A new Light in your inbox
Welcome to the new Riverbirch Yoga newsletter, Lovin’ The Light! It’s a new and hopefully improved way of staying in touch with you, providing you with the updates you need to plan your Yoga schedule, sharing new possibilities, and expressing my dharma and calling to BE LIGHT with the intention to be a gentle and inspiring Light in your inbox.
Lives are too bogged down in heavies and stacks of to-dos. You don’t need more to clutter your desk and consciousness. So, I’ll do whatever I can to keep this light and Light-filled. Take what you can from these little visits and leave whatever you don’t need just hanging out in cyberspace!
This edition, I invite you to explore Riverbirch's new beautifully designed website and the upcoming schedule of happenings here. And I’ll also introduce you to some Riverbirch characters just for fun!
"Time slips sideways here..."
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If you could create your “perfect day,” what would it look like? What, who, and where would be included in your perfect day? What would you eat, drink, do, or not do? Where would you be? Who would you share it with, if anyone? What would you wear? What time would you get up and go to bed? How would you spend your morning, your afternoon, your evening, your night?
My favorite book and movie is Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnin. In one scene, a woman is savoring a blissful retreat, lounging in a garden by the sea and she says dreamily to herself “time slips sideways here!” That’s a perfect moment, a perfect day. When time isn’t moving forward or backward and just floating by effortlessly “sideways.”
I’ve had a couple of stand-out “perfect days” recently. And while I was in the midst of them, it was like eating the most scrumpti-luscious chocolate cake. I savored every bite ‘n slurp of the day and let the icing slide down my chin without wiping it off! You know, the satisfying bliss of all things being relaxingly “just right!” I didn’t exactly plan the days and was delightfully surprised when I realized I was standing (or reclining!) in the center of a perfect day. Yum!
One of those days included what one might ordinarily label a “grueling task” - cleaning up fallen debris from the twisters that recently hit our property. Jon and I worked on our own that Saturday. We started the day on a 5-mile walk and took our already sweat-drenched bodies straight into the task of lifting and pulling giant limbs and small branches across the woods and yard, sawing up fallen trees and raking loose debris into tarps and throwing the whole mess into our firepit to be burned. If we went up and down our hilly acre fewer than 100 times, I’d be surprised! It was so hot but the breezes came just before the passing out point. We worked for hours and hours cleaning and tending the fire. We would move as much as we could into the fire and then sit with it till it digested enough to make room to consume more of our heaped-up wood.
As we took a fire-tending/water break waiting on the fire to catch up I realized that we were catching up. Our lives had been so chaotic in recent months, each of us working mostly individually to keep our family’s heads above the economic tidal surges and dropping like fallen trees into sleep each night. We seldom shared this kind of concentrated “partnering” time together lately; working side-by-side as we do best. And so I was sitting on a sizzling 90-degree-hot summer day beside our blazing firepit as it consumed great hunks of trees; and in an odd juxtaposition of experiences, I found myself thinking and shouting out loud, “now, THIS is a perfect day!”
I have enjoyed some less physically demanding “perfect days” this year as well: Days spent enjoying my chickens and guineas, my herbs and veggies, my hands in clay, my Yoga mat … Days roaming in deep gratitude around this acre I call Riverbirch, having breakfast in our “front yard” while enjoying dragonflies and hummingbirds zinging around me, laughing wildly at my life-partnering yardbirds, savoring ancient thoughts in blessed moments of Gita reading, spreading my mat and then my body on the earth for some grounding asana and pranayama, writing and allowing my pen to lead me on paper, and sharing the sun’s last moments as it drools its colors into the lake. I’ve had days in the presence of Beings I love dearly. I’ve had blissed-out moments and ecstatically rambling hours.
This property I live in and practice on is a place of retreat. Riverbirch is a muse. Riverbirch Yoga, rooted in the natural rhythms and essence of the Yogic Path, provides generous elbow-room for personal study and reflection. Time slips sideways here allowing one to simply BE. Here there is an openness nurturing free personal expression out of closed energies and bodies. The property and I together share a calling to provide sanctuary for anyone authentically called here. And here is a setting to learn and relearn the song of one’s soul — and to be lifted up to sing it with full-out brave delight throughout every breathing moment of one’s life.
Magical offerings, old and new
Someone once said to me that I create magic. If that is so, I am most grateful to do so. Magical mystical energy is what nudges one into awareness of the Divine, The Authentic, and The Real.
If I can offer anyone just a single moment of magical refuge and time-slipping-sideways kind of inspiration, then I am a happy Yogini! So this year’s calendar keeps some well-loved magic and adds some new magical offerings.
And, speaking of creating MAGIC!....Oh my am I awed, inspired, and ever so in love with Angie who has created a magical online space for Riverbirch Yoga to reach out … and be reached into as well!!!! She’s built a beautiful world you can enter and sigh loudly as if you’re sitting in The Treehouse looking out at a sunset through the trees.
In addition to periodic e-newsletters (like this one) to nudge you to the site, you can drop in anytime you need a Riverbirch fix. Today you can find information and stories ABOUT me and my practices as well as Riverbirch on the Lake, detailed descriptions of OFFERINGS plus the current and upcoming class and events SCHEDULE, a place to go for RESOURCES, some general and inspiring MUSINGS, and fun place to see friends and familiar experiences in our photo GALLERY.
And not too far down the path you’ll be able to access our own “dot com” guided meditation moments, an online forum for community sharing, recommended links and resources, and much more. It’s a magical turning point for our community and I am head-over-heels elated about this new incarnation! It means that the beautiful star can radiate out past the lake touching more and more hearts and lives!!!
Jan's Bikini Barzzzz
1 can sweetened condensed milk (Earth Fare sells an organic that I use)
1 tsp vanilla (always use good real extract not flavoring!)
Pinch of salt (mineralized sea salt is wonderful!)
2 ½ cups flaked coconut (I use unsweetened organic)
2 ½ cups mixture of chopped dates,dried apricots, & dried cranberries (I use the dried cranberries from Home Economist that are sweetened with apple juice, not sugar)
2 ½ cups mixture of chopped pecans, cashews, and walnuts (raw unsalted is best!)
Line 8X8” greased pan with parchment then grease parchment. Mix liquids and salt then mix everything together and spread in pan. Bake 350° 30 min. Cool 5 min. Use parchment to help lift out of pan in one piece. Remove paper and cool before cutting.
This is my own version of a recipe I found online. So many options and variations for this one…..just use the basic foundation of it (milk) and create from there. The coconut mixed with the milk probably provides the webbing that keeps it all together so if you don’t want to use coconut, perhaps you can finely grind nuts instead. Change the dried fruits and nuts to your taste… many to choose from!
