What Homeless Shelters and Refugee Camps Have Taught Me About Seva
As originally published by 3HO. The word “seva” means selfless service, but when I reflect on it, I think I get as much out of my acts of seva as the people I’m serving. Some of my first volunteer positions were in homeless shelters in San Francisco, and today I volunteer to support the refugee population here in Greece. The benefits I’ve gained from seva are many and long ranging. I’ve included three below with the hope you might consider doing seva yourself. 1) My Comfort Zone Expanded When I graduated from Kundalini Yoga Teacher Training in 2009, I didn’t feel like a “real” teacher so I started volunteer…
Connecting the Dots: How I Went from Being a San Francisco CFO to an Athens Yoga Instructor
This is a series describing, dot by dot, how I went from being a San Francisco CFO to an Athens Yoga Instructor. You can read individual installments below or scroll down for the entire series. 1.0-1.1: My Boyfriend Walked Out and My Teacher Walked In (Sept 2007) 1.1-1.2: White Tantric Yoga (March 2008) 1.2-1.3: A Death in the Family (June 2008) 1.3-1.4: 40 Days and 40 Nights of the Cleanse (Winter 2009) 1.4-1.5: The Burning Man Bumblebee Incident (Spring 2009) 1.5-1.6: A Festival in a Field in France (August 2009) 1.6-1.7: How I Crafted My Own “Study Abroad” Program (May 2011) 1.7-1.8: How My Dog Launched My Yoga Career…
I’ve Practiced Kundalini Yoga Daily For The Last 9.5 Years. Here’s What I’ve Learned…
People sometimes ask about my personal yoga practice, and they are often surprised to hear that I‘ve been maintaining a daily Kundalini Yoga practice for 9.5 years. It’s surprising to me too when I do the math, but in 2009 when I finished Kundalini Yoga teacher training, my teachers were clear that if we planned to teach, it was important to have a daily practice. I took this advice seriously and with the exception of maybe 2 days in the last 9.5 years (roughly 3,465 days), I’ve done Kundalini Yoga every day. What’s a daily practice? A daily practice is different things for different people. For me, it means…
What I Learned From the Project 333 Fashion Challenge
What Is It? I first learned about Project 333 when we screened the movie Minimalism on the Acropolis Roof Deck this summer. The movie is all about how simplifying your life makes you happier. One of the trends that it featured was Project 333—a fashion challenge that dares you to narrow your wardrobe down to 33 items for 3 months. The challenge is designed to raise awareness around consumerism and to illustrate how you can actually be happier with less. Most of us conceptually understand we have more than we need. This challenge sets out to prove it. The trend started in the United States, but it’s gaining momentum worldwide.…
An Open Thank You to Snatam Kaur and all the Kundalini Yoga Musicians Worldwide
Today I want to take an opportunity to post an open thank you to Snatam Kaur and all the Kundalini Yoga musicians worldwide. Your music has made all the difference for me and many of the people I teach. In November, I started teaching yoga at Skaramagas, one of the biggest refugee camps in Greece. I first got involved in the refugee situation back in 2015 when I went to Lesvos for a weekend. In 2016, I briefly taught at another refugee organization in Athens, but then I got busy writing my book, and since that time, I hadn’t been involved at all. Last fall, when I saw a…
How to Lose Weight in Four Steps
The holidays are coming, and many of you are asking me how to lose weight. Hm. I’m going to try to answer that, with the disclaimer that I’m not a dietician or a nutritionist. I’m a yoga instructor. However, I do have ideas on weight loss, and I’ve laid out four steps that have worked for me and will probably work for you. My experience is that: 75% of a toned body is what you eat 25% is how and how much you exercise. I say this because I was at my heaviest ever when I was training for triathlons. I was exercising a lot and eating a…
Last Week I Went for a Walk in Spain…
Last week I went for a walk in Spain, hiking the last 118 kilometers of the Camino de Santiago de Compostela. I first heard about the Camino because I’m a big fan of the writer Paulo Coelho. He wrote his book “The Pilgrimage” about his experience on the Camino. The full walk is 780 kilometers and while there are many routes, the traditional one crosses northern Spain ending at the shrine of the apostle Saint James the Great in the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Galicia. Tradition has it that the remains of the saint are buried here. People walk the Camino de Santiago for a variety of reasons…
“Biohacking” was just added to the dictionary–here is what you need to know!
I’m a big fan of biohacking so I was excited to learn the term has now been added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary. You can check out other new additions here, including words like Instagramming. They say language follows culture. 🙂 What is a biohacking? In simple terms, it is using science and technology to make your body function better and more efficiently. You “self study” by observing and measuring what various things do to your body. Then you refine and tweak. You basically take ownership of the way your body functions and focus on what you want to improve. You may have heard of the keto diet, bulletproof coffee and…
I Went On The Ketogenic Diet For 30 Days. Here Is What I Learned..
I’m on a lot of email lists relating to nutrition and wellness so over the last 12 months, I’ve been reading more and more about the Ketogenic (Keto) diet. But the catalyst that made me decide to try it was watching “The Broken Brain” series by the Dr. Mark Hyman. He talks about how the ketogenic diet is actually good for not just your body but your brain. I was intrigued so I decided to try it for myself to see what would happen. What is the Ketogenic diet? The Keto diet is a very low carb, high fat diet that puts your body into a state of ketosis.…
Is Kundalini Yoga Dangerous?
For the Greek translation, go here. Για την ελληνική μετάφραση, μετακινηθείτε εδώ. Is Kundalini Yoga dangerous? I was just at the Kundalini Yoga festival in Athens this month, and another teacher mentioned an Athens yoga studio was hesitant to add Kundalini Yoga because they were concerned it might be dangerous. A Greek Orthodox priest I meet with asked the same thing when I mentioned I teach Kundalini Yoga. “Isn’t that dangerous?” This question comes up again and again because there’s a lot of misinformation out there about the potential dangers of Kundalini Yoga. At the core of this misunderstanding is confusion between kundalini energy and Kundalini Yoga. …
