Bringing Yoga and Ayurveda To You & Me: Portraits of a Lifestyle Worth Sharing.

I spent much of this winter learning about, and consequently thinking about, Ayurveda.

Don't bang your head against the wall if your thinking what in the world is Ayurveda?  In the most simple terms, Ayurveda is ancient Indian medicine.  Indian as in India, not Native American, though I would not be surprised if there were striking similarities between the two.

The course was spread out over the last 9 months, and though my energy with it waxed and waned as it will with anything that lasts multiple seasons, looking back I realize that it truly changed me.  It changed the way I view food and meals and spices.  It changed the way I view my body.  And it changed the way I view the environment around me.  These are all just parts of the large equation that affect health, happiness, energy levels and overall awareness.

I am not a doctor.  Nor am I any sort of health expert after taking a 9-month course.  But I will be so bold as to suggest these things:  drink a warm glass of water first thing in the morning.  Every morning.  Try adding some lemon juice to it.

And, sometime when you're feeling groovy and up for a challenge, sit in a quiet space and listen to your body; feel into your body.  Is it trying to talk to you?  You should probably listen.

I want to share some portraits I took of the lovely teacher of this course.  Her name is Cate Stillman (soon you'll see more portraits from our photo shoot on her website).  She is a warrior for whole health rooted in Ayurveda and Anusara yoga, and she acts as such through education, cleanses, treatments, yoga classes and more.

The best part of our photo shoot?  When Cate harvested dandelions, thistle and alfalfa from her yard ("pests" that most people spray with Round-Up) and threw them into a power blender to make green smoothies.  

Yes, they were fabulous; slightly bitter, as greens straight out of the ground will be, but sweetened just enough with some stevia and agave.

Check out Cate's rad green house, proving us all wrong when we say nothing grows here.

I had fun.

And I think Cate did too.

Basil's Last Western Adventure...For Now.

The Bailey Dog, also known as Captain Basil, The Basil Unit, Basil, Bedazzled, Dazzle, Monkey Dog, Monkey-Pig-Rat Dog, Monster, and Little (among other bizarre mutterings), has begun her own adventure today:  she is riding 2000 miles from Jackson to Georgia with my dad, embarking on a summer full of hot walks, trips to the lake, jumping 360s in my dad's apartment, and eating cat food at my mom's house.  She will likely be standing on the console of my dad's 4-Runner for the entire trip, occasionally tapping him on the shoulder with her left paw for balance or, more likely, attention.

After the NOLS IC, I continued my desert tour by going climbing and biking with Ben and Monkey-Pig-Rat Dog in Moab, Indian Creek and Fruita.

Welcome to our Indian Creek camp:

I haven't seen much of this planet, but I think once I do, Indian Creek will still be one of my favorite places.

We spent one night in Castle Valley, per usual.  Oh Fisher Towers, how I love thee:

After getting thrashed in Indian Creek, dragging our hands and ankles up crack climbs galore, we headed to Fruita, Colorado - a mountain biking mecca.  I was quite enchanted with Fruita:  the bike trails are smooth and scenic, winding through grassy fields and rolling like a roller coaster over narrow ridges.

Ben and I went to Grand Junction one afternoon and passed by a bustling fairground.  He looked at me and asked if I wanted to go ride the roller coaster.  I told him we'd already ridden our roller coaster for the day.

 Captain Basil sighs and takes it all in.  It's a rough life.

Wishing a safe drive to my dad and the Captain.  See you soon in the dirty south!

Dodging Rattlesnakes in the Gila Wilderness & Slinging Chicken Heads in Cochise Stronghold.

I spent most of this spring on a NOLS Instructor Course becoming certified to instruct rock climbing and backpacking courses. It was one of the most enriching & educational experiences of my life.

I belly-laughed more than I can remember belly-laughing since traveling in Ireland with Megan. This was due to the funny people, my own clumsiness, and the dry humor that the mountains seem to pull out of us as we grow dirty and our clothes get holes in them and our inhibitions start to slide away.

We climbed in Cochise - a place that resembled how I have always imagined Africa, dotted with granite domes and outcroppings, lined with gritty crack climbs and chicken heads. We built anchors with nothing but dinner plate-sized chicken heads and cordalettes; some pitches offered only slipknots on chicken heads for protection.

We hiked for 20 days in the Gila Wilderness of New Mexico - the wildest place I've been besides the Absarokas. We saw two mule deer in a remote canyon that had died stuck together by their antlers. We saw beautiful Ponderosa pine forests, and we taught each other about backcountry nutrition, public land management, the reintroduction of wolves in the Gila, how to bake on backcountry stoves using "twiggy fires," and the list goes on.

We spent hours upon hours bushwhacking off-trail, scrambling and rappelling through rock-filled drainages, and wading (or more likely swimming) through icy pools of water lined with steep rock walls.

We climbed Shelley Peak, which you have probably never heard of, but which will remain one of the most memorable summits of my life due to the great company of my hiking group, the surprising and daunting descent route, and the incredible thorny shwack that caused us to "bulldoze" our trail at about a half a mile an hour for the better [or worse] part of 12+ hours.

We witnessed one of our male rock climbing instructors prancing around on a summit in a grandma-style bathing suit, anything but properly worn, and we giggled our way through 8-minute abs sessions, short-roping each other, tangling our limbs together in hanging belays, and climbing in tutus.

We slept under the stars and dodged numerous rattlesnakes and drank afternoon cups of Joe and scrutinized terrain features on topo maps. We drank water that looked like slime (only sometimes Mom) and ate magically expanding foods and repaired various holes and rips and blisters and poison ivy rashes.

Eventually we deepened our yoga practices together, read excerpts of cheesy romance novels aloud, heard each other's farts without wincing, disregarded any previous ideas about b.o. or greasy-slick heads, cut each other's hair, hauled an entire BBQ feast up a 5-pitch granite dome (because why not?), and partied like college kids to celebrate it all at the end.

I am so lucky to have been there for it all.