At Winter Solstice

During winter we let go of light just as trees let go of leaves, we look towards cosy and warmth and probably more time indoors, and we should rest more as our ancestors once did when they followed the seasons and the longer nights more closely than we do today.

Winter is nature's sign to slow down, let go of brighter months and spend more time resting and reflecting. The cycles of the seasons can support us so much if we listen, feel and follow them rather than fight against them.

This blog invites you to reflect on your year and take time to rest. I also share some beautiful words from the poet and philosopher John O’Donohue.

Meditation, Yoga philosophy, Yoga and WellbeingSarah CloverDecember 17, 2024yoga quotes, yoga philosophyComment

Moon Salutation - 3 ways

I'm sure you've heard of the yoga Sun salutation. If you are a yoga student you've probably done a few of them in your yoga practice. But have you heard of the moon salutation?

Find out more about the moon salutation in this blog post and there’s a free 40 minute class where you can try out 3 variations!

Rest and Digest

I love the autumn time, the leaves turning, the cosiness of the darker evenings where lights twinkle in warm homes and we can begin to hibernate. But autumn for me also comes with some challenges.

There’s a cycle to this rhythm of challenge and back to ease for me which I can observe. A cycle that usually lasts for a few weeks at time (but I sometimes notice it over days or longer over months). There’s usually a beginning, a growth phase, some status quo and then a challenge. Then back to the start again. I notice it in my activities, my nervous system, and particularly in my body and mind in the form of anxiety or overwhelm or tiredness. You may also recognise this in your own day to day life.

In this blog post I talk about what this cycle looks like for me, how I let go of challenges and the tools and techniques of rest and digest that work for me to get back to the beginning, to feel brighter and stay well. I also offer you a downloadable Yoga Nidra Practice – created in collaboration with my teacher Barrie Risman – to help you to let go of challenges this autumn and enjoy some rest.

Transition

This time last year in the UK we celebrated Spring Equinox with a sense of being pulled back from blossoming and outward growth, and being pushed inward, into our home spaces and losing freedoms we had taken for granted.

This year I am celebrating a year of teaching classes online, all that it has taught me and the students who’ve joined me. I’m celebrating the teaching of the Steady Centre that yoga brings us. How coming back to centre and spending more time with our ‘self’, has been one of the things we’ve been thrown into, has most challenged us and possible has taught us the most.

We are no longer the world we thought we were, the world of ‘normal’ and we are not yet a new world emerging. We are still in transition. We are still navigating change and always will be.

Read on for my reflections on our year of change...

Yoga and Wellbeing, Yoga philosophySarah CloverMarch 18, 2021yoga philosophy, yoga practice

Love and Listening

Over the last week, I have been overwhelmed by the death of George Floyd and the response worldwide to not only his death but so many others. Responses I see daily on email and social media from yoga teachers, friends, strangers.

I hope that this is a time of great change, of love, listening and unity. That this time around we move forward.

I have been reflecting deeply and am very aware that where I thought I was I am not. In this post I share my feelings and intentions to make change as #blacklivesmatter

Yoga philosophy, Yoga PracticeSarah CloverJune 8, 2020yoga philosophy, yoga practice

Pause

In yoga and meditation, we learn various techniques and tools to help calm the body and the mind, to re-balance, to find ease and to find 'a pause'.

These last few weeks have in many ways been 'a pause' for all of us. Whether our daily lives and activities have changed a little, a lot, or perhaps not at all. We have all been given an opportunity to stop and reflect. This in itself is a practice of yoga.

Waiting

"Waiting is a state of mind. Basically, it means that you want the future; you don't want the present. You don't want what you've got, and you want what you haven't got. With every kind of waiting, you unconsciously create inner conflict between your here and now, where you don't want to be, and the projected future, where you want to be. This greatly reduces the quality of your life by making you lose the present.” Ekhart Tolle

We all find ourselves waiting. Waiting for this phase in human history to be over, for the solution, for the answer. When we project ourselves forward into a future we cannot know, we are missing what is happening NOW.

So how do we get to the now?

How Yoga and Meditation help us in times of worry

We all carry worry around with us. It’s a part of being human. We worry about things we can change and things we can’t change. Some of us worry more than others. It is ok that we worry. We all do it.

The tools and practices of yoga and meditation help us to calm the swirling thoughts of our mind by helping us to bring our awareness inwards, by helping us connect to the peace of the present moment. From this space we are able to take a moment to step back, view the world with more perspective, even change our perspective and then deal with the challenges in a calmer more responsive way.

Whether you practice yoga or meditation or not here are some simple ways to help you calm your mind and your worries and give yourself some space through being more present:

Anjali Mudra and the meaning of Namaste

Every week we bring our hands together at our hearts and say “Namaste” to end the class. It is a gesture to close the class and to enable our class community to thank each other for our practice together. Like all aspects of our yoga practice there is much to study, learn and enjoy in these simple practices as part of our yoga journey. There are deeper meanings to these gestures which I share with you here.

Yoga philosophy, Yoga PracticeSarah CloverFebruary 13, 2020yoga quotes, yoga philosophy, yoga practice

10 Yoga books to add to your Christmas list

My yoga bookshelf is getting pretty full, but there are a few books that I return to over and again as resources for my practice and my teaching. I’m sharing them here as they are all really accessible for any yoga student and I hope I inspire you to buy one as a gift to yourself this Christmas.

Occasional Thoughts Blog

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