Grounded Blog

For many of us, a new year represents a blank slate, a Tabula Rasa. Imagine being able to “refresh” any or all areas of your life. Now visualize this table with two columns, Yes and No. You create your truest life by thoughtfully choosing what goes in the No column and what is a Yes. Everything you say YES to and everything you say NO to matters.  What if your yes’s and no’s were tabulated and at the end of a day, week, year, lifetime, you could see how the data, otherwise known as your life, balanced out?

Have you ever head the term "The Ground Truth"? Spies say it when they want to know what really went down, no cover-ups and no interpretations. Apparently in life or death spy situations it's important to know the ground truth in order to move forward in the mission. In NASA, the ground truth is part of the calibration process where a person on the ground makes a measurement of the same thing the satellite is trying to measure at the same time. The two answers are then compared to help evaluate how well the satellite instrument is performing.

There is a huge difference between going deep and going in. Deeply understanding and knowing something is not the same level of experience as ingesting or taking something in and transforming because of it.

We chant OM in order to ground our energy in the present moment. When teaching kids who are brand new to yoga, I am determined to invite them into the wondrous world of all that is yoga without pushing them into a place of spooky sounds, weird ways and stuff completely unrelated to anything they’ve ever known. This mantra is a mode of transportation from where we were in our individual lives moments ago to where we are now - together in yoga.

el·e·va·tion   [el-uh-vey-shuhn]

noun
1.  the height to which something is elevated or to which it rises:
2.  loftiness; grandeur or dignity; nobleness: elevation of mind.

We believe that the height to which someone is elevated is in direct proportion to the depth in which one is grounded in virtues of the heart. It takes hard work to be a virtuous person and we recognize the accomplishments of our grounded students as they advance in the skill of being grounded.

laugh verb \ˈlaf, ˈläf\

intransitive verb

1 a : to show emotion (as mirth, joy, or scorn) with a chuckle or explosive vocal sound b : to find amusement or pleasure in something <laughed at his own clumsiness> c : to become amused or derisive

2 a : to produce the sound or appearance of laughter b : to be of a kind that inspires joy

Children laugh just for the fun of it, from the heart, as they play. They don't rely on understanding a joke or developing a sense of humor. They just laugh. In Grounded, we teach that Joy is a quality of the heart that can be cultivated and we show how laughter inspires joy through poses such as Laughter Hero, Laughter Milkshake, Oompa Loompa and Mountain Range Laughter.

We teach kids and teens how to find humor in every day life and how awareness leads to amusement in even the most mundane places. This event took place this morning and it's what I taught in my Grounded class this afternoon. I shared the story, taught the poses and we had an awesome, authentic experience. The kids were inspired to write down their own personal stories and the poses that prepared them to handle real life with ease. They loved using the pose stickers to illustrate their writing. Find all the details about these poses and more in our box of 84 Grounded Elevator Series Pose Cards. Enjoy! 

I Am What I Am Grounded Yoga Pose

SA: Touch thumb to first finger and say SA which means Infinite. 

TA: Touch thumb to second finger and say TA which means Birth.

NA: Touch thumb to third finger and say NA which means Ending. 

MA: Touch thumb to pinky finger and say MA which means Rebirth. 

This is a traditional Kundalini Yoga chant that activates specific pressure points that help energy flow to the brain. We love this chant and first realized its transformational quality and how much all kids love it in the Radiant Child Yoga Program training with Shakta Kaur Khalsa.