Ode to Medicine Woman

The following poem was written by Nia student Ashley Henry. A couple of weeks ago, Ashely requested the Nia routine Medicine Woman for her birthday. On Wednesday, I taught the routine and after class, inspired by the meditative soulful movements, Ashley wrote this beautiful poem. Thank you Ashley for sharing your beauty, talent and grace with us.

"It's not who you were at the beginning but who you become at the end, when after facing all your challenges with grace, you find that at the core there is always the supporting comfort of unconditional love to lift you right before you fall into who you were yesterday, but instead of crawling through life, love gives you the wings of a butterfly to soar into tomorrow with a beauty you could not see in the darkness of your own cocoon. -Medicine Woman."

Thank You Body

A Moment of Body Gratitude 

Written by Debbie Rosas
Original post: http://debbierosas.com/post/45688036804/thank-you-body

“Thank you body for dancing with me, for allowing me to experience the rhythmic journey you know as rhythm, melody and harmony. The dance of healing you dance with me in every beat of my heart. I love you body.

Thank you body for the gift and magic of a brain, and for the specialized parts that help me stay on the beat, move my arm when I want to move my arm, when I say “arm move up and down”. I love you body.

Thank you body for always dancing, even when I am unconscious to the rhythm of my life. You, the one who causes me to tap my foot, sway my hips, wobble my head, move me without me even knowing I am dancing. I love you body.

Thank you body for your wisdom that keeps me connected from the inside to the outside, to the dance of your 75 trillion cells. I love you body.

Thank you for the magical subcortical areas in my brain designed to bypass higher auditory areas that make it possible for me to hear you with more than my ears! I love you body.

Thank you body, for the interpersonal experience of moving through space, and for the opportunity to express myself, giving credence and respect to the art and power of self-expression. I love you body.

Thank you body for making me a sensation scientist, curious and aching to explore myself and my body as a vast universe with information to create positive health and well being for me and the world. I love you body.

Thank you body for keeping me in awe as an artist, using my body and live and movement to create art. I love you body.

Thank you body for a region in you, in the brain called the posterior parietal cortex, a magical smart part I know lives toward the back of my brain designed to translate visual information and turn it into instructive motor commands, signals sent forward to the motion-planning areas in the pre-motor cortex and supplementary motor cortex of my brain. I love you body.

Thank you body for creating the neural impulses that stimulate me and allow me to dance. To the magical signals of information that travel to my spinal cord and then to my muscles so they contract and pull on my bones, moving them so I can shimmy, kick, sink and rise, fold and unfold into movement pleasure. I love you body.

Thank you body for the sensory organs that rest in my muscles and provide me with feedback, information sent from my brain telling me the exact orientation of my body in space, and that make it possible for me to know where I am even with my eyes closed. Be here now, and know where you are, this is their Mantra I listen to. I love you body.

Thank you body for the magic of nerves, string-like threads that receive and transmit information, elegantly passing through my spinal cord into the cerebral cortex of my brain, making me Sensory IQ wise and body aware without thinking but by sensing, from listening to The Voices of the Body-my body. I love you body.

Thank you body of woman, for the eight-thousand nerve endings dedicated to pleasure,and for the pulse of life and creative juice you give me, and for the gift of “knowing” what is right when I listen to you, commune with you and honor your voice. Thank you for the opportunity to live in a woman’s body, and as Regena, Mama Gena says, for reminding me that, “When a woman’s turned on, the whole world is blessed”. I love you body.

Thank you body for the constant loving feedback you give me, for helping me to refine and tweak my movement s,o what I do, I do with greater ease, dynamic ease. Thank you for guiding me to choose pleasure via the subcortical circuits in my brain’s cerebellum. I love how I can imagine resting and dancing with you there, at the back of my brain, in the basal ganglia areas in my brains core, standing one with you because I know who you are, where you are and what you do for me. I love you body.

Thank you for reminding me of the importance of FreeDancing, of moving and navigating my body through space without thinking, activating my precuneus: The Your Way and Body’s Way kinesthetic body-centered map, the parietal lobe region close to where the kinesthetic representation of my legs reside. Knowing you are there I move more confidently, and with greater ease and relaxation. I love you body.

Thank you body for sight, what makes it possible from areas in the premotor cortex of my brain to switch on, making it possible for me to mentally rehearse before, see, before I do, what I do. I love you body.

Thank you body for the dance, for the opportunity to interpret, stylize, imitate, and represent what I see others doing in My Body’s Way. I love you body.

Thank you body for the universal language of movement, body language, spoken in a shape, a shimmy, a pump, a push and pull, a reach, and shake, I love you body.

Thank you body for the silent and powerful impulse you use to move me, my cells, you, triggered by sound, music, and by my emotions.

Thank you body for the opportunity to be in a loving community of atoms, molecules, cells, tissues, organs, organ systems, and organisms-me in my body and with other bodies, part of a nested system and part of the Universe.

Thank you body for the map of The Body’s Way, a woman’s way, and for dancing with me. I love you body.

Thank you body for teaching me, we are connected, one, whole, moving and functioning best when filled with joy and love, respect and curiosity. For reminding me that if I continue to thirst for discovering what it means to live in my body as an empowered woman, alive with with light and passion, kept alive by taking the path of pleasure, and by following my heart and the guidance of those eight thousand nerve endings-all is well in the world."

The Way of Practice

Whatever it is you are being guided to/working towards/desiring/in the process of manifesting - Don't give up. Practice presence. Be with your breath and body on the journey.

I was inspired by this poem today:

The Fruits of Practice 

from "Going In and In: Poems from the Heart of Yoga" 
by Danna Faulds

Image from: http://www.yoganonymous.com

Despite fervent pleas for ease
and safety, there are many days
when reality doesn’t quite line
up with what I’d choose.

Breakdown. Letting go.

Surrendering even the illusion
of control. Breathing into the
unknown – sometimes that is
what life holds.

Practice hasn’t brought an end
to pain. I still increase my
suffering like a fish caught on
a line. My struggles only draw
the hook in deeper. But being
in reality is its own reward.

It’s the perfect paradox; the
courage to stand and breathe
when everything in me wants
to flee is as great a gift as the
freedom to seek retreat.

No, practice hasn’t brought
an end to pain but it has honed
my willingness to experience
the moment and sometimes see
perfection unfolding in ways
I wasn’t big enough to plan,
much less predict.

Practice isn’t about achieving
a goal. It’s not a means to pole-
vault over suffering.

Practice is my way of looking life in
the face and saying yes to all
its disparate gifts.

Practice keeps me awake when I would
sleep, and reminds me it’s
the journey, unfolding in this
very moment, it’s the journey
that reveals the truth, and
not the destination.

Class Cards for Nia, Nia-Yoga and Stretch and Fly Yoga Dance

Use your Class Cards now for Stretch and Fly Yoga Dance!

Co-created by Jennifer and Liziah, Stretch and Fly Yoga Dance is a fusion of viniyoga and dance.

Strengthening, relaxing, fluid, fun and therapeutic, Stretch and Fly Yoga Dance is slower than Nia with simpler footwork and dance moves. All of the moves are adaptable for different fitness levels.

Come to strengthen your body in a gentle way, to stretch, fly, extend, lengthen, deepen, connect with your breath and find deep relaxation.

The first 40-50 min of class is done standing/dancing/moving with our bare feet connected to the ground. The last 20-25 min are on the mat.

Feel free to bring your own mat but the studio has mats, blocks, straps, cushions and blankets. Bring water and wear comfortable clothes to move and play in.


Our theme for the month of January is the "Dance of the Warrior: Cultivating Inner and Outer Strength."

We teach every second and fourth Friday from 6:15pm - 7:30pm at Balance Studio in Fremont: 418 N 35th St, Seattle, WA 98103. Our next classes are January 11 and January 25, 2013.

You can now use your class cards with Jennifer or Liziah for Stretch and Fly Yoga Dance! Drop-in rate remains at $15.

How cool is it that you can now use your class card for Nia, Nia-Yoga and Stretch and Fly Yoga Dance? Yay!