The Way of Things

Remembering to Stop

2011-06-06T23:20:00.002-04:00

Sometimes the universe calls for non-action. Sometimes we get so involved in our busy, busy lives, regardless of what we are into, that we forget that our body and mind needs down time, rest and recuperation. Today I did Yin Yoga, simply holding long poses and going into deep relaxation. Don't forget to slow down sometimes, especially in the upcoming busy summer season.

Awareness of Breath and Alignment in Gardening

2011-06-01T21:39:00.013-04:00

Bringing Yogic Mindfulness to Physical Labor

Brian Reeder

It amazes me how my yogic practice has changed my entire approach to my physical self. All physical tasks are easier. I have more stamina, endurance, and flexibility. This is the change that practicing yoga seriously for the past 7 years has brought. However, I suspect the real gift of that practice, beyond those physical attributes I listed above, is the awareness of body mechanics, anatomical alignment and respiration.

By being in mindful awareness of the breathing and alignment, much stress that physical labor brings to the body can be mitigated. Much of yoga applies to any physical activity and many of the poses of yoga can translate directly. The main physical labor I engage in is gardening. I keep many beds and raise a wide range of plants. I also hybridize from several families of plants, with my main emphasis being on Hemerocallis and Paeonia. The poses I find most valuable include, but are not limited to, Forward Fold, Downward Facing Dog, Plank Pose, all lunge-poses such as Crescent Pose or Equestrian Pose, all forms of Yogic Squats, Hero Pose and Child's Pose. These poses build strength and flexibility for a number of the activities that are common to gardening and that make so many gardeners so miserable, and thus hate gardening.

However, having strength through those poses listed above is not enough. You have to have the breath-awareness as well and that needs to combine with an awareness of the bodies alignment. With the strength built through the poses and the breath-awareness you gain from yoga combined with an awareness of alignment, not only is the work easier but you can maintain adequate respiration and not cause imbalances in the body that create pain. This would apply to any type of physical labor, I suspect, but I know it applies to gardening, for me, because I am using it, and it is making the experience better than ever. Anyone reading this should of course check with a doctor before they garden or do yoga, but if you get the green light from your papered specialist of choice, then try to be aware of how you are holding your body and if you are breathing.

I have to be honest. I was never a very physical person. I preferred an air-conditioned room and a good book to grubbing weeds out of beds. So for many years I focused on my poultry research and let me beds go, doing the most cursory work and nothing else. I hated the physical labor, I got winded easily and I had no endurance. I had no flexibility, several deeply-held, old imbalances and a deeply-held story about how weeds grew just to spite me. So when I say that I am able to function outdoors doing very physical gardening work much more easily than before, I had decades of "before" to compare my current state to.

Finally, I think gardening is very meditative, so it seems only natural to me that the yogic awareness of breath and alignment could combine with gardening to enhance the experience. I am very grateful for the many gifts I have received from my yogic practice. The ability to be more physically grounded and capable are two of the the greatest ones. Gardening has always meant a great deal to me. I have a natural love of plants. Now I am given the opportunity to care for them in a more direct way.

The Way of Change

2011-05-11T00:10:00.031-04:00

The Universe unfolds in its own manner, keeping its own council.

In June of 2010, I closed Brian Reeder, RYT, LLC. yoga office in Lexington, KY. At the end of my lease year, a clientele had not manifested, so I let the lease run out and followed my bliss back to my garden in the mountains. I questioned why things had worked out that way. I knew there had to be some reason. There always is, even when we don't see it.

Over the last year, I have come to realize that my yoga practice manifested so that I could garden and work (physically) in the manner I enjoy. Yoga reformed my body, bringing it into a greater state of homeostasis that allows me to function in a healthier manner by working out the kinks and imbalances that cause pain and imbalance, and allows me to maintain an active lifestyle. While I thought I would be teaching yoga in a class setting, I now see that yoga has integrated into my life in a more subtle way.

The really amazing thing about yoga practice is that it has become so integral to my day-to-day life. I still do routines, setting aside various amounts of time so many days a week to actually practice, but what seems much more pervasive is that I am in kinesthetic awareness (body alignment awareness) when I am not doing a yoga routine. In all my activities, both passive and active, I am am aware of the flow of my breath, the tension of the muscles over my adrenal glands, the alignment of my hips and shoulders and a host of other subtle points. This gets carried over into everything I do. From sitting in a chair to weeding or planting in the garden, to carrying buckets of water or bending over to pick clover and field-greens, those activities are all done with a kinesthetic sense of body mechanics and integrate yogic principles. I am constantly looking for ways to not stress my joints and connective tissue and to not throw off my body alignment, especially the hips. I seek ways to integrate yogic poses into all of my activities and I find a great many of them translate very well.

So for a while I will simply be talking about how I integrate my yogic practice into my daily activities on this blog. Since I am not teaching yoga at this time in a public setting, I can write here about yoga and hopefully help others to begin to make a more holistic and organic approach to yoga in their own lives.

I will be reposting the informational pages I had made for my old website, brianreederryt.com. For this blog post, I will reprint the last article I wrote for that website called Yoga For Normal People. I think it has more bearing now than ever. In the last year, I have started to see how yoga can be incorporated into any lifestyle on a daily basis. I think there is a real need for kinesthetically-based yoga practice as a physical maintenance tool for better health and peace of mind. Enjoy the article!

Brian Reeder

Yoga For Normal People

There is the common misconception that to do yoga, one must be flexible, active, healthy and interested in obscure philosophies. This is not the case. In fact, yoga is most valuable for those who do not meet any of the criterion. In order to promote this fact, I am creating Yoga For Normal People to expressly point out the fact that yoga is for everybody.

While yoga evolved within a religious/spiritual framework (Ancient Indian Hinduism), the practice of meditation, breathwork and the postures of yoga are not religious or spiritual practices, in and of themselves. My goal is to divorce these practices from their Hindu roots expressly to study the postures, meditation and breathwork from a scientific perspective. By doing this, I am working to create a practice of yoga that is accessible to all people.

Many people within the yoga community whom I have discussed this with range from offended to lacking comprehension and ask why I wish to re-invent the wheel. The answer is very simple. Many people could benefit from, but would never try it because of the quasi-mystical, new age, Hindu veneer that yoga is stigmatized by. Now, before we go any further, I must state categorically that if you want your yoga practice to be spiritual, laced with archaic philosophies and opaque Hindu concepts, I have no desire what-so-ever to change anything about your practice. Go for it! I strongly support and encourage EVERY type of yogic practice, and the freedom of the individual to practice anything they choose. With that said, I do strongly feel that yoga is in many ways held back by these aspects, and it is my goal to look at yogic practice with a more detached eye in order to understand, from a modern western scientific perspective, exactly what these practices are doing to the body.

I feel that through understanding yoga in light of modern knowledge we can come to an understanding of the practices of yoga as a tool in health maintenance. Yoga as a practice has survived for millennia and has proven to have value to millions of human beings. Like so many technologies in the past, this one has been cloaked in mythology, "spirituality" and religion, because it was first understood, practiced and taught by shamans, and later by priests. So too was writing, mathematics, architecture, art, and theater, but we have successfully de-mystified those practices and use them to their fullest potential in our everyday lives. To me, I see yoga as an aspect of human potentiality, with no deities or spirituality of any kind required. Thus, if this practice is an aspect of human potentiality, we can begin to strip off the layers of mythology and get down to the real meat of the matter.

So what are we really talking about when we discuss yoga as a tool for maintenance of our bodies and our health? There are three practices from the yoga tradition which are of direct benefit to the body and to health-maintenance: asana (postures/poses/movements), pranayama (breathwork) and meditation. Let us then take a minute to look at each of these practices in a bit more detail.

Asanas are much like stretching and calisthenics. However, there is a much broader range of movements than in typical calisthenics. Beyond stretching, which is a hallmark of yoga asana there is also balance and strengthening, as yoga uses the weight of the body for strength increase. A well-balanced asana practice can incorporate all three aspects, with segments designed to increase flexibility, balance and strength, or can be designed to focus solely on any one of these three areas or any combination that you may need to work with. Finally, yoga asanas can be a valuable therapeutic tool, and yogic practices can be designed to work with a large number of injuries, physical limitations and illnesses, helping to restore the body to health and homeostasis. Asana alone is a nice form of exercise, but when combined with breathwork, becomes something more than regular exercise techniques.

For most beginners, asana practice is the natural doorway to yogic practice. Asana can offer the average person increased flexibility, strength and balance, and a yoga program can be designed for anyone, regardless of their activity level. Whether you run marathons or sit at a desk all day or even sit on the couch all day and haven't gotten much exercise in years, a yoga program of asanas can be developed to begin to bring you to greater health and well being. It is important to look at asana practice as routine maintenance of your vehicle: the body.

To dispel some of the myths around yoga asana, you should be advised that you do not need to sit in lotus position, do head-stands or hand-stands, run through a fast vinyasa flow or do anything you are not capable of doing. In fact, you may never reach a time when you can do those poses, and then again you might and that all depends on your body, its limitations and state of health and your desire and focus. I do not judge anyone who is only using yoga asana as a moderate, low-impact form of body maintenance for health and wellness. In my way of teaching, there is no particular goal. I am not seeking to make you into anything. All I seek is to teach you tools to improve your health, maintain yourself and perhaps help you to patiently meet the goals you have for yourself. I am not seeking to turn you into "super yogi", unless that is your goal, and even then, I may council you to be patient and set shorter, more realistic goals. My goal is to teach you in a gentle manner, starting where you are. Thus, my way of teaching yoga asana is applicable to everyone and is Yoga For Normal People.

Pranayama is not only central to yoga, but is a central part of living a healthy life. While we all breathe all the time, most of us simply do not know how to breathe fully. The average person breathes in short, shallow "rabbit-breaths", only filling the upper lungs partially with each inhale, and not fully emptying the air from the lungs with the exhale. While this will keep you alive, it is not utilizing breath in the full manner in which you are designed to breathe. When your breath is full, it is deep. That is to say, we breathe all the way into the lower lungs, filling them fully. Conversely, each exhale is then long and slow and fully expels all the air from the lungs. Why is this important, you may ask?

The importance of the full, deep inhale and exhale is that it is utilizing the entire area of the lungs, fully oxygenates the body and with each exhale, pushes out the maximum level of toxins (carbon dioxide). This brings greater vitality to the body, greater clarity to the mind and by utilizing the entire lung capacity, keeps the lungs from becoming weak through lack of use and thus more prone to disease. In order to accomplish this full, deep breathe, we learn to expand our abdomen on each inhale and to pull our belly-button toward our spine on each exhale and through this process, we develop the core muscles of our body. As these muscles develop, we gain more core strength and the ability to breathe deeper and more fully with less effort.

Everyone needs to learn to breathe deeply and fully and everyone can learn to do this. Beyond the health benefits of full breaths, when this practice of full breathing is combined with the asanas (poses), that is when the practice becomes yoga. Poses and movements without a full, deep breath are just calisthenics. It is when the full breath is combined with the poses that you are actually doing yoga. Not only do those full breaths enhance the lungs and the body, but the full, deep breath increases the development of the core muscles of the body, which is a major focus in strengthening the body through yogic practice. When practicing the poses, it is as though the breath is actually precipitating and causing each movement. By combining the breath and the poses, yoga goes beyond other types of exercise to create many beneficial effects that other exercise systems simply do not offer. Breathwork is for everyone! Even if you can't perform any of the poses, you can learn to work with your breath to achieve a variety of beneficial effects and to enhance your health and wellness.

Meditation is the final leg of the triad of essential practices in Yoga For Normal People. With the poses, we are working with the physical body. With breathwork, we are working with the most essential function of our lives: breathing. With meditation, we are working with our minds, which not only creates our moods, but also our perception of the world around us.

There are many forms of meditation, and each focuses on different aspects of our mind. The common denominator of them all though is that we are working with our mind, learning to use it more fully and to manipulate our moods and perception through mental discipline and expansion. Some will say that meditation has metaphysical applications as well, and they may well be correct, but I would choose to say that meditation is working with the quantum aspects of our perceptual functions.

For the beginner to yoga, the most basic aspect of meditation is learning to be focused while doing the poses and to integrate that focus through the combination of the poses with breathing. In this way, one does not need to have a dedicated sitting meditation practice, though that may come later as a result of the mental gains (meditation) that one makes in their practice of poses and breathing. So, to begin with for normal people, we simply learn to be present as we practice the poses, not thinking about this or that from the rest of our day (or our lives), and to be aware of and keep the breath flowing while we are consciously practicing the poses. In this way, the triad is complete, and the poses, breath and mental focus come together to make Yoga.

With Yoga For Normal People, I am seeking to make yoga accessible to you, to everyone, to regular, average, normal people. By focusing on the physical aspect of the poses, in conjunction with training the mind to be aware of our physical self in the poses and our breathing while performing the poses, we develop the best of what yoga has to offer. This requires no changes in belief or any other aspects of your life that you value and do not wish to change. I am not teaching a belief system or philosophy. I teach a system of body maintenance that is a tool for heath, well-being and care of the one thing you really have in this world: your physical vehicle, the body.

Breath is the Doorway of the Tao

2010-01-21T02:53:00.003-05:00

When breath is tied with movement, this is yoga. The breath is our life force. Without breathing, we die. However, in the modern world, we tend to have little awareness of our breath. For something that we do constantly, and cannot live without, we give it very little attention. When we become aware of our breath, then we can begin to make changes in the process of breathing. These changes can have a profound effect on our entire lives. First we become aware of our breath, as it is. Then we begin to work with the breath, making changes where necessary.

The Sanskrit term Pranayama is the joining of two words, Prana and Ayama. Prana means breath or life force, while Ayama means to extend or lengthen. Thus Pranayama indicates lengthening the breath. When we begin to lengthen the breath, we change our consciousness and our responses to stress.

At its most basic we are seeking to become aware of our natural breath and then to bring the inhale and exhale into balance, so that they are of equal length. Then, we seek to extend the inhale and the exhale. By doing this, we bring more oxygen into the system, fully filling the lungs and bringing the air down into the lower lobes of the lungs. When we extend the exhale, we expel carbon dioxide out of our systems, reducing this toxic gas. We more fully develop the core muscles of the upper abdomen, the ribcage, with the full exhale. However, the most important aspect of the long exhale is that it reduces our physical stress-response. This can be used on the mat and off.

When we practice the postures of yoga, we connect our breathing, the inhale and exhale, with our movements, so that it is the breath which precipitates the movement. Of utmost importance is the long, slow exhale, which produces calm in difficult and stressful poses.

While the breathing I have described above is fundamental, both to our yoga practice and to our lives, there are several other types of Pranayama we may choose to work with for different effects. The Ujayyi breath is a more intense form of the breath I describe above and is basically an intensification of that breath, which includes sound. Alternate nostril breathing, Nadi Shodhana, is used for calming effects and to energize and balance the system. The three-part breath, Deergha Swasm, enhances our core musculature and teaches us to breathe fully and deeply. For instances of stress or mental anxiety, extending the exhale to one or two counts longer than the inhale is very effective, while extending the inhale to be longer than the exhale is energizing. These are but a few examples of the many techniques of Pranayama.

Pranayama has long been a very special practice for me, and having worked with a wide range of Pranayama techniques for over two decades, I am able to teach you these effective means to embracing your breath as a doorway to control of your response to stress and as a means to shift mood and awareness.

2009-08-01T19:29:00.012-04:00

Birth of a Journey....

I completed my 200 hour yoga teacher training at Barefoot Works Yoga Studio this year, at the end of June! I did my externship at the High Street YMCA, completing 50 hrs + of teaching beginner's classes with a focus on structure, posture and alignment. I am very excited to be set upon my new path! I have opened my office at 2121 Richmond Road, Lexington, KY. Located in Idle Hour Plaza, just inside New Circle Road. I am in suite 224 and am available by appointment.

At Brian Reeder, RYT, LLC., I am teaching beginner's classes focused on learning the basis of the poses, patience in order to learn how one works with the poses, and the fundamentals of both how the pose is performed and what the pose is intended to do for the body.

I am also training athletes in a high intensity form of yoga aimed at gaining flexibility, balance, strength and metabolic optimization. This form of teaching begins much like my beginner's training with a few weeks of introduction to the basic poses to learn their fundamentals, then learning to flow between poses in a vinyasa form by linking breath and movement, then finally, how to put that together to form a flowing, intense practice that can be used to acheive the goal results of flexibility, balance, strength and metabolic optimization.

I have always had a strong interest in and understanding of anatomy and scientific techniques, as well as an interest in the physical sciences. Combining this background with the lessons in anatomy, technique and contraindications I have gained from my 200 hour teacher training, I am working with various techniques of yoga for helping you to learn to "heal yourself" through movement, breath and relaxation. Therapeutic yoga seeks to strengthen the areas which support an injury while, in turn, not re-injuring that area. Therapeutic techniques are also valuable for dealing with stress, anxiety, pain-management and promoting postural balance which encourages homeostasis. Yoga Therapy offers a wide range of techniques which can bring comfort and improvement to a large number of physical issues.

I am also very pleased to announce the launch of my new website. At http://www.brianreederryt.com/ you will find information on my practice, links, contact information and information on the forms of Yoga I work with and teach.

Namaste!

A New Year, Clearer Understanding.....

2009-01-21T13:54:00.007-05:00

As we move into this new year, 2009, I am finding myself more drawn to the most basic aspects of yoga asanas (poses) and pranayama (breathing). No matter where you may choose to take your yoga practice, one is going to be in the body while practicing it, so we should then really understand the mechanics of the poses and breathing. What is it doing to the physical body, which can be documented by Newtonian science? Further, where, and in what ways, can quantum physics begin to illucidate some of the more subtle aspects?

In my own practice, I have begun to focus on the potential of yoga for postural realignment. I believe this is the most valuable aspect of the asanas, that they can be used to realign (through moving toward balance and symmetry)and rebuild (through muscular training and strengthening) our postural potential. Further, the use of very slow, non-musculo focused forms of yoga which seek to lengthen and strengthen the connective tissue through slow, meditative holding of the postures provides a wonderful complement to the more muscular Hatha styles of yoga. I am beginning to understand how one rebuilds their body.

We all hold unbalanced postures, which over time become imbalances which are imprinted on the skeletal system. Much pain in the body, as well as other health issues, derive from improper skeletal alignment. By starting where you are, and patiently using the most basic asanas to realign your body, over time, the structure of the body can shift. It is much like training a tree.

Our bodies are not just arbitrary things, in a vacuum. No. They stand in a force of gravity, which we resist. Through muscular strength, skeletal posture, and the inner organs of balance within the nervous system, we resist the force of gravity and propel ourselves through the "empty air". Yet, it is not so empty. Every inch of space around you, on earth, experiencing the pull of gravity. Magnetic energy seems to radiate from the earth, while other magnetic forces, such as the planets, and the sun and moon are all exerting their own magnetic influence, creating subtle waves of magnetism. We too are rhythmic, frequency wave producing beings. Our bodies, the actual, physical body, produces waves from three major areas.

These frequencies can be and have been measured with current, accepted scientific methods and machines. (A good place to start - Dr. Gary Schwartz - The Energy Healing Experiments) When they are measured, it is shown that there are three major areas of frequency waves produced by the human body.

These three major areas are the head, the heart and the stomach. The heart gives out the strongest waves, which can be measured up to several feet from the body. The head and stomach give off powerful waves as well, but not as high as the heart. All the organs give off subtle waves, and so do all other "living" carbon based life forms.

So our bodies are carbon based, multi-cellular lifeforms which use a very specific set of structures to resist the magnetic and gravitational forces of the "plane of existance", which we call life on planet earth. As we resist, we build our structure in accordance with our responses to the surrounding forces to which we must resist. Emotions and beliefs govern this process in a surprising way.

When we hold unhealthy and asymmetrical postures, our bodies literally grow in that way. So, to begin yoga, one must work with what you find yourself with. Without judgement, assess where you have been resisting in inbalanced ways, which is manifesting as deformities and potential health issues, in your body. From that honest assessment, you then begin to practice the most basic postures. You learn how to do them as well as you can, and you work toward symmetry. Over time, as you gently and slowly hold the basic postures, you can rebuild your form, because you are applying new levels of resistance, and your body will respond.

Much as we find old, gnarled pine trees growing on windswept cliffs, so too can humans become twisted by the forces around them. Yoga, in this regard, can then be thought of as the training of a tree. We are seeking a symmetrical form which does what the body is designed to do; evenly distribute stress to generate homeostasis.

By practicing and gradually improving our symmetry through holding poses, doing so gently and with conscious awareness and intent, we regrow our bodies into new alignments. Over time, we notice that our understanding of symmetry in the poses creates a constant awareness of symmetry and balance in the body. The physical body is our main tool of interface with "reality". The more we inhabit the body and care for the body and bring balance into our bodies, the more we learn to experience life in a balanced manner.

The key to this is to remember, that like any course of braces, reforming, or training, patience and understanding is required. You don't bend the branch or trunk too far, nor too fast. Anyone who has ever looked at bonsai will know that the masters of bonsai are so patient as to only bend a branch centimeters at a time, very slowly and gradually changing the shape of the branch through resistance and minute and gradual change. There may be times when you hit an edge, and spend what may seem like a long time working on a particular areas of regrowth and realignment. Through all of this, we must be patient and simply do the practices, not rushing for anything, learning how to open the body, safely stretch it out and move.
As one develops a yoga practice, finding your edge can be as easy or as difficult as letting go of your beliefs about what you "should" be accomplishing. I often see a push to "grow, grow, grow" in yoga. (Move past your edge and become a warrior!) Some styles, to me, seem a touch gung ho. I think most people really need to look at yoga as a realignment tool (and that would cover all eight branches or "ashtanga" yoga), and then realize that realignment takes time. We must then muster the courage to not look for quick answers, but to have the patience to slowly retrain our bodies, regrowing them and bringing them into their best expression of symmetry.

No matter what spiritual course you have or don't have, you are going to be in your body until you aren't. So you really should understand it as a mechanical, carbon-based, multi-cellular structure which is resisting and responding to the forces around it. From there, knowing what the human body is designed to do, you use the poses and breathing to bring yourself into greater "interface with the universe" (breathing - improved oxygenation) and "respond more constructively to the forces around you" (realignment through poses) creating postural and structural balance.

Happy 2009!

A pictorial Review of what Yoga Can Do...

2008-02-13T02:53:00.018-05:00

Hello and welcome to my third blog post.
Recently, I was going though some old poultry genetic files when I came across a picture of myself from June 2006. I was actually just stunned looking at it as I had forgotten just how big I had let myself get from 2003-2006. For those of you who know astrology, I will tell you that my natal first house grand stellium of pluto, jupiter, south node and uranus in virgo were beginning to be squared by transit pluto. Thus those year represent pluto square pluto and the beginning of pluto square jupiter. Also, my grandmother passed away in october of 2005 and that was a difficult thing. After she passed, I just ate and ate, but not just because of depression, but also because my build and tendency toward being round came from her and I had always been sort of mad about having her body type. So I came to terms with that after her passing by just eating and loving myself. Now don't get me wrong, the pluto transit square natal pluto was nightmarish in many ways, but on the good side, I came out of it with a lot of fears removed, burned away and much more real love and acceptance of myself. In fact, by June of 2006, when the pic I found last night was taken, I was really ok with myself. Even when I saw the pictures at that time, I didnt get upset. I just thought, "ok, you are fat and I still love you". From that, a curious thing began to happen. Once I loved myself for being fat, rather than in spite of being fat, things started to change. I began to eat less and it wasn't torture. I began to exercise more and it wasn't torture. I had been doing a small amount of yoga since 2003, but I had been doing it to still my mind and to cope with a severe pain and near disability in my upper back and shoulders (remember, pluto square pluto!!), but I had not really taken yoga to heart yet. So after June 2006, I was lifting weights, doing cardio and some yoga. I lost weight and by june of 2007, I had gone from 225 lbs to 185 lbs. Let's
take a look...
Left - June 2006 - 225lbs

Right - June 2007 -
185lbs

It was in June 2007 that major changes started happening in my life on many levels. First and most importantly, pluto was making the first series of squares to my natal north and south nodal axis. This then was calling me toward my destiny, my life path. Then pluto was also squaring natal jupiter. The square to natal pluto was finally over. At that time, I began to get more and more into the yoga. Some upsets in my life (pluto square natal jupiter and nodes) was changing my life in a major way and causing me to question a lot of things and I was having a lot of anxiety, so I found that the yoga was quieting my mind and giving me some peace in this maelstrom of emotion. I already knew that yoga could correct imbalances and injuries in the body, as I had used it since 2003 to correct the back problems I had been having (another aspect of my weight gain). Now I experienced it directly as a meditative agent to calm the mind and release endorphins which also made me feel better emotionally. I have practiced tantric meditation for over twenty years and Dzogchen meditation for nearly a decade, so meditation was not something new, and I had already reached some very high levels of meditative ability by this time, but it was a new experience to have meditation be moving, which yoga is and this really brought in a new aspect for me. So from June of 2007, I really started focusing on the yoga and less on weights and cardio machines. First, my mind began to calm, as the movement (absent in most of my regular meditation) gave my nervous energy a channel, while the pranayama gave me a center and my mind, already trained in meditation, naturally then fell into a meditative state. This was blissful. If I had never had any results beyond those, I would have been a devotee from that point forward, but the amazing thing was what began to happen to my body.

As soon as I found that yoga was quieting my mind, I began to do a lot of it, sometimes three or four hours a day. I was doing it for my mind and to give me a new center in meditation, but after a few weeks, I noticed that my body was changing rapidly, more rapidly in fact than it ever had through any diet or exercise regimen I had ever tried,...and I wasn't even trying to loose weight! I was so thrilled to be at 185 from 225, that I felt fine and wasn't looking to loose and more weight, but loose weight I did! Within three weeks I had dropped ten pounds, then in just a few months, I had dropped ten more and then by Christmas, I had dropped ten more, bringing me down to 155lbs. I found also that with the intense yoga practice, my dietary desires began to change. I wasn't as hungry, and I didn't crave heavy carbs or processed sugars so much. I didn't go vegetarian, but I just ate less in general and my body started craving healthier things. So lets take a look at that final process, from June 2007 to January 2008.

Left - August 2007 - 175lbs

Right - October 2007 - 165lbs

Left - January 2007 -
155lbs

Now, In Feb. 2008, I am ranging from 150lbs to 155lbs. I am not trying to stay there, that's just where I have hit. I don't know if I will loose any more weight and I don't really care. In addition to the weight loss, there have been some other amazing changes. First, my back problems have gone away, my shoulders are much looser, my hips are looser and my right toes now point forward instead of to the side. I can thank yoga for this re-alignment of my body too. I feel better than I have ever felt and my body seems to have stabilized at a natural point. I must add that I believe the pluto transits have had a heavy hand in at least bringing yoga into my life, if not actually accelerating the process. I think that both the manifestation of being fat and the rapid changes and loss of weight are very plutonian and are at the center of much of my body image and self image/sense of self worth (natal pluto in first house conjunct ascendant and the first planet in a grand stellium, all in the first house). Finally, I would point out that I am now at the end of the pluto square cycle with pluto having just finished the first square to natal uranus, the last planet of my stellium. There are two more passes of this pluto square to go and then the trial by fire that pluto in sagittarius has been will be over. Pluto in capricorn brings manifestation. Further, saturn is currently transitting virgo, conjuncting my natal moon, trining my natal saturn and squaring my natal sun. Saturn and uranus are both strong ally planets in my chart with natal saturn trine natal moon and natal uranus trine natal sun. Saturn rules capricorn. Pluto is going into capricorn and squaring my natal uranus from the last degree of sag. Transit saturn is trining my natal saturn while conjuncting my natal moon and squaring my natal sun, so I see manifestation coming of the things I have learned since 1995 when pluto went into sag and my world, mind and ego went up in a long, painful, slow-burn; self-immolation! Finally, pluto will make a grand trine in my natal chart in early capricorn, as it trines both natal saturn (ruler of carpricorn) and natal moon. That will mark a time of manifestation the likes of which I have never experienced in this life and I believe that all these influences are working together already to begin this process. I believe you can look at this series of pictures and see the physical manifestation. I would also say that I now know that yoga will be a major part of my life path from now on.

So, in closing, am I just lucky? Did this just happen because of a confluence of planets? No. This is what yoga does. I found that out directly through that confluence of planets, by being brought to rock bottom and lifted back out through a spiritual and physical discipline; that is very plutonian, and very saturnian at the same time and perfectly expresses major themes in my natal chart, but yoga can have these same effects for anyone willing to follow through with it. My example here is to show you what you can bring into your life through a disciplined practice of yoga. I hope you too can find the changes you are needing to improve your health, your body, your self-image and to bring you peace of mind!
Namaste'
Brian Reeder

Yoga - the beauty of the body working....

2008-02-09T20:00:00.000-05:00

I love yoga. There is nothing more simple, or more true, that I can say about it. Yet, why? Why do I love it so much? Well, there are several reason I can sight. One major point is that it stills my mind. Another is that it gives me more balance and equanimity, but perhaps the main thing that I love is how yoga works with the body. Yoga is a true example of form following function. That is, the yogis of the past found the poses, breathes, and visual focus which worked with the natural mechanics of the body. My family-line has had many skeletal problems for generations, and for many years, I too felt doomed to these same problems, and indeed, began to manifest them. Yet when I found yoga, I found a system which worked with the natural dynamics of the body. Yoga helped to correct the problems in my body, most of which were based in poor posture and a lack of use: no stretching, lack of full range of motion, laziness, slouching...

Yoga can do these things for you too. Check into it. No matter where you are in your life, no matter how poorly your body is functioning, you can improve your situation with yoga. Whether you are recovering, suffering from a congenital problem or just needing to get some exercise, yoga has something to offer. Yoga works because it works with the natural way the body is made to move. So get moving, get to breathing. Sweat and allow you body to BE. Yoga can improve your life because it works with your natural system; your natural skeletal design and your breathing, which is the basis of a healthy body and a healthy life.

First Time Around...Here We Go!

2008-01-21T02:14:00.000-05:00

This is my first post on my first blog. I am very excited to be starting this blog and to start reaching out to people all over the world. This blog is an extension of my new website Brian Reeder.net. First, I must thank my best friend, Corey Proffitt, for the wonderful work he has done in building my website. He is the owner of New Image Web Design, and anyone who looks at my site will see a fine example of his wonderful talent. If you need web design, get in touch with Corey at the New Image website which is linked above.

So who am I and why am I here? Good question. I am a 38 year old native of Kentucky. I have been a certified astrologer through the Ivy Jacobson School of Astrology since 1997. I am a Shoden level Reiki practitioner,having received my certification on Sept. 9, 2007, from Robert Fueston of Lexington, Ky. I am an author who has worked in different generas. My first book is a study of the genetics of color and pattern in the domestic fowl, which is based upon ten years of intensive research I did with poultry which was focused on immunogenetics, with color and form being an interesting sideline. My latest book is a hybrid of scifi, horror and philosophy and is titled I, Valeria, available through Amazon and many other book sellers on the web or through your favorite bookstore.

I am also a dedicated yogi. I am not a yoga teacher, but a practitioner. A yogi is someone who practices yoga daily, though I have learned through my practice that there are some days when my body doesn't want to do any yoga, and because I am in union with my body, those days are days of yoga too; the yoga of rest. I have found yoga to be so important to the proper function of the body. I have never found any other system of exercise or therapy that does for me what yoga does. It is amazing and, honestly, if I hadn't experienced this myself, I probably would never have believed it was possible to have such increase in strength, vitality, and repair in the body from the asanas and pranayama of yoga.

I am going to close this for now, but there will be much more coming. I hope to make individual posts dealing with specific aspects of astrology, yoga, Reiki, my writing and myself. Check back often, as lots will be coming along, some specific and informative, some probably just rambling and free-flow.

May the long time sun shine upon you!

Brian