Wholistic Fitness

Namaste Noble Fitness Warriors!

November 24th was Kathy and my FIRST YEAR ANNIVERSARY!!!!!

We woke late thanks to a fantastic dinner party the evening prior here with Teacher Q, Ingrid, Karen, and Chris.

By 11:00 am however, Lovey (Kathy) cranked off a nice run, while I did intervals on our indoor SPINNING cycle. We are, without a doubt, a fitness couple. After our cardio workouts, we did a spot of HP yoga together as the wind tossed tawny colored leaves about our front porch. i surprise my newly wed wife of one year with a card and a way cool, hi-tech sweater. i don�t know how it came about, but both of us fell into a spontaneous zen cleaning mode…perfect! a calm productivity enters our afternoon like a long awaited sigh. by two thirty, i take Kathy to Paramahansa Yogananda�s Lake Shrine Temple…an internationally famous temple of All Religions located just about 20 miles away from us where Sunset Boulevard meets with the Pacific Coast Highway. It�s her first time. We meditate in the temple and beside the peaceful lake. Swan. Waterfall. Slanting evening sun splashing across the lake, filling the riparian foliage like etheral fire. The chi is strong here; Gandhi�s ashes are beside us and Paramahansa�s dharma houseboat floats nearby…a bobbing re-minder of a beautiful Bhakti Master. � Afterward, Kathy suprises me with several gifts as we change into dinner clothes on a bluff overlooking the ocean. she is sooooo cute! i love her! we are such the newlyweds! can�t get enough of each other! � then i take her to the CHARTHOUSE Restaurant where we enjoy an INCREDIBLY ROMANTIC sunset lulling itself to sleep into the folds of a purple ocean. i present my �Paper Gift� to her…a poem whose lines are helped along a bit by a very nice Pinot Noir, Blue Nose Sea Bass and fantastic Seared Ahi. � after the poetry, presents, meal, and the complimentary Mud Pie dessert, we enjoy the drive home, crusing like James Dean up the coast. We linger over Topanga Canyon as if in our procastination, the moment could expand. � at home, we pack for New Mexico where we will spend the next seven days. there, i will immerse myself into my much missed mountain yogi stuff; skiing, snowshoeing, and hanging as much as possible with the cold weather gods. Lovey will accompany me for some of these outings but mostly she will be enjoying the presence of family, hers and mine in the warm Thanksgiving comfort of my parent�s casa in Rio Rancho. I am more than looking forward to this sacred southwest pause. autumn is especially hard on me since leaving the Rocky Mountains. i miss so much the sound of softly falling, early winter snow among changing aspens…i am in desperate need of New Mexico�s dimensions and her rarified high desert air.

Thank you for reading…expect updates from New Mexico…here are some quick ones.

May your Practice be strong and grace-full. Live fully, let go lightly. Love deeply…

coach ilg

wholisticfitness.com

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Hi Steve-

Keep up the GREAT work!! I know that, even after all these years, I haven’t gotten completely on board, herb-wise, but I can attest to the fact that if one sticks to it, the yoga and meditations not only work to help keep one feeling good and “balanced” but they can help get through some difficult times by refocussing outside, or maybe more inside, oneself. Your teachings are definitely from a different plane & having a personal trainer

in the family, I can speak first hand!

I figure that at 52 if I can put my palms on the floor with my knees straight I’m doing ok.

stretching is my friend!!!!!!!!!

Be well,

Dell

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Coach –

just finished a session of HP Yoga. today i stopped doing yoga and became yoga. in fact, today i’m not doing my practice, i’m being my practice. i’m not doing my work, i’m being my work. i’m not doing anything, i’m being everything.

– Teacher in Training, Roche

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EL Coache,

excellent SR Update!!! just amazing CHI baba!

WF always seems to go deeper and deeper. like true spiritual teachings, many times one has to go around and around the self a few times to see IT. and each time with WF….she changes. yet she remains the same. better to crank IT than to wallow in IT. i fall in love with WF/HP yoga over and over again.

i love you,

– TQ

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Dear Coach –

it’s 3am. going to have some warm fortune delight sitting under the moon and see if i can see the meteor show. loved the WF dharma. talk; i enjoy direct lines so much.

– Student Dean

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Light switch Yoga

Now that you have significant hours of barefooted yoga classes behind you, don�t you think it is time to start going barefoot at home? Barefootin� it stimulates nerves laced throughout the soles of the feet similar to reflexology points. So, bring your yoga out of the studio and into your home. Go barefoot around the house. In fact, take out the trash barefoot. Try turning on and off light switches with your bare feet instead of your hands (that�s so… predictable!). This exercise increases not only functional fitness, but an awareness that our yoga is everywhere.

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WEBSITE OF THE WEEK:

(Submitted by Ron Jones of High Performance Health;) http://www.llangley.com/yoga/wisdom/rightnow%5b2%5d.htm

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Hey Coach

Your words in the daily meditations on SUNRIDER are true, I feel them working in me everyday. The price can be a bit much but the price of not using them was higher, I’ll pay with a smile.

stay cool and have a good week.

warrior Todd

Aumsville, OR

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My Dear Coach –

I cranked that Reseda hike again! chopped off a full 8 minutes since the first time. it was lovely. there is something so primitive, so root chakra about hiking. i thought of the beauty of this work. there are no pretenses to WF. it is so freakin real.

and i thought of how beautiful you were yesterday at your Yoga Workshop. how brave to speak the dharma with such courage and integrity. and i thought of how wonderful all those souls there….doing there best to grasp what this wildman was cooking;-) i would look around and see all their sweet faces. some blank with a “i don’t know what da fuck he is talking about, but i’m diggin it anyway;-)” i know they loved it. i sure did. it felt as though you were answering THE question i was needing about creating a program for the NOW.

i thought of how many times in my life i was happy and didn’t realize it till it was gone. always looking to the past or wanting more in the now. today…today….in this moment i AM happy.

see you in the Grotto…

Q

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Dear Coach –

I can do head stands all day long–well, at least until I pass out from the blood rushing to my

noggin’. It’s the HAND stand that I can’t do right now. I figured I’d train myself up using the wall for support, but that’s even a reach at

this point.

– Hak

Beautiful Hak –

to get Handstand first get it’s Sanskrit name: Adho Mukha Vrksasana or Downward Facing Tree Pose. thus, a tree needs roots. your roots for this pose must come through the hands and into Mother Earth. the trunk of this tree is your spine. your legs are but the branches, your feet become the leaves. everything becomes lighter as you move up the tree.

in HP Yoga, we don’t use walls or props to grow a tree. this weakens the roots and the spiritual (inner) learning is sacrificed in favor of mere gymnastics.

thus:

to develop the roots: learn to master ‘crane pose’ (bakasana) first. then, eka pada bakasana (one -legged crane pose). key: improve relationship between armpit and knee, not triceps and knees.

to develop the trunk of the tree: wheel pose (urdhva dhanurasana). key: keep elbows and knees moving in toward midline, and legs strongly working toward extension.

to blossom your tree: bring mula bhanda (root lock) while simultaneously raising the legs upward from Crane Pose and finding Wheel Pose during their ascent. this is going to effectively shift your C.O.G (center of gravity) over your hips and the press up will be easy.

i have never seen a tree ‘jump into’ it’s beautiful maturity. it grows into it. thus, i do not teach Handstand using walls or props but only patience, strength, and balance. the very qualities needed in the life of a spiritual warrior.

PAGE REFERENCE: Light on Yoga, by BKS Iyengar…

bakasana: 315

eka pada bakasana: 336

urdhva dhanurasana:357

May Your Practice Be Strong & Sincere,

coach ilg

www.wholisticfitness.com

visit:

DIRECT LINES: Daily Meditations from Coach Ilg