The Nutrition Guru and the Chef

I’m a firm believer of putting yourself in situations that MAKE you happy. I don’t believe that happiness just comes to us, or that we ‘deserve to be happy’. We have to seek it.

Let me tell you the story of how I came to learn this.

Years ago, I had a hip reconstruction. I was in pain for a long time, unable to exercise. I had constant dark circles under my eyes, to the point where people would say ‘are you ok, what’s wrong with your eyes?’

I developed a friendship and mentorship at this time with my treating doctor, Dr June Canavan, a leading Sports Medicine practitioner in Australia and highly sought after overseas.

She asked me if I wanted to scrub in with her the following day on 5 knee surgeries. I was over the moon. She also prescribed me a different medication for the pain. One…

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To the lady at the tram stop…

To the lady I met at the tram stop on Sunday…I want to say thank you.

You approached me as I was reading my notes from the Divine Sleep Yoga Nidra course I was attending being run by Jennifer Reis. I have never met a person I did not know that was so excited to hear I was studying yoga and yoga nidra! Your words of encouragement were beautiful and timely. Being in your presence created a sense of calm, a strong knowing that I am travelling on the right path.

I had only just finished meditating and had given everything ‘over to the universe’ before you came up to me at the tram stop. Your presence and words were a message that could not have been clearer. It has taken me many years to finally be on this path. Dharma has many meanings and it can mean duty, which is why I led the life I did previously, but Donna Farhi highlights that dharma can “also speak of a soul purpose that we alone can accomplish” and that “our dharma is almost always the option we choose last because it is the most challenging”. It is very good to finally be on the path that my soul has been waiting for.

 

Pain as a motivator

Many people begin practicing yoga for pain relief and healing…myself included. On our first day of yoga teacher training back in July last year, I was surprised by the number of us there that had come to yoga through pain and injury. To heal ourselves.

I had spent years (and a lot of money) visiting doctors, chiropractors, osteopaths, physiotherapists, myofascial release therapists, acupuncturists, and massage therapists for my pain. And they all assisted in relieving my pain when it was most acute…for a short period of time.

But it was the move to Melbourne and a session with an honest physiotherapist who told me I needed to start taking yoga classes for any type of long-term change to occur. I wasn’t entirely convinced that yoga could provide the type of relief and healing I was looking for but it wasn’t long before I started to notice positive changes in my body and mind. Not only was I taught yoga positions that could relieve and prevent the pain, I was taught the process of listening to my own body. This awareness of what my body needs on a specific day is invaluable and continues to guide my yoga practice.

Ganga White’s book ‘Yoga Beyond Belief – Insights to Awaken and Deepen Your Practice’ includes a chapter on Injury, Pain and Healing for all yoga practitioners and for those that are still unsure if yoga is suitable for them because of their injury or illness.

 

What if…

What if our religion was each other

If our practice was our life

If prayer, our words

 

What if the temple was the earth

If forests were our church

If holy water – the rivers, lakes, and oceans

 

What if meditation was our relationships

If the Teacher was life

If wisdom was self-knowledge

If love was the centre of our being.

– Ganga White