Shakti Sistas are go!

It's been building for a while and at long last I'm stoked to announce the birth of the Shakti Sistas. Now, let's get one thing clear: I have a lot of Shakti Sistas, and bothers, mothers, fathers and every relation inbetween of the Shakti persuasion.... It's a fun group of people I know. And who knows where this partnership between will go, right now it's us, we're looking for recruits.

I'd like to say there was a vision brought unto us as part of some kind of group Dyanic experience. There wasn't, this is what happened: My friend, Claire and I had a conversation along the lines of:

Claire: Let's teach a workshop

Adele: Yeah, like totes, let's teach inversions

Claire: OMG yeah, let's do it

So cut to three months later to this conversation, just after our Heels Over Head playshop:

Adele: Dude, that was really fun

Claire: Yeah man, let's do it again

Adele: Done deal

OK, it might have been a little more measured and a little less High School Musical. You get the gist.

Sometimes life is that simple. That's Lila, divine consciousness at play, which was great for our Heels over Head Playshop. Sometimes life rises up to meet you without any need for grasping or control. Which is a direct quote from my Sankalpa, intention, when I set it in the summer time. Which is handy since that the subject of our first event as the Shakti Sistas, a one Sub-Urban retreat in the new year - Set aside your expectations, set alight your dreams. 

Join us, it's gonna be like totes amazeballs.

To book your space, email Claire (please be quick, place are already going...)

And please join out Facebook group to join the Goddess revolution and be the first to hear what's happening!

A little thank you

I was reminded of some words from Elena Brower today: “when stuff happens I think about how I can teach this, I par it down to one sentence and refine it. Then I ask how can this be of service to others and I teach that”.

I’d forgotten these words and I’m so happy that I was reminded of them. Life deals some curve balls, stuff we didn’t expect, stuff with think is unjust, stuff which just makes you angry at the world. These words reminded me of two specific things that I’m profoundly grateful for.

Number one: that somehow I have access to this great mass of yoga philosophy through some truly phenomenal teachers. It’s like having my own personal satnav to help me find where to go when things gets really tough. Somehow my brain clicked right into it and I remember it, that’s how I know it’s serving me. I’m so grateful for that.

Number two: that I get to teach people yoga. That I get to take my experience and offer it back out into the world in a way which might just help someone, or at least that’s my intention when I teach. That in a small way have to look at my own response and work really hard to find the lesson, the nugget of gold. I’m so grateful for that.

Thanks Elena.

Balancing on the paradox

The 12 segments of the Zodiac keep turning and we find ourselves deep within the Cancerian section of the zodiac. I take a peek at star signs occasionally to see what I can learn. Cancerians are known for being a bundle of contradictions, living life on the turn of their emotions. The yogi learns to balance these contradictions in the eternal paradox that it means to be human, which is: how can we be in the body and yet be free? That’s what spiritual practice is for.

Because, if we can find a place where two seemingly contradictory things meet, we have found the place of balance. And that’s the place where freedom resides. This is quite literally why we do yoga poses. The further away we take ourselves from where we feel centred, standing upright, to turning ourselves upside down, eg handstand we completely change our perspective and have to move into where it feel uncomfortable. That way, we can find our way back, whenever we get taken off centre, by whatever life throws at us. I love the quote by T.S. Eliot, one of my favourite explanations of this eternal paradox:

We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.

The light within and without

The last few weeks I’ve spent a lot of time contemplating teachers and the impact they have on our yoga practice and lives. There are also super interesting symmetries between one of the meanings of guru (the weighty one) and the Anusara opening invocation.

What this is leading me to is that on some level everything is a teacher. Something I’ve known intellectually for a long time and links back to my previous post of simply acknowledging you don’t know and moving from there. However, when everything gets turned on its head and you feel buffeted by life, how do you find centre? I don’t have an answer other than moments on and off the mat where we see ourselves and can reflect are moments which lead us to a greater understanding of ourselves and our response to the world. Then maybe, just maybe, we can respond in the highest.

For me, teaching then completes the circle. Somehow simply practicing and taking on these great teachings is a great spiritual goal and you’re definitely going to see shifts and changes, positive (just to be clear) in your life if you practice in this way. There is something totally profound about putting yourself back in the dark, by adding a new dimension to your practice to illuminate it even more brightly. Then again, if you’re showing up on your mats, that’s amazing to me. Even if you’re not, it’s still pretty cool. Our teachers, in whatever form hold up a mirror for us, whatever you see is impermanent and changeable. I try to move from that knowledge.