........tiptop toes

Yogis,

I still have feet on my mind. More specifically, the toes. I wonder if I have a foot fetish?

While I was in Vancouver, one of the Yin postures we practiced was called ‘Toe Squat’. You get down on your knees with the legs together and curl your toes under so you are on the ball of the foot. Slowly you begin sending the weight of the hips back over the heels. Only until you begin to feel something. That first sensation. The beginning of discomfort.

For some, the hands will still be on the ground with a rounded back. Many may put their hands on the knees while others will be able to place their entire upper body weight on the toes by sitting upright on the heels.  It doesn’t matter. What counts is simply having the toes curled under and being able to stay for about a minute or even eventually two.  If you are feeling it, you are doing it. If after 10 seconds you have to come out……..well, you went too far. Back up.

I have been doing this as a daily practice as it helps to wake up the toes, open the bottoms of the feet, stretch the shins and strengthen the arch and ankles. I also include it now as part of each class. 

At first there were moans. Then groans. But onward we go. Doing it. Over and over. Allowing the magic of time, not our pushing, to create the change. Practicing patience.

Each time I queue the pose I remind everyone to make sure the pinkie toe goes along for the ride, as it often prefers to hang back and do nothing. It wasn’t until about two weeks ago though, that as I said it I actually looked under at my toes and much to my surprise, the pinkie toe had not been joining in! Sly little devil. I find that I must slide a finger under it each time and invite it to come forward to join the rest. You might even find that with the fourth toe.

It has been over three months for me and my toes are delighted! I began noticing real changes about a month ago and each week my feet feel different. Not sure I can put it in words other than to say my feet feel more alive, flexible and strong. I can make new movements with my toes and can draw the big toe away from the second toe with ease which I believe can help prevent bunions and other aging toe issues. 

This can be quite intense so be gentle with yourself. You can always put a blanket under the knees if the knees are sensitive. Don’t stay too long. Be ok with discomfort but remember….no pain!

Your ten little toes who you ask so much of each day will thank you.

Happy feet,
SARAH

Bee-ing me!

......5:30 am

Yogis,

5:30am and I are tight. We have known each other for over 30 years now and have spent almost every Monday through Friday together. Through the years of mothering with my big pregnant belly, through raising three boys to be men and navigating corporate life. We continue to stay together even now into my crone years as I navigate this change of life. Now that is a bond not taken lightly!

For the first ten years it was running. Up and out the door by 5:30 come rain or shine, hot or cold. Then yoga entered the scene, first once a week and then twice with conscious breathing beginning as the clock marked the time. Always up, dressed and present for whatever happens at that time of the day. Even an annual running girls holiday gift exchange……..

It is always this week, however, that a tinge of sadness creeps in as I open the door to head out. Like clockwork I know that this will be my last week of running in light.  I can already see the signs. When I return from my vacation there will be a marked difference as 5:30 will once again be shrouded in darkness, although it will ease me in by continuing to offer some light for the run back. For a while at least. 

There exists only a two-month window each year where I leave and return with the early rays of sun on the horizon and the busyness of the birds as they prepare for their day.  Even then I may cross paths with only two or three people. It is a solitary time. For the remainder of the year the streetlights are on as I watch my feet hit the pavement.  The number of human encounters dropping even further. Days I see no one.

There is an innocence to the early morning. Each night as the lights go out and we sleep, it’s as if the slate is wiped clean. A calm spread like a densely woven cotton blanket. The plants still laden with water at 5:30 from an overnight rain, washed clean of yesterday. 

Houses remain dark but for a few dim lights that I spot as I run by. Imagining the early riser of the house quietly making coffee, in their robe and slippers, trying not to wake the family. The newspapers all lying at the end of the driveways, with the news of today still bound in wrappers. Unknown.

There is also a stillness at 5:30. A quiet. Not so much of nature, but of the human world. Not yet broken by the blare of the tv, the hum of the computer, or the starting up of cars heading to work. Not even by conversations at this time of day, which once started, bring back all of yesterday’s news.  The cotton blanket kicked off as the vibration once again ratchets up.

At times as I run beneath the sun or moon, stars or rainbow, rain or snow, or practice by candlelight, I am reminded of the gift I am being given.  A time to see today before anything has been painted on it. A day filled with limitless possibilities. Able to set my own intentions for what I plan to create and drop them into the pause that exists at 5:30am.  Thank you, my friend.

Shhhhhh………
SARAH

.......bee-ing me

Yogis,

This week I chose to spend my time with the bees.

It honestly wasn’t a conscious decision. I headed out to the garden after taking Phoebe to the creek one late afternoon and noticed it was ‘bee time’. The sun no longer blazing on the bee balm, yet still gentle dappled sun, hot heavy air and several hours left before sunset. 

Bees of every size, shape and color…….

It became my daily routine.

Watching, listening and feeling them surround me as I sat.  Some avoided me, others checked me out and a few even accidently bumped into me as they flew on by. None bothered me in any way. I was simply part of their new landscape. I soon became ‘buzzed’ from their vibrations.

They also never tangled with each other. All varieties side by side as they shared the gifts the flowers had to offer. Nor do they prey on any other species. Bee-ing kind.

I then began to photograph them.

Have you ever tried to get a good picture of a bee? Well, you quickly realize where the phrase ‘busy as a bee’ comes from. They literally never sit still. Land, reach in, shimmy over, reach in, flap the wings, shake, fly to the next flower. Their wings flapping at an incredible 200 beats per second. Intent in their mission, there is no time to be wasted.

I found I had to find a spot, settle in and watch. Focus. Learning their timing and anticipating the next movement. At times standing, often on my knees and sometimes even sitting in the dirt.  Phone only inches from the hum. Steady breathing. Slow movement. No hurry. Bee-ing there fully.

In the matriarchy of the bee world, the queen rules the roost.  She lays 2000 eggs a day and the entire hive revolves around her. Directing the output of golden nutritious healing honey. Now that’s my kind of goddess!

I knew the picture I wanted.   I could see it in my minds eye.  I set my intention …….’I have a picture of a bee flying to the flower’.  I visualized it.  I ‘knew’ it would happen. Bee-lieving. I continued snapping trusting that I would capture the moment in time. And so, it came to ‘bee’…….

I am blessed to be able to share this space with the bees. Bee love.

Bee-ing me as often as possible,
SARAH

......a poet

Yogis,

“Hello, sun in my face. “

A student shared her experience of a meditation talk she had attended the night before. It had been centered around a poem by Mary Oliver, and more specifically the last line which reads…...

“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”

Mary Oliver’s writing always stops me in my tracks, touching something buried somewhere in the deep recesses of my body. A quiet inner longing that as often as I try, I can never quite put into words. She somehow does it with ease. That want to feel more. To live deeply. Be moved each moment by the beauty that awaits right outside the door. This was the third time she crossed my path reminding me to go back to read her work again.  All of the quotes here are hers.

“Ten times a day something happens to me like this - some strengthening throb of amazement - some good sweet empathic ping and swell. This is the first, the wildest and the wisest thing I know: that the soul exists and is built entirely out of attentiveness.”

Attentiveness. I often photograph for this purpose. When patience sits with me I can see ‘it’ through the lens of my camera. Feel it under my bare feet. The wind at times whispering it in my ear. And the world notices back.

As I read some of her words I often want to shout to her through the page…..hey wait, I should have written that. As if she had been walking beside me the other day on my favorite trail and somehow read my mind. Heard my inner voice.

Ordinarily, I go to the woods alone, with not a single
friend, for they are all smilers and talkers and therefore 
unsuitable.

“I don’t really want to be witnessed talking to the catbirds 
or hugging the old black oak tree. I have my way of 
praying, as you no doubt have yours. 

Besides, when I am alone I can become invisible. I can sit
on the top of a dune as motionless as an uprise of weeds, 
until the foxes run by unconcerned. I can hear the almost
unhearable sound of the roses singing.

If you have ever gone to the woods with me, I must love
you very much.” 

I too can be invisible.

This morning while meditating a stirring opened my eyes. Through the open window I watch a fox emerge from the brush, soundlessly lifting onto my wood pile. Followed by another. And then one more, but this last one needing that quick frolic in the grass first. Following the leader. Perhaps a dad teaching the art of hunting. Or siblings out for their first solo adventure. For one brief moment they pause, three red faces peering up at me. One leaps down, then another and then another.  My heart resumes its beat.

“You can have the other words-chance, luck, coincidence, serendipity. I'll take grace. I don't know what it is exactly, but I'll take it.”

Grace. I know it when I feel it. The pouring through of aliveness unobstructed by those tight knots of worry or fear that I chose to untangle on that particular day.  When I surrender, lie back and allow myself to be touched. 

Mary Oliver often makes me cry, and that's a good thing.

“I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.”
SARAH

Yin Yoga Workshop
Sunday, July 15
3 - 5 pm

$30

.......beachcombing

Yogis,

I stood at the edge of the ocean. Sand between my toes. The squawk of the seagulls above. Sun on my quickly bronzing skin. The water rushed in encircling my ankles and then just as quickly retreating back from whence it came. 

Beachcombing. The act of ‘an individual combing the beach and intertidal area for things of value, interest or utility.’ I was there to see what I could find, but in the process discovered that beachcombing mimics life.

Like the inhale, the incoming waves bringing in the new. Colors, shapes, textures. A broken conch shell, seaweed, crab claws. Making the unseen - seen.  Forming an intricate collage in the sand. Followed by the exhale of the outgoing waves. Taking that which was no longer needed. The heaviness burying my feet deeper in the sand.  The collage changed forever in a single breath. A single wave.  A single moment.

Impermanence. Three feet ahead I spot a piece of driftwood rushing in with the foam, but in the brief moment it takes my feet to free themselves and propel me forward, it’s gone. It may return…..but then again, it may not. Attachment causes suffering.

When I first comb the beach I am looking. It can be dizzying as I scan in search of that treasure. Expectations. But as I slow the breath, slow the steps and soften the eyes I begin to make the shift to seeing. Just as I am able to ‘look’ at you or ‘see’ you, I begin to see the life that lies at my feet. Imagining the history. Wondering what brought them here before me at this precise time. Our paths crossing. Seeing vs looking.

I remembered hearing over the week that there were sand dollars.  As I stood at the edge of the ocean taking pictures of the flow of the tide and the gifts it was bringing, I visualized the pattern a sand dollar holds. My camera suddenly focuses on a white shape. Had it been there all along or was I finally seeing? Had my vision brought it here? Reminded that each breath is a chance for something amazing, I pull it toward me.

The incoming tide in late morning. Strong, fierce, filled with life. We move our chairs, umbrellas, bags and shoes back….but never enough. Three times. Four times we move. Underestimating its power.

Before long an outgoing tide. Noticing that as time passed, the waves no longer reaching the same distance, items washed in become still. Drying in the heat of the baking sun above. No longer so rich in color. Left behind. For now.

A horseshoe crab that washed up earlier. I watch as each family who passed tried to save him. Placing him back into the edge of the water.  Urging him to swim. Attached. Not wanting to allow the death that was so clearly approaching. As the tide retracts he is finally allowed to rest and be with whatever is to come. Not unlike dusk or the fall which becomes winter.

Time passes. Only to begin all over again. Each day. Every day. Every breath.

I watch my feet, since where they are, is where I am. Here. Now. Perfect.

Beachcombing,
SARAH

Reiki

Those who come, tend to come back......
Come spend an hour with me.
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sarah@serenitycircleyoga.com