For a while now I have wanted to write a reflective piece on how this teacher training course came to be such an important inspiration and influence on my teaching, practice and self. Recently through becoming more involved with the course in an assistant administrative capacity I’ve been spurred on to write this reflection that is specifically aimed at my fellow yoga teachers and therapists looking for a course with a healing focus and with a difference. The importance and impact this course and teaching methodology has had ties in with my own personal history and story; this approach that has touched and infiltrated all my teaching; specifically what it really means to hold space and how I can do that more effectively, so that all students, all health issues, all bodies, all souls are held in that space.
On the home page of Healing Space[1] it says that it is ‘heart led’ training course. This training opens us up to leading, teaching, living from the heart. I believe we need more teachers taking trainings like this whether or not it is their ultimate desire to work with people living with cancer or other long term or life-limiting illnesses. As teachers we need to look deeply at how we hold space, how our language can be permissive in that space to be allowing and forgiving, how to offer gentle therapeutic touch in class, how we can offer our teaching from the heart, what healing is and how on a deeper level we can be with being. The main course book is in fact entitled ‘Being with Dying: Cultivating Compassion and Fearlessness in the Presence of Death’, by Joan Halifax[2]; written from the Buddhist approach to death it is an essential contemplation both on life and death, on compassion, on empathy, on the holding of that space not only for those who are dying but for those who are suffering. Working with people living with cancer we may be being with dying. For those of us holding a regular yoga class there may not be dying but I am quite convinced there will be some spectrum of suffering, on our own personal scale of suffering, this book opens up conversations on compassion, empathy and holding space and makes it the perfect companion to the course.
As an already qualified teacher and long-time yoga student I came to seek out the Healing Space course following a personally challenging period health wise which ultimately involved major surgery and a deep rethink on how I was practicing yoga and teaching it. After the surgery all I could do in my yoga practice was sit on my yoga mat breathing into the very raw surgical sites; I was consciously breathing deep love and healing into my body, directing it toward the scars and pain and allowing tears to flow. I did start to move but differently, I was practising my own healing yoga, it was profound for me; I was listening more deeply and taking more care of myself. “Healing” as a process has different interpretations and characteristics and the need for it can catch us unaware; physical, emotional, mental or psychological. To be drawn to work in a more healing way it may not be our own experiences but more the experiences of those around us, someone close who is suffering or it may simply be a natural inclination; we are called and drawn to it.
The longer we are students of yoga the more probable that our practices or teachings will change over the years injury, inquiry, life circumstances, body changes and many other considerations bring with them a heightened sense of listening to what feels more right. Maybe this happens, maybe it doesn’t and maybe nothing needs to change. One of the beauties of yoga is that it is very hard to make hard and fast rules. Your story and experiences will be different especially if you are interested in this kind of work. As yoga teachers we are students, we are also human and we arrive where we are from our experiences and body-soul stories. When I was ready I started to seek out a special kind of teaching course. I had a much clearer idea of where my teaching had to come from and what I was being called to offer. I was then very lucky to find the Healing Space.
The structure of the Healing Space course differs depending on whether you complete the online or the intensive course but the content is the same. The online format is of course highly versatile as it permits you to complete the work at your own pace handing in the relevant coursework for each module once you’ve completed the work and meaning that you don’t have to take time off to do it. There are three modules with three separate assessments to be completed before proceeding to the next module and a fourth section entitled Self-Internship Requirements which centres on the final practical assessments which allow students to pull all the skills that have been studied together to plan and offer healing space two healing spaces classes to separate case studies. It’s very rewarding at this point just to see how much you have developed as a teacher throughout the course. There is equal focus and importance given to the range of topics covered which include looking at how to create a healing environment, offering presence, love and compassion, working from the heart and looking after yourself, looking at cancer, how it is commonly viewed and spoken about along with contemplations to view through it a different lens, looking at describing cancer from a yoga point of view (the pancha kosha system) and being aware of different treatments and side effects and how they might affect class approaches, great care is taken to understand that yoga is not a cure for cancer and that we are not offering an alternative treatment but due treatment is given to the scientific evidence that shows yoga’s effectiveness in people living with cancer citing relevant studies, there is a one whole module covering suggested and adaptable breathing and asana practices (including yin and restorative yoga suggestions) along with mindfulness, relaxation, yoga nidra and the use of mantra and mudra, how these practices are offered and whether they are suitable is considered deeply and always from a healing perspective. For me personally one of the most important parts and the part which has changed how I approach all my teaching covers reconsidering language we use in class – how we offer, invite and suggest leaving an open space for exploration on the part of the student, there are no assumptions or direct directions, this trauma-sensitive language is a big part of a healing space. The online option also offers videos with yoga nidras and led meditations. Support is offered in the way of a skype tutorial and a facebook group. The intensive course covers the same content and consists of five days of intensive training in a non-residential setting in Brighton, UK. This is followed by a further six months internship and self-study including the final assessment.
One of the first questions we were asked to contemplate on the course was ‘What is healing?’ The course attempts to answer this question fully, to uncover and explore healing whilst learning about working and offering compassion through yoga to people living with cancer, undergoing treatment for cancer or in the post-treatment place in an authentic and heart let way. We need more authenticity in our offerings; we need more teachers with an awareness of trauma sensitive language and the ability to hold a space which is permissive and open, caring and allowing. We may then discover unique subtle skills inside ourselves, and a less is more approach that will benefit not just people living with cancer but others in need. There is so much there and I do encourage you to have a look especially at the online study option, details below:
For more information on Healing Space visit https://myhealingspace.org.uk/. Courses are listed at https://myhealingspace.org.uk/our-courses/ where there are opportunities for yoga teachers and therapists to study online or intensively. More information on Yoga for Cancer can be found at https://myhealingspace.org.uk/yoga-for-cancer/. And for all further information email us at  [email protected].
Lastly, do follow us at https://www.facebook.com/healingspacecourse/


[1] https://myhealingspace.org.uk/
[2] Halifax, Joan. (2009). ‘Being with Dying: Cultivating Compassion and Fearlessness in the Presence of Death’. Boston: Shambhala Publications Inc.

I had the great chance and privilage to study with Judith Hanson Lasater last week in London. For those of you who don't know her, she is one of what I call the old school yogis, she was one of BKS Iyengar's early regular students in the US. Currently living in the San Fransisco Bay area she has been teaching since the 70's and has published a library of books. Known as a teacher's teacher I've been interested in listening, meeting and studying with her for quite some time, perhaps ever since I heard one of her trademark pieces of advice to teachers that we should ' teach people not poses'.  

And she has a lot of trademark pieces of advice. Last week I was there to study  her speciality of restorative yoga and how to teach it. She recount her belief that stress is the route of most modern illness and that because the core benefit of restorative yoga is stress reduction it is therefore the ultimate healing practice. At the end of each day of the course she'd say to us 'So see you tomorrow to continue  doing nothing'. This to a roomful of 80 yoga teachers who were all very convinced they were doing something (getting a new yoga qualification and skill) but her point made was effective. The heart of restorative yoga is to do nothing. How many times do we literally stop and do nothing? That includes stopping the constant movement in the mind as well as the body.

One of our homework tasks after we returned home was to do less. She asked us just that, 'Can you do less?' and then challenged us to remove 1 to 2 things from our schedules for a few weeks and see how it felt to not be busy every minute 'And see how you feel', she'd add. I have to confess I have been doing this for several years, it was a conscious and determined lifestyle change for me for health reasons. I am the first one to admit that as a self-employed yoga teacher I am lucky, I have a choice, and I work it by no longer feeling that every minute schedule or day has to be filled with a prescribed activity, work or class. Part of living my yoga demands this space of nothingness and it is in that space that I replenish myself and am then available at better quality for those around me. For others it may be just limited to a half hour of a day or saying no to a plan, or just going with the flow on a day when there is free time. I know and readily admit that this is in no way easy in a world as fast paced as the one we live in.  As modern beings, and Judith is right on this, we believe that being busy is a sign of success and is good, the constant rushing from one thing to the next is to be commended even if it leaves us exhausted and fatigued. How about if we viewed doing less as the norm, as the sucess, as the wow-factor? How would that feel?

So my friends here's the task should you choose to accept it: As the Spring energies rise and bring forth a flurry of new intention setting, can you do less? Could you do less? Try it and see how it feels. You will hopefully be delighted with the results.

I admit it, the title for this blog post is not my own, it is part of the title of a book I am reading written by one of my first yoga teachers in London, Norman Blair, whose classes I discovered back in the Noughties (the 2000's). The book itself is brilliant and I recommend it to all yogis, however it is the title that strikes a cord and resonates deeply with me these days and aligns with my current interpretation of the yoga practice, after all if we are not foremost concerned with brightening our inner skies then what are we doing?

2006. Then and there was when and where I became hooked on yoga and London being London it was available 24-7 (nearly), at the beginning I was practising three times a week. Norman's class was on a Saturday morning. I was new to yoga but I jumped in fast, ('much too fast' I now hear my older and wiser self muttering), ashtanga was my practice of choice (for those who don't know it is a beautiful and powerful breath led vinyasa practice), the breath, the movement, I felt connected, I felt strong, I felt joyful but my focus at the beginning wasn't really on brightening my inner skies it was on physicality, despite Norman's humurous reminders that long hamstrings did not equal happiness nor did our ability to touch our nose to our shins in certain forward folds, I was intent on getting it there. I was obsessed. I wanted to add in a fourth class a week but was not sure I could afford it. I remember clearly calculating that if I reduced my already strictly bugeted food expenses I would be able to afford that one more class a week. So I did, switched supermarkets, reduced my needs and continued on my quest. Norman is one of the best teachers I have ever had and his soft voice encouraged softening, encouraged letting go of striving, encouraged all the wisdom I needed to hear but there was one unwelcome guest that needed to be taught a thing or two; my ego that kept accompanying me to class. And the ego was dealt with, as in I got injured, deeply injured to my hamstrings and siatic nerve. It was then that I was ready to learn and listen. 

Fast forward about 11 years, and how things have changed. A few years ago I sank down into hanumanasana (splits) and around the same time I managed to get my foot behind my head - yes, I know deep enlightenment right? Wrong - quite honestly I was a bit disappointed, it was an anticlimax after all that expectation; being able to do splits hasn't in any way made my life better which takes us back again to Norman's wisdom about long hamstrings. I was explaining to a student last night how I reached that point and thought so what? What is this? I've realised in yoga we kind of go round in circles ut each cycle seems so much more rich than the one before. So here I am now right back at the start again re-exploring all that I by-passed on the way. That is the beauty of yoga, a constant reworking and questioning, discovering and then repeating the same again and again. You have to stay curious and patient on this exploration.

My practice these days is slow, slow enough so I can notice the breath, slow enough so that I can notice the body responding to the breath and more importantly it is about feeling over form; feeling into each moment and movement in the body and listening to it respond. I am less and less interested in the end point. My definition of perfect has changed. I have been deeply drawn to simplicity, gone is the obsession with the fancypants postures (ok, maybe I lie a little, that depends on the day), mindfulness and breath have taken over, my influences are Max Strom's beautiful breath led simple practices, Uma Dinsmore-Tuli and Angela Farmers non-linear feminine focus, a wonderful teacher Jude Murray has really taught me about seeking and offering compassion and kindness in the practice, whilst my studies with Diane Long in the intuitive yoga of Vanda Scaravelli have heightened the focus on the inner enviroment, on feeling, dropping the push and pull and truely enjoying what I see and feel.

What do I see? Now when I get on the mat I know that I am looking to see, even if just a little, a brightening in my inner skies, and then a deep intention to carry that with me off the mat. There are clouds, and believe me this Winter has seem a few clouds darkening my inner skies, but with this as the focus there is so much potential. Each breath, each movement is really a way to parting the clouds, to clear the sky and to see ourselves more clearly and then imagine these bright inner skies being radiant so that they can uplift others and then our yoga really becomes alive and real and bright.

Happy Spring all, stay bright inside. Juliette xxx

*The book reference on this post is "Brightening our Inner Skies - Yin and Yoga" by Norman Blair

Hello from the rain and wind in England,

At least the weather has inspired me to write a blog post as I sit watching the very British rain fall.
As we approach the end of the year, the Winter solstice reflection sets in. On my mind is the past two weeks that have been definitely the most challenging and unpredictable for me this year but also the happiest and most joyul. I have been reminded of why I practice yoga; yes because it fully supports my life off the mat. I have been an observer on something very real to me and my family. Living directly with my father’s Alzheimer’s in these days has challenged and tested me. Helping my mother recover from a hip replacement has been equally hard as she is normally the one who pampers me when I arrive home exhausted and overdone at the end of year.

It may sound yoga clichéd but there has been a lot of learning to let go; every time I go home there is a part of my father that is less and less there and the grief and letting go wrench themselves out, sometimes it is subtle this time there was also the physical letting go of his beloved vintage car that he can no longer care for though it was my tears that flowed so readily, that was memories gone and the young, energetic dad who would whizz around in that beautiful car. There have been moments of frustration and sadness but there have also been moments of beauty, of laughter, of simplicity and wonder.  

I have let go of the plans I had for the reading and study and practice I was going to do which as I write I find myself thinking, how self-centred I can be about this yoga thing. I have kept to my morning practice but I have settled into a day schedule that involves a lot of helping and action for others and this has humbled me. Yoga practice is not just what we do on the mat. Sometimes I really doubt yoga and why we do it (yes, I do), and then I find myself as I am now fully testing my own practice and what I teach at class and finding the work being reinforced, why? These weeks like no other I have operated on being fully present in every situation that arises, I have tried to open my heart with full compassion, myself to learning, and in all this the patience and respect that flows automatically, the list goes on. I am not presenting myself as some kind of hero and saint as I openly admit, it has not been easy but I have learnt so much from it. I have begun to fully realise how hard my mother’s role is as a full time solo care-giver and I send out a lot of love to all those who are in the same role.

Maybe this is yoga. This is life and this is yoga. Yoga is all around us, testing us, inviting us to open, to discover ourselves, to give, to receive, to break down self-limiting beliefs and then to drop in to acceptance and search for the beauty and there is beauty, find it, grab it and keep it in the heart.
This learning experience has been the most magic, challenging and relevant this year, deeply humbling and a reminder of the gratitude that I have for this body, this breath and the family I have around me.

To anyone reading this, I wish you a wonderful end of year 2016 and to a fully awakened rising into 2017.

With love, 
Juliette

It's exactly a month and a half since I launched my yoga classes in Nyon and the surrounding area and what an amazing journey its been. Yoga encourages us to develop feelings of gratitude on a daily basis; truly feeling  grateful for everything in our lives. In December last year I set off for India on a journey that I had been hoping to make for about 7 years; something had always got in the way and prevented me from going before. But by and by the right moment presented itself, as the great Paulo Coelho said in the Alchemist, 'And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.'; I do believe that if you wait long enough for something and commit your energies to getting there then it does arrive.  

I have a heart full of gratitude to many people who helped me on my way; my boss and colleagues who allowed me to take a month's leave and to Stephan, my partner who supports my ideas, my passions, with enduring faith and loyalty. Coming back home to Switzerland in January my heart was once more filled again with gratitude to my amazing teachers in India who not only had guided me on my quest to graduate from the course as a teacher in my own right, but who supported me when it seemed unreachable, and gratitude to my class-mates as friends I made as we embarked on this life-changing experience together.

As I now reflect back on the first three months of 2014, that have been full of change and making things come alive I once more full of gratitude, to Laurent at Body-Up, Nyon who not only has been completely cool in renting me his space for my weekend classes but who has also selflessly guided me with the marketing ideas and help, to Alain at Temple du Yoga whose beautiful space I rent on Fridays, to everyone else that has had to listen to me harping on about my yoga project or has given me ideas and to Stephan who even when busy at work stops to translate, let's face it quite rare, not everyday phrases into french for my classes or for my website.

And finally gratitude to the beautiful souls coming to my classes; something individual in each of us draws us to yoga and I am honored to have been able to share with others a practice that has changed my life. It is a pleasure and a joy not only to teach and guide you in your practice but to meet new people, to chat, to laugh, to learn and to connect with each of you within this lovely community and to give something back.

The yoga journey continues for a lifetime and brings with it new discoveries. This past month and a half has been an important step on my path and hopefully yours too; so when I speak of Spring bringing new things in nature, I can say with gratitude that this Spring I can truly feel that rebirth in my own life.

Spring is here! Have a great one.

Nameste, Juliette xxx