Soul Body Blog
Timely articles and ideas for your health and wellbeing…
Our Space is Your Space
Introducing…… YOU!
Soul Body Ojai is a Healing Center Collective. We are a community. We are a place for new beginnings and established deepening. We are four rooms and a mission. We are a space for teachers, practitioners, students, and clients. We are supportive, cohesive, and compassionate. We are space-holders. We are this for our clients and we are this for each other. Our space is your space, too.
Are you a healer or teacher seeking the next evolution of your practice? It is very possible that the Soul Body Ojai community may be a fit for you. Whether you would like to reach more potential clients, have a healing space available to you 24/7, or simply have a supportive family of practitioners around you to share the journey, Soul Body Ojai is a potential partner to your work. Our contractual space rentals begin at $100/month and include a place on our website, an introduction via our twice monthly newsletter, online room reservation system and private access code, linen, tea and water service, and COMMUNITY. We have an optional business support group for those interested in becoming more active in newsletter creation and advertising, as well as sharing our collective journey. Our Teachers’ Family is supportive of the emotional, spiritual, and professional growth of each one participating and has become a beautiful inner circle of wisdom. We are free to choose our own way within the flexible and nourishing container that is Soul Body Ojai. Free to create, to share, to grow, and to be ourselves. If this sounds like a fit for you, check out the possibilities here: Join Our Team
We are curious about who you are!
Awakening to Love
LOVE. It’s so simple yet why is it so difficult? When did we lose the innocence of love? The ability to love with no conditions, to feel it so fully in it’s purest form. We had that purity when we were children staring into our mother’s eyes. As babies, we understood it’s formlessness, timelessness, and limitlessness but then we grew up and began to place boundaries and conditions around it. It seems that we do that to control it, but that is exactly the opposite of what love is. You see love is not a thing, rather it is a frequency. Yogi Bhajan shared with us “human love is for one thing only. To love your soul, then the infinite world around you will be in love with you.”
Our real work in this life isn’t to fall in love, rather it is to love yourself so fully that one can tune into the vibration of love just by being in your presence. Have you ever wandered into a group of children playing and felt happy? Or maybe your heart opened as 2 people embraced across a crowded room. Perhaps you began crying in someone’s arms even though you just met them. These are all examples of being held in love. I know it seems complicated but really it’s not, it’s the little things that can build a collective love awakening on this planet. But, it has to start with you.
At Soul Body Ojai we are awakening to love and offering transformative and heart-opening classes, teacher trainings, and retreats. Please join us for a special Love Awakening class on Feb. 15th, or in March for Kundalini Level 1 Teacher Training, or the Ojai Weekend Spring Retreat.
We are ready to serve you as we all awaken to LOVE. We invite you to join our movement.
Love,
Jennifer
Pro Tips for Practicing Reiki on Yourself
When you take a Reiki level 1 and 2 class and you forgot what to do with Reiki, here are some simple ways to incorporate the beautiful energy of Reiki in your life.
Meet Eileen Cavanaugh
Eileen is a small flower farmer, a writer and a yoga teacher. (facilitator is her more resonant word). She began taking Kundalini at the age of 20 in Los Angeles with Guru Singh and when she was pregnant with each of her children, she practiced with Gurmukh in her house. She took a break from practicing from age 35-45, but then the awakening came that she needed to find herself again….so began the journey into her own power once more. The writing, flowers and Kundalini all have that common thread of transformation.
The intention at Eileen’s flower farm, Palomar Farm, is to grown a variety of native and unusual flowers reminiscent of ancient ways and days gone by. Medicinal herbs, edible plants, from the wildly weird sunflowers, to the regal romantic roses, to a chorus line of dancing dahlias! Think of it this way, a cross between your grandmother’s old-time favorites with medicinal herbs from ancient times interwoven to create both a visual and sensual feast.
Eileen is fascinated by transformation. Through understanding the natural world of seasons and how the garden changes with each phase, so too do we, with each stage of our lives. We are constantly changing and evolving – which is a beautiful process, but can also be challenging at times to accept the changes and let go. Along with the flowers in her garden, Kundalini Yoga has been Eileen’s spiritual practice which supports her soul’s evolution. Kundalini is a transformational yogic practice which encompasses all that we need to live our highest vibrational life. She lives in Ojai, grows all varieties of old time flowers, holds sacred women’s writing circles seasonally, and teaches Kundalini Yoga.
Eileen’s Kundalini Yoga class at Soul Body Ojai is on Mondays 10:00 am – 11:30 pm. See Full Class Schedule
A Winter Journey into Healing
Gather your important things. Put on your thick socks. A fluffy coat. A soft scarf. Maybe mittens. We are going on a walk. The door opens and the air is crisp and elevated, hitting the back of your throat all at once on the first breath…the brain immediately notified and every cell of the body enlivened. The sun above is still high but descending. These days are abbreviated, concentrated, like laser. Focus. One step at a time, now. Up the mountain slope. Into the trees. Into the beginning. But first through the end.
Keep going. Sound itself becomes more still, deeper and more challenging to locate. The beat of the heart grows louder in the silence. Is it your heart or the heart of something else? Something more ancient. Like Truth before words. Like space before birth. Like the vacuum of the inhale of Creation.
Keep going.
There it is. The cleft in the granite. The cavern. Time before time. Make your offering here on the snow before you enter. Your highest and most troublesome aspect. Your shadow and your light. The breath and your blood. Smooth or stuttered, let the mantra be given. Give away your judgment first. And then the defeats. Now, the victories. This year has been fruitful, yes? She will receive it all as good fortune. You are free now of your burdens. Clean of the praises that bind.
Are you ready, now? How long has it been since this reprieve? This surrender? Move one grateful footfall at a time into this womb. There is a fire deep in the interior. Mingmen, the flame of life. You will be bone deep warm, now. The floor is soft and lined in the finest fur. Do you remember it? Was it not so long ago?
Make yourself at home, dear traveler. All is cared for. All is done.
The last solar light drops away and the shadows play upon the deep red walls. Pictographic. Sensual. Nourishing. A most perfect sustenance bubbles over the hearth.
Stop now. Go still. Deeper, now. Yin within Yin. This is the place of the Mother. Your Mother. And she has been waiting here to love you. Enter here and become anew.
See you on the other side, Beloved.
Winter Tips to Deepen into Healing
- Prepare delicious food – Cooking warm foods creates a warm home. Soups, casseroles, and root vegetables are perfect this time of year.
- Practice Meditation– Meditating before the sun rises and sets, helps us to begin and end the day in a peaceful manner. An evening meditation also helps us access deep sleep.
- Indulge in evening baths– Experiencing an evening hot bath is a wonderful way to release the demands of the day.
- Find time outside alone– Breathing in mother nature and being in her presence automatically slows us down. Weather permitting, find some time to take a walk, cross country ski, hike, or tend to your garden.
- Journal – Journaling about anything and everything is so beneficial this time of year. Writing helps us to process our past experiences and dream of future possibilities.
- SLEEP– Sleeping during this time of year is key. Did you know the best time to make up a lack of sleep from earlier in the year is the Winter? Try to go to bed an hour earlier than usual and experience how quickly your body rehabilitates itself.