Desire

What is desire? From where does it arise? Where in the body do we feel this?

Investigating into desire, the nature of desire, and embodying desire in our yoga practice, as we can imagine, is rich and deep, like eating a creamy chocolate mousse, as opposed to a low-fat energy bar (my desire for good food is strong, so please excuse the banality of my food analogies :)

When we allow ourselves to be in the place of nothing to do, nowhere to go, no one i have to be, we can listen inside. Listen into the movement of everything. With every movement, within every single cell, with the seeping pulsing flow of fluids, there exists the background and foreground of Desire. How can we be here without Desire? We ARE Desire. We ALREADY embody Desire - we could not exist without it.

We usually think of Desire as sexual Desire (and food). Well no wonder: in the lower chakras, the organs of reproduction, digestion, and excretion, the feelings of desire can feel the strongest, the most palpable. But by sensing and feeling into the quieter and seemingly hidden places, we can feel the presence of Desire there as well. This is the creative process, and how we come to be.

We Reach, We Push, We Pull, We Move, We Settle, out of Desire. Underneath All of this, there is Yield. Yield to ourselves, allowing this very moment to be what it is, allowing ourselves to be who we are - then we can observe, this dance, this play of Desire - and, as a consequence, reach for what we want. What do you desire, really?

Yoga with Nabi, July 29th & 30th!

Exploration oh exploration
Investigation into sensation
Bones, organs, fluids flow
More we seek, the less we know
~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~

Let's do it again~

Thursday, July 29th

Bhava
21 Elliot Street, Brattleboro

5:30-7:15pm
($12-$13 sugg. donation)


Friday, July 30th
Yoga Room 6 @ the Putney Tavern
133 Main Street, Putney
9-10:30am

($12-$14 sugg. donation)

with love
Banghan Nabi

The resting heart, its desire, reaching, and courage.

Rain pours down on this Friday afternoon.
An intimate and beautiful class in Putney earlier this morning:

Working from the place of the full, resting heart: the seat of our intelligence. We felt what we felt and sensed in the heart, all sides: the front, sides, and back of the heart.
We then drew our awareness to the sternum and up to the manubrium.
I have been inquiring into the heart's desire, noticing its arising, and the courage to act on this desire. The presentation of the sternum and manubrium area felt appropriate to explore.

We felt into the hollow space in the central channel of our bodies (the site of our notochord, also known in yogic text as the sushumna nadi), by spiraling on hand & knees, softening, and breathing into the diaphragms echoed in the body (the crown of the skull, the cave of the mouth, the throat, the breathing diaphragm, the pelvic floor).
From this softened place, we explored crawling, and reaching - expressing outward the inner desire to Reach, to Take into us nourishment, and to Satisfy ourselves. I always enjoy these "un-yoga" movements that echo what we did as growing babies and children. It seems that by re-exploring these patterns, we can gain insights about how we move & express right now.

Then there were the courageous, expressive warrior postures, trikonasana, and the balancing ardha chandrasanas and vertical splits. The exploration took us to one of my favorite Angela Farmer postures: dying warrior. The "reach" in this posture is expressed in moving the upper body away from the lower body diagonally, moving the inner body out of the outer body, and in that, beautiful spirals, like a wet fabric being wrung out, are created and noticed internally, as we continue to "squeeze, squeeze, squeeze" inside. Space spac e space space spaciousness.

It seems that courage applies not only to the outward expression of stating and obtaining what one desires in the world, but even more so to diving inside oneself, deep, deeper, even deeper. We are made up of so many layers, and with an investigation, even starting with one organ, like the heart, or one theme, like courage, we can take that to a very subtle, quiet, cellular level and find such richness of explorations right there. I hope you continue to explore!

Prana, Summer, Class this week...

In the thicket of the greenery, of lushness, of Life in the Summer!
Do you feel the constant buzz of activity, the prana that flows so powerfully these summer days and nights?

The buzzing took me on a 1100 mile roadtrip to visit family, friends, and tie some loosened knots in small-town Pennsylvania and in the belly of the urban beast of lower Manhattan, and I'm quite happy to feel earth and full ground in Vermont.
Blessed place we live in!

Back to Yoga!
Our normally programmed schedule is resuming:

Thursday, July 22nd

Bhava
21 Elliot Street, Brattleboro

5:30-7:15pm
($12-$13 sugg. donation)


Friday, July 23rd
Yoga Room 6 @ the Putney Tavern
133 Main Street, Putney
9-10:30am

($12-$14 sugg. donation)

Hope to see some of you there~
In peace,
Banghan Nabi

FOUND: A Wonderful Sub for Thursday, July 15th Class @ Bhava!

Hello All!

Marybeth will be teaching in my place on Thursday evening at Bhava, 5:30-7:15pm!
Come & enjoy her wonderful energy and invigorating asana practice!

See you next week -
Nabi

No Classes with Yogi Nabi this week!

Hello!

I am on a trip to "get things done" outside of Brattleboro & Putney... on the road this week.
Alas, my class in Brattleboro and Putney will not be happening.
There is a chance that I will get a wonderful sub for my Thursday evening class at Bhava ... I'll keep you posted!

Peace!
Banghan Nabi