COURTNEY ROHAN YOGA

Working on a cure for CLL (Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia) has kept me busy the last couple months. If you did not know that I have leukemia, now you do. I want to get that out of the way. There is not time for tears here, not now. (Prayers, I like those.) You can read more about my journey here in this blog Cancer Free and Yoga from 2012. This does not mean I am dying. Well, not in the traditional sense of one gets an aggressive form of cancer that spreads quickly and possibly gives them a short time to live. No, I was diagnosed with leukemia 7 years ago. I went through chemotherapy for six months and came out the otherside. My dad would say that is why I should just do chemo again. It worked. It shrunk my lymph nodes, and I was able to resume my “normal” lifestyle, until now. The disease is chronic. So that means, it comes back. When my lymph nodes grow big enough, unmoving in certain regions of the body, pushing into things and causing ruckus, I become again a candidat

I just started reading a book called Evolutions Rainbow by Joan Roughgarden. I also just agreed to teach a gender studies class. Though I am excited about this new enterprise, I have a lot to learn. This book has already helped me see some things that I did not know.  Darwin's theory of sexual selection believes that males and females, both, follow a template: the passionate male and the coy female. Roughgarden acknowledges that this may be true, but how now, we must move forward from this idea. We are not just one way. We are diverse. Our understanding should be as well. As we become more diverse, our opportunities, our thoughts, our lives, and our selections do too. The grooves that used to hold us in one category are being sanded down, phased out. What is left is fluid and colorful. More choice is created. This can be confusing. Sometimes it feels easier to have just two outfits or a uniform in the closet. Yet, when we have it, we want so badly to have our individuality,

What are you doing this summer? Do you have plans for fun, for growth, and/or travel? I do. Recently while in South Carolina, where most of my family now resides, I realized how much fun it can be to feel one’s growth, and how travel, even short day trips, can help one to rekindle possibility, creativity and fun, and open the heart and mind to what is available. I have not always liked the feeling of growth. It’s not always been fun. When pregnant with my son, the feeling of growing bigger as he got bigger challenged me. At 25, I did not want to feel big, be unable to touch my toes, or tie my shoes. At the end of my pregnancy after growing 85 pounds!, getting out of bed was a problem, and I was not having fun, though I was growing . When traveling at various times in my life, things were not always fun then either. I may not have been in a warm climate or with those that I love, so things felt harder to appreciate. Though I could not help but

Where is YOUR B.L.I.S.S.? After a good day, after things fall in line, after making love, we feel in bliss, often only feeling bliss in conjunction with an act. If the experience ends in peace, calm, exhilaration or joy, we would say that we are blissed out. And yes, this may be true. Still, bliss is more than something to be induced. Bliss is one of your bodies. Bliss is a pure state of being. Bliss (Anandamaya) is identified as one of the lightest sheaths surrounding the atman, the true self. It must be noted that we have five koshas, energetic lampshades, surrounding the self all of which must be peeled back to experience the bliss body. You can read more about the koshas here . What you will find is that the anadamaya kosha is not about experiences making us feel good. Though good experiences can help us to glimpse this feeling temporarily, the anadamaya kosha is about opening to and remembering your birthright state of being. With awareness to our authentic open heart an

My adopted dogs, Maddie and Archie are really the best adopted dogs I could have asked for. When I see them and their excitement to see me, (probably because I am hands-for-treats) I am instantly reminded that I can relax. I can be myself. They love me without reserve. Everyone needs this experience, a knowing that you matter beyond anything you could do or say, dogs or not. Without my beautiful doggy reminders, I still need to mean something to myself. Though we all would probably agree, we are, as individuals, important on some level. Even if we don’t know it to our cores, most people see that they are relevant, if not in the best of themselves, then in their revenge or victimhood. I would also beg to believe that no matter how deep this understanding goes for us, some of us are looking for validation, for where we are important, still. We want to know that someone sees us, that we are heard. No matter what you mean to others, I can bet at varying intervals, you’ve had to prove wh

At some point we wake up. Well, some will. We wake and realize that how, where, and when we offer what is in our care matters. The Practice Try this: Wake up some minutes earlier tomorrow. Reset your alarm and get up when it goes off. Tonight before you go to bed, think about what you  will do with your minutes. Fill your minutes with one thing that will feel good/prepare you to use your other resources wisely. It is important to have an idea what you will do with this time. It is your resource to use. Here are some ideas: 1.  Sit silently. 2. Drink a full glass of water. 3. Pray. 4. Recite an affirmation or mantra that encourages you. 5. Meditate. 6. Watch the sunrise. 7. Listen to the birds chirp. 8. Take a short walk. 9. Write a list of things you are grateful for.  10. Take some deep grounding breathes, in through your nose and our through your mouth. Yes, throughout the day you will give some of your resources away. That is okay. Bu

You are not the body. You are not the mind. Have you ever caught yourself stuck in the middle of a deep thought? Like a storm that knocks your tree down and takes the roof off, you wonder at a point, how could this have happened? You attempt to change your thought before it gets worse. For a time, you think about something else, until you're back again, thinking the same thought from before, uprooting more of the yard and throwing furniture around. If you said yes to the above questions, I completely understand. Last week, I found myself stuck on the most frustrating of thoughts. A tempest. I tried to write it out. I tried to meditate. As a result, I was no longer frustrated, I was angry, and then enraged. “Why,” you ask? “Those things should have helped you.” Well…. yes, and no. The energy we become stuck in, obsessed on, demands specific tools if we are to address it. I was already too far gone in the storm to write about it. I only wrote myself into more frustration. T