Wholistic Fitness

You never truly know what you are gonna get from me when you make the bold and wise move to take Pilgrimage to the Sacred Peak for a Private WF Intensive. especially during the Season That Really Packs The Prana; WINTER!

Take Most Noble and Cherished WF Online Student Mike Cerame. Brooklyn born and bred shown here to my left, getting ready for his first time ever on an indoor climbing wall during a former Private Intensive.

this fantastically devoted Online Student, now 40 years young, never even got to ‘nature’ until his early twenties. When he finally did? He reMembered a familiarity about the woods that went deeper than just the physical enjoyment.

Not a small wonder that this Fitness Warrior eventually found himself taking Online Studies within my Nature-Born Path under a Teacher who, as a young man Realized that the Essence of Service to mankind is to love and train their Highest Self, not the one in front of him. When i train a Student in outdoor performance, more often than not, a Tribal Magic happens and an uncanny ability to radically improve my student’s skills occurs. this Occurance that has remained steady for a quarter century happens not because i am a great outdoor performance coach. It happens because of the Nobility of the Path that runs Her course through me. The conduit of such effective coaching comes because i Love what i do and, because i Love Nature. i will give all you Teachers and Fitness Trainers (and we have a LOT of you!) a key to the most rapidly Clear and effective way to Elevate your students: train the Nature Cells within them, not the Student as he or she appears.

the seed of my quixotic form of coaching can be ferreted from within this favorite Lord Byron quote i memorized from my childhood;
“There is pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is rapture in the lonely shore,
There is society where non intrudes,
By the deep sea, and music as its roar.
I love not man the less, but nature more.”

On Day One of Student Cerame’s Intensive, i imparted a Secret Temple Teaching to him in the early morning, privvy only to those WF Students ready enough to receive It and brave enough to take Pilgrimage to the Peak to study it.

Afterward, it was time to take this Bronx Boy up to the Peak and revitalize his experience with Alpine Skiing which he had not done in several years. In fact, he had spent only a few hours on Alpine Skis in his life.

in this Multidisciplined Path of Yoga, that, my friends, is simply not tolerable. I could not let another minute go without getting this Warrior up and onto the Sun Baked Snows.

And ski we did. Within 4 runs, using WF Teaching Principles, WF Chi Transmission, and a few HP Yoga call-backs, Student Cerame experienced a “single flash” of DharmaWisdom during his 4th run that forever changed his view of Alpine Skiing and the Metaphysics that Dance The Depths of why EVERY HUMAN should learn the Art of Skiing. The Perma-Grin never left his face for the rest of the Intensive.

“To establish ourselves amid perfect emptiness in a single flash is the essence of wisdom.”
– Dhammapada Sutra

We ended Day One with his complimentary attendance to my Tuesday Night HP Yoga Class here in Flag. WARRIOR UP! Joining 12 other local Warriors in our humble Practice Cave for a typical HP Yoga Mixed Flow Sweatfest and Slugfest with our Ego, we returned to the WF Temple H(om)e and dropped into some fluid DharmaTalk as we sipped a lovely Miso/Ramen soup and ate a light, organic salad (using our non dominant chopstick’d hand, of course!). Let me just say that insomnia is not a common complaint from our visiting WF Pilgrims who take on the incomparable Love and Light that illuminates a WF Private Itensive.

Day Two began with an Early Morning Secret Temple Guided Meditation and Pranayam. i am bound by yogic tradition not to comment further. Let’s just say that, well, you ain’t gonna get this Transmission from reading Direct Lines or my books, you know what i am sayin?

Then, it was off to the Flagstaff Nordic Center to get Student Cerame onto some REAL SKIS! The kind without edges. The kind without heel bindings. The kind of skiing from which ALL Skiing and Boarding began baby: CLASSIC SKIING (aka; ‘diagonal stride’ or ‘kick-and-glide’).

Oh my god…with Ananda joining ‘the boys’ we three enjoyed such an indescribable zen experience among those Sacred Tall Timbered Woods. Once again, That Brahmanic Force that flows through my teaching when i can empty myself enough to allow it, sizzled through my coaching dialouge and clinic and like, well, magic; this Fitness Warrior whose feet had never even come CLOSE to a nordic ski before, was transformed from neophyte to a Nordic DemiGod, cranking off intermediate level runs with the hallmark WF Verve and a mentally focused endurance that all of Scandanavia would applaud!

my Life became Blessed once again at the top of the final hillclimb during our ski. We had already been out for nearly 2 hours, heart-rates as high as the cobalt sky at times for our Beloved Student. yet, as i waited on the summit of the nearly 9,000′ hilltop for my Student, my heart jumped at the site that slowly, poetically materialized from the ponderosa/aspen woods.

There was my Beloved Ananda, kicking and gliding her way artistically, melodically up the ski tracks toward me, her maturing style on the skinny skis looking as graceful as birdflight. Right behind her?

That’s right, Oh Noble TRUE SEEKERS OF YOGA; Student Cerame! Right on her ski tails! Using the Zen Training i first taught him four years ago when he began his WF Studies, his mind was ONE with Ananda’s skis slapping the ski grooves right in front of him. Rising and falling as if water, these two moved up the hill in perfect unison, drumming their skis and poles in harmony with their breath and dance like movement. Ananda’s eyes were as laser focused as Padmasambhava. Father Sun glinted off their poles like flashes of Celestial Might. The Ponderosa themselves seemed to sway to their oceanic breathing. These were no longer two humans. They were two dancing buddhas upon a graced blanket of snow; snow that remains the most potent puja table before which i have ever prayed. i would be HONORED to charge into the Bardo or any Battlefield for that matter, with these two buddhas! Within the tangible qualities of their combined Spirits flowed an essence of what the Study of Wholistic Fitness delivers to all who tread this Narrow, Brave, and Rare Path of the Ancient Mountain Yogis; UNFLAPPABLE, EVER GROWING CHI! Prana, baby! LIFE FORCE! God, i wish you could have witnessed those two beautiful Warriors from our Tribe. Tears came from a feeble coach inspired by his beautiful Students who try soooooo hard.

The most important thing in fitness is what comes from the Intent to be fit in body, in mind,
and
in spirit.

As Gunde Svan, the legendary Swedish Nordic Ski Champion told the press after winning a(nother) Gold Medal at the World Championships,
“It is my life motto;
If you want to win,
you have to want to win.”

how BAAAAD do you REALLY WANT TO WIN (the Human Race…Enlightenment?). i mean, REALLY?

And the most important thing about being a caring yet fierce coach or a Teacher of Yoga is what is not in the ‘certification’ courses.

What matters most
is
the degree of Love
and the Teacher’s devotion
to that Love.

i love you yet i remain endlessly devoted to loving your Highest Self even more…

special thanks to Pilgrim “HL” Cerame. Dharma Blessings for your travels back home.

and loving gratitude to my Beloved Ananda for cranking out there with us boys and deliver to our Tribe this
inspiration photos. may all Beings Everywhere be inspired and Awaken.

And may ALL of you schedule your own WF Private Intensives before too long. i will not be providing this internationally-acclaimed, 5-star Warrior rated Service forever. do not delay. get the direct Transmission before you travel much Higher. it may be more important than you think.

God Bless This Path,
God Bless Your Practice.

om so ti,

coach ilg
founder/Wholistic Fitness Personal Training