Posted on No Comments on Ayurveda everyday, all the time ( or Ayur…what? I thought you practiced Chinese medicine?)

Ayurveda everyday, all the time ( or Ayur…what? I thought you practiced Chinese medicine?)

Folks want to know what’s with all this Ayurveda talk?  I thought you did acupressure, jin shin do, Chinese medicine? I find it easy to add in another ‘label’ or ‘model’ to get equally enthusiastic about.  Especially when it’s so functional!  It’s always been really important me to highlight the connections between seemingly unique and separate ancient models of health and healing.  How are things the same is way more fun for me than how are they different.

My own dive into the world of  Ayurveda has changed my life.  It’s given me more beautiful user-friendly tools in my personal survival toolbox.  More awareness of how I feel everyday, with my interactions with food, myself, others, movements that I make, exercise, stagnation, my emotions!  With this plunge I am realizing that these tools are forever because they grow with me and keep me linking to everything that I interact with, even when those interactions change.

This is what is ultimately sustainable about ayurveda.

It has the capacity to evolove and resonate with present culture, in this case:  March 2011 Montreal, Quebec, Canada, Earth.

This intro into the beauty of ayurveda is not all doshic labeling and imported herbs and foods from India.

Especially when Matthew Remski’s talking about Ayurveda.  One of things that was really unique and wonderful when I took the Everyday Nectar Course last year in distance format was the okay-ness with questioning what we were learning and how applicable it is to our daily lives.  This is really important to me when learning anything that has ancient wisdom to offer. I always want to remember: “hey! We live here, now, so how does this work in my life?”

So Matthew’s coming to Montreal on April 3 for one whole week of Ayurveda learning, talk, tea, food and consults!

And I thought it’d be nice to get Matthew’s own words (‘cause he’s so good with the words!) on the sustainability of Ayurveda, it’s longevity and the benefit Montreal yogis  could gain by adding in Ayurveda to their practices.

what is sustainable about Ayurveda?

MR: Ayurveda is a path of relationship. It teaches attunement to your natural balancing strategies, and helps to turn every common interaction (with food, weather, relationship, activity) into a tool in your personal medicine chest.

what is the longevity of taking everyday nectar?

MR:  Over the years I’ve tried to create a learning system that’s self-perpetuating. This makes use of books and other hardcopy resources, but more important are the intuition strategies that I try to communicate — tools that make Ayurvedic discovery natural and ongoing.

what’s the benefit for  Montreal yogis to add Ayurveda knowledge to their practice?

MR: For millennia, the yoga traditions have assumed that the practitioner was employing Ayurveda naturopathy to support her evolutionary arc. What’s lovely about Ayur-language is that it interfaces with general yoga knowledge on the levels of gross and subtle anatomy. It’s the nuts-and-bolts medicine of yoga, and its elegant to learn. Asana teachers especially feel their instructions and interactions bloom once they get a little bit of Ayurveda under their belts…

Whether are a yoga practitioner or you just want to get to know yourself better and better, this particular Ayurveda course is a priceless tool in your personal toolbox. For life.

Still not sure?  Come to a by donation lecture at my second home, [ahimsa yoga] on Sunday April 3 7pm and take part in an interactive dialogue with Matthew to find out how much Ayurveda you instinctually know.  Ask questions, gain insight and drink tea!

One of the kernels I remember from this first course was this idea that it’s easy for Ayurveda to be idealized, so don’t be misled!  I am not saying that Ayurveda is the absolute only way and best way.  It simply has beautiful gifts to offer.  And as we learn them we must consider always how Ayurveda must be practical and in conversation with modern culture.

One week of Everyday Nectar gives us the space to begin this conversation.

Contact me! Nadia, for details & to register.

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Posted on 1 Comment on Ethics?

Ethics?

Speak your truth. This is the word on the holistic street. Sometimes it is hard, challenging and scary. And when you do speak your truth what happens? Do people really want to know? Not always, even if they say they do.

Here’s my question: As a bodywork therapist do you want to know that I am practicing what I am preaching, at least a little bit? Do you care? Do you take my services more authentically with the knowledge that I am receiving my own bodywork session, in whatever form, at least once per week? Do you assume this or do you even care, as long as you feel good after your session?
I had a colleague share with me yesterday that her professional association had implemented a policy to receive 4 sessions per year of their respective modality. Amazing! I thought, but not so for everyone in that association. People don’t generally like to be ‘required’ to so something, especially when it challenges their personal ethics. But why the resistance? Is it based in fear and needing control over the parts of lives that we feel we can control? And even if this particular ethic is not part of our respective association’s “code of ethics”, are we not compelled to have an ethic of our own? Whatever that may be.

Personally I would love to join a professional association that required me to receive sessions in my chosen modality. I feel that this kind of commitment to oneself fosters sustainability at its’ roots. If I can advertise, promote, encourage, this amazing-ness of what I practice it truly sustains me at my roots. And there is so much talk these days about wanting “complementary medicine” to be more valued for what it is, especially by the allopathic medical model. If the healing community as a whole truly desires this then even more the reason to regularly support all kinds of healing modalities, not only the ones we practice ourselves! This community commitment is one that will sustain these practices over the long term, as we, practitioners ourselves, are models for our clients and community that we really do believe in what we are saying and doing.

Of course, while pausing to write this I came across another great quote to give me some encouragement:

“The basic work of health professionals in general and psychotherapists in particular is to become full human beings and to inspire full human-beingness in people who feel starved about their lives.” -Chogyam Trungpa

Nice. No matter if you are a health professional or a psychotherapist, or a massage therapist or a naturopath, isn’t this statement from Trungpa is solidly true? Being human is enough qualification for me to inspire full human-beingness in myself and others. This is my truth for today.

Speak your truth. This is the word on the holistic street. Sometimes it is hard, challenging and scary. And when you do speak your truth what happens? Do people really want to know? Not always, even if they say they do.

Here’s my question: As a bodywork therapist do you want to know that I am practicing what I am preaching, at least a little bit? Do you care? Do you take my services more authentically with the knowledge that I am receiving my own bodywork session, in whatever form, at least once per week? Do you assume this or do you even care, as long as you feel good after your session?
I had a colleague share with me yesterday that her professional association had implemented a policy to receive 4 sessions per year of their respective modality. Amazing! I thought, but not so for everyone in that association. People don’t generally like to be ‘required’ to so something, especially when it challenges their personal ethics. But why the resistance? Is it based in fear and needing control over the parts of lives that we feel we can control? And even if this particular ethic is not part of our respective association’s “code of ethics”, are we not compelled to have an ethic of our own? Whatever that may be.

Personally I would love to join a professional association that required me to receive sessions in my chosen modality. I feel that this kind of commitment to oneself fosters sustainability at its’ roots. If I can advertise, promote, encourage, this amazing-ness of what I practice it truly sustains me at my roots. And there is so much talk these days about wanting “complementary medicine” to be more valued for what it is, especially by the allopathic medical model. If the healing community as a whole truly desires this then even more the reason to regularly support all kinds of healing modalities, not only the ones we practice ourselves! This community commitment is one that will sustain these practices over the long term, as we, practitioners ourselves, are models for our clients and community that we really do believe in what we are saying and doing.

Of course, while pausing to write this I came across another great quote to give me some encouragement:

“The basic work of health professionals in general and psychotherapists in particular is to become full human beings and to inspire full human-beingness in people who feel starved about their lives.” -Chogyam Trungpa

Nice. No matter if you are a health professional or a psychotherapist, or a massage therapist or a naturopath, isn’t this statement from Trungpa is solidly true? Being human is enough qualification for me to inspire full human-beingness in myself and others. This is my truth for today.

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Posted on No Comments on Oh Dear! Not another "Self-Help Blog"!

Oh Dear! Not another "Self-Help Blog"!


Welcome! and be forewarned for many more exclamation marks to come.
What does this even mean? Sustainable You? It can mean so many things, sustainable is such a trendy hipster phrase these days, which is cool, but really at the root of living sustainably is getting to know yourself (and others and the rest of the natural world), which is also cool. And it’s what I am into.
So here will be many things that I find are sustainable and why. Things that help me to connect and re-connect to my community, the earth, and mostly myself, ’cause it all starts there.

So, yes, in essence another self-help blog. What can I say? and really, what can you expect in 2010, anyway?
Self-help is where it’s at. Help yourself first, get out of your own way and out into your world.

And it’s not all new-agey, green, pseudo eco-chic, locavore, organic goodness by the way. Sometimes all these words are not all they are cracked up to be and we’ll check out why.


Welcome! and be forewarned for many more exclamation marks to come.
What does this even mean? Sustainable You? It can mean so many things, sustainable is such a trendy hipster phrase these days, which is cool, but really at the root of living sustainably is getting to know yourself (and others and the rest of the natural world), which is also cool. And it’s what I am into.
So here will be many things that I find are sustainable and why. Things that help me to connect and re-connect to my community, the earth, and mostly myself, ’cause it all starts there.

So, yes, in essence another self-help blog. What can I say? and really, what can you expect in 2010, anyway?
Self-help is where it’s at. Help yourself first, get out of your own way and out into your world.

And it’s not all new-agey, green, pseudo eco-chic, locavore, organic goodness by the way. Sometimes all these words are not all they are cracked up to be and we’ll check out why.

Share