November 8, 2025

What Becomes of Gratitude in a Transactional World?

Gratitude lives at the interface of body and mind. Deep in the brain, the insula translates sensations like heartbeat and breath into a felt sense of being. When we practice gratitude, empathy, or mindfulness, this same circuitry brings coherence to our inner and outer worlds, helping us feel meaning rather than just think it.
November 8, 2025

The Neuroscience of Embodiment, Empathy, and Gratitude

Gratitude lives at the interface of body and mind. Deep in the brain, the insula translates sensations like heartbeat and breath into a felt sense of being. When we practice gratitude, empathy, or mindfulness, this same circuitry brings coherence to our inner and outer worlds, helping us feel meaning rather than just think it.
November 5, 2025

Feeling Deeply, Acting Wisely

Yoga helps us become more perceptive, even sensitive, to feelings that arise from within, but sensitivity alone isn’t enough. Without the grounding of intention and guidance of attitude, sensitivity can easily spiral into negativity. This reflection explores how we can turn awareness into right action, both on and off the mat.
November 5, 2025

The Predictive Brain and Yoga Practice

One reason yoga sharpens perception may lie in how the brain anticipates the causes of the sensory signals that shape our experience. In neuroscience, this is […]
October 25, 2025

From the Inside Out: Practicing Gratitude in Relationships

It might seem paradoxical that turning inward, through practices like yoga and meditation, can strengthen our outward relationships. But at its foundation, gratitude requires awareness. To experience feelings of gratitude and express them, we first need to be aware of what is happening within and around us. If we are distracted and desensitized, then we don’t have the bandwidth to be mindful.
October 18, 2025

Gratitude for Self: It Ain’t Easy (But So Worthwhile!)

Many of us are practiced at self-criticism, but less familiar with self-acceptance. Without it, our efforts toward growth can become driven by striving, discontent, and a sense that we’re never quite enough. To work with this, we’ll explore gratitude in this inward-facing dimension through several approaches.
September 30, 2025

Parking & Access Update – Please Read Before Your Next Class

Matcon Construction is currently realigning a storm sewer on Spring Street. From now until October 24th, there will be temporary road closures on Spring Street, Monday through […]
September 8, 2025

Tending the Overloaded Mind: Embodiment Practices for Mental Relief and Resilience

In times of heightened mental demand, such as the return to routine in September, our inner world can become noisy and overloaded. This article explores how higher-order thinking—like planning, reflecting, and managing competing mental tasks—can tax our cognitive systems, leading to fatigue and emotional depletion. Drawing from neuroscience and embodied practice, it proposes that yoga offers a counterbalance: a way to redirect attention toward simpler, grounding sensory experiences that reduce cognitive load. Through mindful movement and somatic awareness, yoga offers not just a temporary escape, but a tool for long-term mental resilience and clarity.
May 8, 2025

Between Wake and Sleep: The Mysterious Territory of Savasana

Savasana is often seen as a time for simple relaxation, but beneath the stillness lies a diverse and complex experience. It can bring deep release, strange dreamlike imagery, and a heightened awareness of the body and breath. In this piece, we'll explore what makes savasana unlike any other practice, a state where the mind floats between waking and sleep, and both ancient teachings and neuroscience point to its transformative potential.
January 16, 2025

“Not Doing” is a Skill Worth Practicing

In a recent intention-setting discussion in our teacher training program for 2025, I reflected on a pattern that I feel present both personally, and with the […]
November 11, 2024

Ambivalence and Purpose: A Remembrance Day Reflection

On Remembrance Day, when I reflect on wars past and present, feelings of sadness for the loss of life and compassion for those who endured (and […]
October 4, 2024

How much should you listen to your yoga teacher?

Yoga teachers are seasoned guides in mindful movement and safe alignment and have your best interests at heart. But let’s be honest—sometimes all those cues can feel […]
September 8, 2024

Mindful Movement vs. the Harmonics of Habit

You and I are amazing creatures, capable of learning a seemingly endless amount of patterns (ideas, skills, facts) to help us navigate our worlds more effortlessly […]
May 8, 2024

From Automatic to Aware: Rediscovering Reality Through Yoga

Our minds are beautifully efficient. Some days, I find it hard to appreciate this, especially when I'm tired or overloaded. But even so, there is so much unconscious work going on under the surface that it's baffling how the most seemingly simple feelings and actions come to life.
February 4, 2024

Manifesting Contentment: From Lack to Wholeness

I’ve been distracted lately by thoughts on the pace of local development and how this will inevitably affect the future of our lives and livelihood. Sometimes, […]
January 4, 2024

Embodiment: Bring Good Intentions to Life

October 20, 2023

Vairagya: Softening Views for Deeper Understanding

In yoga philosophy, vairagya is the practice of softening our held viewpoints. Our mind is a powerful tool for predicting the cause of whatever experience we […]
September 20, 2023

September Shifts: Navigating Nature’s Paradox and Our Inner Journey

I was out for dinner with a friend the other night, and we reflected on the feeling of September’s “new year”; a transition period between Labour […]
August 20, 2023

Thunder’s Wake: Reflecting on a Wildfire Summer

I was woken up this morning by the crash of thunder that cracked over the roof. I jumped up and looked out the front window at […]
May 8, 2023

What is the Subtle Body?

The practices of yoga, developed over thousands of years, help us to understand ourselves, our relationship with others, and the greater whole. Yoga explains that the […]
ScheduleMy Account