Tag: Self Care

Clearing it Out: Yoga for Elimination

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Greetings beloveds,

To go with this months theme of clearing it out, I want to share with you all some yoga poses that support digestion followed by a quick flow. Enjoy!

Stimulates Digestion

Warrior II – Counterpose: Downward Facing dog

Warrior I – Counterpose: Downward facing dog

Revolved Extended Side-Angle – Counterpose: standing forward bend

Revolved triangle – Counterpose: Standing forward bend

Chair – Counterpose: standing forward bend

Cobra – Counterpose: Childs pose/lying on belly

Camel – Counterpose: standing forward bend/childs pose

Bridge (pg106) Counterpose: Knee to chest

Bow – Counterpose: lying on belly/childs pose/ downward-facing dog

Locust – Counterpose: Lying on belly/childs pose

 

  Simple Seated Twist – Counterpose: staff

 

  Standing forward bend

  Open-Angle – Counterpose: knees-to-chest

  Splits –  Counterpose: downward facing dog

 

Start seated with your legs crossed comfortably. Inhale feeling your back lengthen and straighten as you do. Place your right hand behind you and exhale into a twist bringing your left hand onto your right knee for seated spinal twist. Hold here for 3 breaths.

Now extend your legs in front of you into staff making sure your spine is straight by imagining each vertebrae stacking one on top of the other. Inhale arms overhead and exhale bending at the waist into forward bend. Hold for as long as you need.

Inhale slowly raising your arms overhead and exhale lowering your arms. Repeat 2 times.

Next, spread your legs as far apart as is comfortable for you into a v shape. Inhale arms up exhale bending at the waist placing your hands on the floor in front of you where ever you feel comfortable for open angle. Hold for 2 breaths then on your next inhale raise up slightly and on the exhale bend forward from the waist lowering deeper into the pose. Hold here for 2 breaths. Repeat as many times as you like until you have reached the deepest pose for you.

Now inhale slowly raising up out of the pose and find yourself in legs together, abdominal muscles activated, arms comfortable at your side. Inhale raising your arms overhead letting your shoulders slide gently down holding your arms parallel to each other elbows and palms facing inwards into Mountain pose. Take 2 breaths and then exhale lowering your arms as you do so. Repeat 2 times. On the third, exhale bend forward at the waist for standing forward bend. Repeat this again 2 times. Return to standing position arms lowered at your sides once again.

Plant your right food firmly on the ground at the front of your mat if you are using one, feeling each toe connect with the ground. Step your left foot back behind you with your foot turned out. Align yourself until your hips are squared. Inhale slightly up and exhale bending forward at the waist placing your hands upon the ground or blocks if needed. Exhale, rotating your core and bringing your left arm up so your fingertips are facing the ceiling or sky. Let your head follow the stretch of your arm looking upward into Revolved Triangle. Hold for 2 breaths or longer if desired. When ready, exhale lowering your left arm down along with rotating your core back towards the ground. Inhale, slowly raising up from the waist bring your arms arms to rest on your hips.

Inhale rising up slightly. Exhale bending your right knee at a 90 degree angle into lunge, your left foot turned outwards. Place your hands firmly either on your knee to steady yourself. When you’re ready inhale your arms up in the same fashion used in Mountain pose for Warrior. Breath here, using your feet to feel the connection to the ground. Your weight should be centered in your hips, your core strong supporting your upper body. Hold here for 4 breaths. Inhale raising up just slightly and exhale releasing your arms back to your knee.

On your next exhale place your right arm on the outside of your upper right thigh rotating your core but leaving your left arm still on your knee. Inhale, and on your next exhale hook your left arm pit as deeply as you can into your knee letting your right arm lift up extending overhead. This should create a relatively straight line down from the fingertips of your right hand down to your left foot. Breathe here in Revolved Extended Side-Angle. If you are feeling too challenged here, lower that right arm and raise your left forearm to bring your hands into prayer pose. Your core still rotated to the right. Hold and breathe here. When you are ready, exhale lowering that left arm to the ground placing your right hand on your right hip. Inhale, raise up slightly moving your left arm to your right knee and bring your right hand to meet it there.

Both hands resting upon your knee on your next inhale step your left leg forward both feet together knees slightly bent. Steady your yourself and inhale slowly rising up into standing. Repeat again on your left side.

Once done, standing tall inhale your arms up overhead into Mountain and then exhale releasing your arms to your side. Repeat as many times as desired. On your last exhale bring your hands together in Prayer pose at your heart chakra.

Namaste.

With love,

-Rose

 

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March Journal Prompt

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Greetings!

The end of winter – Pisces Season

Spring Equinox – Astrological New Year – Start of Aries Season

Rebirth

These are all themes related to this time of year. Thus, this month our journal prompt is VISION. What is your vision for yourself? For the year? For the day? We can get bogged down in the details sometimes we need to see the bigger picture. Before we rise in the spring, let us dream in winter soothed by the peaceful waves of Pisces.

28 Days of Love: Basking in the Glow of Love

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Greetings beloveds,

Can you believe it? 28 Days of Love is coming to a close today. Over the past 4 weeks we have connected with our heart, mind, body, and home/living spaces to find clarity and bring ourselves into alignment with the energy of love.

How do you feel? Take a moment to integrate the information and lessons that you have learned over the past month into your life completely. It may take some time to feel and know what changes you have made or may still need to make. Behavior and thought process changes enhance our states of being. Above all else I hope that this time has brought about compassion for yourself and others. Love is so much more than warm fuzzy feelings. It is the basis of our existence. Through love we find ourselves. Through love we find our purpose.

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So I send you forth with love, always and forever.

-Rose

28 Days of Love: Week 4 The Connection between the Heart and Home

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Greetings beloveds,

This month has gone by so quickly! I have to admit though I have been looking forward to this week since I started this project. Week 4 is all about creating a loving heart centered living space. Why do I find this to be the most appealing topic of them all? Because our homes, living, work, cars, and other sacred spaces are the external containers of our energy. They can be the closest (or furthest which we will discuss later) to a safe space that one can encounter. Our homes have such powerful energy associated with them and can affect huge portions of our lives. Yet we are not always called to give them the attention and energy that they can require. When one is trying to stay afloat in a world gone mad maintaining and creating a loving container is one of the most important tasks that we can take upon ourselves to prioritize along with other self-care activities. Perhaps it’s time to check your self-care list and see if there are one or two activities that focus on the care of your home. Perhaps it’s time to start seeing our spaces that we reside in as extensions of ourselves and find balance in those energies.

This week we will explore the heart and the home. The importance of cleansing our living space through clearing and decluttering. Then we will discuss a little bit of the ancient Chinese practice of feng shui so we will know about the relationship between energy, movement, and our homes. After which, we’ll identify the love and relationships portion of the living space in order to see how what we place or don’t place in that area may be affecting our hearts. Lastly, we’ll look at decorating our heart space in order to create the environment that will nurture and feed our souls.

I look forward to continuing to build this loving space with you all.

See you tomorrow,

-Rose

28 Days of Love: Lov’n the Physical

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Greetings beloveds,

It’s finally here! Week 3 of our 28 Days of Love has officially begun. If you couldn’t tell from the title, the focus of this week is our physical form. That’s right we are about to get bodied! Our connection to our bodies can be wrought with thoughts and feelings that can be super accepting and supportive or not so kind. Yet our bodies are our material manifestation of our being. It houses our soul and mind. Our bodies are beautiful but they may not always exist in the way that society believes that they should.

People are born in a variety of forms with various states of health. It holds no bearing on one’s worth yet we place so much value on how our bodies look based on examples that are often unrealistic. The level to which we feel that we need to meet these standards affects not only how we feel about ourselves but how we interact with others. I can only speak to society here in the USA, but we have made some strides in becoming more inclusive of various body types and self-expression. There is still quite a bit of work to be done though. This is why we focus here at The Bliss Institute on connecting to our bodies through sacred movement and mindfulness. For the next week, we will discuss various ways to love our physical form.

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There are so many ways to love our bodies. Through the foods that we feed it, the activities that we engage in, the environments that we live in, and the thoughts that we think. When we take the time to treat our physical forms like the precious gifts that they are it improves our lives tremendously. Often though we may not have the time, energy or resources to do all the things we would like to for our bodies. Which is why our intentions and beliefs can be just as powerful as the things that we do. Here’s to a week of exploring ways to treat ourselves and show our bodies some love.

-Rose

28 Days of Love: Connecting With Your Higher Self

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Day 3 Connecting With Your Higher Self

When looking for love we often search outside of ourselves. Buying things, eating rich comfort food, in the company of friends, family, and romantic partners, in various forms of entertainment. Yet, no matter how fulfilling these connections may be, they are nothing in comparison to the connection to authentic self. Finding love from within for many is a lifelong journey.  Everyone experiences the lifelong task of being the embodiment of love that must be continuously and consistently nurtured. When we make this connection though, it provides us with a gateway to our “higher self”. You may have heard this term thrown around the new age, spiritual, conscious, enlightened and whatever else folks are calling themselves these days sphere. Realize that your higher self is nothing more than that innate portion of your being that gently (or for some of us not so gently) guides and supports us. That which is outside of time and space that exists in order to hold our energy in whatever form it may take.

Some folks are preoccupied with connecting with their higher self through meditation, clean eating, and “vibrating higher”. I have another secret to share with you. You are always connected with your higher self. You are always one – just in different forms. One form is not better or worse than the other we just are. In our entirety. We may not be as aware as we could be of the information available to us in this life form. That is the advantage of connecting with our higher self. Insight, wisdom and ultimately power to transmute energy. When we are connected to our soul being or our higher selves it is our direct line to unconditional divine love.

Tomorrow check out how to connect to your higher self.

-Rose

28 Days of Love: Connecting With Your Heart Exercise

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Day 2 Connecting with your heart exercise

Are you feeling that heart energy? It’s a soft, gentle, tug that flows from the center of your chest to your crown. It swirls through your brow brushing out the clouds of lowness. Bringing a sense of euphoria and celebration. It moves gentle down through your root, legs, and feet to connect you to the Earth. Grounding you in everlasting abundance and stability.

Heart Connection Exercise

Find a comfortable spot where you will be able to relax. This could be a chair, on a pillow on the floor, or your favorite place outside. Anywhere where you can relax, focus and not be interrupted is preferred. Settle into your space. Close your eyes. Focus your attention on your breath. Feel as the oxygen flows into your lungs, filling them with life. Envision all of your worries, all of the drama, all of your responsibilities of the day filling those bits of air. As you completely fill yourself with this deep breath hold it for 5-8 seconds. Really putting your attention towards instilling each other air particle with the stress that you intend to release. When you exhale envision all of those worries releasing to the universe where they are transmuted into refreshing air for the natural world.

Continue these breaths 5-10 times or for however long it takes until you feel completely at ease. Once you have entered that space, center your attention on each chakra starting with your root chakra. Feel it pulse, pull, and draw round your etheric being. There will be a moment when you will feel that connection. It is different for everyone. If you don’t feel anything such as a wave of energy flowing in that area. Repeat this for your sacral, solar plexus, heart, throat, third eye, and crown chakras. As you move upwards through each chakra pull that energy along as you go. Some areas may feel sluggish, although this isn’t an exercise to clear one’s energy you may want to spend some time doing so. You may feel a slight buzzing around your head from this exercise. Continue to move that energy upwards past the crown for our energy fields extend much further than that. In fact continue to let you energy expand as far out as you desire (to infinity and beyond ;)! )

At this time bring your attention back to your heart chakra located at the center of your chest. Feel it pulsate with life and joy. If you feel sorrow, regret, pain, or worry focus on the center of your heart. Burrow down and envision a spark of light/energy/life at that center point. From there picture whatever makes you smile. Then transfer your smile to your heart center. Let your heart smile ad shine forth. Fill it with joy and let that emotion of well-being radiate outwards moving down through your lower chakras into the earth then upwards until it reaches the stars.

When your heart smiles you are connected. Let your joy be your guide.

-Rose

Enchantment: The Power of Winter

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Greetings beloveds,

I hope you have had a wonderful holiday season. There’s so much magic available to us at this time. This is the liminal space of the 8th gate. Past the complete release of the 7th gate where we are judged by our own heart, body, and soul. This judgement is an assessment. It is a an unfiltered look at our actions, words, thoughts, and desires. We are always found guilty. Guilty of living, loving, and being fully present in the 3D. The outcome releases us from that density where now we can be free to design our next steps.

  • Create: paint, draw, write, read, cook
  • Rest: sleep in, take a walk, visit friends, take a trip
  • Cleanse: the body through food, the mind through meditation, the soul through gratitude, your space through decluttering/donations

Most importantly take that leap of faith into the 8th gate to release your dreams and highest aspirations.

Full Moon in Taurus: Well of Wisdom

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Greetings beloveds,

Tired? Me too. It’s been a long 10 months of 2018. The new moon in Venus, Venus retrograde, and the sun moving in to Scorpio have brought up all of our shadows are love. Love towards ourselves and love towards each other. The scales are being weighed. Have you found yourself to be lacking? Are you looking at what others have, trying to find out how you get to be like them? Scrolling through social media or visiting friends where you find yourself comparing your life to theirs. Yet, the Emperor is wearing no clothes. Social media presents a carefully cultivated world where even when someone is experiencing a difficult time it still seems like their life is amazing.

This Taurus full moon, focus on what you know you excel at. There is a special wisdom that only you hold. It allows for you to navigate the world in a way that only works for you. When you tap into your well of wisdom, you realize that it doesn’t matter if someone’s life is better or worse than yours. There is no game, there is no competition, there’s nothing to win. Yet, everyday can be a victory because everyday you make choices that reflect your truest hearts desires. Here’s a challenge for you for the next 18 days until the new moon in Scorpio where ewe will do deep shadow work.

Each day take 10 minutes to be still with the intention to discover a new piece of personal wisdom. Love yourself radically. You are smart, capable and fully able to be a success at being yourself.

Take some time to be kind to yourself.

-Kamilah Rose

New Moon in Virgo

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New Moon In Virgo

 

Greetings beloveds!

Well since this is going to be a rough new moon my recommendations are to spend time working on your projects, relaxing forms of entertainment and with good friends. It will help balance out a lot of the anxiety you might feel. So here is our Virgo New Moon Ritual.

Virgo Harvest Manifestation Ritual

Part I – Make 4 Lists

  1. 6 things that bring you joy
  2. 7 things you accomplished this year
  3. 8 things you are working on
  4. 9 things you love about yourself

Part II.

Take part in the 11/22 Reverse Harvest. Starting on 9/11 for the next 11 days post 1 thing that you love about your life. Then later that day journal for 11 minutes on your dream life. Put as much detail as you can into the journal entry.

This challenge will end on September 22, on the Fall Equinox. Complete your equinox ritual as you please and “plant” a copy of your last journal entry to be fed by the warmth of the Earth’s soil. The work that the divine masculine has done over the spring and summer is ready to be planted in the deep rich soil of the divine feminine’s powerful shadow work during the fall and winter. We let the plant the things that we dream in a reverse harvest at the fall equinox so that while we are releasing the parts of our work we no longer need we can gather our dreams as they bloom in the spring. Winter is a season of death and release. During this time, we give our dreams the freedom to expand while we do our own work of letting go those parts of us that are holding us back from these dreams. Watch your dreams come true as we enter the astrological new year in Spring 2019.

Virgo New Moon Reading

We are in late summer where the world appears to be covered by a sepia filter. We are winding down into the energy of fall. Before the feminine enters the underworld, the masculine must finish its’ time of shadow work. The work of integrating our retrograde experiences into our personal narrative. Luckily, we are assisted by the fertile energy of Virgo who is the expert at creation through cultivation. Unfortunately, that can lead to an overly critical nature of ourselves and each other. If you find yourself feeling envious of what could have been, who you used to be, or others around you take a time out. We will need to flex our patience skills this new moon. Do not push, do not be cruel to those you are envious of. Acknowledge what was or could have been but do not stay there. Without the ability to let the past stay in the past you repeat the same lessons in the same way with little progress. Although we all find ourselves in patterns, we have to cultivate the ability to be present/mindful so we can recognize the patterns the second they come up. From there we can then make different choices which lead us to a new path where we can explore the other possibilities that we discovered during the eclipses.

That’s right, this is a new moon of closure. The last new moon of the summer brings all the work that we have been doing to a head. It’s time to harvest our integrated shadow/light bodies, souls, and minds. Put your purpose to the test. Are you about this life or still just playing games? Envy steals our ability to focus on ourselves limiting our means to create. Stay present. Stay focused. And if all else fails use any negative feelings, rejections, or doubts to fuel your fire and prove all the naysayers wrong. Use that Virgo energy to flip the script and create gold from lead. It’s your time. Take your shot.

Kamilah Rose