Huhtikuussa järjestimme ystävieni Anna Elfving-Gomezin ja Louise Méruksen kanssa viikonloppuretreatin Wiurilan kartanolla. Leirin perusteema oli hyvinvointi sekä rauhoittuminen arjen hektisyyden keskellä. Joogasimme, ulkoilimme, söimme kasvisruokaa ja juttelimme terveellisistä elämäntavoista. Asuimme Wiruilan upeissa puitteissa ja nautimme täysin siemauksin upeasta seurasta ja kauniista kevätpäivistä.
Anna ja Louise ovat lapsuudenystäviäni. Meillä on aina ollut paljon yhteistä ja he ovat osa perhettäni, mutta olemme vasta viime vuosina huomanneet miten paljon pidämme samoista asioista ja kuinka tärkeäksi osaksi elämäämme jooga ja hyvinvointi on muodostunut.
Wiurilan viikonloppu oli meidän ensimmäinen yhteinen tapahtuma, mutta olen melko varma, että niitä tulee paljon lisää. Muistan kun olimme nuorina tyttöinä menossa nukkumaan Louisen kanssa maalla ja totesimme yhteen ääneen, että haluamme matkustaa Australiaan ja asua siellä. Noin vuiisi vuotta myöhemmin asuimme Sydneyssä. Louise vuoden, minä kaksi. Ja nyt talvella suuntaan sinne jälleen Ellan kanssa takaisin kolmeksi viikoksi. Unelmat tulevat usein toteen ja mitä toivomme myös saamme. Näin se elämä vie eteenpäin ja koko ajan usko itseen kasvaa ja usko johonkin suurempaan voimaan, joka kannattelee läpi haastavien aikojen ja on läsnä myös aikoina jolloin elämä hymyilee suuremmin kuin ikinä aiemmin.
Viikonlopun ohjelma!
Kahvila ja ruokatila.
Rauhoittavan yin-joogan taikaa.
Rakas ystäväni Catharina Hohenthal oli myös mukana viikonlopun touhuissa
ja rauhottui kerrankin oikein kunnolla.:)
Avustamista ja päällä seisonnan opettelemista.
Kaikki Louisen taikoma ruoka oli vegaanista ja ah niin hyvää.
Samaan aikaan kotosalla Ella ja Jack ajavat traktorilla, polskivat vedessä ja kalastavat sukulaisten kanssa:
Nämä ihanat koiratuotteet löydät balithedog.fi -liikkeestä.
Sunnuntaina ehdin vielä tallin kautta kotiin:
Tack Kära Ullica att du var med.
Tule mukaan seuraavalle retriitille Westerby Gård - tilalle Inkooseen.
Its All About You - Autumn Retreat järjestetään 14.-16.9.2018
Lisätietoa tapahtumasta ja osallistumisohjeet löydät täältä. Voit myös laittaa lisäkyselyä suoraan sähköpostiini kiaherold@hotmail.com.
Tässä vielä upea lainaus, jonka Anna luki toisen päivän joogatunnin lopussa kaikille osallistujille. Itkimme ja nauroimme, halasimme ja tanssimme:
Imagine your life has sudddenly ended. It just happened this very second. No warning, no time to say any goodbyes Don’t worry, you felt nothing It was just one of those things
You used to live on this blue panet But somehow now you don’t Take a moment for this to settle in...
No matter how loved you were... life will go on without you The world will keep spinning
So, seeing as you are now...dead
1. what did you love about your life? 2. Do yu have any regrets about your life? 3. If you were given one more chance... what would you do?
You are about to get your life back. But before that happens Take a deep breathe in! And hold And hold Hold Hold Breathe out Now breathe in new life Breathe in new hope You’ve got your life back. What will you do with the time you have been given?
A friend of mine approached me today and told me that I put up such nice yoga pictures and was wondering if we could do a yoga program that she could follow in the mornings. Something that would make her more flexible. She is also a horseback rider and as you probably know I am more than keen on teaching the art of yoga to people that deal with horses.
Then I started thinking. She wanted me to make a program and feel more flexible because she had seen some nice pictures of me doing Asanas in the beautiful Finnish archipelago. She had seen the surface of what yoga is to me. Yes, it makes me more flexible, and yes, it makes me a better horseback rider. But all in all it comes down to this: Yoga has saved me and where I was at in life. It has made me a happier and much more balanced human being but it has also helped with my chronic health problems that I have been suffering with for many years. My chronic intestinal problems have almost been debilitating at times and even if I will probably never get rid of the problems completely, learning to live with it and learning to calm my nervous system down has helped me tremendously.
And yes, of course it is nice to take pictures of different yoga poses and try to look as nice in them as possible. Honestly though I am probably the stiffest yogi around and in most poses I look like I would be checking out the mat for the first time. But that doesn't matter either because my yoga practice that is truly my own has nothing to do with that. When I flowed through a sequence yesterday evening at a small hut next to the sea, with the sauna still warming the room in a warm summer night I remembered why I do this. I do this because it gives me comfort. It gives me peace of mind and it gives me that moment where I am present with what is right there, right now. It makes me tap into my own frequency, my vibe and my energy. It makes me tap into my tribe and really teaches me to listen to who I am beneath all that surface. Beneath all those pictures and smiles that we so easily put up toward each other. It makes me raw and naked to the bone. It makes me me.
Here are some fantastic words that I wanted to share from amazing Lara Heinman. I wish I will have the possibility to study human anatomy with her someday.
"That is all I am trying to do. To educate people to listen, to be critical thinkers. Everyone knows what their own history is, even if they are not consciously aware of it. If I have gotten a run down on somebodies injuries or their current state it still isn't telling me the whole picture. The person really needs to listen to their own bodies. I always start of by saying: "Do what feels good. Don't do what doesn't feel good." People love getting that permission. They love that simple statement. But I also try and sequence and think about things in a way that will put most people in a good place, an integrated place. I do believe that you have got to get people to understand what their core is. And the core is everything that is surrounding your ribcage and your spinal column. It is just not your limbs and in yoga a lot of times we cue more about the limbs than the core.
When we own our power the sacral plexus and the shakras are right there. And when we discover them and really tap into them and don't give that to anyone else but ourselves, that is who we are. That is our identity, that is our security and our stability. So no wonder that you feel less fearful because you just automatically feel more secure in you.
Anatomy is the structure of the body but it is the investigation of the internal workings. Anatomy is not just this frame, muscles, sceleton, ligaments, fascia. It is the container of out spirits. We are walking around in this container, this uniform. Do we want to have a bright, lit up Uniform or do we want to be like a dark shroud. We can wear our emotions on our body or we can free our emotions through our body. You are the body, mind and spirit. It is all there together." - Lara Heinman
Tonight I had the pleasure to listen to and meditate with Humanitarian and Spiritual Leader Sri Sri Ravi Shankar.
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar started the evening by talking about us as vibrational beings. How we know how to eat when we are hungry or sleep when we are tired, but we do not learn what to do when we feel frustrated, angry or sad. We do not learn how to change our negative vibration toward a more positive one. We just sit with all these emotions and don't know how to get away from it.
When it comes to changing your vibration Sri Sri Ravi Shankar says that Meditation is the way.
"It helps us come out from all the negative into the positive."
Here are Sri Sri Ravi Shankars 7 reasons to why everyone should meditate:
It makes our vibration positive and everyone wants a positive vibration.
Meditation brings clarity to our vision. We don't want to walk around with a confused mind. The more challenging times the more clarity we need.
It enhances our intuition. Every business man needs intuition.
It enhances creativity.
Meditation improves our perception and our communication. All conflicts in the world are because of a lack in communcations.
It helps the balance of the mind. In both bad and good times it helps you keep the equilibrium of the mind.
It brings forth your skills. Everyone has skills and meditation helps bring them forth.
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar also talked about love and how important it is to give and contribute to each other in a relationship. He also reminded that we should not demand love because when we demand love we also destroy love. We should not question if someone loves us:
"Do not demand love. Take it for granted that everyone loves you."
Whenever I travel abroad I usually go riding at least once during the trip. I love riding in different countries and with different cultures and some of my best memories are definitely from cantering down the streets and beaches in Bayahibe (The Dominican Republic) or heading out in the desert of Dubai.
Finding a good place to ride always requires a bit of googling and might also include some luck.
The best way to find your way around in a new country however is usually through someone local and this time we were very lucky because one of our friends who studied at the RYT 200 yoga teacher training with us happens to live in Marbella. So when Janina Tainio asked us to join her to Ranch Siesta Los Rubios for a few hours hack (that in a very Spanish way ended up taking more than three hours) we were of course more than excited to head to the ranch situated between Estepona and San Pedro de Alcantara (I mean just listen to these names. Who would say no to riding in places like this).
On a Tuesday afternoon we headed off with Janina, Auli, and Aulis two daughters. My daughter Ella went to stay with her friends for the day and night since she is not at all as into riding as the rest of us. When we were hacking in the amazing Spanish countryside Ella was enjoying her time out in the sea and in the swimming pool on a Unicorn floatie instead.
The drive to Ranch Siesta Los Rubios took only around 30 minutes from where we were situated in Marbella. The Ranch is run by an English woman named Caroline Grahm, her fantastic mother and amazing children. The Ranch is small but extremely cozy and as soon as you enter the area you can feel the good energy surrounding you. Caroline welcomed us warmly to her yard and after watching a jumping lesson together with Caroline we headed of to get our horses (most of them were already tacked up and ready outside the barn.
All the girls. Peppi. Auli, Janina and Wilma.
The yoga teachers / horse enthusiasts getting together.
Normally during the summer time the horses are ridden early mornings and late afternoon / evenings. Due to the unusually cold summer this year however we were able to head out for the hack at 2 pm already. The weather was perfect for horseback riding. The sun was shining slightly but the air was very fresh and the wind kept all the flies away from the horses. This was a very important thing especially for the little 4-year old mare that I was riding since her tail had been cut off almost completely in her previous home and she used her hind legs to kick off the flies from under her belly.
We took of through some beautiful landscape and after walking a few miles on a road with a little traffic we came to the most amazing place where hills met water and citrus trees bloomed followed by the prettiest roses. When Caroline told us that the horses are used to traffic and even big trucks but her horse (that had only been ridden for 2 months) and mine (that had only been ridden for 4 months) could still react to the trucks swishing by I could already see myself heading off full speed in another direction or jumping straight off the road or under the truck. Her horses reactions were however quite different from what I am used to with Thor. This cutest little mare took a few small spurts in the beginning of the hack but after that she had really no reaction to anything other than the flies that irritated her if we stopped for a while. Her concentration was mostly on trying to find some bush to eat on the way and keeping herself close to the other horses. Even when cantering she was completely relaxed, lifted the canter nicely and stayed very kindly as the last one of the group. Caroline said that she had even had beginners on this 4-year old horse.
The hack was fantastic and I felt so at home just smelling the horses and being around likeminded people. What I however liked the most about the place was definitely the way that the horses were treated and trained. Carolines manner with the young horses was so beautiful and you could really feel that every situation was a training situation for her. And as this once again proved there really are no difficult horses. Only difficult situations or wrongly trained foundations.
I also absolutely fell in love with this little mare. An absolutely adorable horse with a great temperament and so kind and gentle. So totally different from the handsome Swede that was waiting for me at home.
Time for a sip of the purest water.
Luckily I was travelling when Thor had an accident- My best friend Tiina took care of the wounds in his legs and seeing them now they still look pretty bad but I think I would have been devastated if I would have been around seeing them fresh and open. I am just so very very grateful that nothing worse happened to either one of them and so happy that the wounds have healed very well. You never know what the next moment in life brings in front of you and I am just so thankful that I get to spend my life around all these fantastic people and the majestic animal called a horse. Tomorrow morning I will head out with Thor for a long hack and just give him all the time he needs.
The 4 year old mare that I was riding.
And the little pony that was saved from the slaughterhouse because he ran off to the stable next door where Caroline was visiting the veterinarian and decided to take him home with here.
Do you have any favourite destination where you have been riding? Any place that you would recommend visiting.
Ok, hello Carpet? How cute am I. Maybe a bit hot with this coat.:)
If you are interested in riding holidays in Spain, Janina Tainio is more than happy to help you. You can find her contact information here. More about Ranch Siesta los Rubios can be found here.
Janina and Ranch owner Caroline.
PS. Unfortunately I do not have many pictures from the hack. I really had nowhere to put my phone this time and I took Janina's advice and enjoyed the ride from the horseback rather than through the lens of my camera. So all the pictures that are taken from the hack are taken by Caroline.
PSS. Many horses in Spain are rescue horses. That is also why many of Caroline's horses are mares because there are more mares going to slaughter and being saved by amazing people such as Caroline. Wish I could have my own yard with Ella, Jack and Thor someday. We would take every horse possible to that yard. It would be such a dream come true.
