultivating an Even Mind – Dean Lerner

The root cause of afflictions such as pride, desire, anger, and hatred initiate from an inability to feel a connectedness or oneness with the essence of our Being (Yoga Sutra II.17), the essence that we all share. This inability gives rise to an illusion of separateness, a mental veil between ourselves and the world around us. To develop an even mind, we must remove this illusory veil.

For Your Health: Be Sweet To Yourself – Kira Ryder

Yoga is a practice of intimacy. And by now you might have noticed that we are our most intimate relationships. We are the ones we are talking to most often. We are the ones usually talking back. And we are the ones we think about almost non-stop. This can be embarrassing when you first see it. Seeing it is the first step to freedom.

Relief from Spring Allergies – Marla Apt

For many the coming of spring brings the dread of allergies and their effects – watery eyes, runny nose, congested sinuses and pressure behind the eyes. Marla Apt has kindly offered this asana sequence that she wrote (with input and approval from Geeta Iyengar).

Elements of Retreat – Tilak Pyle

In retrospect, I would say that my first retreat was the summer I spent working in Yellowstone National Park after my freshman year of college. It was the beginning of my spiritual path.

The Tenth Door: An Adventure Through the Jungles of Enlightenment (Chapter 1) – Michele Hebert

“Señorita Michele, Señorita Michele.” The urgent whisper at my cabana window pulls me out of my slumber. Anna, the wife of our guardián, Fernando, is gesturing for me to follow her. The light of the full moon pours through the window screen. The full moon!

Why I Teach Yoga – Lanita Varshell

A beautiful, thirty-four year young plus size woman (mother, military wife) walked into my studio for our Monday evening plus size class. She said she was having a hard time finding a Yoga Class doable for her body, but someone she talked to at our center on the phone assured her she would love my class.

A Key to the Yoga Sutras – Dean Lerner

The simple truth can be elusive. For example, in Tolkien’s book, The Lord of the Rings, the perplexed wizard Gandalf labored for hours to solve the simple Elfish riddle, “Speak Friend and Enter.” Similarly, within the depth and eloquence of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras lies the simple truth for living a free and enlightened life.