Stillnessinyoga

Beloved Yoga lovers,

As the movement of the after summer towards our Autumn season is embracing us, I look at the chestnut trees in front of my window, and they are becoming rusty brown. Every year the Chestnut trees seem to announce Autumn before any other tree. So after the harvest of your veggie garden has passed it’s peak, what now? A lot of people find the meaning of the element Metal the most mysterious. Metal is the withdrawing of our life energy from the outer world and turning it inward, and releasing what we do not need anymore.

My daughter walks around very happy:

“Oh mum look at the rain, feel the cold, I’m so happy it’s Autumn, I’m going to read my book in bed!”                                                                                                              She is Metal through and through. Super organized, every school exam already planned for, and the amount of homework she plans to do per day. Scheduled jogging, soccer and self-yoga practices and one day rest for herself: Typical Metal-processes. Metal likes an organized life, and is a process of Alchemy: How to crystallize who I truly am? How to be REAL without nonsense? It is like Michelangelo chipping away the marble to reveal the Art piece he had in mind. This time you and I are the art pieces. A Metal person can make radical decisions if that’s best for them. How to be me in all my uniqueness? What to let go of, to stand in being me in this very moment?

The organs Lung and Large Intestine belong to Metal. The nose and the anus being the openings to our outside world. As yogi’s we understand the Lungs and it’s importance: When we breathe deeply in and out, our energetics expand, our clarity expands. The lungs are our sign of life after we left our Mother’s womb, after our watery existence, we have to breathe in the air to live. It is where our physical body attains the right color of our blood,  and yes, we are here now, where our breath is.

The Metal processes are transformative, from a leaf to rotten earth, from earth to crystal, it is the time to create structure, to let go of what is not any longer needed, to create space for the new. It can be painful to let go, or liberating! It needs the courage of the Lungs to make those decisions, it can offer us sadness to let go. When our Lung and Large Intestine system are in balance, we feel expanded and full of courage, when we experience sadness it might be out of balance.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

The autumn is the balance of yin and yang. Metal is the growing yin. The love of the heart and the Summer melt Metal

Our friends at Gather & Feast have made a delicious recipe that we wanted to share with you. She has video live stream, so you can follow along cooking and cook with her. We enjoyed making it, and here are some pictures of how results!

• 

• 

• 

Ingredients:

• 300g good quality dark chocolate
• 80g coconut oil
• 3 eggs or 3 ‘chia seed eggs’ for a completely vegan cake (blend 3 tbs chia seeds with 6 tbs water (or 9 tbs of water if it seems a little dry) and leave to sit for a couple of minutes)
• 1¼ cups coconut sugar (or panela or 1 cup brown or raw sugar)
• ½ cup pure maple syrup (or ¼ cup coconut sugar or sugar of choice)
• 1 tbs vanilla bean paste or extract
• ¾ cup buckwheat flour
• 1½ cups almond meal
• ½ tsp bicarb soda
• ½ tsp baking powder
• ¼ cup cacao powder
• 400g raw beetroot, peeled, grated, or blitzed in a food processor until fine
• ¾ cup milk of your choice
• ½ tsp sea salt

Chocolate Fudge Frosting

• 3 large ‘just ripe’ avocados
• ⅓ cup coconut oil, softened
• ⅓ cup pure maple syrup
• 3 tbs cacao powder
• 1 tsp vanilla paste or extract
• ¼ tsp sea salt
• 200g dark chocolate, melted & slightly cooled

For the full method watch the live stream from facebook live, or read the article

[Insert the text here]

My teachers’ name is Baba Purnanand. Which means something like the bliss of the moon, or Full Moon.

Every meditation camp in silence 10 days or 3 weeks or more, would end on the Full Moon. Me being a Cancerian and a watersign, have always felt strongly connected to the Moon,.. In Australia it was easy to sleep outside on the full moon night with a little wood fire in the garden or on the beach,..

As there is a strong full moon eclipse approaching on the 10th of January in the sign of Cancer, and there are major planetary changes on saturday and sunday too I like to share a text of Osho:

The full-moon night is the best for meditation. Many people who have become buddha’s have attained their enlightenment on the full-moon night, even Buddha himself.
It may have been a coincidence, but it is significant to remember: he was born on the full-moon night, he became enlightened on the full-moon night and he died on the full-moon night.
Something in the full moon seemed to be synchronizing with Buddha’s energy. Use it. Be alert and use every possibility to help you go in.
His birthday, his death day, his enlightenment day, all fall on one day – the full-moon night… the same month, the same night. The full moon has tremendous importance, so just do one thing: you can remain available, that’s all. If it happens, good; if it doesn’t happen don’t feel worried about it.

Next time again you try – when the full-moon night comes, start at least five days before, sitting in the night, just waiting. Wait one hour every night for five days, then the full moon will come. That night wait for at least two, three hours – not that you have to do anything: you are just there, available.

If it happens, you are ready; if it doesn’t happen, nothing to be worried about. If it doesn’t happen don’t feel frustrated, because it has nothing to do with your doing. If it happens, don’t feel that you have done a great thing, otherwise it will never happen again. If it happens, feel grateful; if it doesn’t happen, simply wait again.

Each full-moon night start waiting. It will be coming more and more and it will be staying more and more. And when it comes, don’t try to control it. Don’t try to be in that state a little longer; don’t bring desire in, because those are all disturbances and they poison the whole thing.

It is a door of the beyond. Just start waiting for it… waiting but with tremendous patience, with no hurry. Don’t try to drag it. It is beyond human control but one can manage to invite it in a very indirect way. Take a bath, sing a song, sit silently in the night – wait for it. Sway with the moon, look at the moon, feel full with the moon… feel the moon showering on you, dance a little, sit again, wait. Let the full-moon night become your particular night for meditation – it will be helpful.

O S H O

Liver poses

Come to lay on your back, fold your knees and feel the feet on the ground hip width apart.

Place your right foot on the left leg and fold your hands behind the knees like in the picture.
Pull your left knee of the floor. Find 80 % of you edge in the stretch for all of those poses,
not your maximum. Stay for 2 minutes.

 

Come to sitting. Stretch your legs in front of you.

If your back is rounding while sitting, bring a pillow under the sitting bones, this will help you to maximise the benefit of the pose. Fold your right leg,  bring that foot to the left leg.Place a pillow under the knee if you need one. Come and bend forward. You can let your head rest on a pillow. Stay for 3 min.
Than repeat on the other side. Lay down on your back for one minute to rest

Come to sitting and spread both legs apart. Come and sit on a pillow when your back is rounding.

Grab a block, or a few books, and place your elbow on the block if possible.Let your head rest on that hand. Bring your other arm overhead.You feel this stretch to the side of your body and inside both legs. You can always bend knees if the stretch feels to strong. Stay for 1,5 min. Repeat on the other side.

 

Final yoga pose.