THE KIDS AT CITY BALLET, L.A. (CBLA)

I am lucky enough to be the yoga director for this group, City Ballet of L.A. and to teach three classes to the dancers and their mothers on Saturday mornings. They are the only group of kids anywhere I have taught yoga, that you can hear a pin drop in the class. What is that?! I have taught up to 30+ kids in a room and never have had to "wrangle" or "remind" anyone about respecting Self and others. I feel so privileged to guide these angels at this tender time in their lives. Cards are stacked against them as young Latina and African American women living in this downtown jungle, but we are moving the cards and empowering them with dance, yoga, the arts, a Voice to speak out and take up space.

Tomorrow they will be taking up space along with the adult pros (the Company) in Nutcracker Swings at the Nate Holden Theatre on Washington Bl.(around Rimpau). Robyn, the artistic director, incorporates Duke Ellington's Nutcracker with Tchaikovsky. It takes place in World War 2 and it's gorgeous to look at. The best thing about this version of Nutcracker is it is mercifully about 90 minutes, if that, with no intermisson. Last year, we played The Orpheum and it was a blast to be inside that amazing space. But I like that Nate Holden is being used and it's my hope, living so close to that theatre, that more art comes to the space. More art, more life, more people.

SAFETY IS A MYTH UNTIL ITS ME

People have things and places they call their sanctuary. Like the ocean, or the libaray, or a temple of some sort, or the mountains, the desert, a yoga class, a recovery meeting, church, temple, a nightclub.

Here is my recent lesson on making places and things my sanctuary: They become the opposite.

The second I decided that a certain yoga class was my "sanctuary" - yes definitely my "one safe place" in the city, my "only solace" in the urban jungle - I got stalked there.
Insult to injury - I found little support, though I had been coming regularly for 10 years. I was told "All are welcome to this path, there is a reason he is here. you don't own the yoga." huh?

I had to change my schedule totally and haven't found my groove there since. I now sit in the back, not the front. But there was a gift in it. I felt so viscerally, how much I had put that place and those teachers and spiritual people into the position that should be reserved for either A. My own Divine Inner-Teacher/Self or B. My Higher Power
Again, once I decided a certain teacher was "my one spiritual teacher" - this teacher showed an unkind side and I was shattered.

I thought I had learned the lesson. But then I replaced venues. Just when the recovery meeting I started in my neighborhood, turned into "my cozy safe magical place" - wow, my feeings have been hurt there several times, why? I assumed everyone was safe and loving etc. Right. Wake up call: people come to 12 step meetings because they are insane on some level, and I forget that and turn them into safe angels. It's not the people who are safe, it's the group consciousness, the amazingly safe way the program is structured. People get hurt before and after meetings, not during.

Wow. Fortunately I do have spiritual tools and the ability to see the bigger picture and not be afraid to shift old patterns of thinking when making people and places and things bigger than me doesn't work. Yet it takes a painful and repetitive lesson for me to change permanently. My new perspective, based on experience...

Nothing and no one is "safe" on planet earth. And so what?

I have to be my own safe person, my own sactuary, my own best friend, as the cliche instructs. Period.

As long as there are people, there is going to be conflict (hopefully not ALL the time) But yes, even in a yoga class, even at the ocean, even before the alanon meeting. And once I stop looking for "safe havens" and simply walk through different spaces with grace and courage, adapting, with eyes open and sensitive to the environment, then I don't have to live like a wandering exile, compartmentalizing places and people into Safe and Unsafe, trusting This One with my firstborn and That One, not at all. They're just people, many sicker than others, many surprisingly sane and balanced. And they don't all have to like me and I don't have to like them. It's all an illuion anyway and two weeks later, does it really matter? So that's the good news.

ITS OKAY TO FEEL WEIRD ON THANKSGIVING

Sat Nam and Namaste. And as a yoga teacher to children and young adults, this is what I told them, while everyone else is telling them to "BE GRATEFUL!" Yeah, yeah.
I will, but not when you tell me to.
I never liked the "sitting around with relatives" part of this holiday - and I never ever could sit through a footbal game, and am thankful my family of origin felt the same way. Then there's the food. I like de-bunking fixed unexplained traditions. Having recently returned from New England and seen Plymouth, Mass for the first time - I got some facts straightened out. First, they ate seasonal vegetables mostly, venison, some foul and likely no turkey on the "Plimouth" Thanksgiving, which was actually a Harvest Feast. So I went out into my garden and picked everything that looked ready. So far on the menu - fried green tomatoes, squash, red potatoes and mixes greens. But this is a collaboration so we shall see what the other contingent brings to the table, if he ever wakes up.
I am big on not forcing the emotional imperative about any given holiday. I am grateful, yes and it's healthy for my nervous system to practice gratitude. But I am also sad and melancholy around this time, having lost a father and grandmother on Thanksgiving day in the past decade. And around Christmas, I just go into my conspiracy theories for a month, until it's over. On New Years Eve I read the Tibetan book of the Dead, The Talmud or the Bible and try to figure out who wrote them.
When moods come up around now, I don't squelch them anymore and put on that crazy happy face for the public or immediate family, nor do I have shame about being and feeling sad, mad, frustrated, muddled or anything else that isn't the popular emotional color of the Holiday. I am not a sheep, I am a human being with complexities and a history - I could never force myself to be pious on Sunday mornings, in a party mood on New Years Eve, totally grateful for having to cook on Thanksgiving, impish and precious on St. Patrick's Day and madly in love with my perfect partner on Valentine's Day. The gift of that is I get to be authentic and at one with (yoga = union) my Self. For example, I am going to sign off now and scream. Details to follow.
Blaire Baron Larsen
IKYTA RYT

JUMBO YOGA FOR YOUTH CLASS AT GOLDEN BRIDGE

What other yoga class for kids is over 90 minutes? Don't we all just assume kids won't last in a room that long with such a discipline? That is why kundalini yoga is ideal for children - it's all about moving!

The Sunday morning JUMBO yoga class at Golden Bridge (ages 6+) is the only class with enough time to really go deeper with students. Hence, this class is well known for its transformative effect on young people, sparking a desire in them to take up their own yoga practice at home. The children gather in a tribal circle and share on specific topics, then they play stimulating, ice-breaker games, developing especially the right hemisphere of the brain, then participate in a solid one hour yoga set ending with meditation and deep relaxation and a closing ceremony.
Blaire Baron Larsen teaches children ages 6+ Kundalini yoga all over Los Angeles. She is Yoga Director at both the City Ballet of L.A.(School) and L.A. Shakespeare Youth Festival.

THE MARATHON CLASS AT GOLDEN BRIDGE

Teaching the 9:30 Sunday class to children ages 6 - 14 at Golden Bridge for 5 years (and now again) was the best teaching experience for me in regards to how to keep children engaged for TWO HOURS. And these are children who don't necessarily want to be there. They are usually in this class because their parents are taking Gurmukh's class downstairs and they had no where to put them, or they want their children to fall in love with yoga the way they have. It is my job to give them an enjoyable experience that makes them want to come back and find their own relationship to yoga, their own journey with it. It always starts with ice-breaker games, which trick their brains. Suddenly they are having fun and opening up as a group. Even those who were determined not to participate or share, open up and reveal what is on their mind. After we have created a safe and comfortable dynamic as a group, then we start our yoga. And before we know it, the two hours is over and they are receiving their Yoga Stones for participating. I wish I had their childhood.

THE YOUNG PEOPLE'S WORKSHOP

THE YOUNG PEOPLE’S WORKSHOP is a 2 hour sanctuary for children 7-13, geared toward empowering them with options (primarily yogic tools) for handling the stress and challenges of Daily Life.

We cover some core issues in The Workshop, so first we must create a safe space through ice-breaker excercises. We address and express our bigger-than-life emotions, our "24/7" schedule, our work load and our current challenges with peers. We then role-play these scenarios, practicing different solutions on them - example - how and when to stand up to our perceived “oppressors.” We all have them.

Halfway through the session we are ready for yoga class, which includes a meditation and deep relaxation. The final results are a newly boosted self-esteem through the practice of ahimsa (non-harm) and “esteemable” acts, a new courage to stand up for ourselves and to admit our faults (versus placing blame, covering, or acting out) and a renewed connection and acceptance of our Selves that we lose every now and then by trying to please the world.

We hope to create a movement of youth, certain in themselves, as they face this uncertain world. Therefore, our students bring home with them the materials covered and contact information to stay in touch and follow up with any future issues that present themselves.

Next workshop in Los Angeles is set for July, location TBD. To be on the mailing list for THE WORKSHOP contact us at yogamidcity@gmail.com.