“Welcome to 2012, a time of transformation, change and new consciousness. You roll your eyes as you read this. Welcome to another new year, you think. This is the year when everything is going to be perfect, your new years’ resolutions are going to stick and the next 365 days are going to be better, more creative, and more satisfying for you, your family and everyone you love and care about, way more than the previous year, and yes, we’re going to achieve world peace as well. Before you unleash your innercynic, hang in there for a moment and breathe. “
That’s an excerpt from a recent piece I wrote for the wonderful Asia Spa Magazine, which is based out of Hongkong. Not merely a showcase of fluffy spa profiles, the magazine has creative, inspiring and thought provoking articles under the helm of it’s current editor Rebecca Walker. I am so happy to have a lead story in the January 2012 issue, a story that marks my re-entry into the world of writing after the birth of my baby son ten months ago. I hope that you enjoy it. And yes, happy new year!!!
Afraid of going to your Halloween party dressed as a witch or a pirate for the umpteenth time, but don’t want to splurge for a new costume? Never fear, you’re not alone. Local eco online store Lavish + Lime is here to help!
If you know me, you know that I love cooking and eating whole, natural foods, which is why I am so excited about the Blissology Project Commitment #4: eating food that’s high on the pranameter(TM). It makes sense, right? If we eat food that comes from a natural, prana (energy) filled source (ideally no factories between you and your food) we are going to be more radiantly alive?
To celebrate that awesome connection between this simple idea: we are what we eat, here’s a recipe for some blissology “bliss” balls, made with organic, raw ingredients and a whole lotta love.
fall blissology: transformative + powerful YES (yoga.ecology.surf) retreats with @eoinfinnyoga and moi, in Bali or Tofino http://ow.ly/6osPt , few spots still left!
July 1st is already here, which in Canada is the celebration of Canada Day, in the time honored tradition of Canadian holidays and American holidays being, you know, a few days apart!
By now, even the far north should be in the midst of summer, bbqs abound and the days go on forever, well at least until ten o’clock at night, which is one of the things that I cherish about living on the 49th parallel.
The World Health Organization announced yesterday that cell phones can possibly cause cancer. Whether you’re rolling your eyes, or sitting upright in disbelief, you are probably paying attention. Yes, this is important to our health, especially given that currently, worldwide, there are 5 billion cell phones in service, this amongst a global population of a little over 6 billion.
I am finally home, after three weeks exploring southern California with baby and husband in tow. The idea was to get away from the spring rain here in the northwest which has actually felt more like November rain recently; and to get in some yoga classes from some of my favourite teachers, oh yes and surf too.
The wise yogi knows “the inaction that is in action, and the action that is in inaction.”
from the Bhagavad Gita
So much has happened this year already. Wars, retribution, elections, revolutions in the Middle East, earthquakes and tsunamis. Our world is turbulent right now. The time has come, as poet and activist Joanna Macy writes, for the Great Turning. We have a choice to move from a world centered solely around conventional economics – what author David Korten calls the Age of Empire – towards an Earth Community, a world where the values of community, sustainability and love inform our lives in a powerful way.
As I was bringing in a new baby into our world earlier this year, I couldn’t help but think that it is both a challenging as well as an imperative time to bring new, conscious souls into our universe. After all, we need some help don’t we, to move towards that Earth Community? I also felt strongly that in order to withstand the ebb and flow of our life in these challenging times, I had to turn toward a meditation practice, to find strength and peace.
Yogi, Blissologist, surfer and all around renaissance man, Eoin Finn, who, full disclosure here, also happens to be my husband, believes that you can find inner peace in a hammock. He calls it hammock enlightenment and says he discovered it while on one of our Yoga, Ecology + Surf retreats in Costa Rica, where he came closest to what he has sought for many years in his meditation practice.
Eoin recently gave a Ted Talk on why getting into a hammock can change our world.
“By slowing down, we become kinder, more compassionate beings” he says. “We start to pay attention to our relationships be they with our yoga practice, our intimate family, the food we eat, our communities and our environment.”
Don’t worry, I’m not just talking about an afternoon siesta, it’s about so much more.
Hammock Enlightenment in Vancouver, Canada
Hammock enlightenment is about being outside and experiencing the spirituality in nature, in becoming present to life as it unfolds. And yes, you can find it right in your own backyard or under a leafy tree on your city block, you don’t have to retreat to a forest, though sometimes that can help.
Says Eoin, “Hammock enlightenment is a pathway towards sustainability. We cannot protect our planet unless we truly feel what is sacred in it. We need to feel connected to something in order to want to safeguard it. We have to love something in order to fight for it.”
Mother’s Day is approaching. This year will be my first year to experience it on the other side. As I write this, I feel connected to my own mother, our lineage of mothers, and to our universal mother, the Earth. It is time, now more than ever to shower our Earth with that sacred love and connection she has so long cocooned us with. As James Cameron showed us in Avatar, the consequences of ignoring the heart of our planet are terrible. And as art mirrors life which mirrors art, we see aspects of this throughout our world. The planet is heating up, something’s brewing. We have to act now.
And sometimes action can mean the opposite of what you think, it can mean slowing down, so we can reset and begin to honestly evaluate our actions and create change.
Here’s Eoin’s talk. Listen and let me know if it inspires you.
Do you think slowing down is an antidote to our modern way of life?
Do you think slowing down will allow us to become more present, more kind and more connected to our communities and to our planet?
Do you think slowing down will allow us to change course?
Thank you for subscribing to this blog. I am going to do my utmost to sneak away during my baby’s naptime and post at least once and hopefully more each week!
I’ve been quite under the radar for the past few months… wow is it April already… but with good reason, my husband and I are currently enjoying the sleepless wonderment of our new baby boy, born (we had a natural, home birth) in February of this year. While life with a baby is so many things, joy, bliss, tiredness, presence and a huge oxytocin enriched dosage of LOVE; it has also made me obsessed with food and eating better than ever before. As a breastfeeding mama, I am amazed that what I produce can feed a growing human being and eating well does take on a whole new meaning when you consider that what you eat is what your baby eats. I want food that ranks high on the Prana Meter as described by Yogi/ Blissologist Eoin Finn. With the added challenge of not having a lot of time on my hands, I’ve been on the hunt for nourishing, whole food recipes that are also quick to prepare.
It has been a busy few weeks for me. As you can tell, I gave up the idea of updating a holiday wish list a week before Christmas, despite having a great list to share!
Traveling in the tropics with v. limited internet access was definitely a deterrent and then I also realized that if I spent all my precious vacation time on my lap top, i wasn’t present to the beauty around. Jet lag and the travel back – a long journey – to skirt through all the snow in europe, also delayed things… but I am happy to finally feel a little more settled and alive and healthy back in our northern pacific home.
It is probably as different as possible from where I grew up in India… as quiet as India is noisy, as treed as Bombay is bereft of foliage, and as cold as India is warm… both from the personalities of the people and the temperature.
As the countdown to the New Year has already touched so many places on our globe, my wish for this year, is to be able to take the time to reflect on changes, on connecting to our life missions, that deep place within us that informs all our goals; and to be hopeful in a world of chaos.
I was lucky to meet some super inspiring people over the course of my travels in India and Sri Lanka so I’ll try to share some of those stories over the next few weeks.
In the meantime, I hope that you have time to savour these last few hours of the present year sharing stories and laughs with family and loved ones and can take a moment to wish this world peace and bliss. With our collective manifestation, who knows what could happen!
