There’s always more, isn’t there? Beautiful thing about life, on or off the mat.
It’s midwinter and I’ve been hearing about new classes and workshops happening around the state, from classes with Tonia in Girdwood, to workshops in Sat Nam Rasayan with Hargopal in Homer and KY for breaking habits or addictions with Haridass in Juneau. Check out the offerings from the Basecamp, and hope you are all having a great winter!
Cheers!
and happy holidays. Your fellow northern yogis would like to invite you joint them for winter solstice celebrations in Wasilla and Homer, and for community and classes in Anchorage, Homer, and Juneau.
May we all glow
with peace, love and light,
so that others sigh with pleasure
upon finding us,
warm fires on a cold night.
Cheers, everyone!
Greetings,
In the Alaska kundalini community, we have new or updated classes with Anna/Shivcharan in Homer for beginners, prenatal and all levels. In Wasilla, Hari Atma Kaur Khalsa is offering a special four-week series of kundalini yoga and meditation to help break unwanted habits. And from the internet yogis, here are some tips on making the most of your meditation practice and a lovely meditation to reclaim your inner remote control.
In Anchorage, the first week of September is already starting to feel like fall. The air in the mornings is crispy and evenings are getting dark again. The summer flower baskets have been put away, and by the end of the month the leaves will be on fire with the reds and yellows of autumn and the termination dust will come back to the mountains.
This time of year, the pace of life seems to speed up. The cool air almost pinches me into action, and with everyone coming together again for school, work, and fall party season, sometimes I am tempted to feel overwhelmed. However, this year I am noticing that meditating has helped me develop much greater patience through the ebbs and flows of activity, strength to gently manage the flow of events when I can influence them, and trust that it will all work out when I cannot.
Wishing everyone a fun and safe September.
Wow, this summer has been a welcome bath of light! Even on the few cloud-covered days, I’ve been looking around and seeing so much that I missed during the haze of the dark season. And what a world of color – eyes hungrily drinking it all in. At times it is also a time of breathtaking spiritual illumination, as expanded conscious awareness shows so much more of what is.
Even if “what is” includes things I’d rather not see or have to deal with. Sigh. Except after practicing this exercise of looking at what I’ve been hiding from myself for a few years now, I’ve come to actually enjoy discovering the depth and complexity of life beyond my blind spots. It’s not always pleasant, but it’s deeply satisfying when I am able to keep an open heart through it all. Sweet and juicy, like Alaska tomatoes.
I know many fellow Alaska yogis have been spending the summer out and about and not so much on the mats together, but we’ve got some classes going on and starting up around the state, so please check the offerings in Fairbanks (yay – Devta’s back with a gong!), Juneau, Anchorage, Homer and Sitka.
And for your own meditation experimentation, I invite you to join me in practicing the Meditation for a Calm Heart, which I’ve found helpful in coasting through stressful situations, maintaining patience in relationships and increasing breath control. Or maybe chant along with our many many yogi friends around the world who are doing the global sadhana Meditation to Heal Ancestral Wounds, which is a tremendously powerful meditation.
Meditation for a Calm Heart
print
video with a short introductory talk
Meditation to Heal Ancestral Wounds
print and video
video with an emphasis on material security
sat nam. peace be with you,
Narayanjot Kaur
Breakup at last! I’ve been noticing the bright sunshine in Anchorage luring us outdoors, but there is still enough snow, ice, slush, puddles and mud to make navigation slow and tricky in many places. I think of how life is like that sometimes – I am eager to be rushing off on the next adventure, but the conditions are not quite ripe. Rushing would likely cause more harm than good. I am forced to be patient, take it as it comes.
I tell myself:
Go slow to go fast.
Soak up the sun.
Watch the mountains, the water, the sky, the little bits of fresh green beginning to erupt here and there (burgeoning, I have learned, is the term for that).
It’s a good time to connect with Soul, with Mother Earth, with the Divine Feminine that gives us the patience and clarity to flow with what is and absorb the love and the lessons all around us. Enjoy classes offered this spring in Fairbanks, Juneau, Homer and Anchorage, and here are a couple of suggestions along these lines for your home practice:
Meditation for Coziness and Stay Connected with Your Higher Self
From our very earliest experiences of this life we exist within the container of our families, and those can be some of our most rewarding and challenging relationships. Just like the physical heirlooms that get passed down through the family, the beliefs, behaviors and life choices that we inherit from family includes both treasures and junk. On some level, who’s to judge?
Before my mother took it upon herself to help my grandmother clean out her house, that place was full of treasures that were once “good stuff” but had suffered from decades of Florida heat, humidity, bugs, and Grandma’s cigarette smoking. Time and technology made some of it obsolete. Kids grew up and grew out of the things they left behind when they moved out of their childhood home. And Grandma was holding onto it all, to the point that tradesmen couldn’t access parts of the house that needed to be fixed.
If my life, my consciousness can be likened to my grandmother’s house, then it is time to take my mother’s cue, get in and clean out all the good stuff that no longer serves me, patch up the things that need to be fixed or healed, and move into the future with a greater sense of ease, confidence, and openness. Time to honor the past while creating space for something new.
We’ve got plenty of opportunities for this kind of spiritual housecleaning this month:
March 9 (Anchorage), Heather/Narayanjot will be offering a spring cleaning healing workshop. Heal yourself, your loved ones, and enjoy tea with your fellow yogis!
March 14 – 17 (Homer) and March 21-23 (Anchorage), please join us for a weekend of spiritual housecleaning with Hargopal, who will be visiting from Los Angeles to offer Family Constellation workshop and individual sessions. These classes and consultations will offer the opportunity for us to deeply explore our family of origin, identify and let go of family dynamics that are holding us back from living to the fullest.
More weekly classes in Juneau, Homer, Fairbanks and Anchorage (including classes in Fairbanks and a new Thursday night class in Anchorage!).
For your home practice, Sodarshan Chakra Kriya is probably the king of kriyas for this kind of work. If you’re not used to it, start with just 3 minutes, and then work your way to longer periods of time. Especially if you are developing a daily personal practice, it’s great to start small (with something you have no excuse not to do) and go from there. Just like cleaning our physical space, a little bit here and there can add up to a huge impact as the rooms are tidied, the floors swept, the shelves dusted… and then suddenly it feels like a whole new place!
February: the month of candies, cards, and declarations of love.
If yoga teaches us anything, it is that we get no greater blessing than by loving ourselves and honoring our (higher) Selves. So, here is a meditation that can get some seriously fabulous love juices flowing through you.
How serious? I spent winter solstice with about 300 other yogis holding my hands in poses similar to these for hours at a time three days in a row. By the second or third day I found myself telling people, “If this is all there is, it’s more than enough.” I’ve rarely been so completely satisfied with life, the universe, everything. If you had met me that day, I would have beamed so much love at you, you wouldn’t know what to do with yourself.
Keeping your arms up can be challenging, but it’s worth it. In the immortal words of Yogi Bhajan, keep up and you will be kept up!
Reverse Adi Shakti Kriya for Ultimate Experience of Love
There’s plenty to keep us all in good spirits (please visit individual city pages for details). This month, regular and new classes in Anchorage and Juneau, and we’ve got some great special events coming up this spring:
Sat nam + Much love!
Narayanjot Kaur (Heather)
Wow, as the clock ticked into 2014 this year I heard so many friends offering the most beautiful wishes to each other for a fulfilling year to come. It wasn’t just the usual “hope you have a good one” sort of thing. Over and over, I heard a deep knowing and offer of moral support for all the brave new things we’ve been dreaming about but that have not quite happened yet, despite our best efforts. So I’m keeping that chain going and offering to all of you who read this my warmest wishes that you are able to grab your most beautiful dreams out from under the bed, dust them off and make them happen in 2014! Here is a lovely kriya for some kundalini-style inspiration:
Kriya for Intuition to Know in Advance and Manifest Your Ultimate Destiny
In December, a whopping 15 Alaska yogis showed up (and kept up through three days of white tantric and a week of onion-rich food) at Winter Solstice in Florida. We posted a few photos on the Basecamp Facebook page. This means more kundalini goings-on for Alaska in 2014, as we inspired each other with ideas for classes, workshops and other events.
For now, regular classes continue. Shivcharan/Anna is now offering a Monday morning in Homer, and beginning in February, there will be a monthly healing circle starting at Spirit Path in Anchorage.
Sat nam,
Narayanjot Kaur (Heather)
Sat nam, all!
Hope that everyone is keeping warm, enjoying the Alaska winter wonderland when we have it, and that your holiday season is full of love.
…and the latest and greatest Kundalini happenings around the state are:
Homer
Anchorage
Sitka
Juneau
Greetings everyone,
Another year and the dark season is upon us. The long nights draw us inward, asking us to examine our inner worlds and how they color and shape our outer circumstances. What a great time for meditation! Yogi Bhajan once told the Nirvairs that with our extreme day and night cycles, we must either drink a lot or meditate a lot up here in Alaska. For those of us more inclined to meditation, Kundalini classes continue this month:
And don’t forget that winter solstice is coming up soon! Some of us will be going to the big gathering in Florida, while others of us will gather for local solstice events. Since I started taking kundalini classes with the Nirvairs, I have not missed the opportunity to attend a kundalini winter solstice ceremony and have found that the intentions I’ve set during those times have consistently manifested in uncanny and beautiful ways. And there’s nothing like yogi tea and cookies with your yoga buddies!
Alaska Kundalini Yoga Basecamp 