DEAR YOGIS,

Here is the studio where I paint my beautiful angels...it is an inspiring small space that looks out onto the garden.  When I go in there I immediately feel like getting back to the angels and to painting.  I don’t have to move anything, change anything.  It is all waiting for me – “a room of my own”.   It is important where the table is located.  I can look down onto the table and do a miniature, and then rest and exercise my eyes by looking out into the distance of my garden and beyond.  Think about this when you locate your computer and your own art table.

I know how hard it is to have to keep covering up, moving your work and changing.  If you want to draw, paint or create, it is made much easier with a dedicated space, not necessarily a room, it can be a largish cupboard (like the one in “The Lion The Witch and the Wardrobe”).  I have seen some stunning conversions – wardrobe to office space, meditation room, or art/craft studio space.

We ask our students to use this principle for their meditation and yoga.  If you have a dedicated space, then as you move past it during the day you acknowledge the importance of this space to you.  It gives the space power, and gives you a longing to sit down and meditate or paint.  So much better than a willy-nilly (accidental) attitude to your practice – art or yoga.

Here is the latest Angel.  Not yet framed, and maybe not yet finished – I am not sure.  I am also doing a full length angel on an opened tea bag.  Something different, and quite a bit more difficult.  Another way of looking and thinking.  Just to my yoga students and recipients of the newsletter the cost is $65 including a lightweight frame and postage.  For the double length painting $135.  There is only ONE of each.  They are originals. To purchase email be to make sure the one you want is still available, then you can pay in the usual way.  Don’t pay until you have spoken with me.  I have to check if it is available, and then reserve it for you.  They have been selling rather fast.  I will be putting them on the web when I can get a few put by, but they will not be at this price.

I am still working on THE MAGDALEN ORACLE/TAROT.  

It is not an easy task, although the angels are helping.

 

THE TEACHING/LEARNING CONTRACT.

I often get asked if I am going to record my zoom sessions.  The answer at the moment is “no”, because I think that the teaching/learning platform, rather like a theatrical performance contains a contract between the teacher and the learner which benefits both far more than just looking at a screen.  By announcing a class, I am making a commitment  to be there, on time, prepared and ready to teach.  Hopefully Telstra knows this and the internet is available when I need it.  The student in order to get the most out of the experience needs to turn up on time,  ready to learn, take notes, ready to interact with me (and or the group), and ready to ask questions (preferably ones I can answer).

In a zoom class (as in a theatre) the student knows not to eat noisy food with his mike on, not to interrupt, not to wander about carrying on another conversation at the same time as the class and not to have a demanding dog, cat or child on their lap.  If it was in a theatre there would be other unstated understandings about big hats, noise, comments, and interactions with the people next to you.  In a different way these also apply to the zoom sessions, but not to a recorded session although recorded sessions need discipline and understanding also.

To experience a recorded session the student can turn up any time, listen to a bit here and a bit there totally out of context… and generally does not get a real lesson.  They get the feeling that something has happened, but rarely is it successful, and rarely does the student totally understand the session – particularly the rather difficult philosophical concepts we tackle which mostly require a teacher to be the guide.

I hope this answers (in rather more than a sentence or two) those who have asked the question “Are you recording this?  Most everything I do can be found in book form on my etsy site – so you can always READ it – thereby developing another lost art.

ATTENTION:  I am re-instating our YOGA TEACHER TRAINING DAYS.  The first Sunday in the month starting April 4th at 2pm.  All welcome.  Graduates, students, interested yogis.  Let me know if you are coming please – there will still be covid etiquette.

I LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING YOU ON THE MAT, OR IN THE ZOOM ROOM.

NAMASTE – JAHNE