AYC_Toronto2018.indd 1 6/4/18 7:58 PM AYC_Toronto2018.indd 2-3 6/4/18 7:58 PM TABLE OF CONTENTS

W e l c o m e L e t t e r 1 L e t t e r f r o m t h e E d i t o r 3 A c c e s s i b l e Y o g a T e a m s 6 P r e s e n t e r A r t i c l e s Dianne Bondy 9 Chantel Ehler 11 Tama Soble 13 Michael Hayes 15 Anita Haravon 17 Shana Sandler 19 21 Chris Stigas 23 Tobias Wiggins 27 Tiffany Rose 29 David Rendall 31 Shelly Prosko 35 Lee Majewski 37 Tracey Eccleston 39 Linda Varnam 41 Judith Mintz 43 Carol Horton 45 Judy Hubbell 47 Mary-Jo Fetterly 49 Jivana Heyman 51 A c c e s s i b l e Y o g a N e t w o r k 55 A c c e s s i b l e Y o g a C o n f e r e n c e E u r o p e 57

AYC_Toronto2018.indd 4-5 6/4/18 7:58 PM Dear Accessible Family,

I just wanted to say thank you for coming to our first international Conference, and our first conferences: Over the weekend find one or two other people who you can support in some way. Conference in Canada! We are thrilled to be connecting with our Accessible Yoga community Help them reach their goals, connect them with other people you know, share their work on around the world, and that’s why the theme of this Conference is “Embracing Community.” The social media, or find some other way to lift them up. That’s how we truly embrace community. Accessible Yoga community includes anyone who shares the goal of making the yoga practices Use #jivanahomework to let me know what you create. There is so much we can accomplish available to everybody who is interested in learning them. together!

In particular, I’d like to thank all of our amazing presenters! I’m so excited to learn from you this weekend. Also, thank you to the University of Toronto for hosting us, and our local volunteer Om, team; Chantel Ehler, Katie Juelson, Ray Chappell, Spencer Jones, Sharon Metz, Chris Stigmas, Jivana Carolyn Harding, Denise Gains, Stephanie Ragnay, Margot LeBlanc and Jacqueline Peters. I also want to thank our staff, in particular Conference Manager, Brina Lord; Operations Manager, Megan Zander; Communications Director, Sarah Helt, and Graphic Designer, Sevika Ford. Our Board of Directors, Priya Wagner, Dianne Bondy, Rudra Swartz, Prashanti Goodell, and Sarani Fedman, who also edited this Journal. Thanks to Iswari Spoon for laying out the Journal. Also, thanks to all our other volunteers here this weekend and the close to 500 Accessible Yoga Ambassadors around the world!

Heartfelt appreciation to all our supporters, including our main sponsor, , who made our scholarships possible, as well as Yoga International, for sponsoring the World’s Largest Accessible Yoga Class. I’d also like to thank YogaMate, and all the other amazing sponsors included in this Journal.

I hope you enjoy this weekend and have an opportunity to connect with the other attendees and presenters. Networking is not only a key part of finding work as a yoga teacher, but a way to build an alternative yoga community. In fact, I always give the same homework at all our

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 1-2 6/4/18 7:58 PM Dear Friends,

Welcome to the Toronto Accessible Yoga Conference. So many details and so much energy go to support you in these short pieces and from the presentations that each author offers during into making a conference come together. Everyone has made a concerted effort to set aside this conference weekend. I hope they inspire you to go back to your community and share these the time to be here and to prepare our hearts and minds and bodies to take in all that the gifts. That sharing and connecting is Accessible Yoga. We learn from and support each other so conference has to offer. that we can offer that same wisdom and inspiration to others. It is about Sangha - embracing And then there are the organizers who have spent hours of their time putting together the our spiritual community. physical details, arranging for this beautiful space at the University of Toronto, locating props, chairs, tables and people to set them up, support staff, food, microphones - the list can go on.

Then there are our presenters. They were asked to be presenters because in some way their Ommmm and Love, journey to this time and place has involved a deep understanding, experience, or involvement Sarani Beth Fedman in the path of Accessible Yoga. Some gain knowledge of the tools that an accessible yoga class Editor or teacher can offer to them as a student. Others are teachers who are sharing yoga with those who haven’t always had easy access to the teachings and practices of yoga. Both sides of the coin, student and teacher. One not so different from the other. Everyone experiencing the joys and challenges and support that yoga can bring to us all. This journal is full of their stories. Each presenter who writes here is sharing their particular experience on the accessible yogic path. There are stories of pain. There are stories of transcendence. There are stories of deep insight and creativity. They are all stories unique to each author but with the common thread of our reaching for understanding and support. And finding that wisdom and support through the teachings of yoga. I had a wonderful ride as I read each author’s story. I hope you find much to learn and much

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 3-4 6/4/18 7:58 PM B o a r d o f D i r e c t o r s Dianne Bondy Priya Wagner Rudra Swartz Sarani Fedman Steffany Moonaz Prashanti Goodell Jivana Heyman

S t a f f Jivana Heyman–Director Brina Lord–General Manager Megan Zander–Operations Manager Sarah Helt–Communications Director Sevika Ford–Graphic Design

A c c e s s i b l e Y o g a T e a m s The Accessible Yoga teams came out of our 1st conference in 2015 when so many people came forward to get involved in this movement. If you want to get involved, please email us at [email protected]. 5 6

AYC_Toronto2018.indd 5-6 6/4/18 7:58 PM C o n f e r e n c e L o g i s t i c s T e a m s Communications Team Toronto Logistics Sarah Elizabeth Helt – team leader, Prashanti Goodell - board liaison, Tricia Gschwind, Chantel Ehler, Katie Juelson, Ray Chappell, Spencer Jones, Sharon Metz, Chris Stigmas, Lauren Fonvielle Carolyn Harding, Denise Gains, Stephanie Ragnay, Margot LeBlanc, Jacqueline Peters Graphic Design - Iswari Spoon, Heather Sevika Ford, Mary Padma Bickel Through collaborative efforts the Communications Team uses all forms of social media to reach the European Logistics public on behalf of the Accessible Yoga Movement. We, as a team, post to Facebook, Instagram, Priya Pernilla Halldin, Alessandra Uma Cocchi, Katja Sandschneider, Felicitas Scheel, Twitter, and our Accessible Yoga Blog in an effort to keep all our yoga connections up to date on Isadora Bilancino what we’re doing, where, and how. In this digital age, the Communications Team plays a vital role The mission of our Logistics Teams is to support the planning and organization of the in connecting students to teachers, teachers to institutions, and bringing Accessible Yoga to the Accessible Yoga Conferences by locating venues, coordinating transportation, scheduling world. lodging, and all other ‘behind the scenes’ details. We communicate with other teams to create

a supportive, collaborative, and collective community. By meeting regularly and designating Advocacy Team volunteer assignments, we strive to create a structure of systematic support that enables all Mary Sims – team leader, Steffany Moonaz - board liaison, Virginia Knowlton, Prakasha teammates and attendees to thrive in their experience at the Accessible Yoga Conferences. Capen, Jennifer Gasner, Rose Kress, Elle Potter, Myra Rubinstein The Advocacy Team speaks up for inclusion within the yoga community and beyond. We are Inreach Team currently working with Yoga Alliance to expand the requirements of Cherie Hotchkiss – Inreach Leader programs to include training in Accessibility to make sure that yoga teachers are receiving proper The Inreach Team establishes and maintains communications with all our Accessible Yoga training in this area. We’re also overseeing the new Ambassador program which will engage our Ambassadors! Inreach is organizing all data to create a single system to carry Accessible Yoga almost 500 Ambassadors around the world to offer educational programming and share the forward as it grows. message of accessibility and equity in yoga.

cholarship eam S T Education Team Valerie Roberts, Carolyn Hitzler Sarah Helt, Jivana Heyman, Priya Wagner, Sarani Fedman Working together in an effort to provide financial accessibility to yoga teachers and The Education Team is exploring different outlets for sharing the work of Accessible Yoga. We are Accessible Yoga students combined, the Scholarship Team’s goals encompass inclusive currently exploring how to create an online video platform to share Accessible Yoga classes and communication with new and returning Accessible Yoga Ambassadors. We strive to offer a workshops and highlight the amazing work of our conference presenters and Ambassadors. welcoming environment for new Ambassadors through open communication. We encourage

all Ambassadors to get involved by sharing the goals of Accessible Yoga with their personal International Team – Regional Representatives networks and beyond. The Accessible Yoga International Team is made up of Regional Representatives who connect the Ambassadors in their region. We are dedicated to building a worldwide network of Accessible Fundraising Committee Yoga teachers and students. We engage yogis from all over the world to be aware of the great Priya Wagner, Maria Amma Fandino possibilities that yoga offers to people with disabilities or people that have been excluded from The Fundraising Committee seeks grants, donations and in-kind gifts from a variety of sources these teachings. By creating a strong network we learn from all the different circumstances in each to fund scholarships, programs, salaries and organizational overhead costs. We conduct donor and every country and support each other in spreading Accessible Yoga around the globe. research, identify new sources of funds, engage new audiences and build long term donor

relationships. We are committed to Accessible Yoga Facebook Groups AccessibleYoga’s mission and strive Accessible Yoga Ambassadors – main group to carry the mission forward. The Greek Canada Southwest Committee is headed by a member Spanish UK Southeast of the Board of Directors. Italian UK: Kent Northwest Swedish Asia NY – Northeast Dutch Australia SF Bay Area French US: Sacramento Portuguese Texas German Midwest

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 7-8 6/4/18 7:58 PM had moved on from yoga she was riding a bike that was powered by her hands—that’s how strong her arms had become. ACCESSIBLE YOGA VOICE Eventually she got a minivan and I now see her driving all over the city. It was amazing to see the

Dianne Bondy transformation of a person who was relying on her mother to a Interview by Kathleen Kraft person who felt more physically comfortable in her body to ride a bike, to learn to drive and to eventually move out on her own. Where do you teach and who is people who feel really intimidated Can you tell us about a teaching the population? stepping into a yoga studio experience that particularly She was one of my best teachers. I space, so I designed this website moved you? was inspired that she wasn’t afraid My most accessible platform and primarily for them. to reach out to people and to the one that I’m most proud of I had a student who was in a try. She’s one of the people who is Yogasteya, which I created in Every Wednesday I do an wheelchair who suffered from helped inspire this yoga. 2012 well before the online yoga Instagram Live class and I put genetic scoliosis. She couldn’t boom had started. I had a brick it in the Facebook group or on bear weight or walk on her legs Why do you teach this population? and mortar yoga studio, and there the site so that people have an but she could wiggle her toes. She What made you choose this were groups of women who were opportunity to was essentially strapped into the specific group? having babies. In Canada, where practice live with us. I also teach chair and couldn’t raise her arms I live, we get a year for higher than her chest. She The population that I was maternity leave. Some “I knew how much the yoga practice had sent a group e-mail to primarily interested in was people of the women asked me had impacted my life and had allowed me every studio in the city and of color because those were the to record the classes no one but me got back to people I did not see in yoga class. on audio so they could to make peace with the body I was in...” her. At the time I was taking It inspired me to create a space for practice at home when advanced teacher training people who looked like me and that population… I knew how advertisements for retreats with they had a break, so at first my at the park at the end of my and I thought it was a great to put my image out there, which much the yoga practice had everybody running around in the husband and I decided to set up street every Saturday from May opportunity to use my skills as a was really hard for me initially. impacted my life and had allowed string bikini and doing yoga on a camera in the studio and record to October. I like to teach in teacher and to serve somebody. I At first I used stock photos of me to make peace with the body I the beach. I offer retreats for full- the classes. unconventional places because told her that yoga is mostly about thin white women because I was was in and to be a better person, a bodied, melanin-infused yogis! they’re less intimidating for breathing. worried that nobody would come, Eventually I decided to create an better global citizen, and a better people. but when I finally put myself I’m excited to work with people accessible platform for pregnant She lived in my neighborhood so parent and spouse. I wanted that out there in the larger body who are either doing the work and post-partum women, people Last but not least, I have a we met at a church where I was for everyone. doing all kinds of different kinds that I’m doing or students who with disabilities, and people group of ladies that have been teaching, and we tried to figure of things—, yoga at What are you excited to do next I can help feel better about with larger bodies, essentially practicing with me for over ten out what we could do together. the wall, yoga with props, yoga with your students? themselves and understand that people practicing with a range years—they come to my house Her mother came with her the first without props—then everyone this practice is for them, and that of limitations. After some time, I and range in age from 75 to 80, so time and explained what some started coming because I looked I’m excited to offer retreats and spending time being angry about broke it down more and created I do a lot of accessible yoga with of her challenges were. I decided like them. getaways and yoga opportunities your body or feeling bad yourself an accessible yoga website. It them. Hip replacements, knee to reach out to her massage for people that don’t feel So that was the catalyst serving is not a life well spent. mostly catered to people in larger replacements, arthritis, and so on. therapist and her physiotherapist, like they belong. You see the bodies, because when you show I really appreciate them because and we all worked together to up to a yoga class and the teacher they help me try to figure out how figure out how we were going to Dianne Bondy, E-RYT 500, has a degree in the social sciences and uses this background in her is not in a larger body, he or she to vary and evolve this practice serve her best in that chair. This work and activism in the yoga industry, and has led to her having a worldwide following of doesn’t know what to do with so more and more people with went on for the better part of dedicated and socially conscious students. She is a regular columnist for Elephant Journal and Do you. There’s a whole group of limitations can get to it. three years, and by the time she You Yoga, and has been featured in magazine.

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 9-10 6/4/18 7:58 PM relaxed even further as she smiled broadly and Each of us has the ability to rebalance ourselves and talked about how peaceful and beautiful he was shed the burden of stress and anxiety. The key may when he slept. We had our solution. be physical or based in any number of intellectual gateways. Memory and imagery are powerful, SIMPLE SOLUTIONS I asked Francesca to observe her grandson’s torso, as is the knowledge that we are all capable of particularly his belly while he lay sleeping, and participating intentionally and actively in our imagine that she was mirroring the movements journey toward balance and health. in his belly. I reminded her that she was a baby Tama Soble once, sleeping and breathing as peacefully as her grandchild. The image and memory of her sleeping grandson became Francesca’s route to an intentional, relaxed Tama Soble began practicing yoga breathing pattern in her own body. Over time she with Esther Myers and Monica Voss in I have been thinking about Francesca quite a Because the approach to yoga I teach is so was able to access her relaxation response through 1984. She has had additional training in bit lately. Possibly because I have not seen her interwoven with the breath cycle, it seemed logical many different avenues and during stressful and Body-Mind Centering and meditation. for a while and am simply wondering how she is to establish an awareness of the breath right from triggering situations such as car rides and interviews She teaches classes, teacher training, doing. Francesca (not her real name) was a private the beginning of our lessons. with insurers. She was able to maintain breath advanced teachers’ seminars, and offers student for about two years. I saw her twice a awareness while practising gentle yoga and walking retreats in Ontario, the United States and week for about an hour each session. I was part My hope was that by helping Francesca develop meditation that led her toward greater stability on Italy. Tama has worked extensively with of a comprehensive health care team brought basic skills to intentionally call upon a restorative her feet and the confidence to take walks around those living with anxiety, depression and together to help her manage and recover from breath pattern, she would have a tool at her her own home and eventually longer walks outside. PTSD. She has also taught students with physical injuries and PTSD caused by a car accident. disposal for calming herself and over time, through One small connection unlocked many possibilities. a wide variety of physical challenges In addition to my sessions with Francesca, I was gentle diligent practice, guide her nervous system arising from aging, accidents and illness. involved in many phone conversations and team toward a more balanced and resilient state. Tama co-owns and directs Esther Myers Yoga Studio and its 750-hour Teacher meetings about her progress. The problem was that she had become so unfamiliar Training Program and 250-hour Graduate with full, relaxed breathing that nothing seemed When we first met, Francesca was in a great deal Teachers’ Program with Monica Voss. of physical and emotional pain, had mobility to give her autonomous and sustained access issues and was essentially housebound. My role to it. I could talk her toward the experience, was to encourage her to explore and enhance the and she could maintain it if I offered ongoing range of motion in both healthy and injured joints, imagery, visualizations or other cues. However, encourage stability when walking and standing, and when left in silence, her breathing would revert offer stress relief to rapid and shallow. through breathing “Each of us has the ability to rebalance ourselves She recognized the meditations. and shed the burden of stress and anxiety.” difference between the Before any of this breathing patterns but could happen we could not sustain the had to establish simple trust between us. natural self-soothing breath. The first couple of times I met with Francesca, her A solution came from a very simple source. During psychologist was present. This arrangement was one of our early sessions, Francesca fell asleep made so that there was someone present that following a guided meditation. I thought I would Francesca was comfortable with as we got to know give her a few minutes of much needed rest and one another. Initially the assumption was that the began glancing around the room. There were many psychologist would observe the first six to eight family photos, one of which was of a smiling baby. yoga sessions. In the end, she only needed to be When Francesca woke I asked about the photo. This present at two. This was a testament to Francesca’s was her grandson, now 18 months old. Did she ever openness of mind and willingness to try new babysit for him? Yes, of course. Did she ever put him approaches even while living with such a high down for a nap or to bed at night? Yes, frequently. degree of discomfort. Did she ever sit and watch him sleep? Her body

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 11-12 6/4/18 7:58 PM to make a student’s behavior commune with students who own power, and learn to evaluate “right” or “wrong”; want to appreciate the value of their own process and abilities. to mold a student into their their own experience, and explore However once that happens, own image. the freedom of walking their own the rewards are powerful and path. It’s a much greater challenge exponential. I reject that system. I seek to to teach a student to explore their

Chantel Ehler: My first yoga “class” was Jane Fonda’s 20 minute Sun Salutation video with my mum as a teenager in the early 90s. In 1999 I was struck with debilitating pain that MAKING THE YUJ IN YOGA WORK FOR YOU led to the loss of strength in my right arm and periodic inability to move. I used yoga as a weapon against my fear and my pain, which worked for some time, driving me to attain Chantel Ehler my certification in Kripalu (2002), Moksha (2007) and many other certifications and training including Yoga Therapy. In 2012 I began to unravel the damage I was doing to my body in yoga, and chose another kinder, gentler path. I started the Amara Vidya Yoga School in 2015. Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.

Right now there is a group I The benefit I have received not in life, and savor the “good stuff.” work with weekly. We are all just from teaching, but from I have time to learn, observe, exploring different approaches, taking my own yoga journey, is and reflect on what worked and and talking about how some of hard to describe. I know that if I what didn’t. Having a chance the tools and techniques impact hadn’t gone down this path, I am to step back and reflect isn’t us. Finding a way to connect, to certain many times over that I always available when in pain. be truly present with Oneself, is would be worse off, if here at all. There is a lot of caretaking that as challenging as it is rewarding. It serves me when I wake up and is invisible to the outside world. It’s also a subtle thing, not easily am in the deepest despair, riddled When an opportunity to assess, taught that takes time, patience, with pain, scarcely able to move: contemplate and evaluate arises, and a willingness to experiment. • I remember and track my breath it is treasured! I love this kind of ongoing, long term learning in a small group. In • I look for what I can do I have taught yoga since 2002, and this type of session, we get time to • I meditate I am weary of the lack of informed explore and opt in or out of what consent, critical thinking, or sense • I drop into the Observer, and of agency present in the current is serving us and what makes trust in the Shift things appropriately challenging. yoga climate. What shocks me is In my therapy sessions, I often • When I am able to move, I start having students expect me to tell get to work with individuals who small them what to do, to expect me to have the same challenges as I • I can take small steps, aware that disempower them with corrective, do, coping with daily chronic with each step, it disproves the potentially injurious adjustments, pain that ebbs and flows in often darkness, the fears that want to and then getting angry with me bizarre patterns with no end. In battle within me, telling me “this (or dismissing me) when I refuse that brief time, we get to work on is the last time you’ll be able to to harm or disempower them. The the little things, the things that we do x” hierarchical structure of many can change, the things that bring areas of education (not just in us deep into ourselves. When the pain subsides, I have an yoga) train students to expect that opportunity to participate fully a teacher is there to judge them;

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 13-14 6/4/18 7:58 PM Michael Hayes, the proud owner of a “Buddha Body,” has more than 20 years experience teaching and has studied extensively in the following traditions: , Ashtanga Yoga, Thai Yoga, Om Vinyasa Yoga and Yoga Anatomy. In addition, Michael has traveled WHERE DO I STAND IN YOGA? regularly to Thailand and studies with master teachers. His classes benefit anyone regardless of their individual anatomy, flexibility, age, or yoga background. Michael has Michael Hayes also practiced massage for more than 20 years as a licensed massage therapist.

Where do I stand in yoga? That dance exchange, Vinyasa, Iyengar, Hatha, Sivananda? from breath to movement, from moment to moment. With all my different studies and teacher trainings, with all the different modalities of bodywork That’s all we really have as human beings. which have helped me, with my understanding of body mechanics, At 58, I believe that different styles of yoga were with my understanding of movement created for different types of people, different types of bodies. Yoga is the road. How you choose to walk it, Is my journey into teaching for all of us, the creates opportunities for growth. ‘alternative’ yogis.

The must change as our intentions and My process of being a yogi is my process of understanding change and as our bodies change. understanding this body, this breath, this mind, To observe balance between the breath and the body. Buddha Body Yoga’s trademark line is: “where large bodies find their center.” That is my touch stone.

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 15-16 6/4/18 7:58 PM OUTSIDE IN THE BRONX Anita Haravon

Taking yoga outside, being flexible – not just in the body Anita Haravon is bringing yoga to the people – all the people. Every day, Anita uses her yoga training and medical background to work with people who have great need for physical and mental restoration. Her clients include senior citizens, people of size, people with physical I teach for Shape Up NYC, a right next door to a small cottage already arrived, I did not want limitations and those with lower incomes. program of New York City’s where Edgar Allen Poe lived in to turn them away. Although Department of Parks and the 1840’s.) The studio is in a cozy, I was disappointed with the Recreation. The program offers well-lit space within an art gallery. unexpected cancellation, I paused fitness classes, free-of-charge, at for a moment and took a deep community centers, senior centers I arrived to find that the room breath. I chose to overcome my and libraries all over the city. Last was unavailable for class because upset by being creative. Let’s fall, I had the pleasure of teaching it was being painted. I was told take the chairs outside! Let’s hold Chair Yoga for Seniors in the that the class must be cancelled. an outdoor class! The center’s Bronx. On a bright, crisp morning Unfortunately, no one had told staff helped us to bring a few in October, I arrived to teach at me or my students in advance. chairs outside on the grass. The the Poe Park Visitor’s Center. (It is Since three students had weather was brisk and refreshing. We had a wonderful practice: seated meditation, grounding, spinal twists, moving with the breath, feeling the autumn air. I was grateful for my students’ willingness to be flexible inside and outside of their bodies and embrace the unexpected. We shared and connected with the beauty of the outdoors and the benefits of yoga.

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 17-18 6/4/18 7:58 PM can we embody the commonly cited yoga=union It’s ok to complain and be disappointed with the concept in a community context? status quo as a starting point. We don’t need to have things worked out in our heads in order to It’s time to go beyond our comfortably conceptual begin. It’s probably better to not have it all planned OM’s and Namastes, to go beyond sending out our out. We can leave some space to observe, listen, and well-meaning Shantis from our cloistered privilege. remain open to what arises. Let’s take catchwords, like “diversity,” “inclusion” and “oneness,” so commonly spoken in spiritual Let’s start with the breath and move from there. circles, to heart. Let’s be open to exploring and connecting outside the familiar. COMPLAINTS AND QUESTIONS: ACCESSIBLE YOGA AND UNIVERSAL ACCESS Shana Sandler specializes in facilitating yoga classes that are welcoming to people of all abilities. In addition to being on staff at Ahimsa Yoga Toronto, she has taught at the Miles Nadal Jewish Community Centre, women’s shelters, various after school programs, Community Living Toronto, and she teaches Chair Yoga for seniors. In 2017 Shana founded Shana Sandler Inclusive Yoga Community Toronto, a weekly drop-in Accessible Yoga class. Shana is passionate about expanding yoga’s reach through classes that embrace universal access. Drawing upon the facets of yoga that can be shared by everyone, Shana creates an affirming I’ll admit it. I’m opinionated and prone to there is no net. Perhaps it’s as simple as connecting space that brings people together in community. complaining. I point fingers at others and with aspects of the practice that are universal and criticize what they’re doing and not doing. It’s available to everyone. We won’t know unless we try. so much easier to make other people wrong isn’t it? Self-righteousness was mine to hide In 2017 I founded Inclusive Yoga Community behind until I decided to transform that Toronto, a weekly drop-in class that welcomes opinionated fire into action. everyone. It is not a class for people with disabilities; it’s a space where people of all abilities I was always struck by the lack of accessibility, practice together. There have been people from the diversity and inclusion in yoga studios. Change mainstream yoga community who have come, but is coming and I’m thrilled to see the explosion of the number is small. This both baffles and saddens people out there me. I’ll receive kind creating yoga for all. “It’s about sharing yoga and expanding words about this our community.” wonderful thing I’m My focus isn’t about doing, but I don’t advocating for a particular group, but about the want it to be separate, special, alternative or a possibility of creating an all levels integrated class “good deed.” It’s about sharing yoga and expanding where no one is excluded. This is not a class for our community. people with disabilities, which can perpetuate separation, but a universal access class where When I started exploring Accessible Yoga, I began people of all abilities come together. I’m not saying with these questions: specialized classes aren’t needed, but there are times when people want to attend a class that isn’t What would an all levels class that excludes no one for anyone, but for everyone. look like? What if we didn’t automatically default to categorizing ourselves based solely on physical When sharing my thoughts about integrated yoga, ability? a typical response is: “Who is your target group? How can you teach a class that serves everyone? How could mainstream yogis benefit from a Why would a mainstream yogi take a chair yoga different kind of practice outside the typical asana- class? You’re casting the net too wide.” Maybe centric experience, connecting with practitioners who would never have access to a studio? How

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 19-20 6/4/18 7:58 PM The proprietary attitude of various schools over “yogic truth” can provide for a while the engaged heat of dialectic. But like passionate and aggressive lovers melting into each other, the proprietary schools could resolve their quarrels with a fire that illuminates, as the notion of ownership burns. Nobody has the truth. Truth is the product of sharing what seems to be true. We all inquire into yoga. From the book, “threads of yoga” by Matthew Remski, 2012 EVOLUTION THROUGH HACKING Matthew Remski is a yoga teacher, trainer, and consultant. He writes about cult Matthew Remski dynamics and adverse experiences in yoga culture at www.matthewremski.com. His forthcoming book is called Shadow Pose: Stories of Trauma and Healing in . He is represented by Westwood Creative Artists. He lives in Toronto with his partner and their two sons. There is an old riddle: the blade of a knife, no matter practices. Neuroscience smashes mind-body how sharp, cannot cut itself. The problem with dualism. Language theory shows our self-referential looking at consciousness is that we are consciously circularity, illuminating the problem of black-box looking. The I that looks for itself looks through the consciousness. And then there is meditation itself, lens of the I’s eye. in which all cognitive Consciousness “The yogi is a hacker dedicated to breaking ventures come into a still is the black box the protected and protective code...“ focus. Meditation is like of experience. a key generator. Each Consciousness is moment of integration like proprietary software both produced by and sold (and there are so many we haven’t been invited to the end-user: our sense-of-isolated-self. to recognize!) spits out a key-code to unlock the product of our self-possession. Consciousness wants The yogi is a hacker dedicated to breaking the to make money (identity) out of its privacy. But the protected and protective code of our self-enclosed yogi is a self-hacking Robin Hood. conscious life with awareness. She reverse- engineers how we went from being immersed By strict cultural code, hackers share everything in our livingworld to believing in our separation they learn. The discoveries of any individual must and its permanence. Key hacking codes include enrich the hive. And as they do, the individual evolutionary biology, developmental psychology, expands, and her boundaries become more porous, neuroscience, and language theory. Evolutionary and she craves yet more intersubjectivity. Yoga biology provides us with a working model of how should in the end be completely open-source, everything makes itself, changes, and improves where open-source is the medium of empathy, according to innate desire, rather than divine fiat. so that everyone can read the code, reflect each Developmental psychology allows us to empirically other’s creations, and alter it towards their novel unfold layers of mental function so that we can applications. clearly see what we are treating through meditative

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 21-22 6/4/18 7:58 PM Chris Stigas: 3 years ago I suffered a spinal cord injury in my condo as I fell in my own bathroom into my bathtub and lay there for 15 hours until I was rescued. I was told I would never breath, eat, or possibly speak on my own ever again. Through breathing exercises and positive frame of mind I managed to recover all 3. As life would have it I reconnected with my high school friend Sharon, who introduced me to yoga and the healing powers of YOGA IS FOR EVERYBODY, AND EVERY BODY breathing, meditation and a positive mindset, all building on my existing path to recovery. I’m so excited to be part of such an important and monumental movement with all the possibilities and hope it brings to people in similar body abilities. Chris Stigas

It seems like in today’s current and two arms behind your legs. have for me to enjoy and feel the culture everyone is more Two people standing on three benefits of yoga on many different concerned about being image toes, etc. For the newcomer this levels. perfect rather then authentic. can easily translate into “Oh, I Our pictures are not a snapshot can’t do that” or “ I don’t look like The Accessible Yoga Conference of a sliver of life, but more like that”. These perfect images can in Toronto is designed to bring a presentation of a repeated effectively block the beginner out this key piece of awareness to moment until the desired of practicing yoga, which can be people already within the yoga outcome of community, as well as to bring awesomeness is this perspective to those captured. We can Yoga lets me focus on the range of motion who want to try yoga, but re-take and re-take that I do have...“ are intimidated by the to achieve this. To picture perfect images even further this idea we can add one of life’s most inclusive types that are so prevalent. a filter, crop, or even move the of exercise. I’m very grateful to have my shot plus or minus three seconds, For me, after my spinal cord injury, friend Sharon, an accessible yoga if needed, to catch us with our instructor who also believes in eyes open. yoga is one of the few exercises I can still participate in. I am only this approach. She has introduced Unfortunately I see this condition able to Independently move my me to this truth. infecting the yoga community. upper body. Yoga lets me focus Inspired by her words, yoga is for We constantly see pictures of on the range of motion that I everybody, and every BODY. these “perfect bodies” performing do have, on breathing, and on poses that simply baffle the calming the mind. It has nothing masses. Upside down on one to do with what position I can get arm, one leg behind your back into or what body composition I

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 25-26 6/4/18 7:58 PM This is why creating a culture of consent is so doesn’t value consent. By demonstrating that essential for yoga studios. In a larger social world consent is important to us, I believe we may be able where consent is not seen as normal or natural to empower a shift in culture. Ultimately consent and where rights to bodily autonomy is often helps us to cultivate a safer space.” questioned, it can feel embarrassing, challenging, By including these cards, yoga instructors CREATING A CULTURE OF CONSENT THROUGH or even impossible to articulate needs (or worse, if you do articulate your needs, they aren’t heard!). communicate a vital message to their students. YOGA PRACTICE Many facets of Western culture often teaches us that Consent cards, if well integrated into a studio’s we do not know our bodies and mind – in fact we culture, highlight that their community prioritizes are encouraged to disconnect. Which is, of course, informed choice, accountability, and student’s antithetical to a practice of mindfulness through agency regarding their own bodies. It allows Tobias B. D. Wiggins yoga, but still present in a yoga practice taken/up by everyone to develop self-awareness, empowering the West. To touch and be touched is not an uncomplicated Consent has been discussed in many venues, but is Creating a culture of consent in a yoga studio is matter. There is something immediately profound mostly tied to feminist movements that challenge about much more than asking permission to touch and tender about physical proximity to another naturalized sexual violence and slut shaming, while each other. It’s about actively challenging a social being. Touch takes trust and elicits vulnerability; it also supporting survivors of assault. But discussions world that tells us we don’t know ourselves and is the vulnerability of two people connecting, of about consent reach far beyond sex, to thinking our bodies, that renders self-care suspect, and one letting the other into the private space of their about agency more broadly, and our right to say encourages us to push ourselves past our limits. own body. “yes,” “no,” and to change our minds in any situation. Crafting a culture of consent means valuing our From feminism we’ve learned that consent cannot many different identities and histories, with the In most Western yoga studios, physical adjustments be implied; consent cannot be assumed from the knowledge that those identities and histories are from the instructor have become a taken-for-granted absence of a “no,” as it requires an active “yes” that an intimate part of “showing up” in our practice part of the practice. And like other customary can be revoked at any time, without shame. through body, breath, and movement. It’s about practices, it sometimes becomes difficult to question normalizing conversations about boundaries, self- its normalization. In other words, it can be most Because Western yoga spaces carry the taken-for- love, and choice. challenging to dispute “the way things are,” to granted notion that adjustments are desirable, yoga disagree with a set instructors can also face Touch is important. It is also a beautiful part of yoga of unspoken rules regular pressure to give – allowing someone who has committed a part of that govern a studio Crafting a culture of consent means valuing our them. This includes the their life to the practice, to impart their knowledge both teachers and students in the processes space or larger many different identities and histories...“ subtle message that if through physical connection. This is why tools like of offering and receiving adjustments. Most community. they do not give expert consent cards, which allow students to flip between a importantly, it is through having these conversations, physical assistance, they are not a “good enough” “yes” and a “no” during their practice, are so essential. Some people crave the deepening or alignment with each other, that we can continue to build the teacher. The uncertainty about how to actually These cards are becoming more common in studios that can come from the steady and knowledgeable types of healing communities we truly need to thrive. get reliable consent to touch students may create across North America, including their introduction in hands of an yoga instructor, while others – perhaps additional stress. Toronto by Christi-an Slomka and Jamilah Maiika in I want to acknowledge Christi-an Slomka (http:// those whose have survived trauma, who are socially May 2013. Other local studios have been following www.lakesofdevotion.ca), and thank her for her marginalized, or who live with chronic pain – A yoga teacher may try to ask the student out-loud suit, including Union Yoga’s upcoming launch of contributions to my thoughts and progress towards might have more mixed feelings. In reality though, during a class: “can I offer you an adjustment?” But their cards in August 2017. Slomka shared in an writing this article. I’m continually moved and everyone’s desire to be touched can change day to for many reasons this question restricts an easy, interview the year of their release: inspired by your yoga practice and politicized day, and even from moment to moment. straightforward response. The teacher might already care work. be so close to touching the student that saying “no” “We can’t always know what someone has been Many yoga communities have begun to recognize feels hard, there may be concern that saying “no” through and if touch may be a trigger (especially Previously published by Union Yoga Studio at how social and political issues impact our personal in a public space to a generous offer is rude, or the when it comes without consent). Rape and sexual http://www.unionyogastudio.ca/ practice – including discussions about how cultural student may not believe that a “no” is really possible. abuse can continue unchecked in a culture that appropriation, capitalism, racism, body positivity, and And because of these and other restrictions, students feminism all transform yoga spaces. As a holistic and might be given an unwanted adjustment, one that embodied movement, the physical components of Tobias B. D. Wiggins is a PhD candidate, consultant, and social justice advocate in Toronto, Ontario. In perhaps carries negative emotional or physical the department of Gender, Feminist, and Women’s Studies at York University, he teaches and writes on teaching must also then, consider the politics ramification. of consent. interdisciplinary topics relating to sexuality, gender, race and racism, dis/ability, and colonization. His dissertation research explores contemporary issues of transgender identity and mental health. You can find him at https://www.tobywiggins.com or on Twitter @wigginstobias. 27 28

AYC_Toronto2018.indd 27-28 6/4/18 7:58 PM especially for mental health to feeling ok with other things. survivors, we are at the mercy deny our full experience. There are some of us who cannot of our programming. Yoga is for “choose” our thoughts. Some of everyBODY and it doesn’t always I have been exploring the ideas of us are at the mercy of the waves need to feel or be positive. body neutrality, being ok with not that are our fluctuating thoughts. liking certain things, and maybe For some like me, who are cult

GROWING MUSHROOMS FROM SHIT Tiffany Rose is one of the only TRAUMA INFORMED YOGA empirically trained PTSD Yoga educators and facilitators in Alberta, she owns LacOMbe Yoga and is on faculty with several teacher training Tiffany Rose academies, she also teaches workshops for people who serve and support those who may be living with the effects of trauma. She writes about her own lived I’ve been in eating disorder – that I was able to feel like I was One of the mushrooms to experience with Complex PTSD recovery for over 25 years, I also living. blossom from all this shit is that I and Yoga at Unguru.ca. live with severe mental illness. am able to use my hyper vigilance My area of expertise is in yoga for I embrace the fact that there are (developed through years of mental health, I teach PTSD Yoga parts of myself that I fucking hate. abuse) to gain some sensitivity and work regularly with people Especially that asshole “Rick” into the “energy” of others, I who live with ongoing mental who sits at the back of my mental can read a room pretty well. health concerns. theatre and yells “kill yourself”, This makes me a sensitive yoga teacher and the feedback I’ve The brain is part of the body. I hate that guy. The best way I have developed to keep living received from my students is that I I have chronic illnesses that will in a body that wants me to die, help them have a feeling never go away. In order to survive wasn’t through positivity. It was of safety. I have done herculean “Some of us are at the mercy of the waves An important element internal work with of trauma sensitivity my mind that helps that are our fluctuating thoughts.“ is autonomy, which me live. That work, means we do not the most effective define an experience for our action I have ever taken and the through finding a way to make art students, thing that keeps me showing with shit, and sometimes art isn’t and can also be viewed as a part up day after day for my family, positive. of ahimsa. for my work, and for the world, was in embracing negativity. It My work with trauma and yoga Forcing our students to adopt wasn’t until I stood and faced is based in knowledge, but also any mentality or dogma in order and witnessed and held space for in the lived experience that has to feel like they can participate is all the darkness, all the horrible been boiled into my bones from not allowing them to experience thoughts, all the never quiet a lifetime of surfing constant their own truth. I think it’s scary to screaming voices, the one dark trauma, upheaval and heavy allow people their full experience booming drum of a voice that dark things. especially if it feels negative calls to me daily to end my life or “toxic” to us. It is damaging

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 29-30 6/4/18 7:58 PM the community’s collective grief over his passing, * I recently discovered in March of 2018, through a I began to advocate for awareness around mental psychiatric reassessment, that my bipolar II diagnosis health challenges, and for the first time I felt grateful was in fact a misdiagnosis, and I currently do not for my own traumas, wounds and challenges. I have any diagnosis. My journey through the mental could see that they weren’t anything to feel shame health system will be part of my discussion during the for. They were gifts, intimately planted inside my Accessible Yoga Conference in Toronto in June, as well body, meant for me, meant for me to care for and to as future articles. love and grieve. They were braille-like texts woven into my nerves that I could touch and translate and teach from. ON YOGA, GRIEF & MENTAL HEALTH CHALLENGES David Rendall began practicing yoga āsana and meditation in 2003 at age 17 to ease his depression, anxiety and racing thoughts. In 2013, he completed his training at Downward David Rendall Dog and has since taught at Yoga Star, Yoga Village & Mount Sinai Hospital. David teaches slowed down, gentler, student-centered versions of the traditional ashtanga-vinyāsa sequences & restorative hatha postures. He holds a safe and thoughtfully-sequenced space, guiding students towards inner exploration, balance and integration. David serves as a mental health advocate through public speaking, writing, and visual art – www. frameofmind.blog. He is currently finishing his studies as a massage therapist at Kikkawa Michael Stone was my teacher for 6 years. He vulnerable times. How can invisible suffering be College, where he’s done clinic outreach with cerebral palsy and AIDS patients. deepened my practice of yoga and Zen and like welcomed to heal in relationships, communities and thousands of his other students, he taught me ways practice spaces? How can our sense of shame be to love the parts of myself that were broken. In lessened? the year before he died, he gave me an important gift - he disclosed to me his bipolar diagnosis. I’d These days, I am acknowledging what brought me reached out to him around my own diagnosis to practice in the first place – anxiety, depression, – bipolar II*. He shared his heartfelt support, racing thoughts, deeply woven traumas and the treatment advice and feeling of being unsafe ways for me to connect “In yoga, I discovered the basic sanity in my own body. I began these practices nearly 16 to practice. He seemed of my body and breath...” surefooted in his own years ago in the offices of health… did anyone my cognitive behavioral expect him to stumble? When he died, he died therapist - an East Coast nurse, and Buddhist – who human, imperfect and stumbling. I think we were offered me her embodied compassion. Not long all painfully reminded how vulnerable we are. after I began Zen meditation and yoga practices. In yoga, I discovered the basic sanity of my body and Michael died seeking relief. He took a street drug breath, and ways to balance the thermostat of my and accidentally overdosed. For many years he nervous system. Empowered by this, and with the managed his health and even thrived with yoga, support of community, I didn’t feel so alone. meditation practices and therapy. As a Buddhist and yoga teacher, he taught people how to When I met Michael 6 years ago, he inspired me to navigate their suffering. What drove him towards become a teacher. I did my training, but it took a his tragic fate? Will we ever know? All we know long time to step into the role. I didn’t know how is that while practice can hold some suffering to teach from my heart, from the place that had sometimes, it cannot hold all suffering all the time. brought me to practice. I substituted for several We need each other so much, sometimes in ways years and only in the past year did I begin to hold that are not always available. Many struggling my own classes. When Michael died, I felt I began through mental health challenges will traverse to know who I was as a teacher. In my grief, and

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 33-34 6/4/18 7:58 PM “but it always hurts, so how do I Yoga teachers and therapists effectively and safely; but it takes know when to stop?” The advice can gain an understanding of time, patience and a willingness to “stop when it hurts’” is rarely the basics of pain science and and commitment to learn, on our effective to help the person in experience yoga practices and part, to understand more about YOGA AS AN ACCESSIBLE, SAFE AND pain reach their goals of being movement guidelines that are pain and to practice working with EFFECTIVE PRACTICE FOR PEOPLE WITH able to progress movement and accessible and adaptable for and helping people in pain. improve function. We know that people living with PERSISTENT PAIN pain alone does not give us an persistent pain. We accurate indication of the state of can use yoga to the tissue (8); so should we even help people in pain be using pain alone as a guide to move and live with Shelly Prosko tell us when to stop moving? But more ease, improve if we push past the pain, how do function and be we know if damage is occurring or empowered to if it will cause a flare up? manage their pain

There are approximately 100 and other health issues as an improving functional outcomes million Americans, 1 in 5 adult adjunct to treatment. Some for people with chronic pain and Shelly Prosko, PT, PYT, CPI, C-IAYT is a Canadians and 1.5 billion people healthcare professionals, like pain associated disorders (5, 6, 7). Physical Therapist and Professional Yoga worldwide who suffer from myself, are even integrating yoga Therapist dedicated to empowering persistent (chronic) pain (1,2). into their treatment sessions with But there’s a problem. and educating individuals to create and sustain optimal health by teaching, In 2017, The American Academy patients. Even though yoga can be a promoting and advocating for the of Pain Medicine reported that valuable option to help people Since 1998, I have been integration of yoga therapy into modern there are more people living with in pain, it unfortunately isn’t an integrating yoga practices healthcare. She is a respected pioneer of chronic pain than diabetes, cancer option for everyone. Yoga classes and philosophy into my PhysioYoga, a combination of physical and heart disease combined (3). in the community are often not therapy and yoga therapy. Please visit The opioid crisis has appropriate or accessible for www.physioyoga.ca for more info. resulted in an increased “We can use yoga to help people in people in pain for a variety awareness of the need pain move and live with more ease...” of reasons; one of which is to provide effective that the instructors may not and accessible non- physiotherapy sessions. I use my have the appropriate training, pharmacological treatment 1. National Academy of Sciences Engineering Medicine (2011). Relieving Pain in America: A Blueprint for skills, knowledge and training and they may not understand options for people suffering from Transforming Prevention, Care, Education and Research. The National Academies Press. Available from: https:// as a physiotherapist and yoga contemporary pain science. persistent pain and better pain www.nap.edu/read/13172/chapter/2. Accessed March 7, 2018. care education for healthcare therapist to assess the person and People in pain may find that 2. Schopflocher, D., Taenzer, P., & Jovey, R. (2011). The prevalence of chronic pain in Canada. Pain Research & providers. create an individualized program their pain flares up when they Management: The Journal of the Canadian Pain Society, 16(6), 445–450. guided by my clinical experience, attend a yoga class, regardless Can yoga be part of the solution? the best current evidence and the of the type of class. Sometimes 3. American Academy of Pain Medicine (2017). AAPM Facts and Figures on Pain. Available from: http://www. I think so. Over 30 million person’s values, needs and goals. even gentle, restorative, chair or painmed.org/patientcenter/facts_on_pain.aspx. Accessed March 7, 2018. Americans practice yoga (4). More I help people who suffer from a beginner classes can exacerbate 4. Cramer, H., Ward, L., Steel, A. et al (2016). Prevalence, Patterns, and Predictors of Yoga Use: Results of a U.S. and more people are looking to variety of health issues, but my symptoms in those who live with Nationally Representative Survey. American Journal of Preventative Medicine, 50(2), 230-235. yoga for overall wellness and training and experience is focused persistent pain. The common 5. Ward, L., Stebbings, S., Cherkin, D., Baxter, G.D. (2013). Yoga for Functional Ability, Pain and Psychosocial to address their specific health on helping people who live with advice is then given: “listen to Outcomes in Musculoskeletal Conditions: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. Musculoskeletal Care. 11(4), concerns. A 2016 study reported persistent pain. your body and stop if it hurts.” that back pain relief was one of 203-217. I have witnessed the benefits of Although this may appear to be the most popular health-related 6. Cramer, H., Lauche, R., Haller, H., Dobos, G. (2013). Systematic Review and Meta-analysis of Yoga for Low Back Pain. yoga for people in pain. Research sound advice in the short term, it reasons that people practiced often isn’t effective as a long term Clinical Journal of Pain. 29(5), 450-460. yoga (4). Healthcare providers is steadily growing to support the pain self-management technique. 7. Bussing, A., Osterman, T., Ludtke, R., Michalsen, A. (2012). Effects of Yoga Interventions on Pain and Pain- are recommending yoga to their use of yoga as a safe and effective approach to reducing pain and A common response we will Associated Disability: A Meta-Analysis. The Journal of Pain. 13(1),1-9. patients for stress management hear from the person in pain is, 8. Butler, DS & Moseley, GL (2003). Explain Pain. Noigroup Publications. Adelaide. 35 36

AYC_Toronto2018.indd 35-36 6/4/18 7:58 PM 2. Slow and deep breathing to help the body relax a person with any specific physical limitations. It into the posture rather than force the body into the is our responsibility then to discreetly find out the posture. reason for the limitation and to offer appropriate 3. Focusing on self-awareness of the body with modifications. Once you demonstrate such sensitivity attention to specific muscles and ligaments. and understanding – you will find that you just Awareness is also directed to any emotions or gained a loyal student! thoughts that might be arising. When these three elements are included in instructions, the asana class becomes more of “being in asana” than “doing asana.” Often, if conducted Lee Majewski, MA, DYEd, C-IAYT is the skillfully, such an asana class feels like a meditation founding director of Yoga For Health Institute in slow movement. This is purposeful in that it helps in Toronto, Canada. She also is a Senior Yoga to provide safe body engagement, and it allows Therapist at Kaivalyadhama Yoga Institute, INCREASING BODY AWARENESS IN STUDENTS WITH CANCER the student to release accumulated tension. It also the world’s oldest yoga institute located in builds self-awareness in clients, who typically are Lonavla, India. Her own journey through disconnected from their body. Finally, and perhaps cancer brought home the value of ancient Lee Majewski most importantly, it gives power back to clients to yogic methods and techniques to facilitate do what is comfortable and not necessarily what the self-empowerment and healing in her life. teacher instructs them to do. For more information on Beyond Cancer or On our part we, as yoga teachers, have to be Chronic Solution retreats you may contact extremely attentive to students needs and recognize Lee directly at [email protected]

In 2006 life served me the unexpected experience People who come to a group yoga class and do not of a cancer journey. The treatments lasted almost talk to the instructor before the class, usually are in 3 years and changed my life completely, giving it early stages of diagnosis and before any surgery. new and unexpected direction. In the last 10 years Others may be well recovered after surgery but do I progressed from corporate management to full have some movement limitations. There are also time yoga teacher and then yoga therapist, certified those who didn’t have an operation at all, but the by the International Association of Yoga Therapist. nature of their cancer may present some limitation Today I work mainly in their movements. with students with “Often, if conducted skillfully, such an asana class All these cases call cancer and non- feels like a meditation in slow movement.” for a specific and communicative cautious approach diseases (NCD). to asanas. It also calls Working with students who have cancer is especially for abandoning extremely challenging asanas and rewarding although it can be quite challenging. offering modifications or alternatives to the class. There are many different cancers and typically 4 Usually, while teaching asana, we tend to put an main stages of progression of these diseases. Each emphasis on the body alignment – and rightly type of cancer and each stage has its own challenges so to avoid any injuries. However asana class for and limitations, yet for each of these stages, yoga students with cancer moves the emphasis from offers tools of relief. In a group class it is not always body alignment to the student’s awareness of his/ possible to know where in the cancer journey the her limitations. Therefore, we focus on three major person is. Therefore, I will outline a general concept elements, which are reflected by the instructions: of how to safely teach an asana class with clients who 1. Sensing the body’s limits in asana and backing off have a broad range of needs in attendance. while holding onto the essence of the pose.

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 37-38 6/4/18 7:58 PM because they feel that they were to the point that the joint will taught. If they didn’t learn it, let down by yoga. I don’t believe become loose and sloppy. Loose how can they teach it? Practice that yoga was the cause. It was joints make many more advanced Svadhyaya (self-study.) Explore. extreme physical versions of poses accessible. The question Listen to and honor your students yoga that lead to their issues. If is, are you willing to give up and your own experience. Learn WHY CAN’T MY BODY DO THAT? you study ahimsa how the body (the principle of “Learn how the body creates natural limits, and when creates natural nonviolence to you should and shouldn’t push past those limits. ” limits, and when Tracey all living things), you should and how can you ask students to push comfort in walking in your senior shouldn’t push past those limits. through pain and discomfort to years for the chance to say that These tools are available to all accomplish a pose? you could once put your foot teachers and students of yoga. Eccleston behind your head? They make yoga truly accessible. Joints are meant to be stable. In my late teens, I hit a yoga I did push to accomplish a pose, type is long, slender and hyper- Yes, we can stretch and stretch Yoga is a lineage-based system. plateau. It seemed no matter how I risked injury? Finally, why did flexible. My experience is that and eventually they will stretch Teachers teach what they were hard I worked on certain poses, my Yoga Teacher Training not when something comes easy, they simply weren’t accessible educate me about proportions, you don’t know what you don’t to me. I felt like a failure. I’d been compression vs. tension and know. It may be hard for someone Tracey Eccleston, IAYT, E-RYT 500, IPT, is owner & educational director of Ageless Arts told over and over if you practice orientation? who has pretzel knees and hips Yoga offering a 200 hour Yoga Teacher Training and many workshops. She is the creator a pose every day for a year, you’d to understand the difficulty of two Chair Yoga Teacher Trainings – “The Foundations of Chair Yoga” &” Chair Yoga be able to accomplish it. Yet I still Let’s start with why our teachers sitting in if their are not educating us about Therapeutics; Balance & Support.” After completing her 200 & 500-hour yoga teacher struggled with many poses. student doesn’t have the same training, Tracey saw the need to make yoga even more accessible. She studied and was the body’s natural limitations? physiological make up. Why did no one tell me that the I suspect it’s because many co-director of Lakshmi Voelker Chair Yoga. design of my body could be yoga teachers have “traditional I was blown away the first time I causing the limitations? Or that if yogini bodies.” Their body watched “Anatomy for Yoga with .” I had no idea how drastically my short arms affected my asanas. I was shocked to learn that my ankle joints created limitations. I was also surprised to see that not everyone could touch their chin to their sternum, or raise their arms behind their head. Now I understand why so many students don’t have a straight line in downward dog and/or struggle in shoulder stand and plough. What hit me the most was that as a teacher I was potentially putting my students in risk of injury. Which leads us to the problem of idolizing the hyper-flexible and the lack of education about “overstretching.” I’ve noticed in the last 5-10 years many of my teachers have had hip and knee replacements. They are now struggling with their yoga practice

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 39-40 6/4/18 7:58 PM Position Simple support students with anxiety, Think about where you position Less is more. An anxious mind depression or a history of yourself as a teacher. If you are cannot follow complicated jargon trauma. They can leave the class inviting students to close their and instructions. Save Sanskrit with a sense of ease and clarity. eyes in a vulnerable posture like terms and detailed anatomy These simple steps can foster a WHAT IF BEGINNER MIND = ANXIOUS MIND? Savasana, sit down and speak for more experienced students. desire to return to class with a from a single location. Being Repetition is helpful, not boring. better understanding of how the able to locate your voice in a Repetition is also reassuring. tools of yoga can support them Linda Varnam stationary spot will help them to in their journey. feel more secure. Using these simple guidelines can

Linda Varnam is a Certified Yoga Therapist and Qigong Instructor. Her passion is empowering students to include the valuable wisdom of yoga and qigong as powerful tools for daily living. Her extensive experience includes developing a seven week breathing program while a member of a clinical team in a holistic mental health program servicing international clientele.

I love to travel. I often include a issues of mental health, both new environment it is reassuring yoga class in my itinerary. I find personally and professionally. I to be welcomed and perhaps the experience of going to a am often caused to consider: How receive a short description of the new teacher, hearing a different can we as yoga professionals hold lay out. “Great to see you. Props perspective, and allowing space for anyone struggling with are here, washroom is here …” myself to be the student, a wonderful opportunity to “When anxious about a new Invite learn for my own teaching. environment it is reassuring to be Use language that invites Being in a new space, but is also clear. For listening to a new voice, not welcomed...” example, an invitation knowing what will happen like “Make yourself next, and noticing how that feels, mental illness? How can we create comfortable,” can often feel vague I am reminded of how much the opportunity for safe entry and create confusion. Be clear. Try energy and attention it can take and continued support to explore “You may wish to use a blanket for to attend a class. the practices of yoga as tools for warmth; if so, please feel free to healing and recovery? From the take one from the shelf.” I remember many years ago pacing perspective of a beginner mind the pavement outside a yoga and an anxious mind, I have found Choice studio and willing myself to go in, these few simple considerations Empower people with clear to overcome my anxiety and fear to make a huge difference. choices. If the choices are too and take that step. Fortunately, I vague, this may lead an anxious made it inside and to the class. My Welcome person to feel overwhelmed and life has changed since. This may feel obvious, but I even more anxious and unsure of My journey practicing and am surprised it doesn’t always what to do. teaching revolves around the happen. When anxious about a

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 41-42 6/4/18 7:58 PM This is what is often known in Sanskrit as Sangha. By doing a physical yoga practice, we offer ourselves care to develop our own personal path If we practice ahimsa, aparigraha, satya and asteya, to peace. We can’t only serve ourselves, however, we bring Patañjali’s ethics to support the many as Lara demonstrates; a feminist ethics of care in USING THE LANGUAGE OF YOGA truths of diverse communities and their experiences yoga means that we create a diverse and inclusive in order to make yoga inclusive and accessible. By TOWARD AN AUTHENTIC FEMINIST ETHICS community. This community of like-minded people using Patañjali’s language in our discussion of a supports and inspires each other to serve and OF CARE feminist yoga ethic, we also make an attempt at grow together. There is much potential for healing, staying true to the dharmic tradition from where personal growth, and social change if we practice yoga descends. Even if we are not necessarily a feminist ethics of care in our yoga practices and connected to a guru-based lineage, we can still community. be connected to our practice community by using Judith Mintz these terms and understanding their implications.

“Feminism is the struggle to end sexist oppression” work toward sharing rather than clinging to power, Judith Mintz is a PhD Candidate in the Gender, Feminist, and Women’s Studies program at (bell hooks). Feminism asks us to re-think and re-set which would otherwise perpetuate violence. We can York University, Toronto. The title of her dissertation is “Gender, Health and Cross-Cultural our power relations and our privilege from all our expand the ways in which we understand concepts Consumption in North American Yoga Communities: A Post-Colonial Feminist Ethnography.” intersecting positions in society. Feminism is not such as ahimsa and aparigraha into notions of A yoga teacher and shiatsu therapist since 1998, Judith turned to the academic world only for women, but as a social movement, it has how we can care for one another and ourselves. to examine the conflicts and contradictions in the holistic health world and to develop the power, says hooks, to transform all of our lives in The yama “satya,” or honesty, relates to a personally frameworks for accessibility. a meaningful way through authentic approach to living intersectional community “This community of like-minded people and being in the world involvement. We need a supports and inspires each other to serve (Stone). Satya and ahimsa feminist ethics of care in and grow together.” are “inherently connected” yoga not because there (Gonzales and Eckstrom). are a lot of women in the Satya is more than telling North American yoga world, but because through the truth to others; it is connected to how we focus yoga, many people have unwittingly replicated our awareness on the honesty of our yoga practice, conditions of social inequality through expensive our desires, and how we moderate these desires. classes and gear, body idealism, and multi-level For example, we can consider satya through the cultural insensitivity. Through an ethos of a feminist authenticity of how we are in our bodies when we ethics of care, we can create a truly accessible practice yoga. practice that fosters a connection to social action and authentic yoga. Using Patañjali’s Yoga Sutras as To demonstrate how we might integrate the Yoga a philosophical framework we can develop ethical Sūtras with a feminist ethics of care, I’ll share an guidelines that incorporate feminist principles that example of “Lara.” Since 2013, Lara has been help shift the power relationships in our society. teaching a weekly chair yoga class to a committed To get an idea of how we integrate feminist care group of women in their 60s and 70s. The class fee with yoga ethics, we need to explore Patañjali’s is $9, which pays for the rental of the space; Lara teachings on the yamas or his ethical precepts. leads the class without payment. Lara keeps yoga For this article, we’ll briefly focus on ahimsa (non- accessible to people in her community both on a violence), aparigraha (non-greed), satya (truth), and physical and monetary level. She puts the benefits asteya (non-stealing). of the practice first, rather than turn yoga into a commercial project driven by financial gain. While Much has been written on the yogic social ethical not everyone can afford to teach for no pay, Lara’s practices known as the yamas. As yoga practitioners example is worth considering. Lara has created an developing a feminist ethics of care founded on inclusive community of practitioners who support inclusivity and accessibility, it is important that we each other spiritually, emotionally, and physically.

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 43-44 6/4/18 7:58 PM ever experienced on my mat connected to the next. the point. There was a mystery to my being that It was like an ever-growing beaded necklace. And yoga was starting to bring to the surface. It broke as it grew longer, each pearl deepened into a more through to my conscious awareness that day at lustrous beauty, creating a new layer of experience Walden Pond. with each day of practice. -- Adapted from Carol Horton, Yoga PhD: Integrating And it came to me that day that all my issues the Life of the Mind & the Wisdom of the Body, Chapter about work and family, identity and ambition, 5 (Kleio Books, 2012) professionalism and feminism, were really not

Carol Horton, Ph.D., is a writer, educator, and activist working at the intersection of , social science, and social justice. She is vice-president of the Yoga Service Council and a co-founder of Chicago’s Socially Engaged Yoga Network. Carol has written four books and A STRAND OF PEARLS THREADING THROUGH MY DAYS: numerous articles about yoga, and serves as an associate editor for Asian Medicine: Tradition YOGA AS SPIRITUAL PRACTICE and Modernity, and peer reviewer for Race and Yoga. Carol Horton

The first time I experienced a visceral understanding summer afternoon. The disjuncture between the of yoga as a spiritual practice, I was standing wonder of the setting and the angst inside me was knee-deep in the late summer water of Walden simultaneously painful and absurd. Pond – that very same place where Thoreau once contemplated the lessons of nature, the nature of I knew this. But knowing it did no good. America, and the wisdom of the Bhagavad-Gita back And then, in a fleeting instant of a moment, I made in the early 19th century. a shift. I let go of my internal turmoil and looked up I was irritable. I’d moved to the Boston area for at the sky. The sun was starting to set, in multiple the year with my husband and two small children tones of red, yellow, orange, gold. The clouds had because he’d received an academic fellowship at just parted enough to see it clearly. I felt my feet on MIT. This was, of course, good. We were fortunate. the earth, legs in the water, heart open to the air, Yet I felt disgruntled, cranky, and dissatisfied. eyes toward the sky. Everything that had been so preoccupying simply Work-wise, I’d been “There was a mystery to my being that yoga dropped away. And able to take a paid the universe opened research project was starting to bring to the surface.” to me in a moment. with me to complete in absentia. But to do so, I’d forsaken my spartan, The feeling was but nonetheless professional downtown office timeless. But it was also newly nuanced. Because for telecommuting from a lovely, but nonetheless rather than being an isolated instance of grace, it lonely suburban café. felt embedded in a growing chain of similar, if less dramatic experiences. And this feeling of familiarity, My head was spinning with self-absorbed anxieties. I felt certain, came from the growing momentum of My heart felt tightly bound up with packing tape. my yoga practice. Why had I left academia? Why had I left Chicago? Why this; why that? I knew my obsessing was a And the words came to me like a vision. My yoga waste. But I couldn’t stop. practice was like a strand of pearls threading through my days. In my mind’s eye, I saw the Here I was, lucky enough to be able to take my slow, ongoing process through which each small two little boys to the legendary Walden Pond on a moment of internal stillness and spaciousness I’d

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 45-46 6/4/18 7:58 PM falls, has beginnings and endings, my students feel the energy come then the “Finale.” I would like to and middle parts where little is in from the farthest star in the see a kinder world, and I keep happening; so does work in the universe through their fingertips, trying to envision it every day in classroom. Everything is unfolding as the imagination brings energy the “Development” of my own in the “Development” section in through the body. To help others long life. I draw a larger circle a symphony. There are sparks of more fully express their innermost that invites others to see the energy ready to take flight in the joy in learning, we do not need possibilities; even as I move slowly final “Allegro”. Keeping awake and to fear new things and different in the dark at times, wondering aware, with unexpected moments ways of thinking. where it is all going, or as I draw of surprise is part of what I love in a deeper 3 part breath coming to do. I also use the knowledge I Life is so like a symphony. There home on the bus. gained crossing a lake in the dark are exciting parts, and there ACCESSIBLE YOGA FOR SENIORS IN AN URBAN to climb a mountain. I like to have are slower parts. There is the ENVIRONMENT “Allegro” and the “Lento”, and

Judy Mirabai Hubbell Judy Hubbell (Mirabai) presently teaches Accessible Yoga, T’ai Chi Chih, Breath and Vocal Resonance to seniors through her Mind Body and Body Dynamics I classes in the Excelsior & Mission Neighborhoods of SF. She serves to build community throughout the City of San Francisco and as Chair CCSF’s Older Adults Department. Judy sees her work as that of helping others develop the connection between the breath, body, and mind by bridging various modalities. Accessible Yoga gave me the Freedom, equality, and a sense of living styles that make life so freedom I needed to start doing justice is also strong for me. I am amazing, that we cannot run away multi-modality work after 30 years devoted to the idea of working from this complexity. of study in classical yoga, the with diversity and bringing people qigong-based world of T’ai Chi together to get a project to work Although Accessible Yoga Chih, and teaching singing. In all that invites freedom to grow. I is developing a world-wide these disciplines, the connection love to take public transportation community, a bigger circle, my of mind-body is work is to figure paramount. “To help others more fully express their innermost out how to do something like that I like starting joy in learning, we do not need to fear new things on a smaller scale. I everything from its and different ways of thinking.” enjoy intellectually roots. How does developing the the foot come down and become at the end of the day, or to walk connection between various rooted to the floor? What are the everywhere in my hiking boots, modalities, but the purpose of lines of energy in the body work even to meetings! my work is not only developing we do with Accessible Yoga? a program that meets the needs How do we maintain alignment? As we know, every circle may of seniors, but one that has at How does the breath and voice start small but eventually grows its essence the joy of life-long fit into the world of mind-body larger. In my job of running learning. Students of all ages can for health? As a professional a program in a big city, I am laugh, sing, and use their voices to singer until the late 80’s I had committed to working with empower movement and feel the also become very interested in diversity and advocating for energy of the breath. contemporary classical music, seniors. My program serves those where improvisation and aged 55 to 102 of all cultural, Energy can be brought up technique come together in raw ethnic, and diverse backgrounds. or down as we work in the and fun ways that intrigued me. I believe it is the complexity of classroom. Music has as its essence an energy that rises and

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 47-48 6/4/18 7:58 PM conscious intentional approach being are more readily accepted the change agent in places where has made a huge difference with and understood by many it is needed. One is a concept the ambulatory population in who have had the experience called “Yoga-fit4disability,” which coming to terms with their own of adversity or trauma. I am uses both cardio and yoga to help body/mind disconnect. continually humbled and inspired clients achieve better health and ACCESSIBLE YOGA VOICE by those people who have to well-being. I am also very excited Does your special-needs teaching deal with a lot yet are still earnest about the “Recovery Deck” project affect how you teach “mainstream and diligent in their desire to I created to implement yoga in yoga”? stay positive and attuned to their hospital settings as best practices Mary-Jo Fetterly I find that teaching the special- physical, mental and spiritual for newly-injured spinal cord, needs population informs my being. brain, stroke, and cancer patients. teaching of the mainstream Finally, I am always excited about What are you excited to do next my Adaptive Yoga Training Interview by Kathleen Kraft population more than the other with your students? way around. I find that concepts program and the students who such as patience, acceptance, Lately, I have been working on are learning how to become surrender and the ability to see new projects that combine yoga adaptive yoga teachers. Where do you teach? Who is the help me deal with those feelings exists overtly in this group and oneself not just as a ‘physical’ and coaching in order to facilitate population? and distortions. Once I had ‘covertly’ in able-bodies. No established myself physically in a matter who we are or what our I teach adaptive yoga at my more grounded and familiar place physical incarnation is, we need to in-home private studio and at and I could teach to ‘the physical,’ learn how to love, care, and most Mary-Jo Fetterly is a mother of two, a Yoga Teacher/Therapist and President of Trinity rehab centers, hospitals, and I began to notice that teaching importantly, manage our physical Yoga Inc. She began her formal training in Iyengar yoga in the mid 80’s, while raising private physiotherapy centers. yoga to populations who had bodies in our experience of being children and studying psychology. She opened “Shanti Yoga Works”, the first yoga studio I also teach at the Heart and some form of trauma or physical physical. This is crucial for both to be established in Nelson, BC. During the first operational years of the Shanti Yoga studio, Stroke Foundation, populations. Mary-Jo developed a 200-hour yoga teacher training program, and formed the company Youth Without Limits “No matter who we are or what our physical Consequently, “Trinity Yoga”, which has trained hundreds of teachers since its inception. – Cerebral Palsy incarnation is, we need to learn how to love, care, I changed the Association BC, BC and most importantly, manage our physical bodies way I teach to Wheelchair Sports my adaptive Association, and Spinal in our experience of being physical.” groups so that I Cord Injury BC. I also can address the run Adaptive Yoga challenge was quite different than potential fragmentation between Teacher Training programs. I teaching a group of ambulatory the body, mind and spirit in direct enjoy teaching in my home studio people. ways, thereby moving toward a most of all because I have a lift more conscious and intentional and the equipment that is needed The concept of ‘body-betrayal’ acceptance. This slower, more to make yoga truly accessible for all bodies. Can you share an experience that stands out? Since becoming disabled, the experience of teaching and practicing yoga has been exaggerated, meaning that when I first was injured I had a very different sense of my body and who I was in my body, and as a result I needed the spiritual, non- physical tools of yoga in order to

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 49-50 6/4/18 7:58 PM am your disciple. Please teach me, for I have taken Ask yourself these questions, and let the questions refuge in you.” (Swami Satchidananda, The Living reverberate in your mind for a few moments before Gita, 2.7) going on to the next one: Arjuna represents the mind, and his willingness Who am I? in this moment to admit that he doesn’t know what to do is a turning point in the story and in Am I my body? his life. Not knowing is the beginning of a conscious Am I my mind? ASKING THE BIG QUESTIONS spiritual path. Only when Arjuna realizes he has talked himself in circles and can’t find an answer, Am I my thoughts? can he let go and allow his divine consciousness Jivana Heyman (Krishna) to guide him. Have you ever felt like Where are these thoughts coming from? Arjuna, confused and not knowing where to turn? Who is listening to the thoughts? Arjuna’s surrender represents an openness to his I remember when I was young, I would look up at India. Interestingly, there are many other scriptures own intuition and spiritual growth, which is a model Who am I? the stars in amazement and wonder what the hell that make up this rich tradition. for our own transformation. After a few minutes, deepen the breath and then was going on. Somehow the infinite space in the sky slowly open the eyes. opened up space in my mind for big questions like For many people, yoga philosophy seems confusing Arjuna’s big questions lead him to the realization and out of reach, but I’ve found these teachings that he doesn’t understand the nature of reality. “Who am I?” “What am I doing here?” and “What’s This is an excerpt from Jivana’s upcoming “Accessible offer clear answers to many of life’s big questions in He’s confused and needs help—just like me! In fact, the purpose of my life?” When I watched my older Yoga” book, to be published by Shambhala a way that nothing else has for me—and I’ve always that feeling of confusion is something I’m learning siblings reading chapter books, I thought, “Maybe Publications in 2019. Originally published on the Yoga had a lot of questions! to appreciate in my own practice. Sometimes I try those books have the answers to all my questions?” for Healthy Aging Blog. I was very disappointed when I finally started to to meditate and just end up in tears. I used to think According to these texts, the key teaching of yoga that I was too messy, but now I see that this is the read those books and realized they were all about is that each of us is an aspect of the divine, and that human drama. most powerful kind of practice. I cherish those we all have that universal consciousness within us. moments when I can cry out for help to my own As I got older, I bought into a story about my life, It’s not something we have to get or achieve—it’s inner guide, my own inner Krishna. I know that my which focused on finding a partner, settling down, our most essential self. To touch that place, we big questions are the door to answers that rest practice yoga, which is mostly about working with Jivana Heyman, C-IAYT, E-RYT500, is the making money, etc. It was a nice story, but it didn’t in my own heart, and it’s a door that can only be founder of Accessible Yoga, co-owner include those big the mind and making opened by admitting that my mind doesn’t know “I know that my big questions are the door peace with the inner of the Santa Barbara Yoga Center and questions, which the answers. After Arjuna collapses, Krishna smiles an Integral Yoga Minister. His passion is hung over me like to answers that rest in my own heart...” voices of anxiety, and begins to teach him about yoga—how to live in greed, and fear. The making yoga accessible to everyone who stars, always there, the world in a peaceful way. is interested. www.accessibleyoga.org but imperceptible in the light of day. I was obviously yoga practices are looking for some clear spiritual guidance, and I didn’t specifically designed to help calm the mind. And An Accessible Jnana find that until I started practicing yoga more deeply all those crazy yoga poses are really about how you Yoga Practice: in my twenties. As I began studying yoga philosophy feel inside! Find a very comfortable and the teachings of Swami Satchidananda, I was In the Bhagavad Gita, the big questions are offered position seated in a chair, excited to learn that the process of asking these in the context of a story about a battle. This is an seated on the ground, or questions is a key element of yoga practice, called analogy for an inner spiritual struggle. Krishna, who lying down, and check your Jnana Yoga, or the path of wisdom and self-inquiry. is the divine incarnate, counsels the protagonist, posture. Close the eyes or keep them open enough to What a relief it was to find teachings that focused Arjuna, a great warrior prince. Arjuna is about to confront his extended family in battle, and the story read these questions. Relax on the meaning of life and how to be happy. When I the body. Take a few breaths, first heard Swami Satchidananda speak, I remember begins with his emotional turmoil at the thought of fighting and killing his own kinsmen. After going focusing on long, slow sitting in stunned silence with the feeling that exhalations. he was finally addressing my big questions. He on and on about why he can’t fight, Arjuna finally constantly quoted from the Yoga Sutra of Patanjali gives up, collapses at Krishna’s feet, and tells him, and the Bhagavad Gita, two of the main sources of “I am weighed down with weak-mindedness; I am information about yoga philosophy from classical confused and cannot understand my duty. I beg of you to say for sure what is right for me to do. I

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AYC_Toronto2018.indd 53-54 6/4/18 7:58 PM Notes

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