Prama Yoga Retreat

This past weekend, I went on my very first yoga retreat with Greenville Yoga's Liz Delaney. We traveled to little place in Western NC called the Prama Institute. It was a weekend of yoga, vegetarian food and socializing.

this was a cute little entrance leading you the facility - I took this pic on my hike

this was the institute from the road - again on my hike

We arrived Friday evening where we got settled quickly and had a yoga class at 5:30. It was a gentle flow class but in reality, not so gentle. The thing I love about Liz's classes (and Brian's as well) is that breath is the most important and the movement comes second. The movement is very slow and calculated, so you would think you wouldn't be out of breath or your heart rate wouldn't elevate, but it does. The breath work and the movement 1) raised my heart rate and 2) raised my heat level. It's the kind of class where I can close my eyes the whole time and when I'm done, I feel like I've just finished an hour and a half meditation. Very nice. 

We ate dinner after and it was DELICIOUS! I should've taken pictures of the food because it was all very delicious. They have  gourmet chef there who cooks everything vegetarian. We had gluten free cupcakes that were absolutely amazing!

here is Sharon, the chef. She has a program at the end of the year

Yummy Yoga

We had a morning flow class again and then some free time. Everyone was talking about a little hike they took, so i decided to give it a shot myself. And for whatever reason, I REALLY wanted to go by myself. I think partly because I was kind of scared to go by myself. I wanted to test my ability to trust my intuition and build confidence in my ability to do things by myself. I'm fairly independent BUT I don't like to venture out much on my own simply because I'm afraid of not knowing what to do. So while it seems really easy to just go off by yourself and hike during the day, I was actually a little nervous. The hike ended up being so great and I found 3 different trails that I followed. I took lots of pics, but here are some of my favs. 

I was totally fascinated by all the pretty wild flowers

this was a different trail I didn't take but looked very cute

I loved this old structure, there were a bunch like this

I saw a hawk here but it was too fast & really it scared the beejezuz out of me

the grassy knoll and I somehow missed the first trail but found the second time

We had a couple of other yoga classes that were amazing, some delicious food and then set off to return home. Overall, I had a great experience and highly recommend a yoga retreat to anyone. It's a great way to get recharged and away from all of the responsibilities of home. I loved bonding with different women and doing things that were positive and healthy for my body. 

the group - I'm in the bottom right, with the black sweater and purple top 

Lynne, who is an awesome yoga teacher and Liz, who is very fun

Liz, the owner of greenville yoga and I after my hike

Trying to get back...

As I' m trying to get back in the swing of things, I've been thinking about my blog lately. I keep wanting to blog about things, but get sidetracked because of work, yoga, football, etc. I actually really miss it. One of the challenging things is time. I don't necessarily want to blog at work, simply because things have changed and I'm much busier than I used to be. It's not as easy to take a 15 minute break to bang out a blog post. I'm trying to reduce the amount of activity I do at night so that I can be present for my husband and myself. The other challenge has been content. I don't necessarily want my blog to be so serious, but I also don't want it to be a daily inventory of what I do, because that's kind of selfish and boring, ha. So as I explore all of the different things this could be, I hope that I can somehow get back into a rhythm of posting more consistently and posting things that people, mainly my family and friends, would like to read. 

To recap the weekend, 

1) It's finally football season. We had an awesome weekend of Clemson vs Auburn, AL vs MI, USC vs Vandy, NCST vs UT, and VT vs GT. In my completely unbiased opinion, the Auburn/Clemson game was the best. While during the midst of the game, I was very anti Auburn, and called them all kinds of names in the book, this is actually a team that I enjoy playing and would love to do so in the future. 

Sammy Watkins (source)

I really love college football and will make a confession. I was literally so sick before the game started, I couldn't tell if it was from the food I ate or my nervousness about the game. It is 100% completely irrational, but something I cannot control. I am hoping that there are others in the world that felt the same way, because that is embarrassing. Seriously. 

2) A new study that Stanford conducted came out today. Here are the multiple ways in which the study was reported. 

Examiner

Ny Times

I find it interesting that two news sources say something different. The other thing I find interesting is that it was a study conducted over 2 years and that it only mentions the lack of different in nutrients, but a major difference in the presence of pesticides. It does not mention the effects on the environment. Of course, I have my own opinions on this, but I'd like to spend more time researching this before I state my final opinion. Maybe there is something to this, maybe not. I will say that I have focused less on organic and more on local produce and supporting my local farmer. 

3) My struggles with going green. I have noticed that it is SO MUCH harder to really go green. I mean, there is so much added convenience in using certain things that aren't as environmentally friendly. Also, the products that have chemicals DO TEND to work better. For example, my Tom's deodorant is not super effective. I found that out in the DC airport when I lifted my arms in the security machine and I STUNK. I was very embarrassed, needless to say. I'm not 100% sure what to do about this. I mean, I don't want cancer, I want to be conscious about the products that I buy and the effects on the environment, but I also don't want to stink. 

4) Lastly, I'm attempting to get back into running. Of course, it's humbling having to start over again, running a minute on and a minute off, but I actually enjoy running and if I could actually get up before 7 am, think I could do it much more often 

I'm going to work on consistency and meaning so I hope you guys keep reading. Please let me know if there are any topics you'd like to discuss. 

Namaste!