Category: Workshops

Heal Yourself Through Writing

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Heal Yourself through Writing

Heal Yourself through Writing

~ A writing workshop with Nicole Olmsted ~

When: Sunday Nov. 9, 11h-15h

Where: English Yoga Berlin’s Kreuzberg yoga studio (click for map)

Cost: 30€ (20€ reduced)

 

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“The hand is an expression of the heart therefore writing is an act of love.”
~Nico

The power of storytelling is when we become aware that we create our own reality. It allows us to take responsibility for our life and to make choices towards our authentic self. When we react out of pain, confusion or fear, the story can lead down a hallow road but when we step towards our highest potential we have the ability to lead a heroic tale.

During this workshop, we will dive into techniques to heal your life through writing. We will go over the art of “Morning Pages,” a technique made famous through Julia Cameron‘s The Artist’s Way. We will use focused writing exercises to help shift perspectives of the past and create new ways of seeing your world. We will then recast your story by identifying archetypes to empower your sense of self. Rewriting yourself is part of the healing journey to discovering your greatest story.

About Nicole:
Growing up as a writer, she explored the different stories of life. In her youth, she wrote poetry of the vast beauty of nature and the fantasy of a hidden world. As a young adult, she wrote of romantic curses of young love and the exquisite pain of loss. She wrote what she experienced and what she hadn’t.
It was when she showed up for an Artist Way workshop, that her world began to make sense. It was being dedicated to the creative force and taking responsibility for the life she had written. What she found, is that the journey to your truth, is one of the most powerful stories of all. Now, building community through sharing these techniques and self awareness is part of her devotion to this work.

English Yoga Berlin offers yoga in English out of our Kreuzberg studio. We teach hatha yoga, vinyasa yoga, yoga nidra, restorative yoga and classical yoga, and our classes include yoga asanas (yoga poses), pranayama (breathing) and meditation. Our emphasis is on community yoga and we strive to make our yoga classes as high quality, accessible and inclusive as possible, so that all members of our community can share the ways in which yoga benefits modern life. You can learn more about us here.

 

Soundwalk and Flow Meditation Workshop

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feeling the cobblestones
feeling the cobblestones

When: Wed. 30. July, 2014 / 18h to 21h
Where: HeileHaus eV / Waldemarstr. 36, HH, 2.OG
Cost: € 15 (reduced rate €7 or more)
…or one stamp on a 5er card or one recuperation

When going from place to place, we often go through the world disconnected from our environment and with closed off senses – looking at mobile devices, listening to music on headphones, or simply with thoughts on other things than the present moment. We rush about, eager to get to the next place, rather than strolling along and observing – not only to what is happening around us, but also ‘within’ us – our physical sensations as well as emotional reactions to what we see, hear, feel, taste.

When we learn to become aware of our own sensations, we are more readily available to react to unforeseen circumstances and make better choices in the moment. This practice is often called ‘mindfulness,’ and it’s something that we learn to do during exercises of being present, ie; meditation, yoga and tai chi.

This workshop takes us out of a Berlin yoga studio and into the city (around Kottbusser Tor) for an outdoor walking excursion, practicing awareness of our surroundings, and ourselves within them. It blends together several traditions – Vipassana Walking Meditation, Vinyasa Yoga Flow, Chi Yoga and Soundwalking.

What is a Soundwalk?

A form of interactive audio-art where the audience member participates on a walk of a predetermined path set-out by the artist, either listening to a recording on a mobile device or listening to the environment. This workshop will draw from the variation developed by Hildegard Westercamp, which very much resembles Vipassana walking meditation, with a focus on silent observation of the present moment. Despite being called a “soundwalk,” people who are deaf, non-hearing or with limited hearing are encouraged to participate using other senses.

What is walking meditation?

Vipassana walking meditation and Buddhist walking meditation are two forms of walking meditation where the participant strolls along, silently observing their own way of walking, the details of their surroundings (like the sensation of cobblestones beneath their feet), as well as their own feelings in relation to them.

What is Chi Yoga?

Craig Perkins, a yoga teacher trainer and tai chi practitioner of the Yandara Yoga Institute developed a standing warrior sequence, specifically for practising yoga asana on the sand, that combines some tai chi movements with vinyasa flow yoga. His ideology towards yoga is as an anusara-inspired peaceful warrior – meditation, movement and balance in readiness for whatever comes.

The workshop facilitator:
Juli has been teaching vinyasa yoga since 2009 in Berlin, a practitioner of different traditions of yoga since 1998. She is also a filmmaker and sound designer, and has instructed media arts classes that often include soundwalks.

If you are interested in attending the workshop, please contact us to reserve your spot, and get more details on the workshop page. 

English Yoga Berlin is a collective of yoga teachers dedicated to providing community yoga in Berlin. We offer yoga classes in English, and we teach hatha yoga, classical yoga, restorative yoga, vinyasa yoga and yoga nidra. You can see our schedule here.

Next Weekend: Cleanse yourself from the Inside Out

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This coming weekend 17th and 18th of May you will have the opportunity to participate on a six-hour workshop where you will learn and practice some of the most powerful cleansing methods of Yoga:

 

Balance the Ha and Tha in your body

  • Jala Neti. Rinse your nose and stimulate the whole respiratory system. Ideal for preventing colds, managing seasonal allergies and improving the removal of air-bound contaminants.
  • Agnisara. Abdominal self-massage to spark the digestive process and tone the internal organs.
  • Kapalabhati. To purify the lungs and oxigenate the brain.
  • Trataka. A concentration and cleansing method, which brings clarity to the eyes and improves our ability to focus.
  • Additionally, we will explore the Kundalini yoga technique of Vishuddhi Shuddhi (the Source of Energy), which purifies the subtle energy channels in our body.

The effects of these methods can be experienced in the whole body. You will feel lighter, clearer and more energized after the practice.

See more details in our workshop page.

March 1st: Embodied Kundalini for the Glands Workshop

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This 2.5hr yoga workshop is a great opportunity to get to know your own body in a different way, learn some Kundalini techniques and give your endocrine system a supportive boost as the Springtime arrives! Poet, dancer and bodyworker Laressa Dickey will use embodied anatomy techniques from BMC (Body Mind Centering) to guide participants through a non-dogmatic, highly personal exploration of what Kundalini Yoga can offer for the glands. For more information, click here.

English Yoga, 10997 KreuzbergWhen?  Saturday, March 1st, from 11h until 13h30

Where? English Yoga Berlin’s Kreuzberg yoga studio, Goerlitzerstr 39 (map here)

How much? sliding scale, 15 to 30euro

The workshop is limited to 10 participants; please get in touch if you would like to reserve a space.

Laressa Dickey teaches a Kundalini Yoga (inspired) Workshop

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The Endocrine System: Glands & Balance

Chances are, some of us may have come across Kundalini Yoga before. And chances are, some may have walked away with definite opinions and reservations. While there is a brand of it that is perhaps over-the-top for many of us, Kundalini Yoga as a practice has much to offer in terms of kriyas (set of exercises) that target and promote health and balance in particular body systems.

This workshop will offer the chance to experience Kundalini Yoga in a non-dogmatic way, and instead through an embodied anatomy approach. We’ll work using techniques from Body Mind Centering (BMC) to learn about the endocrine system: where these glands are, what they do and why they are important for our health and well being. Then, we’ll integrate this new body awareness into our practice of the Kundalini kriyas.

Why glands? Why now? The endocrine system is an underlying support for so many of our human cycles: metabolism, sexual development, immunity, mineral and hormonal regulation, menstruation, sleeping/waking, digestion, survival instinct, etc. This system regulates the function of the body’s organs, and its job is to preserve our balance (homeostasis). This time of the year in the transition between Winter and Spring is a great time to promote balance in the body; we are not quite finished hibernating and not quite ready for blooming yet, even though we may feel the coming new season. With emphasis on the glands, we give time to really be where we are, and we “tune up” so we can maintain balance as we transition.

Come with your imagination and curiosity! Come with loose clothing and a willingness to try new things. 

About me:

As a yogi, I come to the mat also as a dancer, a poet, and bodyworker. I come from a perspective of movement, having studied dance since I was a child, and I teach (and try to live) from my experience working with the body in the study of dance improvisation and somatics. I also come with a keen interest in health and healing, and my own life experience of working with the limits of the body using yoga, expressive arts, and alternative medicine. Kundalini Yoga as a modality has been a big support to my health and development as a person, without me having had to adopt any of the perceived dogma of it. I now understand what my own Kundalini teacher used to say: “We don’t do Kundalini yoga because of how it makes us feel while we are doing it. We do it because of how it makes us feel afterwards.” It is the benefits Kundalini Yoga offers that make it meaningful to me.

  • Date: 1st March 2014
  • Time: 11 AM – 13.30 PM
  • Cost: 15-30 on sliding scale
  • Where: English Yoga Berlin

Please email englishyogaberlin@gmail.com to reserve your place.

Shatkarma Workshop: Yogic Detox

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This weekend English Yoga Berlin hosts a very special event.  As the summer kicks off, we want to support our students in cleansing their bodies and minds, bringing balance to their systems and learning something new!

Our Shatkarma Workshop is an opportunity to clean your body and your mind of the stuff that makes you sluggish.  It is also a step in the right direction to create meaningful change in your life, dropping habits that have nothing to do with the You of today in favour of a lifestyle that better reflects who you want to be.

We have decided to keep the price of this workshop on a sliding scale, as a gesture to our dedicated students and those who want to discover the possibilities of yoga.  So, come along and explore some of the most powerful cleansing methods yoga has to offer.

– When:  Saturday 17th May (10h-13h) and Sunday 18th May (10h-13h).

– Where:  English Yoga Berlin

– How Much:  35-50 euros, sliding-scale.

Tuning in with your Intuition – Pranayama Breath Work JUNE 30TH

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We are excited to announce the third of Rakel´s Pranayama workshops! For those of you who did not attend the first two, Rakel Sosa is a very experienced Raja Yoga teacher who specializes in Pranayama (yogic breathing). She has trained widely and internationally, with many well respected teachers, and we are very happy to give her a space to do her thing here in Berlin! You can learn more about Rakel and her projects here.

Intuition is the ability to understand or know something immediately without needing physical proof, based on your feelings rather than facts. That’s how the Cambridge dictionary defines the word.

We are all natural intuitive beings. We often have a “gut feeling” on what we need to do in any given situation. We know what the next move needs to be, because it just feels right when we think about it. But then often something happens. A thought comes up, a belief, and then we decide not to listen to our intuition. Noone’s really to blame since in our western society we are raised to follow our mind much more than our intuition.

The thing with intuition is that is not about the head, it is not about figuring anything out with the mind, it comes from a much truer source: the heart.

Yes, the heart is an amazing organ. At a physical level the heart is the most powerful source of electromagnetic waves in the body. Recent studies of the Heart Math Institute in California confirm that the heart emits waves that are 60 times stronger than that of the brain. They spread around the body in 360 degrees reaching up to four feet outside the body.

Through the electromagnetic field created by the heart we are broadcasting and receiving emotions, information, like radio waves in a continual exchange with the world. Isn’t that fantastic?

We are all such incredible intuitive beings. We don’t even need to develop our intuition. We just need to re-learn to listen to our emotions, see how intuition talks to us and most of all, once we get the message, TRUST IT!

In our next pranayama yoga session here in the English Yoga Studio in Berlin, we will be using the pranayama breath work technique to open a new layer of the heart center and connect to our source of intuition. We will be working on feeling how is it that your intuition talks to you. And what beliefs are stopping you from following it.

From my personal experience I can say, the more I follow my intuition the more I thrive in life. So I invite you to join us in this pranayama gathering that will put you right on track with that most juicy part of yourself.

Our next Pranayama workshop is on Sunday June 30, at our Yoga Studio in Kreuzberg (directions here).

Time: 16h00-17h30

Teacher: Rakel Sosa

Cost: 20 €

Places are limited.

For any question concerning this workshop you can contact us at: 
pranayamabreathwork@gmail.com

Spring Cleaning with Pranayama

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Photo by Fern

Breathing is the first thing we do when we are born, the last thing before dying. Our breath is the main vital force that keeps us alive. So, it is a good thing to ask: How is your breathing doing? Besides the fact that of course you are alive, how are you breathing? Are you exploring your breath in its full potential?

At the English Yoga Studio we invite you to experience a very particular and ancient modality of the Pranayama Breathing technique. A powerful exercise that will help you unblock tensions lodged in your body, this work is designed to help you to connect deeply with your vital creative energy. A real resource of wellbeing, this is an opportunity to relax, learn more about yourself and open the way to big fun and inspiration in your life!

 

Join our first Pranayama workshop and breathing circle on Sunday April 28, at our Yoga Studio in Kreuzberg.

Time: 16:00 – 17:30

Teacher: Rakel Sosa

Cost: 20 €

Click here for more details about this and other Berlin yoga workshops.

English Yoga in Berlin’s next workshop Sunday March 24th! Explore and Create your Own Meditation

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All welcome!

Sunday March 24th, 2013

In this 3 hour workshop we will explore many types of meditation in a pragmatic and non-dogmatic way. From melina teaches the yoga of self healingasana to zen meditation, from breathing to tai chi and chi kung, you will be presented with many techniques so you can decide what works the best for you. We will also define the inner workings of meditation and how to apply that to your everyday life.

Please bring paper and pen (or a journal), refreshments and snacks will be provided.

Places are limited, if you want to reserve a place you can place a deposit or pay the full amount for the workshop. It’s a suggested donation of 20euro, so you can choose your price with the drop down menu below. Refunds are available until 48 hours prior to the workshop.

Your contribution

Time: 14h-17h.

Teacher: Geoff

Cost: Suggested donation of 20euro.

Proudly presenting our first workshop: Self Healing Yoga

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Do you feel stressed? Mentally restless? Physically tense? Or perhaps you simply wish to further your yoga practice…

The process of healing can be on many levels, from the simple need for relaxation, to untangling deeply rooted habits. We will be using simple yoga practices and tools which will empower you to let go of your limitations, gain awareness and appreciate your life as much as possible.

Concepts and archetypes are often the root causes of stress and anxiety. By creating a safe and inspiring space, we will explore these seed problems and find ways to take the next steps in the healing process.

Details:Yoga Workshop in Berlin by Melina Cinq Mars

Reflection, yoga postures, breathing exercises, relaxation and visualization will be used throughout the workshop. Mats are available on site, you will need to bring a pen and a journal (paper).

Jan 20th, 14h-17h

Gorlizter Str 39

Taught by Melina

Price: Sliding scale of 15-30 Euro

Open to all!