fbpx

cOMing hOMe…

coming home

Yoga for me gives me a sense of cOMing hOMe to me; this space, like a sanctuary space that I am me. the practice of yoga invites me to a begin a deep communion with myself again and again. Every time I step onto the mat is an opportunity to observe what is arising, the feelings that surface, the conversations that come to mind, the stories that i or you tell yourself or play out all reflect what’s going on in Your life or have gone on and indeed if you continue to listen to familiar stories that don’t serve you will continue to go on. The feelings the conversations, the stories are beautiful portals into the vessel of you, if You choose to go deeper?  or maybe you recognise you stay in the mind, are loyal to the surface? The latter is also an opportunity to change the story and that’s where my invitation is to you….to listen to your familiar stories and embrace the person who’s feeling them, with our judgement ~ thesis coming home. It’s what i’ve been practising; honouring, embracing my different essences or archetypes, like the frightened little girl, the powerful women, the yogini, the rageful fiery goddesses, the reactor, the calm woman, the funny woman… we all have so many faces this is all part of embracing and coming home to who we are.

My London hOMe Yoga Studio, I named “hOMe of Yoga” with a sense that you can come to my home to experience a coming home to you. On the mat I openingly invite you to explore the conversations, feelings, stories that arise as they are the portals into this miraculous body of yours, yes the body as we spend too much time in the mind over analysing, this is especially true for women.

Home for me, as a cancerian, has always been very important, I thrive when secure, stable, am nurtured. When I am not feeling safe and secure I react…I remember in my 20’s when I was exploring myself as you do in your 20’s I flitted from home to home, never made roots and this led to my instability, my lack of grounding. Then when I bought my first home in the mid 90’s it all changed. I had a home, wow it felt good. I expanded into my home, creatively every home I owned I would make beauty, Lakshmi was so present I didn’t even know, and then it was time to expand more, move make new roots, that is when I bought and created hOMe of Yoga and it was my home for 9 years. In those 9 years I truly came home to me, embraced every aspect of myself, not just the good, i acknowledged I react, am fiery, have a Kali type tongue as well as the beauty of Lakshmi. My sadhana in this home was deep, revelatory, filled with deep gratitude. For the 1st year in this home I was in awe of the size of my home, when I was originally looking I drove down the road and said to my friend I love these houses but I could never afford this street – ha the universe thought, let me show her how limitless she is! and so I did buy a home on that street! I felt it also mirrored how I had come to explore this limitless potential inherently within and my home was mirroring this to me.

The only time I felt true pain was in this house was when I was ill, and couldn’t walk, I felt the contraction of suffering and pain in every single movement I made. the turning into the immense pain my whole body, consequently my mind was experiencing from being so out of alignment from reactive arthritis after food poisoning. I had also suppressed, denied the feelings of loss, a break-up, and feelings of betrayal. This is the only time this home and its space challenged me! Because I couldn’t walk or move without immense pain, I recall having to go up 2 flights of stairs to my loft bedroom every single step a challenge, just like steps on a journey to truly deeply know every aspect of your self and embrace the parts you disconnect from. I had 26 stairs to surmount and the pain I experienced was my teacher asking/inviting me to surrender, to let go….

after 9 years I let go in another sense….

New Home

So as you know from previous blogs I’ve recently moved to Barbados. I committed 108%, sold up my beloved home of 9 years, the hOMe of Yoga and moved to see if I am able to create a new home with my husband in his country. I moved on the 27th, 2+7=9 and 9 is the number of completion. Everything feels like completion in one sense and new beginnings in another.

beach

Contemplation time to re-root

I’ve been very quiet since I’ve moved. I’ve needed time to let go, even grieve what I’ve let go of, even though it was by choice. I am taking time out away from social media, my blogs as I find the coming home again to me, a new me, in a new country! So now you know why I’ve been quiet! As this end of 2014 closes I’ve closed one chapter of my life and am beginning to re-write the new chapter.

A woman in harmony with her spirits is like a flowing river. She goes where she will without pretence and arrives at her destination prepared to be herself and only herself ~ Maya Angelou

The Paradox

Yoga for me as I said is a coming home, the paradox is i’ve uprooted my home and as I sat in the airport to leave everything i’ve known in my 25 years in London, it hit me! Boom! I was in limbo, homeless, going to see/make/create a new home in a country i really didn’t know, I was doing it alone with my cat and my husband, no family, no friends, no clients, no work – yep can you guess I was an emotional wreck. so much so I nearly missed my flight, which my little cat was on. and as i saw “gate closed” on the board I ran so fast, I was sweating, shaking with fear, trembling and all these rush of feelings rampaged in my veins I thought i would collapse. Fortunately I didn’t miss my flight, I spoke with the stewardess, who knew my cat was in the hold on the same flight and said could I sit alone as I was a bit of a mess…. I was shaking, crying, sweating with fear so much and there were seats available they obliged!

As I made that flight to my new home I reflected on my last week. My last few classes were a-MAZ-zing, yet the last ever class in the hOMe of Yoga for me was a challenge. I knew it was the last one, the flow of the river of my wisdom Saraswati tongue that guides and eloquently delivers messages dried up, it wasn’t how I wanted it to be, but then I was judging myself! Something I’ve teach women to let go of the judgement. I felt the last class mirrored my uprooting. The coming home temporarily left, whilst I create a new home and until I return to London next year to create a mobile hOMe of Yoga – and so that’s what came to me….

As I sat with all my fears on my flight, shaking, chanting to and for  my cat with Shiva and Durga mantras, especially when there was turbulence, I knew my hOMe is in my heart and I offer that wherever I am. The inner altar is always present and that’s the one to light and kindle, wherever you are.

Barbados

nature around my home

nature around my home

As the plane began to make its descent the feelings of coming home came forth. My husbands arms held me as I cried. And now just 2 weeks on I am still up and down like I’m going up and down those 26 stairs again! And yet as I make roots, feel unstable I’m feeling all those feelings and allowing them to arise, be the portals inwards to seek the new home, the refuge place I take sanctuary in. The beautiful blessing I am learning is this beautiful island is so full of slowness and simplicity and nature. I am beginning to seek the simplicity, that yearns for pleasure and commit to embody the simple pleasures away from drama.

As I write this I am listening to crickets, the cockerels wake me every morning ( not at sunrise they seem to start at 3 am! LOL i dont often haha) the sea is immense, powerful and cleansing and I stare at the vastness of the sky often and use it as meditation. Mother nature is calling me home. as I drove to our home one day my husband said “this is a nice village isn;t it?” and  as I said and thought “wow is this a village? have I moved from a massive city, London to a village….!” OMGoddess! Yes I have and there, in this village community where I build a new home, She is present, Her invitation,my unconscious becomes conscious.

As I’ve been honouring the Divine Feminine all year I feel She is saying: your coming home is for me to explore the feminine more…. I am being invited into nature, She is nature, to surrender, to slow down (Caribbean is slow 3 hours to get my car tax! haha not like london! Just this comment reveals I’m not on Caribbean time yet!) yes I am being invited to slow down, truly feel and embrace life and all the cyclic patterns in nature. As well as create the Sacred Union in married life. Learning to surrender the grip of control and allow my husband to be powerful, my hero and this empowers me, that’s true surrender and sacred Union.

Last few weeks of 2014


WomenUnite

for 2014 my intention was to honour the Divine Feminine and this has been a-MA-zing journey, finding my true calling and purpose, my coming home to serve women… and along the way be a student to the Sadhana and learn even more. When i set this intention I had no idea I would make a massive Leap of faith, yet when you serve something much greater than yourself, your life unfurls and expands.

As we close the year to the darkest time, I am feeling I am going into this darkness and honouring this time of transition…. I am becoming more in tune with my feelings rather than supressing them. I still react, ask my husband! But then I remember the tempestuous relationship of Shiva and Parvati. The polarities are the dark and light, the contraction and expansion, the masculine and feminine, the reaction and acceptance, the joy and sadness…and so for me as we go towards Winter Solstice, and the last New Moon of 2014, in the fertile darkness I sow seeds, I feel a contraction and I pause reflect, feel, breathe, gives this feeling space (a techinique I learnt form one of my teachers) and so the darkness will be bought to light, my seeds begin to flourish as I nurture them, the contraction will expand, the tears become tears of joy.

I’ve chosen, or had it chosen with limited internet at present, to be away from the iphone, and learnt just yesterday that iPhone usage truly depletes a woman of oxytocin by constantly being on it looking striving to be on top of social media, the constant doing. And so I undo the doing, I reflect on 2015 intention – more on that very soon!  I am using this fertile darkness, this time to create my London workshops for January and serve 25 wonderful yogini’s.

MY Support

What is truly helping me in coming home is mantra, these two mantras especially, I chant every day between 54 and 108 each:

Om Shrim Hrim Klim Glaum Gam Ganapataye Swaha

The seeds I sow here contain all the teachings and through the bija mantras honour the beauty and auspiciousness (Shrim) to manifest (Hrim) and attract (Klim) what it is that I need to remove to honour my true self and ne wife more…

and in this fertile darkness at this time of year, even though I am surrounded by glorious radiant sunshine of the Caribbean, I honour the Gayatri Mantra. The oldest mantra for the Goddess that I know any time I am chanting someone else will be chanting somewhere in the world with me…

resting feminine

Om Bhoor Bhuvah Svah
Tat Savitur Varenyam
Bhargo Devasya Dheemahi
Dhiyo Yonah Prachodayaat.

Throughout all existence
“That” essential nature illuminating existence
is the Adorable One.
May all beings perceive with subtle intellect
the magnificent brilliance of enlightened awareness

and from these feelings, this experience I will endeavour to teach you about coming home to you… so you too will perceive the magnificence within you and feel at home.

this track always helps me in cOMing hOMe

Namaste

Michelle x0x