Sarah Powers
January 26-27
Moving Into Meditation
Yin/Yang Yoga And
Mindfulness Meditation
Yin & Meditative Flow Teacher Training
Open to All Students & Teachers
Saturday, January 26, 1pm-4:30pm
Movement Meditation Master Class
Open to In-Depth Studies Students and Teachers
Sunday, January 27, 9am-12pm
Practicing with Sarah Powers
This two day workshop will focus on long
held, passive Yin postures that prepare the
body for sitting meditation. The Yin style
also keeps the body supple at its core while
encouraging stagnate chi (prana) to flow
throughout the joints, making it a wonderful
precursor to meditation. During the Yin
session, Sarah will share how the YIn
practice can develop our meditative
awareness, helping us understand and practice
Buddhist Mindfulness more skillfuly. A seated
meditation session will follow the yoga
practice.
This workshop is suitable for anyone
interested in taking their practice to an
increased level of awareness and stillness,
both inside and out.
Sarah Powers began teaching in 1987. She
interweaves the insights and practices of
Yoga and Buddhism into an integral practice
to enliven the body, heart and mind. Her yoga
style blends both a Yin sequence of long held
poses to enhance the meridian and organ
systems, combined with a flow or Yang
practice, influenced by Viniyoga, Ashtanga,
and Iyengar teachings. Sarah feels that
enlivening the physical and pranic bodies, as
well as learning to open to our emotional
difficulties is paramount for preparing one
to deepen and nourish insights into one's
essential nature--a natural state of
awareness. She draws from her studies in
Transpersonal Psychology, as well as her
in-depth training in the Vipassana, Tantric
and Dzogchen practices of Buddhism. Sarah is
author of the upcoming book Insight Yoga. She
is also co-founder of Metta Journeys, a
service oriented organization that offers
yoga retreats internationally while also
helping to empower women and children in
developing countries. She teaches trainings
and silent retreats with her husband Ty. They
live with their home schooled teen-age
daughter Imani-Jade in Marin, California.
March 2008 Workshops
Free Intro to Yoga
Basics of Vinyasa Flow Yoga
Friday, March 7
6:o0-8:30pm
This class will get you started with Vinyasa Flow Yoga, a balanced and complete mind-body-spirit practice that develops strength, flexibility, focused awareness and overall wellbeing. You will learn a variety of poses, breathing techniques and hatha yoga principles, enabling you to get the most out of ongoing classes. Come prepared to move and breathe, sweat and laugh!
This is the ideal way to get your partner, friends and family into the practice!
Healthy Back, Open Heart
Saturday, March 15, 1:30-4:30pm
Our ability to move with confidence, ease and grace depends upon the strength, integrity and mobility of the spine. With a healthy spine and back, we also can begin to fully open our subtle or spiritual heart center.
This workshop will explore a variety of techniques, including core integration movements, hip and shoulder openers and spinal twists, to help you move safely and joyfully into a deeper backbending, heart opening practice. Open to all levels of students.
Pranayama Intensive
Sunday, March 16, 2008
1:00-6:00 pm
Balanced Core
March 30, 2008
Om Oasis, Monterey
April 2008 Workshops
Hands-On Adjustments Intensive
April 5-6
12:30 - 5:30pm both days
Skillful, sensitive, appropriate touch and verbal cues have the potential power to transport your students to a more conscious awareness and self-refinement in their yoga practice. But before we touch and speak we must first see and understand the unique qualities present in an individual student’s practice.
In this workshop, you will further develop your observation skills; learn and practice effective hands-on adjustments that both address common misalignments and encourage inner guidance in a variety of poses; enhance your skill in linking clear verbal cues with adjustments; and build confidence in the practice of giving and receiving as you learn to better help your students find joy and ease amidst the challenge of their practice.
Open to Students & Teachers. With satisfactory completion of an outside written assignment, this workshop qualifies for 10-12 hours toward Yoga Alliance RYT 200, RYT 500, or Continuing Education Units. Applicable to Yoga Teacher Certification.
Hip Liberation
April 26
1:30-4:30pm
If you climb, run, surf, cycle, play volleyball, board, ski or just like to play frisbee at the beach, strong yet flexible hips are a key part of balancing power and freedom of movement. Yet playing sports (or even sitting around in chairs) creates tightness throughout the hip joint (in the flexors, extensors and rotators) that can limit your freedom and lead to sidelining injuries.
In this yoga clinic, we will look closely at how the hip joint optimally functions in work, play and sport alike. We will identify sources of weakness, instability, imbalance and tightness, then explore a variety of yoga pose sequences designed to help you develop the optimal balance of strength and flexibility for your lifestyle.
The Power of Flow:
Learning to Play the Edge in Advancing Your Practice
May 3, 2008
2:00-5:00pm
How do you know when to push harder or let up in your practice? How are effort and ease best balanced in exploring different poses? How can the breath be a more effective tool for deepening your
practice?
In this 3-hour Vinyasa Flow Yoga workshop, we will explore how to "play the edge" in getting the most out of ongoing yoga practices. Basic elements of the practice - breath, energy locks (bandhas), alignment principles and energetic actions in the poses - will be reviewed and applied in taking your personal practice to a deeper level in a sequence of standing poses, core work, arm balances,
backbends and integrative poses designed to help you elevate and
refine your practice. This workshop will leave you with a more practical and experiential understanding of how to apply the tools of Vinyasa Flow in cultivating a sustainable and self-transforming yoga practice.
Breaking Down the Sun Salutations
May 4, 2008
12:30-5:30
Chataranga, Up Dog, Down Dog. Sounds easy enough, yet it doesn't always feel that way. The steady flow of the salutations often makes it difficult to fully explore the elements of each pose and transition, often leading to confusion, frustration and even injury. Yet Sun Salutations are at the heart of most Hatha yoga practices. Here we set the rhythm and mood for all that follows, warming the entire body as we connect breath and movement in the gradual opening to deeper practice. And as simple as they are, they are also fairly complex when we look at them closely. Learning the subtle nuances of each pose open up your practice in incredible ways, making it more and more a practice of freedom and joy.
In this workshop we will go deeply into each element of the Sun Salutations, exploring basic principles of alignment, breath, movement, bandhas and dristi within and between each of ten basic poses. The workshop is designed for all levels of students as well as teachers interested in deepening their understanding of how to teach safe, expansive, spirited Sun Salutations in Vinyasa Flow, Ashtanga Vinyasa and other flow-oriented classes.
Developing a Sustainable
Arm Balance Practice
May 18, 2008
1:30-4:30pm
Arm balances simultaneously require and help us to develop strength, flexibility, focus and openness. These qualities are heightened when movement into the pose involves hip rotation or flexion - poses like Bakasana (Crane Pose), Astavakrasana (Eight Crooks Pose) or the Mukta Hasta Sirsana Vinyasa (a sustained series of interconnected arm balances that from Tripod Headsdtand). More concentrated mental focus is harnessed when then moving into poses involve steadier balnce, such as Adho Mukha Svanasana (Handstand) and Pincha Mayurasana (Forearm Balance). Practicing these asana sequences safely and consciously leads to equanimity, confidence and personal freedom well beyond the mat.
In this workshop we explore how to approach arm balances with patience, intelligence and compassion. We will look closely at the basic elements of each pose and work on cultivating the integrity of these elements as we integrate them into the fuller poses. Along the way we will practice being present to the whole experience of this practice as Vinyasa Yoga, consciously connecting the breath and bodymind moment by conscious moment.
June 2008 Workshops
Teacher Intensive:
Working with Injuries
Saturday & Sunday, June 7 & 8
12:30-5:30 Both days
We commonly face injuries and other special conditions in yoga. ACL repairs, strained medial collateral ligaments, carpal tunnel syndrome, rotator cuff strain or weakness, various spinal conditions such as lordosis, kyphosis, scoliosis and spondalolysthesis, recent ankle sprains and strained hamstrings are some of the conditions you are likely to find in practically every class.
In this workshop, we will start with the perspective embedded in the Chinese character for "crisis," which has the dual meaning of "danger" and "opportunity." We will learn how to work with a variety of student challenges, exploring how to turn them into opportunities for deepening the overall practice. We will look closely at specific accommodations for different injuries and challenges, including alternative alignment, energetic actions, use of props, verbal cues and hands-on adjustments.
Open to Students & Teachers. With satisfactory completion of an outside written assignment, this workshop qualifies for 12 hours toward teacher certification or Yoga Alliance Continuing Education Units (CEUs).
Handstand Basics
June 15, 2008
OM OASIS, MONTEREY
Summer Solstice:
Inversions & Balance
June 22, 2008
YOGA SOURCE, PALO ALTO
July 2008 Workshops
Yoga Teacher Training &
In-Depth Studies
July 11 - August 24, 2008
September 2008 Workshops
Breaking Down
The Sun Salutations
September 7th, 1:30-4:30pm
The practice of nearly every style of Hatha Yoga – Ashtanga, Vinyasa Flow, Iyengar, Anusara, Power, Sivananda and others - is rooted in the dynamic heart-centered flow of Surya Namaskara, the Sun Salutations. It is here that we set the rhythm and mood for all that follows, connecting breath and movement in the gradual warming, opening and refining of the body, mind and spirit.
In this workshop we will go deeply into each element of the Sun Salutations, exploring basic principles of ujjayi pranayama, alignment, energetic actions, bandhas and dristi within and between each of the 12 asasas comprising Classical Surya Namaskara and Surya Namaskara A & B. This workshop is designed for all levels of students as well as teachers interested in deepening their understanding of how to teach safe, expansive, spirited Sun Salutations in flow-oriented classes and sequences.
Open to Students, Teachers and Teachers-in-Training. This workshop qualifies for 3 hours toward Yoga Alliance RYT 200, RYT 500, or Continuing Education Units. Applicable to Yoga Teacher Certification.
October 2008 Workshops
Free Introduction to Yoga
Friday, October 3rd
6:30-8:30pm
This class will get you started with Vinyasa Flow Yoga, a balanced and complete mind-body-spirit practice that develops strength, flexibility, focused awareness and overall wellbeing. You will learn a variety of poses, breathing techniques and hatha yoga principles, enabling you to get the most out of ongoing classes. Come prepared to move and breathe, sweat and laugh!
This is the ideal way to get your partner, friends and family into the practice!
Hands-On Adjustments Intensive
October 4-5
12:30 - 5:30pm both days
Skillful, sensitive, appropriate touch and verbal cues have the potential power to transport your students to a more conscious awareness and self-refinement in their yoga practice. But before we touch and speak we must first see and understand the unique qualities present in an individual student’s practice.
In this workshop, you will further develop your observation skills; learn and practice effective hands-on adjustments that both address common misalignments and encourage inner guidance in a variety of poses; enhance your skill in linking clear verbal cues with adjustments; and build confidence in the practice of giving and receiving as you learn to better help your students find joy and ease amidst the challenge of their practice.
Open to Students, Teachers and Teachers-in-Training. This workshop qualifies for 10 hours toward Yoga Alliance RYT 200, RYT 500, or Continuing Education Units. Applicable to Yoga Teacher Certification.
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