Today I tossed a penny into a wishing well shaped like my heart… Dreams come true, and my hands… are dream makers, my poems, echos of prayers kissing life into memories… I’m learning slowly that perfection is found in falling down, life is about getting back up again, learning to dance with two left feet and my shoe laces tied together, but I dance… I sing a bit out of key, my voice.. tuned to my heart strings.. pluck me open, kick down the doors of my soul, lets dance in the rain, splash puddles under out feet, sweat glistening something beautiful on skin… the moment sinking its way in… another poem kissing a memory, making beautiful love..
journal
Napowrimo Day 3
A Love Letter to my Broken Pieces
You lay on the floor, puddled memories drip from clenched eyes, tear holding softly to cheek. My shadow sneaks up on me.. Memories sneak up on me, like hide and seek.. my anxiety never picks the safe places to hide… I wear my imperfections like tattoos on my face… safe places are for dreamers, I’m someone that lives for a living… which is why I’m poor, but who needs a car when you can walk the line of a razor blade.. balance has never been my strong suit..so , I choose to teach yoga, hoping that in some ancient pretzel I can find nourishment… I stand in the center ring of my circus, dreaming imperfectly beautiful dreams… coloring out of the lines…
Napowrimo Day 2
There are days I wanted out… but you wrapped your arms around me like love, or.. broken promises. The grip of all that we could be holds me like the echos of pennies tossed in wishing wells… dreams are sometimes nightmares, and we wake up screaming I love you into memories of how things use to be… how things were when we first met… They said we wouldn’t last, but we proved them wrong, your name tattooed on my skin, you’re forever part of me.. ink kissing skin, spilling into poems… forever.
Mike Brazell
Napowrimo Day 1
April is National Poetry Writing month! What this means is that everyday for the month we write a poem. It sounds easy enough, but it can really throw you for a loop. I’m going to do my best this year to stick to getting a poem up each day of the month.
We were a beautiful mess.. We could sing back up to car wrecks, we were anthems to brokenness.. we wrapped broken promises around us hoping to keep warm, like your arms around me the day you left… You reached into my chest and etched your name on my heart… I write poems to forget, only to remember that poems never die… you are etched into my skin, tattooed… You were the first, the ink touches my skin, the pain payment… the battle scars beautiful… our memories endless.
just a bit of stream of consciousness for tonight 🙂
You are Loved. You are Beautiful. You are Divine
Namaste!
Re-aligning with Purpose
So, I took a bit of a break from working on blogs, writing and just about everything else. When we engage spiritual work for a living we have to give ourselves space to take a step back, to re-examine our purpose and to decide what new directions we wish to explore. Life is a dance and we sometimes need to take a break and wait for our favorite song to come on before we step back onto the dance floor. One of the big things I know is that we have to give ourselves space to say no, to hold silence, and to rest. So, I’ve been in hibernation. Now, it is time to come out of the shell of my silence and bring into the work and world something new and engaging. Life gets busy, and we forget to take time to reflect and align with the stuff that calls us. My yoga practice has brought me a lot of balance (pun intended). I find that with my yoga practice that regardless of how I feel emotionally that just moving my body helps the emotions to flow. Some postures can be angry, some can be humble, others can open the valves of sadness, and others bring unconditional joy. We hold a lot of who we are in the physical body. It is often the piece of the puzzle that many of us forget to engage. This body is the one living this beautiful experience. Sometimes the beauty we live is a bit brutal, and the body remembers this. It holds it, and we feel it. I use my practice to move through this. Over the past few weeks I’ve felt many emotions move through me and my practice. The second action is journaling. My journal helps to capture these moments for self reflection, so that I can sit with the narrative of my life experience and see the dance an its many parts.
So, there is going to be more writing, more self-reflective posts and I am also going to be breathing life back into my other blogs. Its time to move through the shell and to commit to this experience fully.
You are Loved. You are Beautiful. You are Divine.
Engage Your Inner Warrior: Standing in Balance
Many of us are entering this new year shedding off the old. The dust is finally settling and it is time for us to move into greater states of connection with what we want from life. So, here are a few questions to sit with: What do you want from life? What are you doing to achieve it? What is your resistance to making these desires manifest?
As we move into this new year I want to bring a bit of warrior energy into our practice. In yoga, warrior postures take us into places of strength, balance, focus. I will however point out that too often we hold these posture with too much rigidity. Warriors have to be flexible, they have to move with the elements, with life itself. Engaging the practice of asana work helps us to embody the warrior. When we move our bodies into a posture that represents our warrior nature we are calling that force into all of our parts.
Here is a quick and simple mediation that you can do to help you find balance.
Warrior 2-
Step one leg forward into a lunge. Your back foot is at a slight 45 degree angle. Your front knee is either above the ankle or slightly behind. You can lessen the intensity of the lunge depending on your fitness level. Your hips are turned outward. One hand is moving forward, the other back. Look forward and back and your hands should be aligned through the center plane. Here is a video to help work your into the posture:
Once in the poster here is a meditation to help you get the most from the power of this posture:
This warrior posture represents standing in the center. Being fully in balance and in control of our experience.
While standing in warrior two, listen to your body. Where is your mind drifiting? How does your body feel standing in the posture, do you feel strong, weak, small, big? Sit with these thoughts as they come up. Where do you need warrior energy in your life?
Now shift your focus to the rear hand:
What in your past is still binding you? Do you find yourself drifting through the your past? Where do you feel that you need balance in your past experience? Send light and energy through your fingertips to those areas of your life.
Now Take your focus to the front hand:
Where in your current experience do you feel bound? What do you feel about your future, does it bring fear or joy? Where in your current experience do you need energy, balance, strength? Send energy through your fingertips to those parts of your life that need it?
Switch sides and do the same thing with the opposite side forward. This becomes a practice of balancing our bodies and engaging the mind/body/ and spirit connection. After you do this practice, take a few moments to journal your experience. What thoughts came to mind? What came up for you? Do you feel powerful, do you feel like a warrior? If not, touch the solar plexus, ask the body what it needs in order to bring that energy into your life?
Blessed be warriors! Practice, connect, love, and stand in your power!
and remember… You are Loved. You are Beautiful. You are Divine.
Michael A. Brazell CFT CSN MAT PAT
theyogawitch@gmail.com
Daily Practice: Keep a Yoga Journal
When we head out for our yoga classes, we pack our mats, our bags and even blocks, but we often forget to pack our journals. The practice of journaling your yoga experience can really help you to embody the practice of yoga. There is a lot that happens during a yoga session, and regardless of the type or style of yoga you are engaging it is important to catalog and dialogue with our practice.
Yoga is also much more than what happens on the mat, and being able to harness the power of our practice to move through our “off-mat” lives helps us to be unified with our actions, intentions and emotions.
I have always found journaling to be a powerful tool for assessing and dealing with emotions that come up. Having a journal is like having a trusted friend that is there to listen, to help us process, and to help us connect to something below the surface. If you are not currently keeping a journal I would really encourage starting one. I’m not going to get into the nitty-gritty of what type of journal you should carry with you, but I personally prefer hand writing out my journals. If you are going to be using your journal in your yoga class, I would encourage a paper journal and then you can transfer to your e-device.
Here are some things to consider including in your yoga journal:
- What postures challenge you?
- What external challenges are reflected to you by the posture?
- What postures feel really good? (This one is especially good if you are feeling deep release or relax from a posture being able to re-create that out of class will be important.)
- What intention are you bringing into your practice?
- What is yoga doing for you during this session?
- Are there things in your life that yoga helps you move through? How?
- What emotions are you feeling during the class? Which postures evoke those emotions?
- Are you currently using a mantra? What have the effects of that mantra been on your life?
- What is the hardest part about yoga for you?
- What is the easiest?
These are just a few questions, and I’ll dissect some of these as blog posts in the future. You can also just write a list of gratitude, or doodle, draw, etc there really is not a right or wrong way to journal… the idea is to get energy moving and to capture your progress on all levels. One of the things that I love about my older journals is being able to see my growth, to see what yoga helped me work through.
Mantras are also powerful magical tools. Choosing to engage and stick with a mantra practice, and then seeing what effect that mantra is having on your life will let you capture those experiences for reflection.
You can also write quotes, intentions and ideas that you want to take into your practice with you. You can also dedicate the energy of your practice to individuals, places and things in the world that might need a little extra push of energy. Writing those down helps us to solidify the dedication of energy, and then as we carry our journals with us we also carry those we care for.
What is your favorite type of journal?
What is your journaling process?
Do you have resistance to journaling? Can you identify the resistance?
What do you journal about?
Feel free to share int the comments below!
You are Loved. You are Beautiful. You are Divine.
Michael A. Brazell CFT CSN MAT PAT
michael@michaelbrazell.com
Bhakti Witch 