I’ve been traveling a lot this summer and enjoying all the wonderful things that summer offers. Things like trips to the beach, stand up paddle boarding, swimming in the ocean, time spent with family and of course live music on the lawn. The list goes on.

I must also mention that there’s one more enjoyable thing that I love about summer and that is a cooling yoga practice.

I’m not one to follow the whole hype of hot yoga. I never have. It’s never worked for me. I’m already made up of fire (and lots of air) so while a cooling practice works for me, a hot practice doesn’t so much. Especially in the summer.

Summer is the perfect time to explore a more restorative or yin style yoga practice. In each of these styles the poses are held for longer periods of time, which allows one to explore the more calming aspects of yoga. These practices are also practiced in a cooler place. Plus, they leave you feeling refreshed and energized.

I have honestly always enjoyed a vibrant vinyasa class, but when I discovered restorative and yin yoga, I found balance. I found that on days where my energy needs to take it up a notch I can choose to practice vinyasa (maybe even in a warmer room) and when my energy needs to be more grounded then I can slow it down and stretch it out. To much of anything is never a good thing. To much yang makes one overly aggressive and to much yin spaces them out. Through the balance of yin and yang one can live more in sync with nature.

In Chinese medicine summer is connected to the heart meridian and in Ayurvedic medicine it is associated with pitta energy (fire). This means energy needs to be focused on the heart. It also means there’s already a lot of heat, which means chill out.

I’ve noticed this summer that there’s been a lot of aggression in the world with wars and bombings. I’ve also noticed a lot of aggression with people sending aggressive emails and spewing fire instead of chilling or cooling the conversation.

What if yoga (and life) were practiced in accordance to nature? What if we let ourselves warm up in the winter by building extra heat in the body and we cooled off in the summer by allowing the yoga practice to be like an air conditioner. Ahhhh.

In my opinion there would be less hatred and more love. More peace and less war.

May you be happy
May you be peaceful
May you be filled with joy.

Namaste

Mary Breath