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| You may or may not appreciate this picture as much as I do...it took a long time to learn this challenging Hatha pose and how to put my body into this shape, especially with my super long legs. :) |
This is for my yoga friends and students who don't understand or are confused as to why I spend time on my yoga mat every day doing BOTH Hatha and Kundalini yoga.
My Hatha friends might think I'm a little nuts to stick with the exact same yoga set for 40+ days in a row rather than intuitively moving according to how my body is speaking to me that day. They might not get why in the world I wake up early in the morning, take a cold shower, dress in white, and wrap my head.
My Kundalini friends are having such a rich and full experience with not just asana (movement/poses), but also mantra (chanting), mudra (what we do with our fingers and hands), and meditation, so they may not see why I would need to do anything else where Kundalini is such a "one stop" form of yoga.
My friends from both yoga tribes might be even more confused as to why I would choose to offer BOTH to my students!
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| It was a good turban day for my Kundalini yoga practice, so I had to document it! Lol |
The short of it as a teacher: I believe both can have their place, and some people benefit more from one than the other depending on where they are in their journey.
I have always been such a positive person. I even won 3rd place as a senior in high school for the Idaho State Speech competition for my persuasive speech on optimism! :D I could convince just about anybody of anything (unfortunately, including myself) because my positivity was so amazingly contagious.
Now, don't get me wrong. Being a positive person isn't a bad thing! We need that positive mind and can-do attitude to tackle difficult things, make commitments, and jump into the demands of life. However, when it's unbalanced (like mine has been for most of my life), we may not be gathering all of the information to see the big picture. We may be quick to commit, and often find ourselves with half thought-out plans that unravel or fall through. We may even place ourselves in positions to be used or easily manipulated by others.
Asanas, the bread and butter of a Hatha experience, help balance the positive mind. <3 Getting deeply into my own body through my Hatha practice (which is exactly what has been required to learn poses like Full Moon, headstands, backbends, and even Mountain Pose) has helped to shift this in me. As my trainer invited me lift my toes one at a time, I learned that I have toes (among many other parts of my body)! It has been a wake up call to just how disconnected I have been to my own body, the ways it speaks to me, and how best care to for the amazing gift my body is to me. I have learned to plant both of my feet on the ground...to be well rooted and come from that place of centeredness and self awareness. Now I interact with others and the world around me from this place. I am anchored. I am steady. I am conscious. I see myself---the shape I am making, the ways I am breathing.
Without Kundalini, I wouldn't have a full (for me) experience. I broke down the aspects of how we spend our time on our yoga mat in a podcast interview a few months ago and what each element does from an Anatomy & Physiology standpoint. My Kundalini yoga practice taps into every aspect of these benefits for my body and my mind in each experience on my mat. Plus, the discipline of a daily Sadhana have been so good for me.
Although not a religion or a type of worship, Kundalini yoga is a spiritual form of yoga. I connect with my Higher Power by listening for my Heavenly Father's voice as I take that time inwardly every day. I learn experientially through the sensations and moments on my yoga mat.
Hatha keeps my feet on the ground; Kundalini keeps my head in the Heavens. <3 And I choose to live life from my heart.
As I live yoga off my yoga mat and in my daily life, it has balanced my negative mind (also helping to rein in my positive mind). The Yamas and Niyamas (yoga philosophy) balance the negative mind. <3 As with the positive mind, it's not bad that we have a negative mind. It's our negative mind that inhibits and hesitates; however, when unbalanced, we can be stuck in pessimism or skepticism, too paralyzed by fear to make commitments, and quite frankly, be a "downer" about life. We want to balance this mind too!
The negative mind and positive mind can fit under the umbrella of the neutral mind. The more we meditate, the more our neutral mind is strengthened and developed. As we have a strong neutral mind, it can help us to hover and observe our experiences rather than reacting to them. The neutral mind "checks" with both the positive and negative minds first, then generates better response than from the positive or negative mind alone.
In a nutshell, I am practicing both forms of yoga so I can balance my minds ...instead of lose them. :D
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