Writing Yoga and Moving Words

A few years ago, I drove down the highway into Philly and had to pull over. I had a blast of insight: a yoga workshop with writing! And not only the idea (which is by no means original) but how to structure it: vignettes of movement narrated by a story. Meditation. Partner work. A related prompt and time to respond to it. Swapping writing silently with the yoga partner. Providing constructive feedback. Rinse. Repeat.

I've offered iterations of this intial idea several times in many locations. It's such an interesting thing-- these workshops don't fill as quickly as say, a retreat to Vietnam. Yet, when studios or students contact me, it's probably the first offering they request.

One of my students and friends finished her senior year at Smith College. She invited me upto Smith to offer a yoga and writing workshop during the VegFest conference on campus. (This friend is also a badass animal right's activist.) It was such a treat to head back to Northampton. I hadn't been since I was an undergrad student at nearby Mount Holyoke. The town had changed drastically and yet I still knew it intimately. I brunched at a Smith dining hall with my friend and other students. I remembered doing the same many, many times with Smith friends during my stint in the Pioneer Valley.

We had a beautiful, intimate workshop at a research station on Smith's campus. This workshop delved into tonglen meditation, activism, and used sample poems by Mary Oliver, Aracelis Girmay, and Naomi Shihab Nye, to aid participants in cultivating the internal reserves to be activists, the necessary compassion, and insight.

I was invited to offer this workshop again in Philadelphia at The Wellnest. This workshop focused on ego, fear, purpose, and transcendence as illuminated by yoga poses and related poems. After feeling the poses in their own bodies, participants read related pieces by Denise Duhamel, Theodore Roethke, Wendell Berry, and TS Eliot. Looking through my own notes from that evening, I found the following snippet from my own response to a prompt:

When it rains the wndow remembers our fingers drawing constellations in steam.

When it rains the door blows open and the neighbor's cat claims the corner sofa.

When it rains my skin is humid and unapologetic.

When it rains the earth sucks and receives.

My feet tattoo soil.

My steps stain the floor.

Until the wind blows the rain sideways and all trace of me is gone.

I'm grateful to have received another invitation to offer one of these workshops. I met my friend, Abby, while training in India. She's a beautiful human, yogini, and director of Hamptons Yoga and Healing Arts. The workshop will be Saturday July 25, 1-4 pm. For those considering enrolling, Abby has offered to help with housing. I can help with rides from Philly and my friend and fellow India trainee, Aaron, is willing to take folks with him from NYC. Email me if you would like to coordinate rides. 

Still curious about the relationship between yoga and writing? My Mythic Beings Retreat collaborator, Caits Meissner, and I wrote companion pieces on just this topic! (Psst! Come with us on retreat!) Read Caits' piece on how yoga can make you a better writer on MindBodyGreen. My friends at Rebelle Society published my piece on writing informing yoga. (This was my first piece that generated fan mail! Rush!) 

I'm steadily in awe of the space yoga creates in my body, breath, and mind. In that space, there is creative generation. There's healing. There's wonder.