All posts by Mindy

About Mindy

Mindy Willis-Menard is an international yoga teacher who's love of yoga, nature, adventurer and life inspire her to teach. A true adventurer of the heart Mindy is also a hooper, rock climber, snowboarder, runner, foodie and cyclist. Mindy teaches classes, workshops and retreats world-wide. Every other moment she spends with her husband and dog, Mrs. Betty Rox.

For the Love of Hula Hooping Sakes!!!

yoga

 

Confession!  I’ve recently gotten hooked on hooping.  Yep, it didnt’ take long, well, the moment I was able to keep the hoop up then I was hooked.  So after my yoga practice, I started just adding about 20 minutes of hooping in my living room and I can’t even begin to explain how happy it’s made me.

I’m thinking that it has a lot to do with my sadness/anger over what’s happened with Anusara yoga (the scandal and all that).  For a while I was thinking that I might not even teach yoga anymore.  I like to learn new skills, try new things, even if they are risky but especially if they have to do with physics and body movement.

I bought a hula hoop over a year ago and basically it kicked the shit out of me, leaving me bruised and angry that I couldn’t do much else then keep it on my waist.  However, as I was told this past weekend in my Hoopdance teacher course, “the hoop chooses you!”  Indeed it does!

Over the last two months of hooping almost everyday, I have noticed a big change in my body.  I feel more connected to my legs and pelvis and I like the flow of the hoop moving around my body.  Having fun has helped me move on from the yoga drama, that has truly been heartbreaking.

I recognized pretty quickly that sure it’s fun to hoop in the private and safety of my living room, of course my pug wants nothing to do with this piece of plastic whizzing by her napping spot on the couch, but it’s far better to hoop with others.  So voila, I thought “why not me” and started to teach.  I like to have some knowledge about the way to teach hooping since its way different then yoga and luckily I was able to attend Hoopnotica’s Hoopdance Level 1 training this past weekend in Stoney Creek.

Hooping is not just for kids friends.  A study from A.C.E (American counsel on Exercise) “America’s leading authority on fitness and the largest nonprofit fitness certification, education and training organization in the world, today announced exclusive study findings that conclude hula hooping workouts offer substantial and positive results”

Further, “at the conclusion of the test, researchers found hooping burns an average of 210 calories during a 30-minute hooping workout (approximately 420 calories per hour), which is comparable to the exertion of boot camp-style classes, step aerobics and cardio kickboxing.”  For a further look into this study check out the link, http://www.acefitness.org/certifiednewsarticle/1094/

This is something that anybody, male, female, any body shape can do and the success stories of people transforming their lives are coming in!!!   If you are not attracted to a regular “workout” type class this is something you can try.  I’m really looking forward to creating a hoop community that is based on fun, clear instructions and inspiration to explore movement and the body!  I’ve created a page on facebook, called Pranahoops, and a site http://pranahoops@wordpress.com.

Hoop your way to happiness, it’s no joke,

Love and inspiration to you,

Mindy

Fall into Grace

yoga

It’s hard to describe how my yoga has changed in the last few months with all the changes to my beloved Anusara but alas all things change so better to let go and let things flow than to cling with a death grip.  Here is what I know now, I miss Anusara! I miss John! I miss his teachings! I miss the kula! I miss planing my next training adventure!  I miss the certification process! There are things I don’t miss too but nothing worth mentioning at present.

During my practice this morning I noticed that I don’t feel like I have the same support backing me up anymore.  Where did it go?  Is is gone or has it just changed?  To me it feels much more independent and unsure.  I was struggling and I really had to go back into my heart to figure out what I was feeling. Easier not to do this work is what came to the surface, and as quickly as it came a deeper knowing that this is my dharma wiped it out.

For a long time my intention was fueled to be a thriving and interconnected being in the Anusara community and since everything has changed that part seems to have gone missing from my practice for now.  I wanted to be certified for many reasons, a landmark I could be proud of in my life, an accomplishment, an accreditation, a recognition, for my ego, for my heart.  Every single thing I have done in the last 7 years has been in deep devotion to this certification.

My deepest gratitude goes out to the teachers on the battleground, doing the difficult work of resolving conflict and trying to repair a massive rupture in what seemed so solid and in the exact same moment perhaps mending their own broken hearts.  .  I’m a runner, always have been and it’s my go-to default when conflicts arises.  I choose to run, to find high ground so I can get a bird’s-eye view of the battlefield and only return when the bloodshed has stopped and I feel safe.

I don’t feel safe yet with Anusara and don’t know if that possibility is even real anymore.  Instead I  want to remember what Grace is! How she supports me, how she loves me, how she empowers me to step up and do the hard work, how to move beyond fear and how to respond to life in courageous ways.  The definition from John, rattles around my head “Grace is the power of the universe that reveals your true nature.”  Of course that’s what Grace is but it feels different now.

My first drop back in a while was filled with uncertainty, fear, aversion, and my breath was shallow and quick.  Bam, I come crashing down onto my wrists, unlike the drop back I am capable of.  The second one bam, even more fear, less breath. The third one I paused, took a deep breath and did it for the kula, from my heart, as a symbol of my connection to them and to my highest Self and I let myself fall back into Grace’s very sweet, strong and capable hands, I landed like a feather and tears came to my eyes.

My lesson this week is to allow myself to fall into Grace whenever I need to!  Not easy when so many things block her power out and my fear of the unknown pushes her far away.  From my heart I call her back into my life, into my practice, into my teaching, into my community so that I may serve in the best way that I can.  When I forget about the power of Grace, I am forgetting who I really am and I never want to forget that but when I do and then I remember again, I am filled with peace, love and bliss.

We can’t do this on our own!  I need to remind myself that I was never meant to do this all on my own.  I need the support of my beloved, my friends, my family and my community to live my life in a valuable, authentic and powerful way.  I am a warrior but I need my army!

May all beings everywhere feel the support of Grace always,

Mindy

For the Love of Hula Hooping Sakes!!!

yoga

Confession!  I’ve recently gotten hooked on hooping.  Yep, it didnt’ take long, well, the moment I was able to keep the hoop up then I was hooked.  So after my yoga practice, I started just adding about 20 minutes of hooping in my living room and I can’t even begin to explain how happy it’s made me.

I’m thinking that it has a lot to do with my sadness/anger over what’s happened with Anusara yoga (the scandal and all that).  For a while I was thinking that I might not even teach yoga anymore.  I like to learn new skills, try new things, even if they are risky but especially if they have to do with physics and body movement.

I bought a hula hoop over a year ago and basically it kicked the shit out of me, leaving me bruised and angry that I couldn’t do much else then keep it on my waist.  However, as I was told this past weekend in my Hoopdance teacher course, “the hoop chooses you!”  Indeed it does!

Over the last two months of hooping almost everyday, I have noticed a big change in my body.  I feel more connected to my legs and pelvis and I like the flow of the hoop moving around my body.  Having fun has helped me move on from the yoga drama, that has truly been heartbreaking.

I recognized pretty quickly that sure it’s fun to hoop in the private and safety of my living room, of course my pug wants nothing to do with this piece of plastic whizzing by her napping spot on the couch, but it’s far better to hoop with others.  So voila, I thought “why not me” and started to teach.  I like to have some knowledge about the way to teach hooping since its way different then yoga and luckily I was able to attend Hoopnotica’s Hoopdance Level 1 training this past weekend in Stoney Creek.

Hooping is not just for kids friends.  A study from A.C.E (American counsel on Exercise) “America’s leading authority on fitness and the largest nonprofit fitness certification, education and training organization in the world, today announced exclusive study findings that conclude hula hooping workouts offer substantial and positive results”

Further, “at the conclusion of the test, researchers found hooping burns an average of 210 calories during a 30-minute hooping workout (approximately 420 calories per hour), which is comparable to the exertion of boot camp-style classes, step aerobics and cardio kickboxing.”  For a further look into this study check out the link, http://www.acefitness.org/certifiednewsarticle/1094/

This is something that anybody, male, female, any body shape can do and the success stories of people transforming their lives are coming in!!!   If you are not attracted to a regular “workout” type class this is something you can try.  I’m really looking forward to creating a hoop community that is based on fun, clear instructions and inspiration to explore movement and the body!  I’ve created a page on facebook, called Pranahoops, and a site http://pranahoops@wordpress.com.

Hoop your way to happiness, it’s no joke,

Love and inspiration to you,

Mindy

Here’s what happens when you add Yoga!

yoga

Something I’ve noticed since starting yoga almost 10 years ago – it changes EVERYTHING!

Make no mistake your life would probably remain more simple if you did not awaken the “sleeping giant” of consciousness.  Once your awake you can look forward to things like these; when you mess up, you’ll  beat yourself up for days, you’re not everyone’s favorite yogi, ouch, not behaving in a yogic way, boo.  Once you are awake, well…. you’re freakin AWAKE.  It’s not a switch that you can shut off and go back to sleep.  If you’ve been bit by the yoga bug it’s infectious and the infection of awareness spreads to every part of your life.

Nothing you do is without a heightened sense of awareness.  Every hour you log on your mat increase your consciousness ten-fold. more so if you practice with your heart first. Pre yoga if you give someone the finger in your car you felt better and you’re proud of yourself for putting someone in their place, post yoga you recognize it’s your problem not their’s.  You eat crappy food and you feel like shit, oppsy!  You lie, it’s not the person you’re lying too because they might never find out, but you know!   Yep yoga will touch every part, even they ones your want to hide from the world.

How does it all work really?  How can time spend in downward dog create such a radial change in someone’s behaviour?  I believe it to be mostly a mystery to the body but truth to one’s soul.  You were born to expand!  If you find yourself a serious yoga student you will thrive in the environments where the teacher pushes you to and beyond your comfort zone.  The truth is once you go there, there’s no going back!

If you try to go back you will feel a sharp pain in your heart of disconnect, take that as a lovely little reminder that it’s pretty hard to go back to sleep and in fact your are not meant to!  The kula will draw you back.  The urge to merge will begin to get so loud you have no choice but to listen.

Once you add yoga, you are adding it to every single thing that you do during the day!  You want to do laundry, add yoga.  You want to go for a nice walk outside, add yoga.  You want to cook a delicious meal, add yoga.  You want to have awesome relationships with other people, add yoga.  You want to be smarter, add yoga.  You want to improve your memory, add yoga. You want to heal your body of illness and disease, add yoga.  You want this world to be a better place, add yoga!

REAL YOGA!  Hard core, shift your consciousness, blow your proverbial socks off because yogis go barefoot, I’m not talking about the kind where you make a comment after class like “that bitch took the shower in front of me”  I’m talking about the straight into the heart of who you are YOGA!!!!  This is where the magic of this incredible transformation occurs!

We don’t have much time to wait for people to wake up if they haven’t already.  I’m not saying we should lose hope but align yourself with beings that have a high vibration of consciousness.  Our planet’s hope lies in our ability to wake the “F” up!

London’s 1st Acro-Yoga Jam Session

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Hey London yoga lovers,

Friday is a day of firsts for London!  It’s the long-awaited (by some) Acro-Yoga Jam Session and idea ruminating for 3 years is now happening on Friday at the lovely LIVE360 on Ridout and York.  Introduce yourself to another level of yoga practice.  Basing, flying, spotting are all part of this fun style of yoga based on acrobatics, yoga and Thai Yoga massage.

Live music to make it that much sweeter!

Come clean and on an empty tummy.

Cost is $5 per person and we start at 7pm and run to 8:30.

The next jam session will be April 27th.

Yoga & Rock Climbing

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Some of you may not have ever heard someone yelling this to you from below.

“Mindy put your right foot on that hold by your right shoulder!!!” 

Yogini on the Rocks!

If you’re a climber than you may have heard it and other amazing ideas for body contortion to get up a route.  I’ve been climbing since I was 15 years old, now 35 and although I don’t get to climb as much as I used to, which was everyday back then I’m a much stronger climber now then I was then.

For a 5 years I was so scared of falling I would downclimb a 12a instead of going for the next move. Fear had paralyzed me.  Fear isn’t a bad thing but in climbing it needs to be managed to reach your full potential.  I would climb and be so calm and strong and then the moment a crux move came my heart rate would accelerate and I would be overcome with the fear of the fall so much that I would back off.

Like yoga practice, I had to practice falling.  When I first started to practice yoga poses really scared me, like handstands and arm balances.  Early in I fell on my face out of crow pose and that fall hurt more than my face.  Fear took over and I didn’t try it again for almost 8 months!  What’s even more interesting is now crow pose is one of my favorites.

You can really overcome a lot of obstacles on your yoga mat. 

Once I started to practice falling on lead I quickly overcame the fear and started to push myself again and it really felt great.  I noticed that fear can creep back in if I don’t take a few falls so it’s really important that as the fear starts to grip me, I have to let myself surrender and literally ‘let go.’

I remember when I started to get into yoga I was trying to show some of my climbing friends a few stretches that would help.  It wasn’t long after that I decided to become a yoga teacher so I actually knew what I was doing (well, sort of).  Yoga has helped my climbing in physical and psychological ways.  My concentration has improved as much as my hamstring flexibility.  Staying connected to my breath in yoga and climbing helps to keep my heart rate down and my nervous system more calm.  Climbing is exciting so my heart rate will jump but I can bring it back down much faster now with some deep yogic breaths. 

Whenever I’m at a climbing gym or the crag I can’t help but notice people posture’s.  It what I do for a living now.  What I have noticed is that climbers tend to have a concave chest and a rounded back with both their shoulders and their head in the forward plane of the body.  Having a strong back is obviously a must for climbing hard but imbalances between the front and back body will limit they body.

People with poor posture have a shorter life span.

When the head and shoulders are forward it puts pressure on the spinal discs but it also puts more pressure on the heart and lungs.  Just by bringing the head and shoulders back your lungs can more fully inflate, more breath, more oxygen, more oxygen, better muscle performance.  Less oxygen the muscles can prematurely sezz up.  Breathe better, climb harder, live longer!

Practicing poses on my fingertips at first was excruciating!  My fingers burned in every pose.  My tendons and pulleys were overused and tight, not strong, tight!  Big difference between tight and strong.  Tight muscles are also weak, they tear easily then the body must use energy to heal.  Strong muscles are ones that are strong AND flexible.  After about six months of steady practice on my fingertips, even handstands, my fingers felt better than ever and I was able to crimp and hold slopers with more strength and ease.  10 Points for  yoga!!

On the opposite end, we can talk about climbers feet (okay I barfed a little in my mouth just typing that, nasty)  Like many climbers I wanted my shoes to be super tight.  I remember back in the early nineties having to order my gear over the phone the guy at MEC in Toronto telling me to downsize my regular shoe size by at least 2 sizes, “the tighter the better” he said.  I started with a pair of Boreal Ballets, I couldn’t get them to be tight if I tried because my foot was so narrow and skinny.

After years of climbing and wearing tight shoes my toes were in very bad shape.  I was told that I was going to need surgery on my bunions at 22 years old!  The corns on the tops of my toes were painful and since yoga is done in bare feet, I started to study my feet a lot more and felt sad about the abuse I had put them through over the years of tight climbing shoes.  I don’t have a pic of my toes back then but I have one of them now.

My bunions are so much better, my corns are pretty much gone! 

I can remember being on a route in Kentucky and after about 40 feet my toes were burning to the point I would have to rest and take my shoes off.  Silly my shoes were so tight the were hurting my climbing not helping.  I always have two pairs of shoes one for easier climbs and a pair that are a bit tighter for harder routes.

Yoga creates balance in the body, mind and heart.

As the warmer weather comes my itch to get out and climb is increasing.  We

haven’t had a climbing gym in our city for a few years now and news has hit that one

is finally slated to open in 7 to 9 months, I can’t wait to put my practice into practice at the gym.

 

The bottom line is yoga will help you climb harder, hands down its the number one cross-training activity that will make a huge difference in how you climb.

Happy climbing and get on a yoga mat asap!

Mindy Willis-Menard

Certified yoga teacher and climbing addict

Why I want a yoga teacher

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At this point I am maintaing my Anusara Inspired status but I can’t say for certain that it will remain that way in the future.  For now I wanted to be very clear in  my decisions about my next steps forward on this journey.  Through all of the insanity of the last few weeks something has become very clear to me.  I NEED a yoga teacher!

I acknowledge the true guru is within in, I really do get that but I also admit that I could use some guidance on this path.  What I recognized is that I can only go so far on my own before a trained set of eyes can take me to the next level.  I am not satisfied to stay where I am!  Sure, I can do most of the poses in Syllabus 2 and many from 3 but my body seeks to expand its limits.

Most postures I actually taught myself! 

Even though  I was mainly self-taught in yoga, it didn’t come without some injuries, some more serious and really freakin scary.  First time I thought I was ready for a drop back, boom, hit my face on the floor.  I know now that it was because I was lifting my arms up too fast and I was losing the connection to my legs.  Skilled teachers, like John Friend and many others have very clear, instructions for doing these more challenging poses.  I’ve been so blessed to have studied with the Anusara community.

I will still try poses that seem out of my reach on my own, I think there’s value in logging time on the mat just doing what I can but I can’t wait for my next workshop to learn more or take my body to that place of radical expansion that just feels so damn good!

Om Namah Shivaya Gurave ~ “The true teacher is within and without”

The Mirror

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I’m writing this now because I can’t bring myself to teach yoga at this time.  This makes me incredibly sad because I want so much to serve my yoga community and many of them are hurting too.  However, I have felt this darkness in my past and I know that I need to take really good care of myself.  I’ve suggested checking into a mental institute for the next week but I would probably hate the food.  I only say this in light because I have ended up there before in a dark time.  This is a bit different.

The last few days (3 to be specific) have been the most heartbreaking for me as teacher after teacher resign from Anusara, the man, and the company.  What took 14 years to build has been dismantled in almost 14 days!  I am devastated!  One of the many analogies I have come up with to try to express the raw emotions spewing from my heart and my guts is that I have been going to a “university” for 8 years and all of a sudden the university has disappeared and I can not finish my degree!.

I don’t know what will happen to the company but I do know that I am really going to miss John and his workshops.  Not only for the incredible information I take in each time, but the community I care so deeply about.  We may never have that again!  Well something like it but it will never be the same and it shouldn’t.

When all this started one part of it hit a nerve for me.  The one thing that happened that really got me was the “married woman” thing.  I just sat with that for a while and felt good that I had something to be pissed at him about.  A married women, geesh, couldn’t you have waited until she got a divorce or something and I sat back in my purity chair and threw stones at that behaviour. 

After a bit I realized that I needed to understand why THAT part of all of this was really bothering me so much.  Why wasn’t I pissed about the pot (how can you be, really?), what about the pensions (I don’t have a pension, I’m a yoga teacher in Canada), the wiccan coven (my word!  If only my Catholic mother knew what I was involved in)?

Nope just the married woman thing!  Then I had one of those unbelievable moments of truth, out of nowhere, a clear insight into it.  Magical!  As John stands in front of us, and I in front of my husband, my mom, my dad, my sister, my friends, my students I carry with me a long lineage of energy and beliefs, even if I don’t know they are even there or I hate them!

The person that you see in front of you is a miracle!  An embodiment of energy that is both Divine and completely fucked up!  My family had a Catholic bomb go off when there was “an affair”, “in the church” no less.  The couple involved loved each other even though they hurt many other people around them and it was difficult.  They didn’t get there because they were both so happy in their marriage, there lives!  Their living arrangements changed and I watched my aunt go through a very difficult time begin alone after my uncle went off to work in another city for, well for far too long, I guess.

Sorry for the history but I do have a point to make and it’s coming just not yet.  The person who suffered the most in this situation was my mom!  She is loyal, Catholic and has been married to my dad for a bagillion years.  I witnessed first hand how this hurt her and I warned her year after year that she needed to let it go, to heal, that she was only hurting herself.  She has finally let go,well a little bit and I’m so proud of her, but it’s taken almost 10 years!

So perhaps that is where my “married woman” button came from, without me really knowing at first where it came from.  John’s behaviour has held up a mirror for all of us.  And what we have a problem with is something we see in ourselves that we do not like but we know it is there!  This of course does not forgive him but when I think of him, I see not just the man, the company, but a long history of lineages that are woven through the tapestry of his body and mind.  I wonder if each of you affected by this picked out one thing that really truly bothered you about all this and recognized that it isn’t the first time it’s shown up in your life, or you families history!

Then we can have compassion!  Every person is a complex being of layers of energy and thousands of years of history.  I think John is a person capable of working this out in this life time.  I hope I am.  Look deeper and then deeper still.  I love and respect my teacher within but also without.  I love and respect John and the other teachers that I have studied with because they have given my some guidance, some help, some direction.  I do not follow them blindly but so far they haven’t personally led me any where but back to my own heart. 

This has been the most powerful mirror ever held to my soul, I want and hope my response is in alignment with the highest.  I feel like this mirror has shattered into a million pieces, each one representing a yoga student that has healed or thrived in the teachings of Anusara yoga and I hope we catch a glimpse of our true nature and that we get to see each other shine again.

Healing to all of your hearts,

Mindy

Yogis Unite? Not so much!

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Yoga is more than poses! Yoga is a lifestyle that impart helps the student to align in a way that brings more joy and freedom into their lives. The true teacher of this path is YOU! The yoga teacher is there for guidance and support but ultimately YOU are in charge of your life, your attitude and your actions. Since we are humans we can/do and will make mistakes! It is through mistakes that we learn how to align again and again.

The contrast of what feels good and what feels bad is really a source of direction from our inner teacher. Many of you have heard of the recent allegation of John Friend and Anusara and I want to let my students know that I am not shifting my course here! I am going to stay steadfast in the teachings of Anusara because they have been the most beneficial to me and I also believe to my students that I share the teachings with. In so many ways my heart was shattered into a million pieces, not because of what these accusations imply about John but how the “yoga” community responded to what wasn’t even proven!

So many people were so quick to chirp up and cast judgement on John and Anusara. I still have such a bad taste in my mouth because I realized that so many people practice yoga (poses) but so few of them are really practicing yogis and yoginis and that is saddening because our planet needs conscious, caring, loving people who are holding a high integral standard for themselves and our planet. And YES we screw up, so what, that is part of the deal but how fast we can come back to the path is what I believe to be an accumulation of one’s time spent on the mat and by studying yoga.

So many of John’s teachings that have directly come from his mouth to my ears, have helped me to live my life more fully, to create healthy boundaries, to pulse with expansion and contraction, to HEAL my body, heart and mind, to be in relationships with myself and others, to empower me and most importantly that the true teacher is within in!

Om shanti, and please please please for the love of this planet and all the humans who share it, be mindful of your actions, forgive yourself if/when you screw up and speak and live from the highest place that you can as much as you can.

Feeling Down? Turn Your Shit Upside Down!

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Yep, depression blows!!!  I suffered from this shitty ass condition for many years.  Those little happy pills helped but they also made me insane, but I’m happy I had them because I know I won’t be here right now if I didn’t.  With people busier than every, every second of the day accounted for by work, kids, sports, laundry, driving etc, etc… no wonder depression is on the rise.  Here’s my opinion, if you want to hear it, if not your are 100% free to not read it 🙂

We are depressed because we are not fulfilling the deepest wishes of our hearts!

I’m no stranger to unbalanced brain chemicals friends but seriously some of us are working ourselves to the brink of exhaustion with no play time.  This is a recipe for sadness!  Our hearts long to connect to community,  have friends, socialize, dress up, dance, eat food together, have “sexy time”, and when we don’t make time for that we suffer heartache and feel poopy!

My depression almost killed me! 

Confessing to you that I attempted suicide many years ago isn’t a ploy for sympathy but rather a gentle reminder of how sacred  life actually is!  If you suffer from this shitty ass condition, get some help!  What I mean by that is DO SOME SERIOUS YOGA and DO IT EVERYDAY!

It’s normal to feel sad sometime, lost, alone, to cry, to isolate ourselves but these are some of the symptoms that are worth looking at.  Here are the 9 main symptoms that doc’s use to help diagnose clinical depression.

1.  Loss of pleasure, in activities that used to make you happy.

2. A noticeable increase or decrease in appetite, weight, or both.

3.  Constantly feeling guilty or worthlessness (yuk)

4.  Insomnia, disturbed sleep, oversleeping, long naps every day.

5.  You feel depressed almost everyday and for most of the hours you are awake.

6.  Inability to focus or concentrate, most of the time.

7.  Intense feeling of lethargy or agitation.

8.  No energy or daily fatigue.

9.  reoccurring suicidal thoughts (boo)

How does depression happen?  The brain is a complex organism but what is understood about it can help to explain a part of depression and how your brain works.  Sometimes there are abnormal levels of neurotransmitters such as, serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine in the brain.  This imbalance can improve by taking anti-depressants or SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, this include:

  • Citalopram (Celexa, Cipramil)
  • Escitalopram (Lexapro, Cipralex, Seroplex, Lexamil)
  • Fluoxetine(Prozac, Sarafem, Symbyax)
  • Fluvoxamin (Luvox)
  • Paroxetine (Paxil, Aropax)
  • Sertraline (Zoloft) ( I took this one for 7 years)
  • Vilazodone (Viibryd)

What about side effects?  Here’s a little list of them:  drowsiness, dry mouth, nervousness, anxiety, insomnia, decreased appetite, long-term weight gain and decreased ability to function sexually (big boo) may occur. Some of these side-effects may decrease as a person adjusts to the drug, but other side-effects may be persistent.

If these drugs help you gather enough energy to get out to yoga that’s fantastic because yoga can and does help depression, but here’s the kicker you have to do it, daily!!  Some days I felt more depressed than others and had to literally drag my ass to class but every time I did, I always, always, always felt better afterward, even just a teeny, tiny, little bit.

According to  Dr. Timothy McCall, one of the reasons yoga helps is that it helps to relieve stress and tension which often has a big impact on the sympathetic nervous system.  Yoga has been shown to decrease cortisol levels that stay elevated from the flight or fight response, which is tied to lifting one’s mood.

Here it is!  Feeling Down?  Turn Your Shit Upside Down!  TANTRA STYLE!

Yoga time is anytime 😉

The benefits of doing inversions are well documented at this point!  Patricia Walden lists that headstand can help clear the brain, stabilize emotions and build confidence.  I couldn’t agree more.

Headstand kept me from ending my life! 

Big bold statement yes!  Headstand with good alignment (critical since I also suffered  a serious whiplash injury from a car accident) also helps to improve the pulsation of the endocrine system.  Think of this system as a series of on/off switches.  When some of them are off instead of on, it impacts our hormones and stress can cause them to get out of whack.  Inversions can help balance them out.

In addition to inversions effect on the endocrine system, you get a brand spanking new perspective on your life when your upside down!  Sure it might just be 30 seconds when your learning but if you build up to ten minutes you are refreshing your eye! Seeing your shit from upside down can help you have a shift in attitude when your right side up!.

In light of the recent article in the NY Times about how yoga can wreck your bod, I suggest with confidence an Anusara teacher.  They can teach you how to create a powerful foundation that keeps your neck safe and in fact can strengthen your neck muscles.

Practice, practice, practice and hopefully it helps you catch a glimpse of your divinity and what a gift it is to have this body and even this condition.

Blessings to you!