Sharing the blessings found in Tantra, Ayurveda & the art of energetically sequencing and bespoking therapeutic practices for all students. www.zephyryoga.com
Itha108is a Greek island retreat set in a place of outstanding natural beauty, providing a space specifically for peace, relaxation and practice.
Ithaca, home of Itha108, is one of the smallest in the Ionian islands that is radiating with Grecian authenticity. It’s shores play host to a long Homeric and mythical history whose many mysteries are sensed amongst animated panorama and secretive coves. Itha108 overlooks the sea and the eastern coastline of neighbouring Kefalonia from an elevated wilderness of olive trees and exposed rocks that provide the elements around which it is built, allowing its natural beauty to speak for itself. An emphasis on indoor-outdoor living ensures full use of the land and its treasures that extend to sweeping and hidden beaches below.
Exploring your Kleshas (Mental Emotional Afflictions) Zephyr talks about how Yoga can bring up emotions that we can learn from. Using Tapas to create mental heat of concentration during our practice, Zephyr encourages you to acknowledge your reactions to the heat within your practice and use that awareness and conscious observation to learn more about who you are. Are these emotions helping or hindering?
In this Practice Zephyr helps you identify the mental afflictions that cause our suffering as we pass through this life. Zephyr challenges you to confront your own suffering and observe your reaction(s) to it. This is a practice that creates heat (Tapas) and helps you to become aware of the mental heat of concentration. Be guided by your own wisdom to experience “Yoga” and move beyond these afflictions.
Yoga and meditation are not methods of anaesthetising your experience in life, rather yoga and meditation techniques are tools of managing those experiences. The anger, the anxiety and grief of the life experience are all real just as the joy, curiosity and happiness are real. However. they are also passing waves that do not define who you are. This practice explores who you are behind these emotions and focuses on discovering the essence of you.
Yoga and meditation are not methods of anaesthetising your experience in life, rather yoga and meditation techniques are tools of managing those experiences. The anger, the anxiety and grief of the life experience are all real just as the joy, curiosity and happiness are real. However. they are also passing waves that do not define who you are. This practice explores who you are behind these emotions and focuses on discovering the essence of you.
Yoga and meditation are not methods of anaesthetising your experience in life, rather yoga and meditation techniques are tools of managing those experiences. The anger, the anxiety and grief of the life experience are all real just as the joy, curiosity and happiness are real. However. they are also passing waves that do not define who you are. This practice explores who you are behind these emotions and focuses on discovering the essence of you.
Grief is a part of love. It hurts because we love. And just as we fall in love and want to share it with everyone, on social media, at weddings and parties and so on, our grief too wants to be expressed. However, in society today we find it hard to know how to express grief, support those who are grieving and find tools to help us bear what is ours to carry. Nothing will ever fix or solve our grief as it is a natural, normal and healthy reaction to loss. When we experience loss, grief fills our life with darkness. This darkness never goes way, we just learn how to expand our life around the darkness.
What can I expect? This workshop will include: – lectures – journaling – Yoga asana – meditation practices
What will I gain from the workshop? There are many tools to help with managing our grief. Zephyr will share some ways that the principles of yoga and Buddhist psychology can help manage grief through writing (vichara), applied yoga-asana and meditation practices. This holistic, mind-body approach will allow you to kindly open the grief experience, physically moving the body to release some of the build-up of sensation or awaken the feelings by creating sensation, a useful method of encouraging the hurt to untangle. Students will also use seated practices and guided meditation to help find more resilience by allowing us to tend to our grief with more understanding, compassion and trust.
Who is it for? Anyone struggling with feelings of grief after loss or who wants to explore this complex emotion.
Go to my recent blog about Grief and Loss to read and find more support in the meantime. Click here.
Workshop with Graham Burns, Raquel Alves & Zephyr Wildman. Three of Yogacampus’ most experienced and popular teachers – have come together to offer this two day immersion into yogic theories and practices which will allow you to unveil and brighten the light of your own heart.
The heart is a complex and enigmatic organ. At the purely mechanical level, its beating keeps us alive. But it is also commonly seen as the seat of powerful emotions such as love and compassion. And in early Indian philosophy, the space within the heart (sometimes called the ‘cave of the heart’) was seen as the abode of our essential self, our true nature, who we really are at the deepest level.
Reaching awareness of that true nature of the self is the essence of yoga, and the heart has always had a special and revered place in the yoga tradition. Patañjali speaks of a ‘heart lotus’ as a focal point for meditation, and most (if not all) of the esoteric models of the yogic body which grew up in the Tantric traditions locate an important energetic centre at the heart which can be accessed through yoga practice. In Buddhism too, the heart centre is important, and is sometimes seen as the home of the ‘clear light of bliss’.
Yet, how often in our everyday life (and even in our yoga practice) do we allow our head to rule our heart, so that that clear light fails to shine as brightly as it might? Would it benefit us and others if, instead of being ruled by our head, we were able to access that light and allow it to shine?
We are really excited that Zephyr, Graham and Raquel – three of Yogacampus’ most experienced and popular teachers – have come together to offer this two day immersion into yogic theories and practices which will allow you to unveil and brighten the light of your own heart. Each of them brings their own unique perspective and specific areas of expertise to help that light shine, and you will enjoy:
• Discussion of the significance of the heart and the heart centre in Indian philosophy generally, and in the yoga tradition specifically. • An exploration of the physiology of the heart, and the psychology associated with it. • A range of profound practices throughout the weekend – including āsana, bandha, mudra, prāṇāyāma, meditation, and yoga nidrā – all aimed at helping you unveil that light. • Plenty of time for question and answer.
The workshop is open to all levels of yoga experience, except complete beginners. However, some experience of prāṇāyāma and meditation will be helpful.
Certification You will receive a Yogacampus Certificate of Attendance.
This 2-day workshop aims to break down the various yoga anatomy theories that have been passed down for generations against more recent medical findings to help students and teachers alike communicate in safer and more effective ways.
As Yoga has matured in the West, our community has been fortunate enough to have help and guidance from complimentary professionals such as Physiotherapists, Osteopaths and others in the medical field who have studied our practice and helped to create the modern, westernised Yoga culture. A fusion of technology, techniques and integrated information in the last fifty years has brought Yoga and Kinaesthesia together and created more understanding of the way our bodies move during our practice along with the benefits and dangers.
As much as this new understanding has helped our practice evolve, ’Old school’ language and ‘wives tales’ that are still floating about our yoga communities and being passed on to students, still exist. Our community is guilty of claims of health benefits that sometimes can be untrue and dangerous. The medical community has been taking notice and unfortunately complaints that yoga has started to cause injuries, due to poor teaching, limited anatomical understanding and unsafe adjustments are now common. Understanding of kinesiology and anatomy need to be on the forefront of any Yoga Teacher’s curriculum in order to create safe sequences and informed practices for all of our students.
The Course
This will be an interactive workshop to test the theories of do’s and don’ts on each other and to come to an experienced conclusion that should leave each yoga student better-informed. The goal is to create an approach to give teachers the skills to be safer and more effective in their community.
This course is for students and yoga teachers who want to improve their use of language in their classes, understand basic anatomy, bio-mechanical movements and health benefits to enhance the living tradition of Eastern Yoga in the modern world.
