From today forward we move into the light. For the next 6 months, darkness diminishes, and the light increases. It is a good moment to think about what enhances our own light, pulls us out of any dark places we may have wandered into, draws us back into our own strength, wholeness, and natural brilliance….
Author: christinajaguar
Daring Greatly
It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who…
Re-Discovering the Tender Heart
“Progress in the practice of yoga postures de-ages us, peeling away the years.” – Rolph Gates. This is not, first and foremost, about looking younger. Although that happens too. In Meditations from the Mat, Gates reflects on his transformation, through yoga, from a heavily muscled soldier and body-builder, to a leaner, more pared down practitioner…
Coming into Balance
Satya. Putting Satya, or truthfulness, into practice is an exercise in humility. But humility has two sides: most of us have been told at one time or another “don’t get too big for your britches,” and we know exactly what that means. Humility is about letting go of the good results as well as bad….
Do No Harm
Ahimsa. A woman I know told me her friends often complimented her on the fact that she had decided not to color her greying hair. How courageous of you!, they said. She told me it had taken some time to allow herself to do this, she wasn’t sure she liked the grey, the way it…
Life. And Death. And Yoga.
The arc of a yoga practice is like the progression of a day, or of a lifetime. I feel this in my practice this morning. With opportunities to stretch and explore, to test your strength, to blunder and try again. To search for balance, and to surrender notions of control. Releasing through breath and movement…
Who’s Got Your Back?
These past five years have been a roller coaster ride on the career front for many of us. Maybe you still feel that you are on the terrifying plunge downward – or perhaps you are on the upward trajectory at last, sighing with relief. Does this crazy ride sound familiar? If so, who have you turned…
In Defense of Idleness
It is difficult for us to slow down. To allow for open space in our lives in which, quite simply, to do nothing. Nearly 50 years ago, the economist John Kenneth Galbraith wrote of the danger of becoming “mentally indentured servants of the industrial system” if we do not take care to distinguish our own…
Blue Sky
“Behind all hardening and tightening and rigidity of the heart, there’s always fear. But if you touch fear, behind fear there is a soft spot. And if you touch that soft spot, you find the vast blue sky. You find that which is ineffable, ungraspable, and unbiased, that which can support and awaken us at…
Going Down
Sometimes you just cannot respond with an open heart. Right? My father died recently, leaving my mother vulnerable and unsure. His death, or perhaps it is more his absence, has disturbed unspoken boundaries and unleashed pent up emotions and resentments among members of my extended family. It seems right to me to defend my mother,…
christina holbrook 
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