What is the connection between relationships and stress?
Did you know?
Loneliness increases stress.
Relationships of all kinds decrease stress. That’s true of both the deep connections we have with family and close friends as well as the more casual relationships we have with people we say hi to in passing.
Having support in our lives greatly reduces our stress levels and positively affects our health.
Research shows that strong relationships are among the top markers for happiness
Today more than ever, we need to build connections, to move away from social isolation and towards community!
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Cultivating Connection
Over the last few weeks, Your Yoga has been exploring the cravings of the 3 major parts of the brain. Our brain stem wants to feel safe and secure. Our limbic system wants to feel comfortable and satisfied that it has everything it needs. And this week, we are exploring our cortex, the higher level part of our brain that is nourished by love and connection. Read on for a free meditation and webinar offer….
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Cultivating Ease
One of the things that turns on our stress response is a feeling of dis-ease or discomfort - a sense that something isn’t okay. But guess what? This feeling may just be caused by being bombarded with too much information. When we are overloaded with stimuli (as is the case for most of us), it becomes really difficult to focus on any one thing because we get addicted to too much at once.
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Cultivating Safety
One of the most effective ways to reduce stress is by noticing and really focusing on all of the ways you are actually safe right now. So often, particularly in these difficult times, we develop a heightened sense of vigilance. We find ourselves bracing when there's no immediate threat. We feel anxious and over-focus on perceived or imagined dangers when the truth of the moment may actually be that we are completely safe.
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Stateside Quarantine and Your Yoga
It is day 14 stateside (AKA our last day of quarantine)! After spending 2 years in Spain, we've found our way back to both a different world and a different life then the one we left. Like all things unfamiliar, this comes with both fear and discomfort and a sense of curiosity and possibility. What has been helpful for me first and foremost is
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Notes from my "Spanish Cuarentena": Day 52
Today I looked back on a blog post I wrote when we initially decided to move to Spain titled, A Year in Spain. Like a premonition, these were the things on my “Spain to-do list”:
Practice the difficult art of not being in a rush
Make more time for nothing
Apprentice to presence and come into a more subtle and vibrant experience of embodiment
Experience moments of connection previously unknown to me
I’ve been “working” on this list since we arrived in July, 2018 but this quarantine took those intentions to the next level, showing me just how little I actually need and that in fact, less continues to be more.
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Quarantine: Day 19 and Online Classes
When we’re in difficult or traumatic situations, feeling both self-agency and purpose is a necessity! Without it, we can feel anxious, fearful or even paralyzed. In quarantine, we can feel isolated, both from our support systems and from what’s happening in our communities. I’ve had moments of guilt for feeling good, for not suffering in the way other people may be suffering. I’ve had moments of feeling useless for not having a role to play in this world crisis. And then I’ve stepped back and recognized that like all of you, I do have things to offer.
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Greetings from Spain: day 4 of quarantine
Many of you know that I am currently a resident of Spain in full lockdown. Strangely, instead of feeling isolated, I feel deeply connected. I'm feeling lucky to be in a country under quarantine. I feel both calm and comforted knowing that every other person in Spain is doing the same thing and that we are all playing a role in containing this virus and protecting those most vulnerable. There is a quality to all of this that makes quarantine feel connecting versus isolating.
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