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Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, United States
Karen is a yogini, writer, student, teacher and meditator. She founded Garden Street School of Yoga in 2000. Karen lives with her husband Chris. They have two amazing sons, Eli and Leo (both of them young men).

Nov 26, 2009

Thanks Giving

It almost bedtime on Thanksgiving evening. It's been a good day. I taught the 8th annual Thanksgiving morning benefit practice this morning. I decided to "practice with" the gang. When I practice with a class it always seems to end up being a much stronger practice - but I think everybody was OK......and seemed happy. I ran a theme focused on the "Wild Generosity of the Sun". We had a great and very "solar" practice.

Here's some of the inspiration:


Brian Swimme on the "generosity" of the sun: "Ninety-three million miles the light has to come, and already we're being warmed up by it. You know, if it weren't for the sun, the entire Earth would be 400 degrees below zero. It just constantly pours out all of that light, and what's amazing is to think about the sun being a million times as huge as the Earth. It's just this vast fire that enables all of life to take place here. And what I really find fascinating is the way in which the sun produces this light. Right at the core it's transforming hydrogen into helium. And in that transformation it's converting some of its mass into energy. Every second, four million tons of the sun is being transformed into this light. That's like a million elephants. So there's another million elephants, another million elephants, and if it weren't for that ongoing bestowal of energy, we wouldn't have any life on earth. So one way to think about the sun, every time you see it at dawn, is to think of it as an act of cosmic generosity. It's this vast giveaway of energy that enables us to survive, enables all of life to thrive. So we are surfing around the source of ongoing cosmic generosity."

"Brian Swimme on life as the sun in a different form: " one of the gifts of science is to realize that what is surging through us in every moment of our life, with every breath we take, is the sun. So in a real sense the human is the human form of a solar flare…….We are the sun in a new form."


I have been wanting to "practice with" the classes a lot lately. (In Anusara we generally do not "practice with" so as to better teach). I think it must be that my body wisdom is telling me to get into resonance with my students - and practicing together is a sure way to do that. I have been away a lot lately -- taking in so much as a student myself in several intensive formats . Right now I just want to practice with my students and get us all woven together on a new same page. So we'll see how long this inclination lasts. The students tell me they like it when I practice with them - probably because I don't do it all the time.

After class I took a walk alone on Tubbs hill while Chris picked up his mom at the airport (she live in L.A.). Then we all enjoyed a supper of soup and salad, followed by root beer floats.

The 10 days with Lee and company was really and truly awesome. I got to see several of the sangha from France, Germany and Mexico. Over the years I have grown especially close with the women from Mexico City. And I got to meet the entire Australian sangha (5 mates).

OK - there is so much more......Robert Svoboda's teachings to name a big item. I will try to get caught up on my writing over the next few days. But I am really pooped right now. So I'm off to meditate (I love love love to meditate right before bed - so don't think I'm too virtuous. I'm just doing what I love).

1 comment:

  1. Karen ~ It was a fantastic practice! It's so nice to have you back - I missed you while you were away.

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