Menu
    07725 795486 hello@lucyogini.com
    • Home
    • About
    • Classes
    • Workshops
    • Contact

Lucyogini

Yoga classes, workshops and inspiration for every body

Love in the time of Corona

April 13, 2020 by Lucy Leave a Comment

Thank you SO MUCH to so many of you who have joined us online and brought our little shala together over the past three weeks, even though we’re apart.  If you haven’t joined us yet, you are welcome!

It feels like we’re sort of settling into this new normal now…though certainly for me, the emotional tides continue to ebb and flow. There is opportunity for clarity here too. And for me it has reconnected me to what this is all about.

Community.

Doing something that matters.

Providing a little lightness, a little openness, a little more kindness.

I love seeing you all at home, coming together to practice and to retain our togetherness. It’s important.  It’s love.

And now we can be limitless! Invite your friends, those who don’t live nearby, those who can’t usually come along to a ‘real’ class. This was always about us all. No boundaries.

So here is our timetable – please note a small time-change to Saturday mornings, and a new mid-week short stretch + meditation class on Wednesday evenings. 

I hope you can join us.  Please get in touch if you have any questions.  Details and updates are also regularly posted on our facebook page, please ‘like’ us to stay connected.

Sending love and wishing you all healthy weeks ahead,

Lucy x

Filed Under: General Yoga Tagged With: community, free classes, guided meditation, home practice, love, meditation, online classes, practice, yoga

Yoga doesn’t care

August 30, 2017 by Lucy Leave a Comment

I have news for you.

Yoga doesn’t care if you’ve haven’t rolled out the mat all summer,
Or missed a few classes,
Or were meaning to get to class sometime back in April and…it just never happened.

Yoga doesn’t care if you have the latest Sweaty Betty Lululemon ultra-stretchy glitter leggings
…or your comfy old jogging pants with the hole in the crotch;
Or if you can touch your toes and stand on your head –
Or if you haven’t seen your toes in a while and your head feels like a troop of monkeys have taken up residence in there…

Yoga doesn’t care if you had chocolate for breakfast.
Or about your hair or make up
Or the air brushed covers of magazines showing ‘perfect’ bodies in ‘perfect’ poses.

Yoga just cares about now.
Community.
Good intentions, open minds and kind hearts.
The life in this breath and the goodness in our actions.

Yoga cares if you show up.
To practice; to today; to this very moment.

Yoga cares about living your practice, body, heart and mind;
Being the change you wish to see.
This is yoga for life.

Not just for the hour of class.
Not just for the current trend.

Making use of every day and night to realise our potential for love. 

And guess what –
It’s never too late, you’re never too old, it hasn’t been too long (true facts).
Classes start back NEXT WEEK – join us and begin again, start afresh, continue the journey – yoga doesn’t mind which it is for you (and neither do I)!

Check out our new timetable for September – including a NEW Monday evening class!

See you soon yogi friends!

 

Filed Under: General Yoga Tagged With: community, love, lucyogini, meditation, new classes, new term, potential, selby, trend, yoga, yoga for life

Special Summer Yin Yoga classes

July 8, 2017 by Lucy Leave a Comment

Hellooooo Summer!

We’ll be taking a little break from regular classes over the summer, but we’ll be back in September with NEW weekly classes and workshops on offer.  Stay tuned – more on that to come!

In the meantime, there are TWO delicious summer YIN YOGA classes in August.  Summer is a great time to practice yin (…although, in my book, any time is a good time to practice yin!) – when it’s warm outside and nature is in full bloom, this calming, cooling practice is the perfect way to add balance to your days, your mind and your body.  Yin yoga is largely floor based, and rather than using lots of muscular effort to hold postures, we just…let go.  Finding a shape and allowing the body to be supported by the floor and by props, which allows deeper tissues of the body to open, to stretch and to be refreshed.  We also stay in poses for longer – up to 4 or 5 minutes – which gives the body time to soften.  And if you’ve ever tried yin before, you’ll know that slow and steady doesn’t necessarily mean easy!  In creating this quiet space for the body to gently open, it is also a deeply meditative practice, a journey within; practicing patience, compassion and understanding.  It’s enlightening for sure!

Summer Yin Yoga classes are on:

  • Saturday 5th August, 9:30-11am @the Good Health Clinic, Selby (£12pp)
  • Saturday 19th August, 9:30-11am @the Good Health Clinic, Selby (£12pp)

Please get in touch to book your place!

Until then, wishing you beautiful summers of love and light xx

Filed Under: General Yoga Tagged With: calm, cooling, light, meditation, meditation practice, north yorkshire, postures, selby, summer, yin yoga, yoga classes, yoga practice

New Year – New Classes!

January 7, 2017 by Lucy Leave a Comment

Happy New Year yogi friends!

I’m BACK baby! I’m delighted to say that weekly yoga classes in Selby will be returning from Saturday 14th January at our new venue, the Good Health Clinic in Selby – a cosy little studio in the sky!

  • Saturdays (two classes), 9:30-10:30am + 10:45-11:45am – Weekend Flow! Come get your weekend off to a flowing start and super-charge your Saturday
  • Wednesdays, 10-11am – Yoga Flow! Your mid-week recharge and refresh

All classes will combine flowing yoga, breath work, relaxation and meditation suitable for all levels of yoga experience.  This is yoga for life – using the tools of yoga to explore this amazing body and the joy of living in ways that make sense not just on the mat, but in everyday life.

More details can be found on our Classes page. I’ll be adding more classes to the schedule as the year goes on, and my teeny yogini grows 🙂

Prices remain as before, £7 per class, or buy a block of 6 classes for £36 (valid over 7 consecutive teaching weeks).

Spaces are limited, so block-booking is recommended.

Really excited to connect and flow with you all again!

Here’s to the continuing adventure – see you on the mat!

lucyogini xoxo

 

Filed Under: General Yoga Tagged With: meditation, north yorkshire, practice, selby, weekly classes, yoga, yoga classes

Maternity Leave

April 6, 2016 by Lucy Leave a Comment

I am now on maternity leave!  Thank you so much to everyone who has shared classes with us, read these posts, practiced with us online!  My heart is full of gratitude.

This is not goodbye!  I will be back! Please stay in touch and check back here and on the facebook page for details of when classes will return.

We celebrated Spring and transitioning last Sunday at our last class (just for now!), and spoke about the time of ‘zwischen’ – the German word for ‘in between’ – the space between here and there, between sleep and awake; before we let go of who we are in order to become what we might be.  

This is of course particularly poignant in these final days of pregnancy.  But we all go through these transitions, every time we approach a change, big or small, by choice or circumstance. It is easy to try to rush ahead… culturally we resent waiting!  Much less honour this time to transition, of becoming.  And yet, there is a necessity to waiting and honouring this time of inbetweeness, where we wait to be called upon to become what we might be.  It gives our intuition space to develop and strengthen. And naming this time helps us to listen to this deep intuition and it’s guidance.

And so now, I wait. With open heart, body a little achy, emotions a little raw, into this time of Zwischen, honouring, listening, watching, reminding myself to trust in the flow of all things. 

This is not goodbye, my friends, only au revoir! I will be back – how could I not?!

Until then, wishing you all beautiful shining summers! I hope you will make time to play, to move, to be full of lightness! (…and you can practice with me online, to help stave off those yoga cravings!)

‘Practice and all is coming’
Trust in the divine truth that we already have all the answers we will ever need; trust in this simple practice – no mats, no lycra, no enlightment required: Get your feet on the ground. Live in this breath.

Everything else…comes next.

To the continuing adventure!
With deepest gratitude and fondest love,
Lucy x

 

Filed Under: General Yoga, Mindfulness & Meditation, Well being Tagged With: between, flow, in between, intuition, maternity, meditation, mindfulness, motherhood, online classes, practice, spring, summer, transitions, yoga, zwischen

FREE Yoga Celebration!

November 26, 2015 by Lucy Leave a Comment

Christmas and the Winter Solstice are approaching! On Sunday 13th December, I’ll be holding our annual Candlelit Free Yoga Celebration to celebrate the year gone by and welcome the returning light!

There’ll be Yoga by Candlelight! Meditating! Chanting!

We’ll rejoice in the darkness which reveals our true light!

Mince pies and chocolates! …All completely yogic, of course 🙂

Places are completely FREE!  Donations to The Salvation Army gratefully accepted.  Places are limited so please do let me know if you’d like to attend – and feel free to invite loved ones to join in too – no previous yoga experience necessary 🙂

Yoga by Candlelight: A Celebration for Christmas & the Winter Solstice!
Sunday, 13th December
5-6:30pm
Brayton Scout & Guide HQ

For more details, head over to our Workshops page!

Filed Under: General Yoga, Mindfulness & Meditation, Yoga for... Tagged With: candlelight, celebration, chanting, christmas, community, free class, free workshop, meditation, winter solstice, yoga

Viva la France

November 16, 2015 by Lucy Leave a Comment

What a week.

It is difficult to stay strong and courageous all the time in a world such as ours.  It is difficult not to feel scared by the randomness, the incomprehensible cruelty of terrorism.

What is there to say that has not already been said?

What can we do?

Hope.  Believe in our human resilience. Pray for goodness.

Dedicate our practice to those needing strength.

Yes. Of course yes.

But sometimes it feels like this isn’t enough.

At this time of year, as we approach Winter, Christmas and the Winter equinox, we often speak of darkness.  In many yogic traditions, there is a belief that ‘darkness’ doesn’t really exist in and of itself – that it is merely a state in the absence of light; the unilluminated.

The Yogi is one who is steady and connected to the illuminated centre, even in dark times. 

Darkness – unilluminated spaces exist within us all.  And certainly it can appear that darkness truly exists in the wider world.

We must learn about the darkness within – through our practice, through our integrity and our search for truth – we begin to meet ourselves as we are.  Once we’ve overcome the darkness within, we can affect that which is outside.

Once we understand that there are spaces of darkness within us they begin to become illuminated; the energetic impact of this illumination cannot help but radiate out into the darknesses that exist outside of ourselves.

Once we start to shine light into areas of darkness in ourselves, we find more – we are emboldened to continue. The more the light penetrates us, the stronger we become.

Does this mean that until we are all Buddhas, enlightened beings, we are of no use to others?

No. We can do what we can.  There are charities we can support.  Messages of solidarity and love we can send.

We can light a candle, dedicated to those who are traumatised, those who are grieving, those who are terrified and lost.

We can get on the mat.  We can meditate, pray. Believe in goodness.

We connect to the centre – where the unending light exists.

I do not have the answers or even the words.

My mum always told me: Do what you can, the best as you can.

That is what I will do today.

 

May we be happy

May we be well

May we be peaceful and free

(Metta Bhavana)

 

 

Filed Under: General Yoga, Mindfulness & Meditation Tagged With: dedication, France, hope, loving kindness, meditation, metta bhavana, peace, practicing love, pray, prayer, terrorism, viva la France, world healing, yoga, yoga for healing

Meditation for Stress Release

December 8, 2014 by Lucy Leave a Comment

Christmas is here!! Are you ready?! Are you?!

It’s a beautiful time of year, but there’s no denying that it’s also the time of year when stress levels – for countless reasons – can rise. It’s the end of the year and let’s face it, it’s just time for a rest.  The mad dash to the Christmas finish line can feel, well, like the last thing you want to be doing.

So here’s my first installment of my guides to getting our inner-selves ready for Christmas and the end of the year.   Over the next few weeks, I’m going to give you different ways to soften and release.  Ways to help get out of our busy, thinking minds and into our feeling selves; a little bit of quiet and intention-setting amid the bright buzz of festive preparation.

This is a guided meditation for stress release, to bring healing to deep parts of the body and help ease you into a place of more centred calm. It takes just 15 minutes and hopefully will leave you feeling a little lighter and a little more connected on the inside – so your light can shine on the outside too 🙂

http://lucyogini.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/Stress-release-relaxation-meditation.mp3

(Tip: This practice is great all year round, not just for Christmas!)

Enjoy, my friends, and let me know how you get on!

Stay tuned – I’ve got more festive practices coming up!!

With love, and jingle bells x

 

(point-to-point meditation based on a practice by Shari Friedrichsen of Yoga International)

Filed Under: Mindfulness & Meditation, Well being Tagged With: anxiety, breath, christmas, festive, guided meditation, heal with the breath, holidays, meditation, meditation for stress, mindfulness, stress release, stress relief

Autumn Equinox: a spiritual Harvest Festival

September 24, 2014 by Lucy 11 Comments

Happy Autumn Equinox everyone! This week we welcome the new Autumn!

Here we are again, the nights drawing in and the mornings feeling a little bit nippier each day…

The Spring and Autumn equinoxes mark points in the year where the day and night is of equal length. They are the point of balance between the two solstices: the summer solstice where the days are longest, and the winter solstice where the nights are longest.

It’s easy to think that the dark nights and cold weather mean there’s nothing going on. But no! This is the time for composting! Deep, rich nourishment. We can take inspiration from the rhythms of the earth and the cycle of the sun to enjoy rest, reconnect to our intuition and rejuvenate. The dark isn’t a bad thing, it is nature’s way of restoring, replenishing and quietly preparing for re-growth. We should take the hint 🙂

The Yin and the Yang

The Autumn marks the beginning of the Earth’s move into the yin cycle of the year; that which is darkest.  The equinox is the point of union and balance, of dark and light, fire and water, the yin and the yang.  We live in a world that is highly yang driven – all about our outer world, the perceived world, that which is closest to the surface.  So often we disconnect from the yin – those aspects of ourselves (and of nature) which are deep, intuitive, feeling and hidden.  Yang isn’t bad – it’s necessary – but there must be balance.  A seamless flow between strength and softness, inner and outer, surface and depth.  A little bit of softness in the strength; a little bit of light in the darkness.

Balancing poses are a lovely way to take inspiration from the equinox as the earth balances perfectly between light and dark; growth and rest; sun and moon; external achievements and inner reflection. Experiment with incorporating balancing poses to your practice; reflect on balance within…even if the body feels a bit wobbly!  Take your time as you move between and into poses – where can we soften? How can we harness strength? How can we embody a sense of fluidity between the darkness and the light?

Cultivating a Sense of Completion

As we move into this quieter, darker time of year, the seasons are our perfect guide and inspiration.  Autumn is the perfect time to contemplate and take stock.

Make time for reflection – for all that we have achieved throughout the busy growth seasons just past.   So often our lives become an endless to-do list, never allowing ourselves time to recognise completion, but rather we rush headlong on to the next undone thing.  How frequently do we feel like we’ve achieved nothing in a day…usually on the days we’ve been the busiest.  Achievement is not reserved only for grand gestures.  The little things, the things that allow other things to tick along, the small acts of kindnesses and understanding; these are the things that make the world go round.  Could we adjust our way of thinking to cultivate a sense of completion, to recognise our acheivements even with the little things in life?   Might this allow us to focus less on what hasn’t been done and see that we are already whole and complete, just as we are?

Harvest festival

It makes sense that as nature harvests, we should do the same.  A harvest festival of all things – big and small – that we have found!  Realised!  Learned!  Achieved!  Conquered!  It might just be for a few seconds, a few minutes, making time to pause and recognise with gratitute where we have travelled from and to; to recognise the shift in the season; to remember that we are a part of this incredible ever-changing Universe, aiming to live consciously, in rhythm with the natural world we are intrinsically connected to.

Embrace the Autumn and the loveliness of what is happening right now. The natural world shows us that change is part of life, that Summer cannot be without the Winter, light cannot be without the dark. Everything unfolding just as it should. Perfect harmony and balance.

“Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower.” 

Albert Camus

 

Filed Under: General Yoga, Mindfulness & Meditation, Well being Tagged With: achievement, Autumn, autumn equinox, balance, body and mind, completion, equinox, gratitute, harvest, meditation, mindfulness, nature, reflection, season, spring, yin and yang, yoga

Home Practice! The Five Senses Meditation

August 11, 2014 by Lucy 5 Comments

I’d like to share with you today a meditation practice I really love.  It doesn’t matter whether you’ve ever tried meditation before, or yoga or anything else of that ilk, this is a beautifully simple exploration in finding your way back to you.

Ever since I was introduced to this practice, it has always stayed with me, and even if I don’t do the full version, I take essences of it with me wherever I go – to find grounding, to find head space and as a reminder that I am here, now, in this body which feels and sees and experiences. You can do this anywhere: at home, on holiday, a busy street, a quiet riverside/beach/country park…wherever you can be without needing to directly interact with anyone else for a little while.  So let’s begin The Five Senses Meditation!

You will need:

–          Yourself

–          A watch (or a way of checking the time)

–          About 30 minutes of your earth time.

Firstly take a few minutes, sitting ideally, to tune into your body.  Close your eyes and bring awareness to the top of your head and slowly move your awareness down throughout your whole body, each limb, each muscle.  You don’t need to spend ages doing this, just touching briefly into every part of the body, noticing what’s there, using the physical body as a way to invite the mind into the present. Watch the rhythm of the breath. Not trying to force or change anything, just letting yourself be right where you are.   Once you have done this, gently open your eyes.

Take a quick time check and set yourself the next five minutes to purely notice the world around you through the sense of SIGHT.  Of course you’ll still hear, smell, feel things, but your attention will be with all that you can SEE.  Notice colours, changes in the light, notice textures, notice movement – notice how your body responds to things you see – are there some things which you react positively or negatively to?  Where do you notice that response in your body? Do things you see bring up thoughts or memories?

Once you’ve done 5 minutes focussing on sight, turn your attention to HEARING for 5 minutes – find layers of sound all around you. Even silence has a sound, a resonance.  Ask the same questions; are there sounds that you respond to?  Do you open up to some sounds, and shy away from others?

Spend the next 5 minutes on SMELL.  In a busy market place, smells might be intense and differing, or somewhere calmer you might have to wait for the subtleties to arrive.  Smells can be so evocative and access deep memories you can barely even recall in your thinking mind.

Dedicate the next 5 minutes to TASTE.  This one can be slightly tricky if you don’t have anything to hand but if you’re super prepared, you could put a small chocolate or some fruit in your pocket before you start – something small, you don’t need a three course meal here.  If you’re in a town often shops give out small tasters on trays for free – if there’s something to hand then go for it, but try not to get drawn into a conversation. If there’s nothing around that you can eat, then you can still focus on your mouth and notice the taste of nothing.

The next 5 minutes are all about the sense of TOUCH – this can be running your fingers over a stone wall or through water; over fabric or through the air; the connection of your feet on the ground; the feel of the air on your face; your clothes on your skin. Hot; cold; smooth; sharp; hard; soft; there are a myriad of textures to experience, not just with the fingertips but the whole body.

Once you’ve completed this, take a few moments to stop again, just as you began, and consider which of these senses made you feel most connected?  Which felt the most intimate? Which brought you back to yourself?  Allow the answers to appear, do not force them.

How did you feel throughout this exercise? How do you feel afterwards?

Of course, you can change the length of time you dedicate to each sense dependant on how much time you have.  Five minutes is a nice taster, don’t scrimp 🙂  You could also turn this into a lovely mindfulness game for children too – ‘How many things can you hear?’  ‘How many colours can you see?’  ‘What can you smell?’ ‘How does the grass feel? And this stone?’ etc – go deeper, asking them (and yourself) to notice and describe the layers of texture and sensation.

I’d love to hear how you get on with this! Which of the senses spoke to you most clearly today? Which made you feel most connected to your sense of self? (you could try it again in a week…a month…a year…and see if it is the same).

Breathe full and deep.  Acknowledge this remarkable body that allows us to see, to hear, to smell touch and taste each moment and ultimately reacquaint us with ourselves. It is yours. Enjoy, my friends.

Filed Under: Mindfulness & Meditation Tagged With: find yourself, five senses meditation, go deeper, hearing, home practice, meditation, meditation games for children, meditation practice, mindfulness, sight, smell, taste, touch, yoga

Next Page »

Newsletter

Recent News

  • *New* Wednesday lunchtime class
  • Love in the time of Corona
  • 2020 Yoga!
  • Yoga is BACK this September!
  • Honouring the seasons

Categories

  • General Yoga
  • Mindfulness & Meditation
  • Online classes + videos
  • Recipes
  • Well being
  • Yoga for…
  • Yoga in Focus

Older Posts

  • January 2021
  • April 2020
  • January 2020
  • September 2019
  • September 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • March 2018
  • December 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • January 2017
  • April 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • September 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014

Back to Top · Facebook · Twitter

Copyright © 2021 · Lucyogini · Website design by BlackPenPress.co.uk