My teaching style is based on the elements. Earth, Air, Fire, Water, Spirit. We always start with Earth the element that represents our physical selves. Becoming aware of our body’s current natural state. Feeling our bones and muscles, textures, and temperatures is a simple but effective grounding exercise. We don’t force a posture or a breathing pattern, in the beginning, we simply arrive in the present moment and check in with the body to see what it might be asking for today. We allow ourselves to take up space and to be fully supported by the Earth.
Next comes Air, we find our breath and start to tune our mind to its rhythm. The element of Air symbolizes our mental or intellectual selves. We use our breath as a tool to oxygenate the body and keep the mind focused on what is here, now. The relaxation response (that blissed-out feeling) happens when we spend a little time mindfully linking the movements of our body with the rhythm of our breath. It doesn’t matter how far you move, how fast or slow you move, just that we synchronize those movements with a mindful inhale or exhale. Most of the time in our practice we are either contracting our muscles and restricting movement, making ourselves smaller, this syncs well with a deep exhale. When we extend our muscles to open up the body, reaching our limbs away from our core is the perfect time to expand the lungs and ribcage with a big inhale.
The Fire element comes into play when we get our muscles firing. Fire represents our energy, our passion, and our determination. We conjure our inner fire when we rise to stand and challenge ourselves with balance postures or a warrior sequence. Sometimes the fire is a long hold or core engagement, sometimes its sun salutations or deep lunges. It is important to know that YOU are in charge of your Fire. You can make your practice as challenging or relaxing as you like by working just a little bit harder or backing off and letting go. Each of us is working with different energies and motivations every day, there will be days when you need to fuel your fire and get things spiced up. There will be days when you need to let your fire simmer down to a few glowing embers to feel balanced.
And then there is Water, the element of emotion and heart. This is where we slow down and care for ourselves. We let the floor hold us up we allow our literal and metaphorical hearts to rest. We let our eyes close and turn our attention inward. When we let our emotions settle into a place of stillness it gives our intuition a chance to speak up in its way.
The element of Spirit comes in when all of the above can happen in a safe place surrounded by like-minded spirits. It is the sense of community, knowing that we are all struggling and doing our best to live good lives in a world that can feel pretty bad sometimes. Being able to celebrate each other’s wins and at times commiserate with each other is just as nourishing for the spirit as being able to share a comfortable meaningful silence.
“ Together we reach our hands up overhead taking a big inhale and as we let our hands touch in prayer we lower them and stop at our 3rd eye center remembering to always trust our intuition, we stop at our lips, remembering to always speak our truth, and we stop at our hearts remembering to do all things with kindness, not just towards each other, but towards ourselves and our planet.”