Archive for May 2020
Leadership Yoga
On March 23rd, ten weeks ago, we began this journey through the ideas of Leadership Yoga. I started this series with the idea of trying to support each reader through the challenges we were only beginning to experience. I had the idea of writing a book on this, but that would take too long, so…
Read MoreNiyamas – Internal Disciplines
Today, we’ll focus on the five Niyamas. B.K.S. Iyengar describes them as the “rules of conduct” that apply to individual behavior while the Idiot’s Complete Guide to Yoga puts it more simply – “what to do, as opposed to what not to do.” Here are the five Niyamas and my thoughts on their application to…
Read MoreInto the Unknown
About six weeks into my tenure as Vice President for Student Affairs at UTSA, a Trinity colleague asked me what had been the biggest surprise. One was the vast increase in the number of emails I was receiving, but my real answer was, “the number of decisions I’ve made since I got here, with basically…
Read MoreYamas – Ethical Principles
In the Yoga Sutra, Patanjali laid out the Yamas, ethical disciplines, and Niyamas, personal disciplines or practices. Today we’ll cover, very briefly, the five yamas and consider their relevance to our leadership practice. (We’ll cover the niyamas on Thursday.) I would paraphrase today’s quote to reiterate, without ethical principles to govern our behavior, there is no…
Read MoreTeaching Yoga
After ten or fifteen minutes in the deep relaxation of Savasana, the teacher begins to recall students back to themselves, from Corpse Pose back to life. Little bits of movement, stretches, maybe even a yawn. Roll on to the side and slowly sit back up. There’s a reason why this is often a favorite pose. The peace…
Read MoreEquanimity
In thinking about essays on the practice of Savasana this week, I had written the words, “equanimity in difficult times”. Nothing more than that, just the phrase. As I was thinking about this topic I googled the phrase and found a wonderful article. (The link is at the bottom of the essay and I recommend reading…
Read MoreLife’s Cycles and Rhythms
One of the wonderful aspects of working in higher education is the cycle of the academic calendar. We may not be able to predict the day to day details since we work with humans who do all sorts of interesting things at all times of the day and night, but we do have a pretty good…
Read MoreReflection
During my senior year in high school, I took a class that was to help me be ready for college. During the first half of the year, we learned to touch-type. And yes, this was some time ago, so I learned to type on a manual machine, which included hitting the return lever with determination – because…
Read MoreSavasana
Savasana, pronounced sha-VAH-suh-nuh, is one of the most, many would say the most important poses in yoga. It is the traditional final pose to any yoga class and it’s also often misunderstood. Like seeing only a room full of people ‘doing nothing but standing’ when you see a class practice Mountain Pose, people often joke that yoga…
Read MoreThe Stories We Tell Ourselves
“Nah, yoga’s not for me. I’ve never been flexible.” It may be the number one reason I hear from people who are unwilling to even try a yoga class. Well, if being flexible means some of the extreme postures some highly experienced yogis can do, then none of us are particularly flexible. But we aren’t…
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