Feeling dog tired? Hankering for a little shuteye in the shade? You’re likely just feeling the sultry, energy-sapping swelter of the dog days of summer.

Ancient Greeks and Romans first identified the dog days. According to the Old Farmer’s Almanac, they run from July 3^rd to August 11^th, although other sources say they begin as early as June 23^rd and end in September. During the dog days, Sirius the Dog Star—named for its distinction as the brightest star in the constellation, Canis Major—rose and set with the sun.

The midsummer prominence of Sirius—also the brightest star in the sky—was thought to cause the season’s withering heat. In his Clavis Calendarium, John Henry Brady called it a time “when the seas boiled, wine turned sour, dogs grew mad, and all creatures became languid, causing to man burning fevers, hysterics, and phrensies.” Whether you’re bordering on hysterics or just feeling fried, a little yogic hair of the dog may restore your vitality.

Adho Mukha Svanasana, commonly known as Downward Facing Dog Pose or simply Dog Pose, is arguably the most ubiquitous of poses. Yoga teacher Donna Farhi calls it the “‘garlic’ of yoga poses—a panacea for whatever ails you.” Dog Pose is simultaneously an inversion, an arm balance, a forward bend and a restorative pose. It opens your shoulders, strengthens your arms, lengthens your spine, stretches your legs, inverts your internal organs and nourishes your brain. It invigorates and calms. For dogs and cats, Dog Pose is the equivalent of a morning cuppa, a remedy that clears sleep-induced physical and mental cobwebs.

Dog Pose is most beneficial when we align our bodies so that the lines of force from the hands to the sit bones, and from the heels to the sit bones are continuous and unbroken. In either Dog or Wall Dog (see photos), our own bodies give reliable alignment feedback. When you are aligned, pressing your hands into the floor or wall will cause your sit bones to rise upward (or backward). The same will happen when you press your feet into the floor.

Begin on hands and knees. Root the palms of your hands evenly into the floor, and spread and stretch your fingers. As a short warm-up, bow your spine upward, drawing your navel toward your spine, rounding your back, and letting your head hang (Cat Pose). Then draw your spine into your back, letting your back sway, and look straight ahead (Cow Pose). Repeat this alternation several times, coordinating your movements with your breathing. Return to neutral.

On an exhalation, round your spine upward into Cat Pose. As your navel and abdominal organs draw into your back, let that movement propel your body upward as you straighten your arms and reach your pelvis up toward the sky. With your knees generously bent, now straighten your spine, lengthening out through your arms as you root your hands and fingers so that your sit bones become the apex of your pose. Widen your shoulder blades outward and lengthen the back of your neck. Gradually begin to straighten your legs, maintaining the continuous line of extension you’ve formed in your upper body.

Note that in the photo, my heels are on a wedge rather than on the ground. My overdeveloped calves won’t allow my heels to reach the ground without compromising my spinal integrity. I compromise by letting my heels lift—with or without a wedge.

Take care not to overextend your spine and collapse your rib cage toward the floor. Instead, draw your abdominal organs back into your back, giving frontal support to your spine, so that the line from your hands to your pelvis is continuous and your front, back and internal bodies are stretching equally. Avoid collapsing into your shoulders, bringing your head close to or onto the floor. When you collapse, your upper body’s continuity breaks at the shoulders, inhibiting the flow of force from your hands to your hips. This weakens your arms and causes your weight to fall into your hands and wrists. Lifting your shoulders will restore integrity to your pose.

Your first Dog Pose of the day is a great opportunity to play. Pump your legs, alternately bending one and stretching the other. Twist and turn. When you do settle into your pose, let all your joints be malleable and mobile, and breathe deeply, letting your body dance around the wavelike motion of your breath. Stay five to ten breaths before returning to all fours.

Ubiquitous as it is, Dog Pose is not for everyone. If you have carpal tunnel syndrome, glaucoma, detached retina, uncontrolled high blood pressure or disc problems, practice Wall Dog instead. Wall Dog feels great for anyone, flexible or inflexible. I practice it with my hands on the countertop while I boil my morning tea water. It’s a great pick-me-up in the middle of a long day at the computer or at rest areas on road trips.

When I watch my cats do Dog Pose, their pleasure is palpable. Their whole bodies vibrate with life. When we humans do it, it often looks and feels as if we are forcing and struggling. Relax. There is no “final” position to attain. Let your pose move and vibrate. Let your revitalizing breath flow through.

Charlotte Bell has taught yoga and meditation along the Wasatch Front and beyond since 1986. She plays oboe and English horn in the Salt Lake Symphony, Red Rock Rondo and blue haiku. She is the author of the book, Mindful Yoga, Mindful Life. See more at www.charlottebellyoga.com.

Last night I returned from what has become the most consistent annual mile marker in my life, the Telluride Bluegrass Festival. I first attended on a lark after seeing a poster on the bulletin board of a local music store in 1983. Among the stellar roster of musicians listed on the poster was New Grass Revival, who I’d seen—and been wowed by—several times in Bloomington, Indiana, in the ’70s. If New Grass was going to be in Telluride, so would I.

If you’ve ever been to Telluride, you will know I’m not exaggerating when I say that this picturesque little hamlet sits in one of the most gorgeous box canyons anywhere. The whole experience was stunning—the scenery, the amazing musicianship, the unusual musical collaborations, the beatific crowd. I haven’t missed a Telluride Bluegrass Festival since then.

No matter where I’m working or living, I make time in my schedule for Telluride. The third week of June is off limits to anything else. Many times I don’t bother to visit the website to look at the roster of musicians before the festival. I just know that it will be phenomenal, and I’ve never been disappointed.

In 1984, I began a working relationship with the festival. My husband at the time wrote a pre-festival promotional article for a local independent, and I shot photos. This gained us access to the press area in front of the stage, more notoriously known as the “poser’s pit.” Being able to see the musicians—their flying fingers and accompanying facial gestures, as well as their entertaining off-mic banter drew me in. I continued shooting photos for seven years, produced their festival program for four years, and have written feature articles in the program since the early 1990s.

I’ve come to know the production, security and backstage crews, as well as some of the musicians whose talents often leave me stunned. In the past 28 years, the luckiest of these have aged and mellowed; others have passed on. This year, I was sad to learn that one of my favorite Telluride characters, Jack Carey, a longtime press pit security guy, lost his life not long after the 2009 festival in a bicycle accident involving a head-on crash with a pickup truck.

In April of each year, I get to research and write two or more articles for the festival program. I love this because it puts me in my “festival head” two months before the event. Most of my research involves talking with people who likewise cherish the festival. The joy and anticipation are contagious. From that point until the time I round Society Turn on the road into town, I think of my upcoming trip to Telluride and smile.

This year I was honored to write about one of my favorite festival regulars, Peter Rowan. I met Peter in 1994. Like me, Peter practices Buddhism, and we’ve had a number of interesting conversations about the nature of life and practice. No matter what he chooses to present at Telluride—and it changes from year to year—his music has a spiritual undertow that resonates profoundly with my own musical sensibilities.

For his 2010 festival appearance, Peter would reunite with four other venerable Telluride regulars—Sam Bush, Jerry Douglas, Viktor Krauss and Larry Atamanuik—to play as Crucial Country. Crucial Country’s last appearance was in 1994, and it’s no exaggeration to say this set of music was transcendent. I was not alone in experiencing this. Planet Bluegrass, the company that produces the festival, made Crucial Country’s 1994 set available on CD. Even Sam Bush, who just celebrated his 36th Telluride, told me he left the stage thinking it was the most fun he’d ever had playing the festival.

From many years of seeing the Grateful Dead, I know that sometimes the magic happens, and sometimes it doesn’t. I know that no truly magical event can ever be reproduced. I’m also clear about the fact that expectation breeds disappointment. So while I wasn’t expecting this year’s Crucial Country experience to be a carbon copy of 1994’s, I can’t honestly say I was not without some glimmer of anticipation.

Whatever anticipation I might have been feeling crashed when I woke up Friday morning, the day of the Crucial Country set (as well as another of my favorites, Hot Rize), with a sour stomach and chills. I felt truly awful, wanting nothing more than to be horizontal, wrapped in blankets to ease the shivers while sipping ginger tea.

The internal conflict was overwhelming. I didn’t want to miss a moment of music—and there was lots to look forward to that day—yet I didn’t see how I could walk to the festival and then sit in the blistering high-altitude sun for hours when I was struggling to sit up in bed. Not wanting to miss the day’s opener, cellist Ben Sollee, I went. I loved his music, but my body was just too weak. I walked back to my room and slept for three hours.

In the hours of fitful rest, each awakening brought the question of whether I’d go back to the festival at all that day. Most of the time the answer was no. When my partner, Phillip, returned to the room for a brief respite, he encouraged me to return just for Crucial Country and Hot Rize. I vacillated endlessly, mainly because I wasn’t sure I had the strength for the walk to the festival grounds. And what if I got there and felt so bad I couldn’t walk back?

We made it to the press pit just in time for the start of Crucial Country. I dearly wished to enjoy the show, but I didn’t have the energy even to tap my foot. My body was freezing, even as most of the 10,000 souls on the field were boiling in the midafternoon sun. About three songs into the show, longing to be supine again, I whispered to Phillip that I needed to leave. “After this song,” I said. Then it occurred to me that I wasn’t sure I could walk back. I was that weak.

Then I gave up. i closed my eyes and let go of any effort to relate the music in any of the ways that were familiar to me. The sound washed through me. I heard with my cells rather than with my ears, and in this let-go state, my body began to heal. I could feel the cell tides turning. I was transparent—just music and nothing else.

By the end of the Crucial Country set, I knew I had the energy to stay for Hot Rize. During the Hot Rize set, I found my feet spontaneously tapping once again.

So again, Crucial Country was a transformative experience for me. Was it the music? Was it the fact that I was willing to let the whole thing go? Or was it coincidence that I began to feel better at precisely the point when I did? I can’t say. But as a musician and lover of sound, I can’t say that the combination of tones coursing through my cells didn’t change things at some fundamental, pranic level.

Saturday and Sunday, my healing continued, slowly but steadily. Even as I write this on Tuesday, I feel the residual effects of whatever bug invaded my intestines on Friday. In yogic terms, I can feel that my annamaya kosha (physical body) is still compromised. But the residue of the beauty of Telluride, the reunions with old friends, and the transcendent power of music have nourished my pranamaya (pranic), manomaya (mental/emotional), vijnanamaya (insight and intellect) and anandamaya (bliss) koshas. I am transformed not in spite of, but because of the multilevel shake-up that illness always brings. And I am grateful for the healing power of mountains and music.

Charlotte Bell began practicing yoga in 1982 and has taught in Utah and the intermountain West since 1986. A lifelong musician, she plays oboe and English horn in the Salt Lake Symphony, Red Rock Rondo and blue haiku. She writes a regular column for Catalyst Magazine and is the author of the book Mindful Yoga, Mindful Life, published by Rodmell Press.

Natarajasana: Shiva’s Celebratory Dance
It’s June, time to kick off your shoes and shed your extra layers. The Roman poet Ovid named June after juniores, or youth, following as it does, the month of May (named for maiores, or elders). With its long hours of daylight, June celebrates the carefree fullness of summer and the plethora of outdoor festivities it brings—festivals, weddings, outdoor concerts and farmer’s markets. Kinda’ makes you want to dance.
In Indian mythology, the shape-shifting god Shiva famously assumes the form of a dancer at times. Being a god, however, Shiva is not just any dancer. He is, in fact, the literal Lord of the Dance, Nataraj, from the Sanskrit natar-rajan, or “dance king.” In this rollicking form, Shiva is often depicted encircled in flames, four arms flung in all directions, one foot crushing a small, misshapen figure that represents ignorance, while the other kicks out in enlightened joy. Shiva dances to destroy, and he destroys in order to create. In Shiva’s dance, sublimating the veil of ignorance brings about the infinite clarity of awareness.
This month’s pose, Natarajasana, celebrates Shiva’s dance, and the joy of June’s youthful exuberance. Begin by standing on a solid surface with your feet hip width apart. No mat is needed for Natarajasana. Check in with your feet. How is your weight distributed between them? Do you feel more weight on the insides or the outsides? Are your heels or balls of your feet bearing more weight than the other?
Feel how you are relating to gravity. Is your body collapsing into your feet, bringing a tired or sluggish feeling? Or are you tightening the muscles around your bones, propping yourself up away from the earth? Try the middle way, what New Zealand yoga teacher Donna Farhi calls “active yield.”
Here’s how: Standing on both feet, yield your weight into your feet. Now instead of collapsing or pushing the floor away, feed your feet into the floor, as if you are growing roots. When you practice active yield, rooting your foundation into whatever surface you’re on, you will feel a gentle rebound that lifts the rest of the body up away from the floor.
Now shift your weight onto your right leg, actively yielding into the right foot. Bend your left knee and take hold of the top of your left foot with your left hand or with a strap, holding your foot behind you. Let your tailbone descend toward the floor as you raise your right arm up toward the sky. This is the first variation of Natarajasana. In this variation, there’s no need to bend forward as in the photo; stand upright, grounding your right foot and holding your left foot with your left hand. You may want to stand with your back close to a wall and allow the toes of your left foot to touch the wall for extra stability. Stay five to ten deep breaths. Gently release your left foot and return to standing.
If you’d like to explore a more challenging variation, from the first version, begin lifting your left foot up behind you, toward your head. As you do this, let your torso begin extending forward and outward until your torso, right arm and left thigh are approximately parallel to the ground (as in the photo). Reach back through the left knee as you reach forward through the right arm, lengthening everything in between. Meanwhile, continue to root the right leg into the ground. Remember, it is Shiva’s bottom leg that stamps out ignorance, the condition necessary for spacious enlightenment, so give the grounded leg ample attention. Stay for five to ten deep breaths. Tilt the body back up to vertical, release your left foot and return to standing.
What do you feel? How has your body changed? How has your consciousness changed? Take a few natural breaths and allow the effects of the pose to settle. Close your eyes if that helps you to feel your subtle energies more clearly. Now repeat the process on your second side.
Whichever version of the pose you choose, remember that Natarajasana is about intelligent action. It is Shiva’s stationery leg that sustains his multi-limbed abandon. For one person, the most intelligent pose may be the second variation, balancing on one leg with the rest of the body in full, horizontal extension. For another, the most intelligent pose may be practicing the vertical variation, touching the wall for stability. Remember that yoga is not about what your body can or cannot do; it’s about finding the perfect balance between challenge and comfort. No two people will ever express any asana exactly the same way.
Balancing poses challenge your concentration, and therefore cultivate concentration. Balancing develops steadiness of mind and a quality of calm that can keep you clear-headed even as your life presents its inevitable daily challenges. Practice Natarajasana when your mind feels agitated or scattered, or when you need clarity for making an important decision. Or practice it when you feel like dancing—in your home practice; at the top of a mountain after a long, uphill hike; or at one of June’s many celebrations.
Charlotte Bell is a writer, musician and yoga and meditation teacher who has taught yoga along the Wasatch Front and beyond since 1986. She is the author of “Mindful Yoga, Mindful Life.” www.charlottebellyoga.com.

In 1986, I attended my first yoga retreat at the Last Resort Retreat Center in the Cedar Breaks area of Southern Utah. I was a relative yoga novice at the time, having practiced only four years. At this retreat, we not only practiced asana twice a day, but we also sat silently in meditation three times a day, ate meals in silence, and met to talk about different ways to make our daily lives an expression of yoga. In my beginner’s zeal, I left the retreat ready to change pretty much everything about the way I lived my life.
And some things did change: I ramped up my asana practice, I started meditating (a little), and I started experimenting with dairy-free eating. But I still had to fit these things into whatever spaces were left over after working 40 hours a week. I often felt frustrated that things like working for a living and doing chores got in the way of practice. And because of this frustration, commitments dropped away over time—until the next retreat inspired me again.
Years and many long insight meditation retreats later, I began to see practice in a different light. On one 30-day silent meditation retreat, my teacher, Pujari, suggested that we pick one activity at the retreat each day to be really mindful. Since this was, in fact, a mindfulness retreat, in theory every activity had the potential to be a vehicle for mindfulness practice. But as anyone who has ever sat a long meditation retreat knows, this is more easily said than done.
Each morning we awoke at 5:30 and enjoyed a cup of hot tea and a piece of fruit before beginning our day of alternating sitting and walking periods. I chose my morning tea and fruit as the time when I would be truly mindful. Mindful tea drinking became a daily pleasure on the retreat, and I found it was a practice I could carry with me. More than 20 years later, drinking my morning cup of tea now collects and calms my mind. The grooves are laid down—I can’t help but be mindful when I begin my informal morning tea ceremony.
I’ve added other things to my daily mindfulness practice as well: washing dishes (thanks to Thich Nhat Hanh), gardening (seasonally, of course), and even cleaning the litter boxes. As a householder living in the world, I realize now that practice is not separate from my life, and those tasks that once frustrated me are opportunities for practice rather than diversions from it.
So here’s the challenge:
Choose one thing you do every day to be mindful. Do this for a month and then reflect on what has changed for you. Here’s the thing: You have to do your daily chores anyway. Being attentive while you’re doing them doesn’t take any more time.

Marichyasana: A Wise Way to Tonify
May—a time for spring cleaning. Whether it’s attic clutter or closet chaos that’s weighing us down, many of us develop the itch to clear our living space after the long, closed-in, cold season. Spring is also a great time to cleanse our bodies, from the inside out.
According to Chinese medicine, spring supports detoxifying and tonifying the liver and gall bladder, our internal storage sheds for wintertime refuse. Spring is associated with the element of wood, and green is the color of the season—think trees and their burgeoning foliage.
In the Chinese medical model, the liver controls the muscles and tendons of the body, so the squeezing and stretching actions of many yoga poses can help tonify the liver. But for direct action on the liver, nothing beats twists and backbends. Twists and backbends squeeze the liver, releasing toxins into your bloodstream.
This month’s pose is chosen from among many yogic twists because of its name. The Roman epic poet Ovid named May for “maiores,” the Latin word for elders. Elders are often associated with wisdom (especially by those of us who are approaching or fully entrenched in eldership). This month’s pose, Marichyasana, is named for the sage Marichi, who Yoga Journal calls “the great-grandfather of Manu (‘man, thinking, intelligent’), the Vedic Adam, and the ‘father’ of humanity.” Elder, indeed.
Marichyasana has many variations; some involve spinal twisting and others do not. This month’s pose is a variation of Marichyasana III. Begin by sitting on the floor with your legs extended straight out in front of you. Place a few fingers on your lumbar spine. If you feel the spinous process poking out like knobs in your lower back, place a folded blanket under your hips so that your hips are higher than your legs. Again feel your spine. Keep elevating your hips until your low back no longer feels knobby. (When the spinous processes are poking out, your lumbar is in flexion. This is not a healthy position from which to twist your spine.)
Let the weight of your torso release into your sit bones. Ground the back of your right leg and bend your left knee, drawing the foot back toward your left sit bone. Place the sole of your left foot on the floor so that the inside of your foot is about four inches from the inside of your right thigh. Scoot your right sit bone forward and your left sit bone back a bit, so that your sit bones are on a diagonal. (Some yoga methods will tell you to keep the sit bones aligned, but I’ve found that this can, over time, create instability in the sacroiliac joint. Take it from a yoga elder with an unstable sacroiliac joint!)
Ground both sit bones and rotate your torso toward your left knee, sliding your right leg forward even more as you turn. Either hook your right arm around your left knee, or place your right elbow on the outside of the thigh. Place your left hand on the floor behind your left hip. Press the left hand into the floor to help lengthen your spine upward. Relax your shoulders. Make sure you are not using your right arm to force yourself into the twist.
Don’t go to your maximum twist. Breathe deeply, and as you inhale feel how your torso wants to rotate slightly out of the twist. As you exhale, feel how your torso moves back into the twist. Relax into these oscillations. When you suppress these movements, you suppress your breath—not the best way to detoxify your liver and restore your energy. Because the liver is associated with anger and aggression, balancing your liver requires that you approach asana practice with gentleness.
Take five to ten deep, nourishing breaths, letting your torso unwind into the rotation. Feel your abdominal organs, especially your liver, stomach and spleen, and allow them to settle into the twist along with your rib cage, spine and core muscles. After five or ten breaths, rotate back to center and stretch your left leg out onto the floor. Sit for a few breaths and be present with what you feel in your body. Relax. Repeat on the second side.
It is common to feel thirsty after practicing twists (and backbends) because of their liver-squeezing actions. Be sure to drink lots of water after practicing them. Twist wisely, without force or aggression, with the patience of the elders. Let Marichyasana renew your liver and your life.

Charlotte Bell is a yoga teacher, writer and musician who has taught yoga since 1986. She is the author of the book, Mindful Yoga, Mindful Life, published by Rodmell Press.

by Charlotte Bell

I wrote this story in 2004, following a visit to my mother. This year was my second Mother’s Day since her passing in March of 2009. May we all celebrate all our mothers have given us.

A half-gallon of curdled milk, a partially eaten veggie wrap, a petrified orange, a plastic bag filled with dark green cucumber slime. These are the relics of a previous life I cleared out of my mother’s refrigerator last Memorial Day weekend. Under normal circumstances, my practical and frugal Depression-era mother would never leave edible food to fester in her fridge. In mid-March everything changed. On a fragrant, Alabama spring day while watering her beloved pansies, she lost balance, fell and fractured her pelvis. She has not yet returned to her home.

A consistent walker for most of her life, my mother can no longer negotiate the fifteen precipitous steps leading to her front door. Four stacks of unopened mail—minus important bills which my sister has culled from the piles-—cover her dining room table. A pencil sketch rests on her easel, awaiting her watercolor brush to bring it to life. A grocery list sits on her kitchen counter. In a single instant a daily routine honed through years of living vanished.

In the wake of her accident, my mother is gradually defining a new model for her day-to-day life. Recasting a life that shifted so abruptly is not easy for an 85-year-old person. In my mother I now see a stubborn resistance to the change her circumstances have wrought. During my visit I heard wistful, wry reminiscences of her former vitality. I heard frustrated speeches against aging. An unspoken uncertainty colored our conversations. She did not speak about what her life might look like in a month or a year, but I knew she was wondering.

When we experience a loss, whether it be the loss of a friend or family member, a loss of a job, a change in our health, or the end of a way of life, it is natural to mourn. It is nearly impossible not to wonder how much easier or better our lives might be had our circumstances continued as usual. But the reality of living is that our lives change constantly. Without loss it would be impossible to grow. It is letting go of the old, that which is no longer needed, that makes room in our lives for whatever is to come.

Since the 1920s my mother has let go of a lot. A lifelong artist, my mother began her career before entering grade school, copying renderings of caricatures she found in books. During grade school she drew paper dolls for herself and her friends. In high school and college she gave up paper dolls for figure drawing. Later on, this art form would evolve into a career as a fashion artist for an upscale Cincinnati department store. Still later, she would give up her career in commercial art to return to drawing paper dolls for her three daughters, and to design and paint sets and costumes for school plays. Finally, as she released us into the world, her art would blossom, evolving from tightly representational oil paintings to fluidly rendered, award-winning watercolor studies of shadow and light. She can no more easily return to copying caricatures than she can return to her childhood body.

Our very lives are a continuum of receiving, releasing, receiving and releasing. Thousands of times each day our bodies naturally draw in and release the breath. When we inhale we receive the vital oxygen that enlivens all the cells of our bodies. When we exhale we expel toxic waste in the form of carbon dioxide. What would happen to our bodies if we only inhaled? What if we chose only to accumulate and never to let go?

When Chogyal Rinpoche, author of The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, spoke in Salt Lake several years ago, he made a statement that has stayed with me. He said, “Freedom does not come from acquisition. It comes from letting go.” In the same way the long since perished vegetables in our refrigerator occupy space that could be filled with fresh, vital foods, the habits we grasp onto for security stultify us. We can not move forward in our lives when we cling to the past. When we set our habits, our beliefs and our ways of living in concrete, we become trapped by them. Letting go of what is no longer appropriate in our lives releases us to all possibilities.

No matter how affectionately we might recall our youth, would we really want to go back? Early in my yoga study, I practiced intensely and attained the strength, flexibility and technique required to accomplish many of the most advanced yogasanas. Twenty years later, even though I might fondly remember those times of physical accomplishment, would I really want to return? What I have let go in terms of extreme practice has made room for a more mature, more satisfying awareness of the subtle energies that govern my body’s essential vitality. As a result my practice has gained integrity, and my body has become stronger and more balanced.

As we live and grow, our understanding becomes more refined. Out of the process of continual drawing in and letting go, compassion and wisdom grow. Compassion grows as we experience the sadness that often accompanies letting go. As we come to peace with the reality and rhythm of constant change, wisdom grows. Each forward step on our life ’s path requires us to let go of what is past. The process of living rests in the delicate balance between letting go and starting anew.

Recently as I looked at an ancient black-and-white photo of my mother at age five, I saw that while she is still the same person, she is also different. The same body that animated her spirit as a child carries that spirit today. But in many ways it is not the same body. In the past 80 years that five-year-old frame has grown to adulthood and borne three daughters. Her black hair has turned white, her skin has loosened, her gait has slowed. But I have seen the wise and determined visage of the child in that photograph a thousand times, throughout my mother’s life. The spirit that lives in that completely remodeled body remains intact.

When the young prince, Siddhartha, first ventured out of his gilded palace as a youth, he was faced with what are called the Four Heavenly Messengers. These messengers-—old age, sickness, death and a wandering monk seeking awakening-—called the future Buddha to his destiny as an enlightened teacher. In him the question arose, if our bodies are all subject to old age, sickness and death, where is happiness to be found? In his six years of searching, the Buddha found that happiness was available to everyone, when we let go of searching for it in those things that are not permanent, which is everything in our conditioned experience. When we rely on our bodies, our careers, our friends and family to make us happy, we set ourselves up to suffer. Ultimately all must be released.

In 1993, during a period of my life when I had let go of what seemed like the very foundations of my being, I asked my teacher, Pujari, “If there is nothing for me to hang on to, if everything I love will one day leave, what reason is there to stick around?” He answered: “To live your life fully and completely. To follow your path with loving care and mindful awareness, to learn the freedom of letting go. To develop wisdom and compassion in the process.”

This we can do no matter what the condition of our bodies. The same wise spirit that peered out of my mother’s five-year-old body dwells in her at 85. This spirit, her innate awareness, can guide her and help her to find the joy in this current phase of her life. There is no one that does not have the ability to live in joyful awareness. It resides within and without. It becomes available to us when we choose to live our lives mindfully, when we pay careful attention to our lives as they unfold, rather than dwelling in thoughts of how much better our lives used to be, or how much better our lives would be if only we were richer, more attractive, had a better job or relationship, a nicer car or house. The list of ways we find to put off living joyfully right now is infinite.

My hope for my mother, and for all of us playing out our lives in this time, is that we can learn to dance harmoniously with the rhythm of life, the rhythm of drawing in and letting go. It is helpful to reflect on your own life, recalling the things you once enjoyed that have disappeared from your life. When you released worn-out habits or beliefs, what became available to you? How did you grow from your many experiences of letting go? These reflections can help you to meet the multitude of let-go experiences still to come with wisdom and perhaps even a sense of joy and adventure.

Happiness comes from enjoying your life right now. Pay attention. When we live mindfully, even the most mundane tasks of our daily routine can be joyful. When we give our complete attention to the present realities of our lives there is no residue left to cling to when it is time to let go and move on. Being fully present with our daily process of receiving and releasing brings the equanimity that allows us to flow with the cycles of constant change.

Sometimes yoga practice energizes me, and sometimes I feel tired afterward. So, sometimes my practice replenishes my energies and at other times, it depletes them. If one of the purposes of hatha yoga (the combination of asana and pranayama) is to replenish the prana we use up in the process of living our daily lives, how can we best utilize our practice to generate energy rather than to deplete it?

In March, blooming crocuses foretell the celebration. By early April, daffodils have their day. Then come the yellow tulips, quickly followed by a succession of reds, oranges, whites, pinks and purples. All the while, the tightly wound tree buds are unfurling into full-blown leaves. By mid-month windows, too, begin to open so that the April’s breezes, so full of life, can reinvigorate the winter-weary indoor air.

April’s name comes from the Latin word “aperire,” meaning “to open.” Named for nature’s annual “opening” of blooms and buds, April is the perfect time to let our own bodies blossom as well, not only through the irresistible urge to be outdoors, but also in our yoga practice. Hasta Panghustasana (Extended Hand to Big Toe Pose) is the perfect pose to express April’s joyous opening.

Hasta Padanghustasana is one of a category of poses my students have named “flying poses.” Flying poses are poses that express expansion. In flying poses, the root of the pose (whatever’s on the ground) extends deep into the ground, while the rest of the body expands outward and upward, away from the earth. The opening comes from stability.

To practice Hasta Padanghustasana, begin standing on a thin yoga mat or directly on the floor. (A mat isn’t necessary for this pose.) Place your feet hips-width apart. Close your eyes and become aware of your feet. Feel how the feet constantly make micro-adjustments in order to keep you upright. This is the nature of balance—constant, dynamic adaptation. So balance is not about reaching some “perfect” position and holding onto it; it’s about trusting your body’s own proprioceptive awareness to make the adjustments needed to keep you dynamically upright.

This is true not only in yogic balance poses, but in the rest of life as well. Balance, then, is about being mindful—and open—to the constant changes inherent in our bodies and in our lives, and responding to these changes with creative ease.

Let your weight rest in your feet. Then shift your body to the right, letting the weight settle into your right foot. Bend your left knee and pick your foot off the floor. Find equilibrium here. When you feel balanced, bend your left knee further until you can take hold of your left foot with your left hand. You may either hold the outside of the foot or curl your index and middle fingers around the inside of your big toe. Place your right hand on your hip and again, find stability, feeling how your right foot is constantly shifting to keep your body in balance. (If balance eludes you, you may do this pose standing with your back to a wall and let your buttocks rest against the wall for additional stability.)

Now, simultaneously, begin to unfurl the right arm and left leg out to their respective sides so that they open gradually like a blossoming flower, until they reach full extension. Extend the arm and leg with equal intention, so that they balance each other. Continue to feed your body’s weight into your standing leg.

If your hamstrings and inner thigh muscles are tight enough that holding your left foot and straightening your leg is currently impossible, place a strap or belt around your left foot and hold the belt with your left hand. As you unfurl your right arm and left leg, let your hand slide on the strap so that you can fully straighten your leg, while holding your foot with the strap.

In all balance poses, our minds tend to find the body parts that are moving to be most compelling. (In the above case, these would be the right arm and left leg.) The stable, standing leg is arguably more important, so as you extend the right arm and left leg, keep at least half your awareness in the standing leg. This will help you maintain stability.

When you feel stable in the pose, continue to ground your standing leg and begin to explore expansion through all the limbs, including both arms and legs, the head and the tailbone. Continue expanding as you breathe. Take five to ten slow, deep breaths, directing the breath as if you can extend it out into all your limbs, including your head and tailbone. Then release your hold on the left leg, letting your left foot return to the floor. Return to standing equally on both feet and let your arms rest at your sides. Close your eyes and feel what happened in the pose. How has your body/mind changed? Then repeat the pose on the other side.

Remember that expansion comes from stability. Every blossoming tree and flower expands from its roots. So do our bodies. Hasta padanghustasana teaches us about the dynamic relationship between stability and openness. Explore this relationship in your yoga practice, and watch how it expands into the rest of your life.

The only time I’ve ever injured myself in 28 years of practicing yoga happened when a teacher told me my headstand was incorrect because I was putting more weight on my arms than on my head. I was a novice student, only four years into my yoga practice, and despite the fact that I knew my neck was not very strong due to a previous injury, I decided to trust the teacher instead of my own intuition. I equalized the weight between my head and arms for about five minutes, and for six months after, I experienced constant headaches, stabbing on the inside of my left scapula and neck pain. After lots of acupuncture, chiropractic and deep tissue treatments—and six months of not doing ANY headstands—things got back to normal.

Perhaps the teacher could have worded her comment differently, less judgmentally. But the truth is, it is my reaction to her comment that caused the injury. Being a novice yogi, I was still very much concerned with accomplishing poses, and doing them “right.” As a teacher, I learned from this experience that the most important thing I can do is to empower my students to trust themselves. I teach mindful practice, so that the truth of each person’s yoga will be evident to them in each moment.

What are your experiences with trusting your gut—or not trusting your gut—in your yoga practice?

Having practiced yoga for more than half my 54 years, I’ve watched a gradual evolution in the focus and spirit of my practice. When I began in my 20s, even though I knew that yoga was not supposed to be about competition, my practice was nonetheless about achieving “advanced” poses. Over the years I’ve watched my passion shift to the more subtle pleasures of practice, in particular pranayama and meditation along with an emphasis on staying in poses for long periods. I still do active, strengthening practice; I just don’t flit from one pose to the next, and I no longer feel the need to do extreme poses, even though my body is willing. My practice is much simpler now. I practice fewer poses in a session, and I give each pose time to unfold and transform. How has your practice changed over time?