YOGA
Manu and Bella Rossi are my teachers of great warmth and experience in Oxford, they teach traditional Mysore Ashtanga every week day morning. Come!
www.ashtangayogaoxford.org
Body Workers
Dan Ruby is a McTimoney Chiropractor and keeps my body moving easily and in good alignment - highly recommended :)
www.espina.co.uk
I have regular reflexology with Rosie and it frequently astounds me how brilliant and effective it is...She is really very very good!
www.clararosetherapies.co.uk
Thai Yoga massage with the beautiful and gifted hands of Kathryn at www.thaiyogamassagewantage.co.uk
Buddhism and Mindfulness
I have a regular daily meditation practice along side my yoga practice and sometimes sit with Lizzie from the Ridgeway Mindful Psychology and sometimes with the Oxford Mindfulness Centre.. who have lots of teachers on a Thursday night guiding meditation
For a fresh and inspiring look at Buddhism in the west I often listen to Michael Stone (3>) and Pema Chodron via podcasts and audio books.
Poetry is a thing I love a lot too...
WILD GEESE BY MARY OLIVER
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about your despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting --
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
The Guest House by Rumi
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice.
meet them at the door laughing and invite them in.
Be grateful for whatever comes.
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
— Jellaludin Rumi,
translation by Coleman B
Stillness by Rebecca Walden (me)
Come here my friend
Stop and breathe with me for a while.
Take off your shoes, be barefoot in the night time grass
Close your eyes and savour sinking deep into the earth.
Let the ground shift
mold to the shape of you
feel the truth of your place in this lonely moment.
Be held gently and simply by the earth.
Feel her deep quiet steadiness below her constant changing above
Allow the cool grass to grow tall between your toes, stretching up toward the vast blue sky.
Stop and be here, friend.
Binding your breath to this perfect moment... and then to the next.
Slip yourself in, softly, with care
between the cool velvet space of the twilight sky and the still warmth of the earth.
let the clamour of your mind pause awhile, to fall quiet under natures gaze.
Prize open your fists, my love, uncurl your stiff fingers and let go of the tumbling stories and twisted words that tear through your mind,
wrapping themselves eternally around your trembling heart.
Let them rest softly upon your palm and watch with open eyes.
Slowly they will drift to the stars that call them from you
Until you can no longer hear them and your heart is free again.
You are not alone, the world and I are with you.
Stop and breathe awhile.
Take off your shoes and stand barefoot in the dusky grass.
www.yogafinder.com
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