A nice thought from Lynn today. Every person needs three bones to survive and thrive. A wishbone. A funny bone. A Back bone.
Do you have all three??
from scrib8.com
Sometimes the detoxing process can bring on the feeling that you are coming down with a cold. This means that it’s working. It’s called the herxheimer effect. It’s because toxins are coming from the tissues into the blood stream, or the die off of bacteria in the body.
Don’t suppress the symptoms with over-the-counter medicine. Just continue to eat healthy foods, drink plenty of warm water and get lots of rest:
the same advice for getting over any cold. You could support the detoxing symptoms with herbal or homeopathic remedies.
Here are some links about the Herxheimer effect. I have no opinion as to the product to help with the herxheimer effect. You investigate and make your own choices.
Gary Null
Herxheimer
Have you ever noticed that sometimes when you have a cold or flu, or you have been fasting for a day you have a white or yellow coating on your tongue? English doesn’t have a name for this but Ayurvedic Medicine (medical model for traditional yoga practice) calls this white coating ama (pronounce like mama)
ama coating the digestive system
I will just give a few facts on ama, and if you want to know more, you can continue to investigate online. Ama develops from improper digestion, the biproduct of bacterial infection, or accumulated toxins in the body. It manifests as the white, sticky substance that coats the entire digestive system and other body systems as well. Think about all the illnesses that show a sticky white substance: hardening of arteries, joint pain, allergies, infections, obesity, glaucoma and more. So when you see ama anywhere in the body, you know you have some detoxing to do.
It is also something you feel in the body: Feeling heavy, fuzzy headed, unclear thinking, aches and pains, bloating, gas, skin blemishes, fever, lack of energy, lack of appetite or taste, or indigestion.
There are a variety of suggestions for clearing out ama from the body, but I offer just one: drinking warm water throughout the day. Start with a 12-16 oz. of warm water first thing in the morning. You could add fresh lemon to this also. Then about 30 minutes before each meal drink another glass of warm water. This begins to flush out the ama and other toxins from the body.
March brings the movement of Water into Wood, Winter into Spring. For our bodies, we experience the power of Water nourishing and infusing Wood. The energy that Water gives to Wood allows for sprouts to emerge fresh and new from branches, and for new leaves to emerge from the inner growth and energetic storage that occurs during Winter.
The organs associated with spring are liver and gall bladder. The color is green.
The liver is associated with the eyes – for example if you have jaundice which is the liver not doing its job properly; you see the yellow in the eyes. Vision – or seeing and imagining what you want to create. This is the spring energy.
Emotionally, spring connects us to the spirit of birth, renewal, growth, expansion, and all that is creative. It is a time for the warrior within to emerge and it is a good time of year to cultivate this energy by strengthening our daily disciplines, creating new goals and creative projects, transforming dietary habits, and cleansing our bodies, and our homes. It is a time of hope, possibility, and inspiration. It is a time to stretch oneself as the new sapling that allows itself to bend in the spring wind.
It’s time to continue a yoga practice as you stretch and tone the body. As soon as possible, get outside to exercise and just to enjoy and see spring happen. Our diets need more green living foods: Fresh sweet immature greens like sprouts. Leafy greens, and things like asparagus and spinach. These help tone and clean the liver.
Knowing what is normal as we age is helpful to avoid thinking something is wrong. Just like its helpful to know changes that happen in our children and their growth, its helpful to know what’s coming up for adult bodies.
These quotes are taken from a New York times article about sleep studies. Here is the link to the article.
” it turns out that sleep does not change much from age 60 on. And poor sleep, it turns out, is not because of aging itself, but mostly because of illnesses or the medications used to treat them.
“The more disorders older adults have, the worse they sleep. If you look at older adults who are very healthy, they rarely have sleep problems.
Most of the changes in sleep patterns occurred when people were between the ages of 20 and 60.” People in this group tended to sleep about a half hour less than others outside this range, woke more often and slept lighter. Most changes were subtle.
So as a general conclusion, if you stay healthy, you could expect some changes in sleep like waking up more often. But if you know this, then there should not be anxiety about the changes.
The second foundation focuses on getting a good nights sleep. When you consider that 84 million Americans suffer from some kind of sleep problem, understanding what it takes to restore our bodies deserves our attention.
It is during sleep that our body renews and repairs itself. Vital organs of the body are restored, old cells are replaced with new cells and the immune system gets its battery recharged. Typically 7-9 hours of sleep is considered a healthy amount of nighttime rest.
Sleep tips
We have many in the class with chronic illnesses of all sorts. By coming to a yoga class you are taking responsibility for your own health. Sometimes a doctor might recommend a yoga class, but not often, so usually each person has to search out his own complimentary therapies and implement them without the extra motivation of a doctor’s prescription.
Here are some of the benefits of attending a yoga class, even if your physical condition makes it impossible to fully participate. Each of these things lifts the spirit which is a pillar of good health:
1. Social support. Getting out of bed and joining a group of other people is strong positive medicine. Each person contributes to the energy of the class and it’s fun to meet new people and enjoy laughter and doing something with other people.
2. Deep relaxing breathing. Most chronic illness is made better when stress levels are lower and deep breathing is a path to relaxation. Shelly and Leslie have both said that if you only came to class and sat in a chair and did simple movements but were breathing deeply and consciously, it would be a wonderful yoga practice. The benefits would be subtle but real.
3. Learning something new. Chronic pain and illness can shrink your world and your desire to try new things so kudos to those who are courageous and learning something new. Brain growth occurs at any age every time a new pathway is made in the brain. Learning new things like yoga and staying with it during the beginner (clumsy) stage stimulates brain growth.
4. Belief is medicine. Just like a placebo, if you believe you are doing something wonderful for your health, then you are. Belief makes biological changes at the cellular level towards health. Linking body, mind and breath is a definition of yoga. Belief is the mind part of the equation.
The winter season is the yin time of the year according to Chinese Medicine. Nature sleeps and goes undercover, inside, and underground.
Using this theme of the internal yin season, what is the best way to look at our New Year’s resolutions? It is to ask if it is an internal or external goal. If it is internal, then it is perfect for the energy of this season and nature’s energy will support you in accomplishing the goal without the force or will power that is required if you were to pick a more yang or external goal.
For example: A common resolution is to lose weight. In just this form, it is totally external – you would see the weight loss on your physical body. But are you doing the internal, spiritual, emotional work necessary to support the external work. Let me suggest a switch in vision for this New Year’s resolution.
During the winter months, set a goal for increasing your connection to God, to your own spiritual practice. Strengthen your inner resources, the same way that nature protects and gathers its resources during the winter months. Cultivate gratitude, and inner vision. Evaluate beliefs, thoughts and emotions that contribute to excess weight or body clutter. Heal the emotions of loneliness, bitterness, unforgiveness thru your own religious or spiritual practice. Create the vision you want in your mind and heart first during this yin season. Use the time wisely during winter for this internal and spiritual work.
Then when spring is eminent, you will be ready and motivated and supported with your inner strength and vision to bring the goal outward into the external world. Just like nature takes its stored water, roots, and seeds from the ground below into the sunshine and above ground for all to see. Then it will be the time to set the goal for weight loss for your external body. It will be easier to accomplish and will require less willpower and internal fighting and frustration. Your inner body and spirit will already be what you want and will manifest into the outer body with ease.
Evaluate all your resolutions in the same way: Here are some of the top resolutions around the country: Spending more time with family or friends, fitness and weight loss, quit smoking or drinking, get out of debt, get organized, enjoy life more, reduce stress, travel. More than half of these are external goals that could be accomplished successfully if the emotional and spiritual work is done first.
Nature has given us the guide on how to grow and improve – from the inside, the spirit, the yin first.
The first week of December we did a practice that discussed the red light reflex and poses that help us be aware of the muscles that are involved in the reflex and to notice if we have that hunched over posture in our yoga practice. Here is a nice article if you want more information about the red light reflex.
Shelly also gave some instruction and detail about the root lock or mula bandha. This second week of December Leslie will continue on the theme of mula bandha and here is a wonderful article discussing the PFM (Pelvic Floor Muscles). It is an explanation that is for the western mind and easy to understand and follow.
Here is what Leslie will share with the class and some of the info is taken from the above article:
The mula bandha or root lock contributes to a lightness and lifting action in the yoga postures, but it also contributes to the health and stabilization of the organs and systems in the pelvic region of the body. So when we add the mula bandhas to our practice, it’s beneficial on many levels, physically and energetically.
In English, that means, let’s do it, it’s good for us.
The pelvic floor muscles are a complex structure of both muscles and fascia but I will just refer to the whole structure as the pelvic floor muscles or PFM or mula bandhas. Mula means root – like the root of our spine, and bandhas means lock.
If your pelvis is a bowl the PFM are the bottom of the bowl, so visualize a suction action on the inside of the bottom of the bowl and you are lifting up and into the body. Its basically the kegel exercise or the same muscles you contract if you have to go to the bathroom very soon, but are without a bathroom.
There are two different ways to use the mula bandha during our practice. Tuesday will be this first way that I describe – a held contraction, and Thursday will be a stronger lift but relaxing with each breath.
For Tuesday: The PFM can get fatigued if we contract them strongly over the length of our practice, just like any other muscle would get tired from use. So rather than a strong lock at the beginning, and fatigue at the end, strike a balance by contracting the mula bandha about 25 % during the whole yoga practice.
First contract the PFM as much as you can, then relax by half, then by half again. This is what you want to feel as you hold each pose and breathe thru each posture.
For Thurday: With each inhale, allow the belly and PFM to relax completely. With each exhale, pull the belly in and up, contract strongly mula bandhas. Some postures make this strong mula bandhas very difficult because of the tilt of the pelvis or gravity pulling the belly down.
In Chinese medicine the late summer season is represented by the Earth element, which focuses on the organs of the stomach and spleen-pancreas. When in balance the earth element emotions are sympathy and nurturing. When we are out of balance the earth element brings anxiety and worry. If we feel we are taking care of everybody else and no one is taking care of us, or if we cannot stop worrying, we may find our stomach rebels, perhaps making us feel weak and tired, creating loose stools, ulcers or pain in the upper abdomen.
Orange and Yellow are the colors connected with Late Summer and sweet is the flavor so choose some foods for each meal that are mildly sweet foods, yellow or golden foods, round foods, -corn, millet, carrots, cabbage, squashes, potatoes, green beans, yams, tofu, sweet potatoes, rice, apricots, and cantaloupe. Not sugary sweet but naturally sweet.
Moving on to Autumn. Fall represents the aspect of Nature which embodies condensation and crystallization. In Autumn, trees drop their leaves so that their simplest and most essential form is revealed, plants die back and reveal the stones of the earth. Letting go of what is not needed, revealing the inner or essential part. Metal is the element that represents fall.
This is the time of transition from the bright, yang energy of Summer to the dark, yin season of Winter. We gather and store the last of our harvest, stocking up and then letting go and reducing to only the most important things. Condense and refine – that is the metal element. The body organs that go with the metal element are the lungs, respiratory system and the colon or large intestine.
Autumn is the time of withering and decay, so the emotion associated with Autumn and the Metal element is grief and loss. However, death can also be a releasing and letting go of old behaviors and emotions or things that no longer serve us. Not only should we clean out the garden, we should clean out our closets and book shelves and old behaviors.
Ways that we can enhance and balance our Metal element would include massage, dry-brushing, drinking fluids, and eating a high-fiber diet. The pungent foods of autumn would be garlic, onions, radishes, ginger, horseradish, broccoli, winter squash, pumpkin and peppers The best thing for our lungs and immune system support is to practice deep breathing everyday – not just on the days you have a yoga practice.
The metal element is related to the mucus membranes which line both respiratory and digestive systems. These mucus membrane linings are the body’s first line of immune defense. Most infections will enter through this route. So, metal is also symbolic of our immune response like a metal shield.
email: leslie @ rexburgyoga.com
208-569-7437
email: shellyspratling @ gmail.com
208-206-8390
