Dear Yogis,

Especially dear are those students who have taken up the challenge of CCP – those in the first intake.  A truly dedicated band, and every one has a little piece of my heart.  It has been an interesting journey and I am only part way down the track – a little over half way.  Because this is a new course, and a new thought (even for our insurance agents), there are new challenges in every session.

This week we spoke about how to come to the comfort and aid of women who have lost children and babies, even those babies considered to be embryos and with no possibility of life as modern medicine views it.  As yogis we understand that at every stage we are spiritual beings with a reason for our existence however short or long that may be.  Even before they/we  have made the decision to enter  the womb we are “alive” and have a reason for being.  We bless those “waiting to be born, waiting to enter the womb”.  As a COMPASSIONATE COMPANION we are like a welcoming/guiding committee for all beings,  and are available to understand and guide parents, siblings, relatives to a calm place, allowing the thought that every living thing has a path.

If you would like to walk this path, if you would like to join with us,  the next intake of the CCProject will be Sunday the 10th of October at 10am.  Please email me and I will forward to you the appropriate admission forms. 

In this new and different world, there will be many ways you can use this certification this new discipline.  Already in our current class we are considering areas we would like to specialise in, people we could help, aid and comfort – Mothers, beloved pets, family members, aged care, mental health.  We have even thought of those CCP graduates who prefer to work to organise the administration required as one is facing life and death decisions (all of us) and getting  affairs and documentation  in order ready to be taken to lawyers, and executors at the proper time.  All the information required by those left behind to carry on,  making sure  there is as little IT stress as possible.  The LITTLE BLACK BOOK OF EVERYTHING is indispensable in this.

CCP  is a short course with great benefit to the world.  I remember many years ago when The Southern School of Natural Therapy opened its its doors, no-one really knew what a naturopath was.  The Directors of this new school asked me if I would like to join the first intake, which for me would have meant 6 months of study.  At the time I was concentrating on yoga.  I didn’t know what naturopathy was, and on that basis I decided that I didn’t want to interrupt my yoga study, so I declined the offer.  The course is now a minimum of four years and costs about $45,000 – I could have done it in 6 months for less than $1,000. Naturopaths are now a valued part of our alternative health system.

If I could go back and got the opportunity presented to me again would I take it, if only to learn new things,  not necessarily to become a naturopath –  Yes I would.  So, learn from me…take this CCP opportunity.

I am offering you this course for under $500 and only 10 to 12 weeks commitment.  Will it change? YES of course, as we understand more, meet more people, and expand our thinking.  Should you consider joining us now…YES YOU SHOULD.  We don’t know where this will lead, but we know it will grow to meet you..  It is a wonderful course already, but it will grow.

To move forward with this (at the moment) short course, please go to www.ccpproject.com to answer any queries,
or  email me yogafirst2@bigpond.com direct and I will send you the application admission forms.

ZOOM STUDY THIS WEEK
Monday 6.30 Teacher Training, Tuesday CCP Study, Friday 6.45 Tarot
Monday 1pm Hatha, Wednesday 5.30 Restorative

STUDIO –  if Covid restrictions lifted at the end of the week. Friday 5.30 (hatha)

 

DECLUTTERING:  I have a big bag of books about Palmistry which I am offering for sale – make an offer, and a beautiful handmade Kangaroo skin drum $200.  I can’t post either of these as the postage would add considerably to the cost.  Email me if you are interested – yogafirst2@bigpond.com

 

 

I WILL SEE YOU SOON.

NAMASTE
JAHNE

 

 

 

 

DEAR YOGIS,

Another few days has past and more to go before we can unlock our doors... Although I did have a visit from my “bubble” person yesterday.  I so enjoyed it.  Because I am busy all the time I didn’t know how much I missed company.  Now I do, However, until lock down is relaxed, I am confined to the bubble.

ZOOM SCHEDULE
STUDY:  Friday 6.45 Tarot, Sunday 10am CCP Study, Monday 6.30 Teacher Training, Tuesday 7.30 CCP Repeat.
YOGA CLASSES ON ZOOM: Monday 1pm and Wednesday 5.30

 

FUNGI/HERBALS…

As you all know, sourcing has always been a huge focus of what I do.  I don’t have a huge menu of herbs and fungi that I stock and sell  especially as I forage and make many of my herbals.  Sustainability and longevity of my herbal practices are a priority.  This also applies to the few fungals, oils and herbals I stock from other suppliers. Because I follow the seasons it’s hard to guarantee a sustainable supply. I am still a one-person business after all.

I have always had the policy that I would stop sourcing a herb from the wild if it became unsustainable whether that was an overseas source or here at home.

This can be annoying to me and to my clients however,  we’re obviously super grateful to the CITES organisation for preventing people from trading in these rare, wild herbs and ensuring their ongoing protection.  (The photo on the right is Turkey Tail growing in my yard this year and on the left in a local garden last year).

And so, we welcome a new batch of Turkey Tail.  Remember that Daoist herbalism is about the energy of the herb and formula, not the isolated herb’s chemistry.  I take Turkey Tail every day, and we have a dedicated band of folk who do this, which is important this time especially considering that this fungi focusses on the immune system, and respiration.  Please go to “Ted Talks” on YouTube and to the film “FANTASTIC FUNGI” on Netflix to review the work of Paul Staments who is the go-to guru of fungi, especially Turkey Tail.

TURKEY TAIL:  $35 for 22 grams includes postage.  This is not a dead, dry powder, but a mix that comes alive when you spoon it.  It is rich and crumbly.. just like you would expect a mushroom to be.

ORGANIC REISHI SPORE OIL:  $25 including postage.  Not many left – we can put you on back order.   What an amazing fungi this is.  Reishi spore oil is a concentrated supplement form of reishi mushroom. There are many great nutritional compounds present in the reishi spore oil. Reishi mushrooms are rich in triterpenes, beta-glucans, polysaccharides, antioxidants, enzymes and ergosterol.

They also contain a source of minerals including magnesium, potassium, and calcium. Order reishi spore oil  today.    The photo on the the left clearly shows the brown stems that are so characteristic of this fungi.

Reishi Spore is oil produced from carefully selected high quality organic Duanwood grown Reishi spores. It is rich in Ganoderma Lucidum (Reishi) Triterpene, Ganoderma Lucidum acid, unsaturated fatty acid, and organic selenium. Our Reishi is grown organically in the mountains in China and extracted in a GMP certified facility. It is tested via hplc for purity after manufacture and is EU and USDA certified organic.     1000 kg dried Reishi fruiting bodies (mushrooms) produces approximately just 1 kg of spores, it then takes over 1000 kg of spores to produce only a few kilograms of spore oil. The Reishi Spore Oil is 30% triterpenes so each 50ml bottle contains 15ml triterpenes.

If you are no close by a naturopath or herbalist to help you, try these fungi.  They are not FDA tested to cure anything and certainly speak to your therapist if you are hesitant.  In the meanwhile access the talks of Paul Staments.  If you would like to try these, please email me to enquire, especially about availability yogafirst2@bigpond.com.  With Covid and lock-downs my students are more self-help centred as nothing much else is available to them.  I have been using these fungi for a number of years.  I am my own experiment – if a herb or fungi doesn’t work for me, or if I don’t feel a difference, I don’t pass it along to you.

SIMPLICITY (Again)
Simplicity is more than a mere reaction to the modern crises.  Whilst simplicity provides an answer, it does not provide an EASY answer.  Both Christian and Yogi simplicity lives in harmony with the ordered complexity of life.

Simplicity is a grace, because it is given freely.  It is also a discipline because we are called to do something.  What we DO does not give us simplicity, but it does put us in the place where we can receive it.

SIMPLICITY IS AN INWARD REALITY WHICH CAN BE SEEN AS AN OUTWARD LIFESTYLE.  We must have both.  One without the other can be a disaster.  It is all about balance.

SEE YOU ON THE MAT.

NAMASTE. JAHNE

 

 

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DEAR YOGIS,

We are a few days away yet from the opening up of Regional Victoria, and maybe the rest of the State.  Now is the time to hit the books, do the study you don’t usually have time for.

ZOOM SCHEDULE for the rest of the week:
Wednesday 5.30pm Zoom Restorative Yoga All welcome – (email me for ID)
Friday 6.45 Zoom Tarot Class. Sunday 10am CCP Training (all welcome – TO BOTH/ALL)

NOTICE TO MASSEURS/Yogis…..Stretching doesn’t work.

This timely message was prompted by an article by a well known American Masseur that I read all the time – Charles Duff.  He massages/thinks  like Tom Bowen (very yogic).  He doesn’t focus on the pain, he sees the problem.  

Everybody’s obsessed with stretching. The minute they  see tight hamstrings, pecs, etc., and all they want to do is stretch them out. Have you found this – sure you have!

Students and clients will tell you “it feels good”, and it does. And don’t get me wrong, stretching is super effective—IF you’ve properly prepared the muscles ahead of time. But this isolated focus on stretching is misguided – it is the way of the physio, not the way of the yogi. Imagine trying to stretch a frozen shoulder client’s subscapularis or pec muscles independently of any others.   Once the screaming stops and they’re done kicking you, maybe then you’ll see what a bad idea that was.  It doesn’t work.

Listen up. Tight muscles are tight for a reason.  As I have said many times before…. they are scared! 

And until you understand that reason, you won’t be able to stretch the muscle. The body will just shut it down – it is protecting you against a presumed pain.     Here’s why: we have sensory organs wound into our muscle fibers, called spindles, that report the degree and speed of stretch to the central nervous system.   If the body feels a muscle is being stretched too quickly or is in danger of injury, it will ALWAYS engage that muscle to PREVENT it from stretching, a process known as the stretch response (or the pain response). Which has the opposite of the intended effect.

Remember, to the body, referred pain is real. Referred pain and taut fibers throw off the spindles and can trigger the stretch response. Very often, the pain comes from the other side of the joint (the shortening muscles), or the other side of the body.  A pain in the right hip could be referred from the left shoulder!

I have mentioned this in many previous classes, almost to the point of exhaustion —but I’m bringing it up again, because it’s crucially important, and most yogis and masseurs miss this. They’re only thinking about the muscle that won’t stretch.

In the case of frozen shoulder for instance, our adaptive, protective posture rounds the shoulders and keeps the arm across the abdomen. That means muscles like the pec major, pec minor, and serratus anterior have adaptively shortened.   The remedy can be clearly seen and experienced in The Bowen method.  Tom Bowen really understood this and used this knowledge in all his work. First, (no matter the “pain”), unlock the back.

That rounded shoulder posture pulls the mid- and lower trapezius muscles get pulled into chronic stretch. Those muscles then become hard and weak as the body uses taut fibers and trigger points to try and stabilize the trapezius in its battle against the rounding shoulders.  It is like dealing with a tortoise shell.  Hard.   We have to address the rounded shoulder posture, or the pain will just come back. But trying to stretch the pecs won’t work—the client will feel pain and cramping between their shoulder blades, due to the contraction in the trapezius muscle.  I am sure you have all experienced this in your self or your client.

All the muscles involved in functional movement must have normal length and movement to maintain health.  

If you try and stretch the pecs and serratus by themselves, it would lead to imbalance.  The brain/body knows this and the pain in the back will trigger the stretch response and shut it down. Which is just another reason people see frozen shoulder as “untreatable.”  Nobody gets this – Except my students of course (The ones that are listening).   The funny thing is that sometimes you can release the muscles in the back, and then the anterior muscles will stretch effortlessly—because you’ve brokered a truce in the conflict. You’ve coached the body back toward healthy, pain-free movement.

Our methods work.   Try them out on your clients.  This is the way that you will be most effective in class and on the massage table.  First you have to understand what is happening, not just go for the presumed easy answer.  In Massage (and yoga) the site of the pain is rarely the site of the injury.   Look elsewhere, understand how the body works and ask the right questions.  Good book?  ANATOMY TRAINS by THOMAS MYERS.

 

I will see you on the mat or the massage table.

NAMASTE – JAHNE