Tag: Kundalini Global
Exciting Times for Kundalini Global and The Power of Community
In a few weeks’ time it will be a year since I certified with Yoga Alliance as a Kundalini Global yoga teacher. That went by pretty fast. Wow. I was in the first cohort of graduates from the training. Soon another big group, full of fascinating and brilliant humans, will qualify and join us. It is an exciting time.
I am extremely proud to call myself a Kundalini Global teacher.
As a general rule I strongly reject names and labels. My pride is testament to both the quality of the training and the potency of the practise. I love it. I do. I love being in classes. I get to them as many as 5 times a week. I adore teaching. I am passionate about this incredible community growing.
Community is one of the first words that comes to mind when I think of Kundalini Global. The past year has been so weird. So hard for so many. Not least in the isolation. The community that Carolyn Cowan fostered over lockdown through her own Kundalini Global classes has been a magical thing to be a part of. It’s amazing, actually, to consider how we all managed to come together so often over zoom and how much solace we found in doing so. Not only solace. Magic. Transformation. Joy. It’s been unforgettable. And we continue.
As the first group of graduates stepped out in to this peculiar, but really quite wonderful, landscape of online teaching we took the spirit of community into our own classes and slowly but surely, we have built communities of our own. I feel the connection between them all. We are, together, such a force for positive change.
At the time of writing I believe there are around 16 certified teachers of Kundalini Global. Within the next few months that will likely treble. I hope it will treble (and more) many many more times over coming months and years. Another training starts in September. If you’re interested in joining us it’s an incredibly exciting time to do it.
You can find out more here:
Kundalini Global is pioneering, unique and, best of all, it works…
Works for what?
Most people come to a yoga class because they have heard through the grapevine, or via a super-skinny YouTube yoga celebrity, that it is relaxing, gentle, or good for stress.
Perhaps too, they seek some kind of a spiritual experience… whatever that means.
Some, like me, come because they are desperate to find respite from how unbearable life feels. How bored they are of their wily, unrelenting mind, and contracted, tense and agitated body. Respite that does not come from a hastily prescribed box of pills from the GP or from the bottom of a bottle of wine.
Kundalini Global classes offer that respite. Quickly, magically, and through a growing, inclusive, community of teachers and practitioners who become experts in, a phrase you will hear us echo: changing how we feel.
We are a community that is new, yes, but growing quickly. And we have things to do. Big things.
What is Kundalini Global?
I do have a little page on my site about this question, a question I get asked regularly. I never manage to do it justice.
Kundalini Global is a new form of Kundalini Yoga. It is tricky to encapsulate in words, beyond saying that it is absolutely bloody amazing.
I find it to be an extraordinary, embodied, safe, kind, trauma-informed, form of yoga. A practise that creates a unique, still and gentle space within and outside of the self. The practise has a strong focus on the power of presence. And it is fun. I always add that. I have to. I have to tell you it is fun because as a statement it passes the test of being kind, necessary and also true.
Kundalini Global has opened up an entire new universe for me. One of connection, of community, one that feels powered by gratitude and intention and that allows for infinite space and freedom to be myself.
We probably aren’t what you expect…
Teachers of Kundalini Global are trained to consider aspects of creating safe, sacred spaces for classes that, I believe, opens up the possibility of exploring yoga to a much wider demographic. That is what we want. What we intend.
We probably don’t dress how you’d expect a yoga teacher to, we may not be as pretty, as flexible or as ‘love and light’… we may not play the music you have come to expect in a yoga class and we sometimes even say or do naughty things. But we are kind. We are open-minded. We practise self-reflection, daily, to notice where we may have yet unchallenged biases, attitudes or blindspots. We are supervised… we work to ensure we are well boundaried, that we are taking care of ourselves physically and mentally. We support each other.
We are human (and not, unfortunately, frogs… at least not always)
Kundalini Global teachers share a desire to use our individual manifestations of ‘humanness’ to offer those who come to classes an experience of what it can be like, what it can feel like, to be present, safe, still and gentle.
How we help you get there can require effort, don’t be entirely fooled by all this talk of ‘gentle, still, softness.’ That’s the reward.
We may have you using your arms as the world’s sharpest swords, working your core, squatting as a frog in stilettos or beaming 80 foot beams of light through your exhausted, extended arms up over your head (it’s not all barmy – but it’s fun when it is). No matter what we invite you to explore, though, all posture is presented with many equal variations to suit all body shapes and abilities, to allow for knowing that a posture is not a ‘can or can’t’ situation.
We show you how to make the postures work for your body. With no ‘ideal’, only equal variations that give the same, or a similar, desired effect.
Kundalini Global is not the preserve of the bendy, the thin, the white, the cis, the straight, the able-bodied, the young, the rich. It is our intention that we do the work to create diverse and welcoming communities that feel safe, fun and, hopefully, sacred. For everyone.
Whilst we may teach on zoom from grey, post-industrial cities in the midlands rather than parading in leggings and bras on rocks in the Ganges, we are all in service to create magical spaces that allow for all manifestations of what it means to be human to be held safely.
Ever unfolding
The work that we began on ourselves during the teacher training with Carolyn Cowan has continued for me every single day since.
‘The work’ – it sounds like a chore, doesn’t it?
Perhaps, if you haven’t ever done a yoga teacher training, you could imagine we mainly practise postures and learn about bones and muscles. We do do that. Lots of it. But the experience of training to teach Kundalini Global goes far beyond that.
With Carolyn you are invited to take apart your entire self-and-societally-constructed sense of self and examine each aspect with open, present, eyes.
I mention presence again here because, in order to do the work, the ability to come to presence again and again is vital. As teachers we must ‘practise what we preach’ and do that.
On the training we become expert at knowing hundreds of ways to come out of the pain of the past and the fear of the future and to the present moment. The commitment is to do it. Believe me, this is easier said than done. It takes huge amounts of self-awareness. It takes an ability to step out of self-obsession. But we commit to it. Because we understand what it opens up.
Deconstruction to reconstruction
I had a point on the teacher training where my entire universe lay in a giant, messy, heap on the floor in front of me.
But I was present to it. I could see the work that was needed.
Deconstruct, examine, look at it in different lights, through different lenses. Reflect. Keep? Upcycle? Discard? And repeat.
Repeat with each and every aspect of yourself. From the stories you feel are pivotal to your life to how you feel about veganism to your gender identity to your relationship to god. Eventually you are left with what is likely a smaller pile of ‘stuff’ of ‘parts’, from which you can begin to reconstruct YOU.
My reconstruction has been interesting. Bits fall off all the time. Usually for good reason. But I reflect on them as they tumble. On what they taught me. New things get added. I have to take them off and have a look at them every now and then too.
Big parts of my work have been about dealing with shame, on body issues, on landing back into my body after years of being incredibly disconnected. It truly has been about challenging all aspects of what I thought about life and what life could, or should be.
When I wrote earlier ‘it sounds like a chore?’ I was going to follow with ‘it hasn’t felt like one.’ But actually, on occasion, it really has.
I have done it anyway.
I made a commitment when I qualified. I wrote an agreement for myself about what being a Kundalini Global teacher meant to me, what my commitment was.
I am really bloody proud of myself for sticking with my commitment to change, to challenge, to reflect and to remain, always, open-minded.
When I got to my teacher training in February 2020 I would NEVER have thought possible that I would be in a place so soon of having taught hundreds and hundreds of classes. Of having built a absolutely awesome community of lovely humans who I teach. To have made my own Instagram account full of artistic manifestations of the insides of my brain, made friends with an imaginary tiger that I was comfortable enough to share with the world… none of this would have felt possible.
It became possible because the Kundalini Global training is an incredible, incredible, way to kick-start huge transformation. A little spoiler: you may have to walk through hell on the way. It’s worth it.
My journey…
When I first came to Kundalini Yoga it was not, back then, Kundalini Global. My first exploration was in the ‘as taught by Yogi Bhajan’ school. I remember someone describing the practise at the time to me as ‘yoga, but more spiritual’. An interesting statement on a number of levels. Hilarious.
I could kind of see what they meant, though. It felt like a ‘spiritual thing’ in comparison to what you may find presented as yoga in a gym. To chant. To focus at the third eye. To meditate for hours on end. And it made me feel great. The endorphins alone were enough to see me leaving class as high as a kite, desperate for my next Kundalini fix.
When I first practised Kundalini Yoga, I went from a lycra-clad, scatter-brained, spiritually-skeptic accidental-class-attendee to a white-linen-wearing, spiritual-name-holding, daily sadhana practising, devotee within months. I also became vegan, stopped drinking, took daily cold showers and believed every problem that had ever existed in my life had miraculously vanished with the power of chanting with Snatam Kaur.
I lived for a few years as if I was floating in a cloud of sparkly fairy dust. It drove those around me mad.
This form of Kundalini did much for me at the time but I never wanted to commit to teaching it. Partly because:
a. Everyone around me thought I had joined a cult.
b. Some part of my knew I had, indeed, joined a cult.
It’s a big topic. And by even discussing it I open myself up to scrutiny in a way I do not feel entirely comfortable with. But the context is important in my journey. Because part of what I love about what Carolyn has done with Kundalini Global also comes to how the practises we teach, just like my description of the work we are invited to do on ourselves, have been deconstructed and examined. The ‘why’ of how they work has been conceptualised within the frameworks of physiology… neuroscience, endocrinology…
We have equally looked at the esoteric thought of the practise. But broadened out that exploration to consider the whole spectrum of religious and spiritual belief systems.
We understand how the practises we work with work. And, yes, many teachers then choose to imbue their classes with all kinds of other concepts and ideas that resonate with them. But the key aspects remain: we can show you how to go from feeling left-out, stressed-out, overwhelmed, anxious, pissed off and offended to the present moment. A place where the ability to accept and allow is possible. And, often, welcome. You also, of course, have permission to stay exactly as you are. We’re only here to show you what you’re capable of if you make the choice to change.
BS Free Yoga
When it comes to Kundalini Global, in private I have said that it is ‘Kundalini Yoga without the bullshit’. A controversial statement? Definitely. And perhaps something of a judgmental one, too.
But, on a personal level, I believe that Yogi Bhajan was not only a despicable predator but that his teachings contained huge amounts of complete and utter, misogynistic, harmful, BS. Beyond that I believe, with every cell of my body, that we do not need anyone to be our guru. We only need to be given some tools and a safe enough space to practise them, to realise that we are powerful beyond measure ourselves.
Creating a new form of Kundalini Yoga is quite a thing. Fearless, fascinating and controversial in itself.
Carolyn Cowan, who founded Kundalini Global, spent decades teaching Kundalini Yoga
before making the incredibly brave decision to take this new, pioneering, path. Carolyn recognised, long before the controversy that hit the world of Kundalini Yoga at the start of 2020, that a new way was needed. A kinder way. A 21st century way. One that is radically inclusive.
Together, I believe the Kundalini Global community will do truly amazing things. I would so love some of those who have enjoyed my classes to train to teach this incredible practise themselves. If you want to read more about Carolyn and the training you can find information here:
Feel free to email me if you have questions.
With loads of love, as always
Sara-Jayne
xxx
Minecraft Massacres, Plaintive Paws and Poems That Melt My Icy Cold Heart: What I Have Been Up To This Week
Hello lovely humans
It’s exceedingly grey and miserable here in the ever-glamourous Wolverhampton. This feels to me the perfect excuse to stay home and ignore the plaintive sounds of Rebel the Golden Retriever, who sits across from me as I type, occasionally offering her paw as a gentle signal that I am not, in this moment, providing her with what she would like. Sigh. I will go out in the freezing drizzle and mud to walk. It’s a must for Rebel and for me too, I never regret it once I am out. A good opportunity to practise Breath of Fire, too. Doing Breath of Fire on a cold dog walk is quite a thing. A great way to get to grips with the breath and a good way to ward off the advances of strangers who will usually assume you are a little strange when you are rapidly pumping your navel as you walk!
We have a week off from homeschool. Hip hip hooray! We’re all absolutely thrilled about this. The kids are still in their PJs today. They’ve been eating cookies my mum made for them for Valentine’s day and generally doing very little else. It’s so quiet in the house. I love it. At least I love it until I go intermittently to check in on the silence and find some kind of horrifying calamity in the bedrooms upstairs that’s come from over enthusiastic Minecraft role-play.
Minecraft has been in my life now for at least 8 years. I must admit that I haven’t ever truly engaged with it until recently but I was very touched when my youngest child this week crafted a restaurant for me and his dad to have a virtual dinner in. I was a blue Power Ranger and his dad was Luigi. The youngest child was the waiter – Super Mario in a cat costume. And, as well as creating an entire restaurant, he’d made virtual menus for us to choose meals from and prepared an assortment of dishes. Unfortunately, my Minecraft skills were not what they they could’ve been and I inadvertently caused quite a lot of damage to the restaurant as I looked around. The entire experience was very sweet until the final moments of our meal when he announced that we would all ‘battle to the death’. It was actually highly amusing and a memory I am unlikely to forget. As I had absolutely no idea how to control my weapon I was killed extremely quickly. The amount of effort he had put in to the whole endeavour was admirable and we were all crying with laughter.
I am finding that it is becoming more challenging to stay present as the weeks pass in lockdown. I have to notice so often that my thoughts have begun to gallop off to the future… bringing with it an activation of a propensity I have toward being somewhat impatient. I find the thing that does really help with this for me is to practise gratitude. In this specific case writing out lists of what I am grateful for right now. Gratitude is a wonderful way to trick the brain and the stress system in to being more present. And I really do have much to be grateful for.
Classes This Week
Yesterday I ran a 3 hour workshop via Zoom where we explored creating safety – becoming safe enough to experience the magic of the yoga mat. We went in some depth in to the individual elements of what, in Kundalini Global, we call the magical equation:
Intention x Breath x Posture = Transformation
It was the first extended workshop I have run this year and I am hugely grateful to everyone who joined me. It was a great experience and I look forward to running it again soon.
This week I teach a free class at 8am on Wednesday morning. The link for that goes out to everyone on my email list on Tuesday evening. If you do not yet receive my weekly email newsletter you can sign up for that, and the free classes here:
I also teach at 7pm on Thursday evening and 10am on Friday morning. Both of these classes are 75 minutes long and can be booked here:
Everything that was broken…
I haven’t allowed myself to read much over the last few weeks as I have had a to do list longer than my over-long arms (I really do have long arms) that I needed to get on top of. One thing I have been picking up to enjoy, in quiet moments, are the poems of Mary Oliver.
Mary Oliver was an American poet who won the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize. Her work was largely and hugely inspired by nature rather than the human world, and came from her lifelong passion for solitary walks in the wild. She did, though, write a book of poems about love. The collection is called Felicity and despite being a human who has never, ever, considered themselves to be a romantic by nature, I find them to be extremely beautiful. In a sentimental moment this particular one even made me cry:
Everything that was broken has
forgotten its brokenness. I live
now in a sky-house, through every
window the sun. Also your presence.
Our touching, our stories. Earthly
and holy both. How can this be, but
it is. Every day has something in
it whose name is forever.
–Mary Oliver, “Everything That Was Broken,” from Felicity
Consider my sharing of that a little Valentines gift to you all. Do get in touch. Let me know how you are. You can leave a comment below or email me. I always love to hear from you.
Sending you love. I should go for my walk now, right?
(edit: I did and it was lovely. If a bit damp!)
Sara-Jayne
xxx
Affirmations For Moving Through Anxiety
When I taught last weekend at This Life Divine we worked with a list of affirmations from my own little library that I have been building and several people have been in touch to ask if I could share, so today I thought I would.
Affirmation is fast becoming one of the tools I turn to first when I need to adult myself, soothe myself, and when I work with intention. I plan to run a series of workshops this year exploring different aspects of taking ourselves on, each using affirmation in our practise in a number of different ways. The first is coming up next month, where we will be exploring safety. You can find out more about that here:
Affirmations for moving through anxiety:
I Am Safe
I Am Calm
I Am Peaceful
I Am Gentle
I Can Choose
I Have Time
I Have Space
I Am Patient
I Am Present To My Life
I Belong
I Love My Body
I Am Safe In My Body
I Am Kind
I Am Kind to Myself
I Give Myself Permission
I Can Make Decisions With Conviction
I Love My Mind
I Deserve
I Am Creative
I Am Brave
I Am Strong
I Am Proud Of Me
I Feel Connection
I Love
I Am Loved
My Nature Is Divine
I Have No Fear
I Have No Pain
I Am
I Can
I Love My Life
My Life Loves Me
How to use affirmation?
Some like to affirm looking in a mirror. Some like to quietly recite one affirmation whilst breathing gently. I like to keep a list, a long list, that I add too and then to reflect in my daily practise on affirmations to work with on any given day. I then use them with my breath practise and sometimes with posture.
There is no right or wrong way. But the repitition of an affirmation practise is what begins to create transformation. It aids in neural plasticity. In changing the avenues that your mind has been programmed to meander down (or shoot down) most regularly.
I wrote recently about my own use of affirmation and how it helps me and it is something I very much intend to continue exploring over this year.
Blossoms, Bones, Divine Life, Divine Trees, Christmas Heaven and a Gift From Me to You: What I Have Been Up To This Week
Happy Sunday lovely humans
Before I get to anything else, I would just like to mention that I am offering a free class on Wednesday 30th December at 2.00pm, UK time. A post Christmas gift. If you would like to come you simply need to make sure you have added yourself to my email newsletter. If you haven’t done that already you can do it here:
I would really love to see lots of you there.
How are we all? I’m feeling extremely Christmassy today. I think it might be time to put on The Pogues and bake some mince pies. Before my morning practise I lit a fire in my yoga room and then went around switching on all of the Christmas lights on the trees. Yes, trees, I really am one of those people who has more than one Christmas tree. The year I moved in to the house I live in now, which was about 4 or 5 years ago, I took on a range of other people’s discarded fake trees and had, I think 8 huge Christmas trees in the house. It was absolutely magical. However, when it came to pack it all away in the New Year I decided it was, perhaps, a little excessive, even for someone who loves Christmas as much as I do.
This year’s offerings a much less abundant but fill me with equal amounts of joy.
I planned to take something of a break this past week but, in fact, I have somehow let myself be as busy as ever. I have put myself on a contract for this coming week to actually let myself be still. I really do need it. It’s incredible how much we allow ourselves to keep going despite our bodies and minds screaming at us to slow down.
One thing I do always make space for is my practise. Both personal, in the early hours of the day, and also to attend classes whenever I can.
Tonight I am incredibly happy that I have the gift of the second of the Christmas Prayer Workshops with Carolyn Cowan. My second time doing this series of Sunday evening sessions which are truly magical. I believe Carolyn plans to run this again at Easter so if you would like to check it out do go over and join her mailing list. Last week we considered the practise of asking, in prayer. The stillness that comes from sitting in this space is pure bliss, to me. It does truly feel like being wrapped in a warm cosy blanket for two hours. Extremely soothing. And fascinating too.
Join us for This Life Divine
This Life Divine is coming up in the New Year. From the 2nd-4th January. This 3 day event has some amazing yoga and breath teachers as well as psychotherapists, all coming together at the start of a New Year to help anyone who is moving through anxious or addictive behaviours. It’s going to be wonderful. Any money raised from This Life Divine is being shared between 3 equally amazing charities that help those moving through addiction and if money is an obstacle to booking a place then you can book on the website for free. It’s an amazing offer. The opportunity to experience three fantastic workshops with Carolyn Cowan would be enough to get me there – with bells on! And beyond that we have so much on offer. Lots of it from my very fantastic Kundalini Global colleagues.
I’m really looking forward to this, both as someone who plans to attend the entire event, and as a teacher who is involved. You’ll find my class on day 3 of the schedule. And loads more information, as well as booking, can be found on the This Life Divine website.
Blossoms and Bones: What I Have Been Reading This Week
I’ve been a fan of Kim Krans for a few years now. I discovered her through a gift given to me 2 or 3 Christmases ago of her Wild Unknown Tarot Deck. But it was her Archetype cards (my goodness they’re incredible!) that I fell in love with. So when I saw she had a book, a memoir, that was hand drawn and written, and then when I saw the sub-title ‘Drawing a Life Back Together’ I had it in my hands almost immediately.
In Blossoms and Bones, Kim Krans shows huge amounts of vulnerability and openness as she takes us on a journey through, what you could describe as, her complete evisceration of her relationship to herself. And then, with great joy, the reconstruction.
At the start she has taken refuge from herself in an ashram for 30 days and for those 30 days she takes on a practise of drawing her feelings.
Stepping through these 30 days with her is quite humbling as we truly witness a deeply personal unravelling.
With each day that passes it feels as if she comes closer to the parts of herself that she has been most avoiding. It was fascinating for me as it mirrored so closely my own story of this year as we were encouraged to embrace our story – to see it as our gold – on my Kundalini Global Teacher Training. In that work we begin to look at some very hard truths.
Then enter a skeleton (could this book be any more perfect for me) who offers its hand to be her guide through her subconscious. To follow the skeleton on a journey within herself – to the darkest parts of her internal relationship to herself.
It was poignant to me that the memoir includes some really very beautiful prayers. Short, simple. But so touching, some of them made me cry.
It’s an extremely engaging book to read. You have to immerse yourself in it, turn it round, lean in closer, squint your eyes and figure out where to take your attention next. It’s just exquisite. I don’t want to give it all away here but I would truly recommend you check it out.
A tale of a human totally deconstructing themselves and the power and exquisite sense of self that comes when, having done that, they piece themselves back together.
That’s about it from me today, although I plan to check back in before Christmas Day.
Do let me know how you are in the comments, or by sending me a message. I love to hear from you.
Sending you all LOADs of love
Sara-Jayne xxx
I Am: Grateful! Why Training To Teach Kundalini Global, Is The Best Thing I Have Ever Done…
Hello lovely humans
So, this week, I finished teaching for the year. I decided I needed a little pause before Christmas, some time for some stillness and reflection before the chaos of having 3 very excited children in the run up to Christmas Day.
When I finished my final class on Friday I was taken aback to find myself feeling all kinds of emotion. It may sound mean but I will admit I felt some relief. I’ve been teaching online every week since February – even before lockdown. And whilst I have seriously loved every moment, from those early shaky, croaky-voiced classes that I spent days-on-end planning, to the insanity of zipping myself up in to giant inflatable Christmas Tree costume to dance with abandon to Wizard in the final classes of the year… I am tired. I need some stillness, now. But I am happy. Really, really bloody happy. My overriding feeling, as I stepped out of my elf costume and carefully rolled up my mat was not the relief at taking a break but gratitude. Overflowing with it. To so many people, to so many experiences, and to myself, too.
Instagram scrolling changed my life…
I spent a long time looking for a Kundalini yoga teacher training. A few years. I was completely dedicated to my practise from the first days of Kundalini yoga entering my life. It helped me. So much. And I knew from an unfamiliar part of myself that it was something that I was destined to take further. To share. But the trainings I explored, considered, sat with for months on end, wondering why, exactly, I felt uncomfortable about signing up when I so wanted to teach, was so certain it was what I was supposed to do… something held me back from them. I knew that, for some reasons I could identify and some I could not, that they weren’t for me.
I remember the day I saw a post pop up on Instagram from Carolyn Cowan that announced she was going to be running a level one Kundalini Yoga teacher training the following year. I was scrolling through Instagram absentmindedly and, for some reason, it felt as if my world stopped. Just for a split second. I’d only been following Carolyn online for a little while… I was drawn to a photo she had shared of a naked woman with a dove strapped to her back and from there I became beguiled by how refreshing her voice was in the sea of Kundalini teachers I had started to listen to. Something about the news of Carolyn’s training made me feel as if I’d been plugged in to the mains… it lit me up entirely and I remember quickly adding myself to an email list and making a note down in my diary about checking in on news about what it would involve. I’d seen enough of what Carolyn shared to know this was going to be something different.
The more Carolyn shared about what she would be exploring on her training the more certain I became that the universe had been conspiring entirely for me to wait for this. I did some online classes with Carolyn and was completely taken aback by how powerful and calming her presence was. How enormous and yet safe the space she held could be – even over the Internet.
I waited with some anxiety for news about where her teacher training would be and how much it would cost and, with a heart beating faster than anything I’d previously experienced, the evening she opened up the website to book, I signed up.
And then I got insanely nervous…
I lived and worked in London for a long time, and, since moving away, I’d convinced myself that I hated it now. That I couldn’t cope with being there for extended periods of time. I was also terrified of Carolyn. I’d never met anyone like her before, I was sure of that, and I immediately got in to a mindset of how I ‘should’ be before I even attempted to take up space on a training that I wasn’t sure, in all honesty, I deserved.
I took on a Kriya called Strengthening the Aura because I thought it would protect me from my vulnerabilities, and train me up for being strong enough to cope with my feelings of inadequacy. I continued this until only a few months ago. It took me well over a year to realise the intention behind my daily practise had its roots in shame, in fear.
In February the time finally came to make my way down to London and join the first module.
It was mind blowing. It was intense and it was completely magical in every way. I will not write about the experience in detail (no spoilers) but it was beyond anything I could have imagined. It was also terrifying.
Kundalini Global training is an extremely powerful, intense and life changing experience.
The great pause and moving online
After that first module I will admit, that whilst I found it extremely powerful, extraordinary and very fascinating, I was on a different planet. I was so ungrounded.
I remember walking my dog the morning after I got home from London, and having a sense I was observing myself from above. My physical body felt an unsafe place to be, for the first time since I’d discovered Kundalini Yoga.
When I look back now I realise a lot of ‘stuff’ I’d stuffed down, that I was
holding in the physical body, was beginning to make its way to the surface.
Whatever experience I had had to date with awakened Kundalini energy, which had all been so lovely with birdsong and beautiful leaves and heightened senses was being pushed to one side as the shit I had refused to deal with came bubbling up eagerly saying ‘now you’re safe enough to really transform.’
And then COVID hit.
It was upsetting, at the time, that our training had to move entirely online. But, in retrospect, in my view, it only went on to make the experience of the next 3 or 4 months one that took us all deeper in to the work we had to do than would ever have been possible had we not all been, as Carolyn so brilliantly put it, ‘sent to our rooms to think about what we’ve done’.
From there, it has been the most insane and flabbergasting experience of change. Not always, in fact rarely ever, comfortable. But always so incredibly valuable. I don’t even recognise myself in the recordings of the training from back in March. The triggers (and there have been many) and morning group practices and the amazing, amazing, modules online – every aspect of the experience of training has shaken me up and caused me to look at every aspect of my relationship to myself and to the outside world. The work is not yet done, it never will be, but Carolyn’s training is absolutely the best thing I have ever chosen to do for myself.
It’s empowered me in ways I did not ever imagine possible.
Falling in love with teaching, falling in love with yourself
My teaching is evolving. Always. But the magical thing is that I have learned how to step in to being allowed to hold space for others, to hold the power that comes with that, in a way that is hugely open-hearted, kind, inclusive and all whilst ENTIRELY being myself. I love it. I adore it. And I really cannot believe the transformation I have gone through when I think back to the absolute terror I felt on the first module when we were invited to form groups and teach each other. I was horrified. Nauseous. Shaking. Ashamed.
When I think about my total open-hearted joy as I taught this week it is gratitude that comes to me, that comes overflowing out of me. It really is the best thing I have ever done, to join the new Kundalini Global community. To share with others the practise that has allowed me, finally, to start being myself.
When the question first came in to the training of ‘how do you feel to step in to the power…’ of teaching, of holding space, I thought I understood. And that I felt ready. Like I said at the start, I spent so long knowing I wanted to teach Kundalini. And I’d been practising myself with such dedication.
But as I started to tip toe in to it I realised it made me feel vulnerable, childlike, pathetic… this was hard. So frustrating. How could sharing something I loved so much feel so difficult? Somehow, magically, the way the training was delivered and how it unfolded, the work on this was done bit by bit. And I can honestly say, now, that I teach my classes with my head held high, believing I deserve, and with no expectation of myself other than to be authentically me and to keep the integrity that the training has fostered.
I have changed this year because I am able to really accept my story, not hide from it. And not feel ashamed. I am able to embrace the lower triangle, the divine feminine, the left side, not only able, I WANT TO and it feels AMAZING. I am able to stand up for myself, to speak for myself in a way I never ever ever have in my entire life. The training has awakened every creative and passionate aspect of myself that has always been there, popping up to say hello throughout my life, but never all at once, and never with the sense of possibility I have now. I feel messier, somehow, but in the best way.
If you are reading this and you are thinking to yourself that you may, one day, like to teach too, please go and check out Carolyn. She helps people in ways I find completely awe inspiring and to be gifted a certificate at the end of my experience, that allows me to share on some of what I have learnt… I have never been prouder, happier and more ready to build on what I have done for myself and for others in 2020 for the rest of my life.
And, by the way, Carolyn did terrify me at the start, yes. Because she is powerful and funny and unashamedly herself. But more than that she inspired me. From the first moment I sat in a class with her. She is, in actual fact, one of the greatest, kindest and most wonderful people you could ever hope to meet. She gave me the best gifts ever, including but not limited to:
Teaching me how to really feel safe in my body.
Direction and help toward letting go of shame.
Wings.
Myself.
Goals plans and huge amounts of excitement, bring on 2021
I may have ended my classes for the year, but I have a lot I plan to do in coming weeks.
I have SO MANY exciting plans for 2021 and I really cannot wait to show you some of what I have planned. I have been brainstorming ideas of how to marry together the joy I get from writing this blog, from my Instagram account, and from teaching and sharing the practises of Kundalini Global. And I have something magic planned. Really really magic.
Beyond that I plan to start running workshops in the New Year, hopefully both online and in-person. I plan to train more. A lot more. I am only at the beginning of my journey. I am committed to this path now. Completely. And I can’t wait to see where the Sara-Jayne Kundalini community is at this time next year.
I’m so so grateful for every single one of you who reads my posts on this website, who comments on my Instagram posts and who come along to my classes. You’ve played a huge part in my transformative year and you gift me more joy than you would imagine. Thank you.
I will be blogging and posting throughout this festive period so no pause on the blog. Just a massive hug and an even bigger thank you.
Sending you all LOADS of love
Sara-Jayne
xxxxxx