by guest author Swami Muktidharma Saraswati For details of a retreat this weekend at Anahata Retreat on non-attachment, please see the end of this article. Attachment is one of the main causes in our lives of unhappiness. Attachment causes fear and fear is the trigger for a lot of other emotions such as anger, stress and lack of satisfaction in life. When there is attachment to an object, however small, there is fear of losing it. … [Read more...]
How do I go about becoming a yoga teacher? Part IV
This is the fourth article in a series which has examined what it takes to become a yoga teacher. And who wouldn't want to be a yoga teacher? You get to do yoga all day long, swanning around the world attending workshops and teacher trainings is part of your job, and you're blissed out all the time. Plus you've got hordes of adoring students hanging on your every word. What a great career yoga teaching must be! Sign me up now! But it's not quite like that... and as Mike Berghan … [Read more...]
How do I go about becoming a yoga teacher? Part III
I'm still getting a fantastic response from yoga teachers on what it takes to be a yoga teacher. This week we have an in-depth exploration from Satyanada representative Swami Karma Karuna. Satyananda teachers are amongst the most immersed in the world of yoga. Their training is both deep and wide, taking many years to complete, but perhaps most important of all, Satyananda teachers all have a relationship with a guru, creating a direct line to true knowledge. … [Read more...]
How yoga helped me find my fortune in the big city
Two years ago my partner and I left Arrowtown to seek our fortunes in the big city. I'd been following my twin passions of writing and yoga as a freelancer in Queenstown, but was struggling financially in a big way. Everything I tried to do, I came up against brick walls- left, right and centre. Nothing seemed to be working for me at all. After a short three day trip to Wellington over the summer of 2008, I knew that Wellington was where I needed to be. Fortunately, it was where my … [Read more...]
An interview with Swami Muktimurti about the power of sound to transform
There is a rich Satyananda Yoga tradition in New Zealand, which means we are fortunate to often play host to traveling Satyananda Swamis from around the world. Next month (March 2010), Anahata Retreat just outside of Nelson is hosting Swami Muktimurti from Mangrove Mountain near Mountain. An expert in Mantra and ancient Sanskrit, she is hosting a nine day/ten night retreat focused on Nada Yoga, or the yoga of sound. Swami Muktimurti is well known for her singing. She has pursued a deep … [Read more...]
The beginner’s guide to yoga: Part 2
Part 1 of this series in the Beginner's Guide to Yoga gave you a heads-up on things to be aware of before rocking along to your first yoga class. You might have been to a few classes now and so have got your head around the right clothes to wear, how to fuel your body before and after class, how to position yourself on your mat and how to forget about what other people are thinking. Now it's time to start investigating the process of posture (asana) a little more deeply. It's so easy to … [Read more...]
How to Apply the Right Yoga Practice to Your Daily Life
by Kara-Leah Grant Life is busy. Most of us are juggling some combination of work, family, socialising, passions & hobbies and health & well-being. Sometimes, despite our best intentions, the things that we know make us feel the best - like regular yoga practice - can be the most difficult to maintain. This is especially true when we go through a life change, or a particularly stressful period. Right when we need it most, our yoga practice falls away. Our job changes, or we … [Read more...]
Effects of the Sankalpa in Satyananda Yoga Nidra – Manifesting the positive
By Guest Author Swami Karma Karuna, Anahata Yoga Retreat Many people on the yogic path are committed to self transformation. This active focus on growth may ignite questioning of one’s own behaviour. Sometimes, there is genuine desire to change a particular habit or pattern, but try as one may, the cause of the action can be elusive! Whether resisting or accepting those aspects of the self which seem outside of conscious control, in truth the reactions, perspectives and even external … [Read more...]
Broken Warriors – reaching out to prisoners with yoga
by guest author Adhyatma, Yoga Education in Prisons Trust I first came across the idea of teaching Yoga to prison inmates when I was staying in an ashram in the northern parts of Bihar, India. I had traveled there without much prior knowledge of why I was really going there, what I was in for, or how it had even happened so easily, and so quickly in my life. But it had! I had been attending some Yoga classes in Mt Eden, Auckland for a couple of years with a Satyananda yoga teacher before I … [Read more...]
A yogic Christmas fable – The Christmas Tree
Every now and then, something drops into my in-box that fills me with delight and merriment. This arrived recently from fellow yoga teacher Roger Livingstone and I just knew I had to share it with a wider audience. Enjoy! Dear Yoga Friends and other aligned beings, Here is my Christmas message. I trust you'll dig it. All my best to you. Long ago in a fabled age when men and women were wise, noble and good, the Christmas Tree had profound symbolic meaning. Some characteristics … [Read more...]