Work is a word I associate with the creative, because I experience the writing I do as more of a craft than an art. Maybe the first draft or outpouring is more of an art, as it is unformed and messy, but writing for me...
When I was in a bookstore in the 70s and first encountered a book on tantra and the concept that sex was spiritual, it stopped me dead in my tracks. “Of course,” I said out loud, under my breath, “what else could it be?” I...
As I read Satprem and Van Vrekhem’s description of the yoga of the cells I felt conflicting feelings: an expansion of energy at the idea of physical immortality, and a disbelief that this is a possibility. I felt mistrust: Was The Mother’s description of the...
As I practiced the qigong set from the video, I first noticed that a sense of balance and grounding were established right from the beginning with the placing of the foot and the solid stance. There was attention paid to proprioception, where my body was...
Previously I maintained a daily hatha yoga practice that has now evolved into a few yoga stretches I do at the conclusion of my three-times-weekly gym workout. I really appreciated Matthews’s perspective on yoga as a moving meditation instructing how to be of this earth...
I practiced whirling when I lived in India. Every day at noon, the erotic, evocative music would enliven the meditation hall where the regulars and the beginners like me would gather. There was no formal instruction, and no one cared about doing it the “right”...
I’m sure like everyone I had a variety of responses while reading this week’s materials: excitement, disbelief, curiosity, and not-good-enough because I’ll never achieve a rainbow body or any other sort of incredible death. Intellectually, it is invigorating to imagine that a technology for Jesus’s...
As I have been practicing the hum sah meditation shared by Tara Judelle, and as I’m practicing it right now as I’m writing, I notice the in-breath is invigorating, and the exhale is relaxing and centering. This is undoubtedly true without the mantra, but the...
I was really struck this week by the idea that Eastern philosophy treats mind/body unity as an achievement, that it is not a given and requires disciplined practice. While I don’t agree with this in theory (it’s already one and therefore nothing needs to be...
This week we examined some very colorful, erotic, fully-embodied traditions more identified with the community and nature than most. Antoinette Santos Reyes spoke eloquently about her Philipina heritage and how she had experienced an “explosion of imagination” (I loved that!) when talking with elders about...