The elements of the Yogic Diet program that I offer are:
1. Yogic Diet
Enjoy energy, vitality, and strength as you incorporate a pure, wholesome, and naturally delicious yogic diet into your life. Tailor your diet to include more fresh and dried fruits and berries, pure fruit/vegetable juices, raw or lightly cooked vegetables, salads, grains, legumes, nuts, seeds, wholegrain breads, honey, fresh herbs, herbal teas, and dairy products such as milk and butter. You may also want to reduce animal products, alcohol, sugar, caffeine, processed and packaged foods, tobacco, white flour, and fried foods which can adversely affect your body and mind. In addition to improving what you eat, the Yogic Diet offers suggestions as to how to eat, when to eat, how much to eat, and so on.
2. Yoga and Exercise
Be Active and Energetic! Make a fitness plan that you can stick to doing the exercises you love. Include hatha yoga into your weekly regimen to:
- Build strength and flexibility
- Lengthen muscle tissue
- Tone internal organs
- Flush toxins out of gland and endocrine systems
- Aid the flow of prana [vital energy] in the body like acupuncture/deep tissue massage
- Deeply relax your body and mind
* Some of the side effects of yoga are great health, abundant energy, proper weight, stress and pain reduction, and lasting feelings of tranquility, peace, and unconditional love.
3. Law of Attraction
We get back what we give out. Our thoughts, feelings, and actions must be focused on what WE DO WANT in order to attract it into our lives. Through the 4 step Bee-ing Attraction Plan(TM), you make an integrated attraction plan for your body, mind, and soul to ensure that you attract health and fitness goals, happiness, abundance, contentment, improved relationships, and a deeper connection to Source into your life. Having a plan is 90% of the solution.
4. Positive Thinking
Take a positive approach in all areas of your life. Practical tools such as contemplation, self-inquiry, prayer, and signs of land will help you release thoughts, feelings, and old patterns that hold you back and keep you feeling stuck in worry, anger, regret, and fear. A disciplined mind leads to steady wisdom and happiness.
5. Spiritual Practice
Make a plan for your spiritual practices. Whether you want to make time for prayer, meditation, scriptural study, formal worship, devotional practice, chanting, service work, or charity, the Yogic Diet will help you go deeper into your own faith. According to the philosophy of yoga, as well as the world’s religious traditions, the purpose of life is to know God and to serve others. Experiment and discover which practices resonate with you the most and make them a part of your life.
6. Selfless Service
Selfless service is a cornerstone of yoga philosophy and of good leadership. Discover what makes you tick, what you came here to offer, and how you want to serve your world. Be inspired and passionate as you improve and touch the lives of others in big and small ways. The Yogic Diet program will help you set achievable goals for finding and offering your path of service.
Monday 31 August 2009
Tuesday 25 August 2009
How I Came to Yoga - Awake, Now What?
Now that I was having huge metaphysical experiences in meditation and even on city buses regularly, what was to be expected from me? Was I supposed to shave my head, give them all my money, and live in a forest? Was somebody going to try to tell me what to do in my life? In May of 1997, I went to one of my teacher’s ashrams in New York to find out a little bit more. Honestly, I was overwhelmed with the energy of the place. Everything and everyone sparkled with light. My heart overflowed with happiness and love. The people were kind and funny. The food was delicious and vegetarian. The teacher seemed to be everything that she should be. I felt like I had come home. At the same time, I was still concerned of what was expected of me in return.
Over the next several years, I came to understand that a truly enlightened being wants absolutely nothing from us. If we give over a few dollars in offering or scrub the floors for free, it is actually for our own benefit and ultimate freedom. It is like in any other sector of life, the more you give, the more you receive. For me, that does not translate into money, necessarily, though I do give a monthly offering. Mostly, it has been about slowly, slowly giving more of my heart, trust, and time to God. It has been about becoming a more giving person in general. It has been about giving me the space to do the inner work to free myself of issues that block my potential. It has been about making time for a few minutes of meditation.
So, the spirituality of the yoga tradition appeared in my life first. Apparently, it was what I needed the most. Over the next 13 years, the contemplation and philosophy aspects of yoga led me to clean up my mental house more deeply and even become a life coach. Then, two years ago I took a hatha yoga teacher training, and the magic of yoga took the 10-15lbs I had always carried around (plus some self-esteem issues) away from me. For me, yoga totally works. Like my brother says, if it works you’ve got to buy the t-shirt.
Over the next several years, I came to understand that a truly enlightened being wants absolutely nothing from us. If we give over a few dollars in offering or scrub the floors for free, it is actually for our own benefit and ultimate freedom. It is like in any other sector of life, the more you give, the more you receive. For me, that does not translate into money, necessarily, though I do give a monthly offering. Mostly, it has been about slowly, slowly giving more of my heart, trust, and time to God. It has been about becoming a more giving person in general. It has been about giving me the space to do the inner work to free myself of issues that block my potential. It has been about making time for a few minutes of meditation.
So, the spirituality of the yoga tradition appeared in my life first. Apparently, it was what I needed the most. Over the next 13 years, the contemplation and philosophy aspects of yoga led me to clean up my mental house more deeply and even become a life coach. Then, two years ago I took a hatha yoga teacher training, and the magic of yoga took the 10-15lbs I had always carried around (plus some self-esteem issues) away from me. For me, yoga totally works. Like my brother says, if it works you’ve got to buy the t-shirt.
Monday 24 August 2009
How I Came to Yoga - An Awakening
How did I come to yoga? In 1996, I was teaching English in Beijing, China and my friend loaned me two books by an monk, or swami, from a yoga tradition.
The swami said to sit in a quiet and pure place and repeat the mantra Om Namah Shivah which means I honor God within me. I made time each day to sit this way for a week. I would arrange a little puja table with a picture of the teacher that my friend had given me, a flower in a vase, and a candle. I lit the candle, bowed, and sat for meditation. One evening as I meditated, my breathe began to steady and deepen and my body relaxed. Suddenly something happened. With my eyes closed, I saw the swami's face clearly looking at me. I felt an energy strongly move in my spine and then I actually left my body through the top of my head. I was hovering somewhere above my body looking down on it.
But this kind of thing didn't normally happen to me. I'm not a new age flake. I kind of believe in astrology, my parents were hippies, and I once ran through a forest with no clothes on, but I had not “left my body.” But here it was happening plain as day and it wasn't spooky. It was unusual yet it felt natural. Then the thought occurred to me...what if I just died? Oh @#%*, am I actually dead? Somehow that one fearful thought brought me right back down into my body. Feeling relieved and disappointed at the same time, I opened my eyes. I was sure something big had just happened to me. Maybe it was the awakening called Shaktipat which the swami had spoken of in his book.
Shaktipat awakening is an inititation that is given from guru to student and has been handed down this way, so the yoga scriptures say, since the dawn of time. For yogis, the body is made of more than flesh and bones. The body is a place in which one can reunite with God. There is a dormant spiritual energy called kundalini at the base of the spine in the muladhara chakra. Once this dormant kundalini is awakened by an enlightened teacher, one can begin his or her spiritual journey and know God in this body, in this life.
Right after my body leaving experience, the phone rang and my neighbor asked me to meet him at a restaurant down the street. So, I walked down the street in Beijing, China with a new awareness that evening. I was overcome as I saw that everything and everyone seemed to be bathed in light. Chinese people smiled and laughed with their families. I could feel their happiness in my own heart and see light shining from their eyes. I felt connected to them. I felt connected to the trees as they swayed with the wind. My senses were heightened with a sweetness. I was drawn to see the light, the best, in everything and everyone. I had received Shaktipat. I still have it. And thanks to my teacher and my ongoing practice, the experience continues to grow and deepen.
The next morning I had a glimpse of how this Shaktipat awakening had affected my life. I was not a depressed person before this experience, but I did awaken each day with a slight feeling of heaviness and a touch of worry. It had been a normal feeling for me and I never thought much of it until it was gone. I noticed that I was now waking up feeling a sense of happiness every day. Though still riddled with life's ups and downs, there was a newfound sense of lightness and joy about living.
One day shortly after the awakening, I was on a bus in Beijing. Of course, I was stressed from: having to fight the old ladies as we all had to customarily squeeze into the bus door at the same time, the screetching bus attendent demanding “Mei peow (Buy Ticket!)" at me as if I was going to try to not pay, and then settling into the noisy, dirty, bumpy ride to my destination. Despite the stress, my breath began to deepen and the mantra “Om Namah Shivaya” welled up from within me. ONS rose up on my in breath and descended on my down breath. The mantra had powerfully seized me and I found myself again shifting back into seeing and feeling the lightness in everything again. Over the years, I've come to feel that enlightenment is that state of experiencing the light, the good, in everything. With practice, this state can grow.
The swami said to sit in a quiet and pure place and repeat the mantra Om Namah Shivah which means I honor God within me. I made time each day to sit this way for a week. I would arrange a little puja table with a picture of the teacher that my friend had given me, a flower in a vase, and a candle. I lit the candle, bowed, and sat for meditation. One evening as I meditated, my breathe began to steady and deepen and my body relaxed. Suddenly something happened. With my eyes closed, I saw the swami's face clearly looking at me. I felt an energy strongly move in my spine and then I actually left my body through the top of my head. I was hovering somewhere above my body looking down on it.
But this kind of thing didn't normally happen to me. I'm not a new age flake. I kind of believe in astrology, my parents were hippies, and I once ran through a forest with no clothes on, but I had not “left my body.” But here it was happening plain as day and it wasn't spooky. It was unusual yet it felt natural. Then the thought occurred to me...what if I just died? Oh @#%*, am I actually dead? Somehow that one fearful thought brought me right back down into my body. Feeling relieved and disappointed at the same time, I opened my eyes. I was sure something big had just happened to me. Maybe it was the awakening called Shaktipat which the swami had spoken of in his book.
Shaktipat awakening is an inititation that is given from guru to student and has been handed down this way, so the yoga scriptures say, since the dawn of time. For yogis, the body is made of more than flesh and bones. The body is a place in which one can reunite with God. There is a dormant spiritual energy called kundalini at the base of the spine in the muladhara chakra. Once this dormant kundalini is awakened by an enlightened teacher, one can begin his or her spiritual journey and know God in this body, in this life.
Right after my body leaving experience, the phone rang and my neighbor asked me to meet him at a restaurant down the street. So, I walked down the street in Beijing, China with a new awareness that evening. I was overcome as I saw that everything and everyone seemed to be bathed in light. Chinese people smiled and laughed with their families. I could feel their happiness in my own heart and see light shining from their eyes. I felt connected to them. I felt connected to the trees as they swayed with the wind. My senses were heightened with a sweetness. I was drawn to see the light, the best, in everything and everyone. I had received Shaktipat. I still have it. And thanks to my teacher and my ongoing practice, the experience continues to grow and deepen.
The next morning I had a glimpse of how this Shaktipat awakening had affected my life. I was not a depressed person before this experience, but I did awaken each day with a slight feeling of heaviness and a touch of worry. It had been a normal feeling for me and I never thought much of it until it was gone. I noticed that I was now waking up feeling a sense of happiness every day. Though still riddled with life's ups and downs, there was a newfound sense of lightness and joy about living.
One day shortly after the awakening, I was on a bus in Beijing. Of course, I was stressed from: having to fight the old ladies as we all had to customarily squeeze into the bus door at the same time, the screetching bus attendent demanding “Mei peow (Buy Ticket!)" at me as if I was going to try to not pay, and then settling into the noisy, dirty, bumpy ride to my destination. Despite the stress, my breath began to deepen and the mantra “Om Namah Shivaya” welled up from within me. ONS rose up on my in breath and descended on my down breath. The mantra had powerfully seized me and I found myself again shifting back into seeing and feeling the lightness in everything again. Over the years, I've come to feel that enlightenment is that state of experiencing the light, the good, in everything. With practice, this state can grow.
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