Since I’ve been in a bit of a career bubble for the last 18 years (teaching, editing, and writing mostly in the realm of K-to-12 education), I’m starting from scratch in building an audience for whom I can share everything I’ve been learning about spirituality, yoga, functional movement, dance/movement therapy, and expressive arts therapy.
That’s why I’m offering donation-based remote classes–and they will always be free or donation-based for those experiencing financial difficulties.
I’m offering a 2-hour remote yoga fusion session on Saturday, November 11, 2023 at 11 a.m. EST.
Join a transformative online workshop that combines the power of mindfulness, breathing, meditation, yoga, movement, drawing/colouring/art, and writing to help you to experience release and renewal. This event is a SAFE SPACE for all. Participants with marginalized identities are welcome! There will be options to move through the workshop privately as well as in community. You will have the opportunity to respond to others’ movement and art, if interested.
I will be integrating my learning from my 500h yoga teacher training and also my graduate studies in counselling, dance/movement therapy, and expressive arts therapy.
Standing with legs shoulder width apart, root down with your feet, feel the ground supporting you underneath your feet. Activate your leg muscles as you rise up through your spine, relaxing your shoulders, bringing your shoulder blades together, feeling open in your chest.
From mountain, inhale as you float right leg up while hinging forward at hips and sweeping arms to the side to Warrior 3.
Exhale as you lightly hop on your standing leg.
Inhale as you lengthen your torso and flap your arms. Stay here for a few breaths.
Exhale as you lower your right foot gently, landing on the ball.
Inhale as you sweep your arms up to high lunge, pushing ground away, growing tall in the spine, and reaching arms up to sky.
Exhale as you slide your right foot back to low lunge. Inhale, flip to press the top of your foot into ground. Exhale, grounding your legs and keeping your hips level. Reach your arms to the left, and then to the right, then move expressively with torso and arms.
Returning to low lunge with arms raised, flip to the ball of back foot and lift right knee to high lunge with straight right leg, grounding legs while expanding spine and reaching up with arms.
Inhale, shift weight forward onto left foot and hinge forward at hips as right leg floats up. Exhale, lengthen your spine and flap your arms.
Inhale as you rotate your torso to the right and find the floor with your left hand. Exhale, move creatively with your floating leg and arm.
Inhale as you reset back to Warrior 3.
Exhale, rise up to stand, staying heaving in right foot, light in left. Exhale as you bend left knee and grab your left big toe. Inhale, straighten torso and left leg while keeping hips level. Exhale as you release your toe and bend left knee while slowly resetting to mountain.
I made this video poem as an artistic response to an assignment about key terms that will inform my beginning identity as an expressive arts therapist. This poem also applies to the writing prompt, “What makes a good neighbour?
We begin by getting off our pedestals.
This poem is my love letter to all of humanity. I am only human–sometimes I’m not my best self with people who are being difficult. But my intentions towards all of my neighbours as well as my self are to be as truthful and loving as possible, in every moment.
I love myself actively, as protest in response to messages of my unworthiness, as salve to heal the wounds from the chains and saws of unrefined minds, as defense in the lifelong war I have waged against my physical self.
I charge forward
to face me,
my best friend,
my worst enemy.
I walk with feet kissing the ground, hips swaying with delight, head held high, wearing my crown of bright jewels, offering gems of truth, love and beauty.
The autonomic nervous system has two parts that provide balance for each other: the parasympathetic nervous system and the sympathetic nervous system. The sympathetic nervous system prepares your body for arduous physical activity, whereas the parasympathetic nervous system helps your body to relax after danger has ceased.
Modern stressors such as heavy traffic, unpleasant exchanges, and being late for work can wreak havoc on your autonomic nervous system. The amygdala, which is associated with emotional processing, sends a signal of distress to the hypothalamus, the body’s command centre, which will send messages to the body through the nervous system to mobilize for danger. Commonly known as the fight-flight-freeze-fawn response, your body may experience dilated pupils, high blood pressure, an increased heart rate, and the feeling as if an alarm is going off in your body. This burst of energy allows your body to respond to perceived danger, usually by fighting or fleeing.
When you breathe a bit more slowly, a bit more deeply, until you’re taking belly breaths ,when your exhales are longer than your inhales, and when you massage the sides of your neck, you activate your parasympathetic nervous system, taking you out of fight-flight-freeze-fawn and allowing you to experience rest-and-digest, or a state of calmness, relaxation, and mental clarity. In this relaxed state, your body ‘s heart and breathing rates slow down, your blood pressure lowers, and your body focuses on digestion.
If you haven’t already watched the 1.5 minute video describing the 3 strategies, check it out, and let me know if they helped you to release stress!
Phoenix Rising Yoga 