by Havah Shaw, Certified Ma Yoga® Instructor
Having experienced more than my fair share of trauma in my life, I was often times in need of tools without awareness that I needed tools – or that tools for such things even existed. Spending about eight years of my life in India taught me clearly that if we focus on the light the rest will fall away.
However, the shadows are real. It appears we carry the samskaras lifetime after lifetime until we do the work. Having tools to look at them with objectivity and some degree of understanding is helpful. But the most important step it seems, is learning to be present with what is and allow these long-buried secrets to rise up to the surface.
We heal that which we have awareness of (and sometimes that which we don’t). But the awareness is key. Not necessarily that we have to name these energies. But certainly clearing and transmuting them is a big part of the work. These energies have been invited and granted permission to be seen through my practice of yoga.
Ma Yoga is to me a mix of the strongest yang style yoga with the softest, most yin awareness-based practice. In fact, in diving deep into Ma Yoga, there is an opportunity for freedom and deep presence. And the steps Jessica teaches to achieve a Ma Yoga experience appear to facilitate a depth of awareness of healing in a way that is unique and effective.
My own Ma Yoga experience as a teacher trainee has unfolded much like a labor and birth. The person I am today is a deeper, more present, cleaner, freer, more spiritual version of me compared to when I started out. This unfolding has been supported and held by Jess and others in the Ma Yoga community. Being honest about the qualities of the feminine, honoring the divine feminine within me, and following the steps of creating space, connecting to earth as an effortless source of strength, getting playful and silly while being flowy like water, deeply grounding our power (fire), and then rising up in freedom to offer my gifts (air).
There has been deep healing for me through the process of becoming well versed in Ma Yoga. I already had more than a thousand hours of teacher training.
Many in transformational healing. However, there is something unique and wonderful about the Ma Yoga process that allows, in a way, body-centered awareness therapy and mindfulness without hard and fast strictness or rules. I love it. And I am grateful to be a part of this sweet, beautiful community.
