Demystifying "down there" with Leslie Howard.

I'm excited about this upcoming workshop to be presented at the Yoga Circle, located in Chicago:

DEMYSTIFYING “DOWN THERE”
Sunday, October 30
The Female Pelvic Floor: A Workshop for Women with Leslie Howard.

From the text on Yoga Circle's website:

Leslie Howard

Proper strengthening and stabilizing of the pelvic floor helps to create the correct foundation of each movement in the body. This is the true meaning of "core work." Whether you experience any of these conditions, or are just plain curious about this region of the body, this workshop is for you:

I fell into the "just plain curious" category the first time I took Leslie's workshop. However I had experienced fear about my pelvic health on and off throughout my adult life. It just seemed kind of scary and mysterious in the area "down there", and I have found that education about what is happening in the pelvic floor can go a long way towards deep healing and peace in a woman's body:


I heartily recommend this workshop for women!

More from Yoga Circle's workshops page about the kind of concerns women might bring to the workshop session for education and clarification, "demystification" indeed:

• pelvic pain 

• leak when laughing or sneezing 

• lower back, hip or groin problems 

• have to go the bathroom too often 

• discomfort during sex or while using tampons 

• prolapsed organs 

• skin irritation

• pregnancy and birth 

In this workshop we will locate, assess, soften, stretch, strengthen and exercise the various muscle groups of the pelvic floor, discuss mula bandha, abdominal health and how to utilize the pelvic floor in asana.

The afternoon will begin with anatomy, lecture and discussion, followed by subtle experiential movements to awaken your understanding of this often ignored area. A series of specific exercises and asanas for the pelvic floor will follow. Time permitting, asana that spotlights the pelvis and hip joints will be practiced. Handouts will be provided. Bring your friends, sisters, mothers and daughters.

Okay, so come to this workshop if you are a woman in the Chicago Area and can make it, and want to take the next step in body awareness. And if you have women friends and family in the Chicago region tell them about this workshop. I can't recommend it highly enough!

Call the Yoga Circle to sign up: (312) 915-0750.

Yogathon for Rape Victim Advocates

I'm thrilled to be participating in:

 3rd Annual Mind Body Spirit…  
 And a Good Cause  
 Benefiting Rape Victim Advocates  
 September 24 & 25, 2011 
Click on the image or text above to see the flyer.

Yoga studios and teachers are participating in the event, sometimes referred to as a yogathon. Participating classes are donating to Rape Victim Advocates.

I am impressed by this description of Rape Victim Advocates (received from a representative):

Every day in Chicago, women, children, and men are dealing with the immediate - and often life long - effects of sexual assault. Since 1974, Rape Victim Advocates (RVA) has been here to help rape victims, offering personal support, accurate information about their rights, and experienced advocacy. From a hand to hold in the emergency room, to clothes to wear home, to an advocate to stand beside them in court, RVA offers survivors of sexual violence the individualized help they need to begin moving beyond the trauma to live healthy, whole lives. Then, RVA goes further, changing attitudes and preventing future sexual violence through education. To improve the treatment of sexual assault survivors, RVA provides training to police officers, state’s attorneys, and health care professionals.

Something I hate about the aftermath of rape is that the victim of this crime is called into question, and their character is scrutinized. What was the person wearing? Were they drunk? Out late at night? Homosexual? Transgender? Slut? Convict? (See my SlutWalk piece at ElephantJournal.com)

Everybody deserves advocacy and protection. Nobody deserves to be raped. It is never appropriate for someone to rape another person.

So I am glad to use my voice in this way, and offer together with the Yoga Circle the proceeds from the yoga class I will teach on Sunday September 25th at 4pm at the Yoga Circle, 401 W Ontario St, Chicago.

Come to class! All are welcome! Let's support this vital cause.

In Defense of Marketplace Yoga

In the society I live in, it might seem like there is no reason to defend marketplace yoga — the marketplace of yoga seems just fine, actually, but there are those among us who are concerned about what is actually getting translated into this marketplace. Are we just telling ourselves nice stories about yoga, or are we really "getting" the yoga?

I have my own experience of yoga education located in this very marketplace to offer up as an example:

In fact, the part I'll talk about now happened in the upscale Gold Coast neighborhood in Chicago. It was the year 2000 at an ashtanga yoga studio that has since closed: Priya Yoga that was at 1 East Oak Street, located above a pizza shop. When walking up the stairs to yoga, the nose was greeted with the smells of pizzas baking.

It was when I was pushing my way up the flights of stairs to Priya Yoga after work that a pungent voice of inner-judgment would often assault me: Who the hell do you think you are, doing this Gold Coast yoga?

But somehow I made it up those stairs, again and again through the barrage of insulting thoughts. It helped that the studio was warm and friendly, and it also helped me that the teachers and other people seemed to like my being there. I loved being there. I loved the yoga. It became like another home for me.

After one Friday-night ashtanga yoga class here my life would be changed invisibly yet indelibly. When this particular yoga class was over, I was on the way out when I stopped to thank the yoga teacher. I was looking into the eyes of this instructor, when what appeared like golden rain began falling down, yet somewhat suspended, like glinty-gold bits in a snow-globe slowly and lightly falling down toward me and all around me — shining bits of light. I had a sense that everything around me was permeated with love: my body, the teacher's body, the air between us and all around me, the other people, the desk behind the teacher, the walls, the carpet, the ceiling, the next room, the door, the hallway and stairs, absolutely everything seemed to be permeated with this love as integrated into the fabric of all things and non-things. Yeah, I was high after that yoga session. Was this experience a figment of my body chemistry? Was it somehow a delusion caused by dehydration, exhaustion or toxicity?

What scientifically happened to me is a little less important than what spiritually happened to me. I actually thought for the first time in my life that the fabric of our world might be good. I had felt it to be absolutely and irrefutably good from a song in my cells. Love had spoken from every particle I was aware of in that moment.

I think that our realizations in yoga are more about our dedication as individual practitioners than about the marketplace of yoga, but this economy does support the houses of yoga and teachers of yoga that create a situation where amazing and previously-unimaginable things can happen for people.

I am grateful that I have been able to have this and many other beautiful, meaningful, and life-enhancing yoga experiences — that I don't think are over by any means. But there was a money-based background that made it possible to experience the yoga that I have. So the marketplace is not separate from our yoga, it actually makes yoga more accessible than ever before because it is a part of our economy.

* also posted at Elephant Journal.