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  • Welcome
    • About Susan
  • Consultations
    • Yoga Therapy
    • Spiritual Guidance
    • Astrology
    • Ayurvedic Health Coaching
      • Vata
      • Pitta
      • Kapha
      • Recipes
    • Rapid Transformational Therapy
    • Yoga for Burnout
    • Payment details
  • Courses
    • Align with Purpose
    • Events
    • Plum Village English Speaking Sangha
    • Mindful Living Course
    • Mindful Parenting
    • Yoga at Work
    • Laughter Yoga
  • Blog
    • Videos
  • Extras
    • New to Yoga?
    • What is Yoga?
    • Meditation & Full Moon Meditations
    • Surya Namaskar
    • Mudra
    • Shanti Mantra
  • New! Teaching Yoga Book
  • Contact
  • Journey to Beautiful Bhutan!
Inspiration

Ancient wisdom, modern solutions

Susan Hopkinson

I'm a mother, teacher, writer, and astrologer helping people like you feel better in their body, mind and life.

  • A Meaningful Full Moon
    In Blog
  • Bearing Trauma
    In Blog
  • Truth or Dare?
    In Blog
  • Better late than never!
    In Blog
  • Coming to light
    In Blog
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Calming the mind

March 11, 2013 /

SUSAN

I help people like you feel better in their body, mind and life. You will get immediate, positive results to help you transform yourself and your life.

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  • A longtime student and friend passed away two weeks ago. In the absence of funeral arrangements, some of her friends gathered at her favourite Greek restaurant, with her scarf as her placeholder, along with some wine, flowers and a candle in her honour. In the most beautiful way, we found a bit of Maria in each other, although most of us were strangers to one another as the evening began. We laughed with each other the same way we used to laugh with her, and shared stories of our times with her. It’s really precious how life lives on through others. Thank you dear friend. 🥰🙏🏻
  • A blast from the past! The brochure from the free #internationalyogafestival that was held the same week as the crazily overpriced 11.11.11 Kundalini Festival (anecdotes from which are in my book) -$1111 (USD)! Surinder Singh Jassal was the only real Sikh there, and he wasn’t asked to teach at the Kundalini Festival (whites only, please). Instead, he taught desi yoga for free 🙏🏻😉Learned a good lesson there 🤣 These are the gems that pop up when doing a good clean out. 😊 #yogajourney #yoga #whatisyoga
  • A new lunar cycle starts today with the new moon in Gemini. Some of you might not know that I’m also a professional astrologer since 2013. In the spirit of chatty and experimental Gemini, I thought I’d share some thoughts on it here. Take your cues from Gemini at this moment and skip lightly through your life, regardless of what is happening now - it won’t last! Changes that we have decided on in April and May are going to be triggered throughout the summer by the upcoming lunar cycles. The results will be seen in September and October, so continue to refine your plans and work towards the outcomes you’d like to see as of September and October. For the rest of the year until the exact conjunction of Saturn and Pluto in January, each new moon configuration will be relating to this energy of profound change and upheaval. Continuing with the theme of unpredictability, the best solution to going forward is to keep an open mind and have a sense that what you thought you could rely on previously might no longer be reliable. This doesn’t have to be a bad thing necessarily, as change can often bring very positive results and can stimulate us to think about challenges in new and creative ways. Mars is conjunct the North Node which is energising your sense of direction and purpose. Don’t look for lasting commitment now, things are shifting. Think of each choice as a step forward not as the ultimate destination. We are changing for the long run so there’s no need to have all the answers now. Recognising that your life and society are changing at the same time leads to a lot of moving parts. It’s all part of the process of massive change we have been undergoing over these past few years and continues dramatically in 2020. Enjoy the ride! 😄😎🙏🏻 . . . . . #new moon #astrology #gemini #transformation #astrologer #tropicalzodiac
  • Hé zeg! My book is now available at #raaklijn in Bruges! ☺️ Right next to the healing hands of Barbara Brennan 😉 #bookstagram #teachingyoga #yogabook #yoga #bruges
  • The quiet work of nature is all around us. It’s been a while since I’ve stopped to just observe the genius of other creatures like this.🐛🌝 #slowdown #mindfulness #natureinthecity #happyjune
  • Going home after a wonderfully rich weekend! With Shantala @veda_belgium and @expatclub #krakow #friends #lovetotravel
  • A full-spectrum emotional visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau on this mercifully sunny spring Sabbath day. We have long forgotten how this all began. The seeds are still sprouting all around us. Either all of us are worthy or none of us are. 🙏🏻
  • Today is Buddha Purnima, the full moon celebrating the life of Siddharta Gautama, the Buddha. Because there is no known date of birth for the historical Buddha, the full moon in May (technically the month of Vaisakh, which sometimes lands in Gregorian April) is traditionally considered his birthday, and is known as Buddha Jayanti or Vesak in India. Probably the most important of all the Buddha’s teachings is dependent arising. Nothing exists separately from everything else - as Thich Nhat Hanh says, what you think of as ‘you’ is entirely made up of non-you elements. Forms can only (appear to) arise when conditions - the various components - are right, and seem to disappear when conditions are no longer right. Life is defined by both impermanence and emptiness. Understanding that our existence is entirely dependent on the fleeting existence of other factors leads us to care as much about those (apparently) external things as we do for our (apparently) individual selves, while at the same time seeing they are always changing. Thây worked for a long time to write a clear and accessible translation of the Heart Sūtra (in the image) which expresses this truth, completing it less than two months before his debilitating stroke. All problems in our lives and in the world today stem from not recognising dependent arising - which is another way of describing emptiness. How might you change your thoughts and actions with this in mind? #fullmoon #buddhapurnima #buddha #thichnhathanh #vesak
  • As both students and teachers, we need to question everything we learn and put it to the test in our own practice before sharing it with others. If there’s any disagreement or controversy surrounding what we have learned or are teaching, we should seek to understand the reasons for this with humility and curiosity. Learning from those who disagree with us enriches our teaching, and legitimate teachers and practices will stand up to strong scrutiny without stirring up defensiveness. If a teacher cannot explain why something (especially something unusual) must be done a particular way, wait until further evidence supports the practice before sharing it. Cloaking things with the aura of mystery is not advanced yoga, it is Manipulation 101. 🙏🏻 From Teaching Yoga in an Upside-Down World 🙏🏻#teachingyoga #yogateaching #yogateacher #yoga #yogabook

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Instagram

  • A longtime student and friend passed away two weeks ago. In the absence of funeral arrangements, some of her friends gathered at her favourite Greek restaurant, with her scarf as her placeholder, along with some wine, flowers and a candle in her honour. In the most beautiful way, we found a bit of Maria in each other, although most of us were strangers to one another as the evening began. We laughed with each other the same way we used to laugh with her, and shared stories of our times with her. It’s really precious how life lives on through others. Thank you dear friend. 🥰🙏🏻
  • A blast from the past! The brochure from the free #internationalyogafestival that was held the same week as the crazily overpriced 11.11.11 Kundalini Festival (anecdotes from which are in my book) -$1111 (USD)! Surinder Singh Jassal was the only real Sikh there, and he wasn’t asked to teach at the Kundalini Festival (whites only, please). Instead, he taught desi yoga for free 🙏🏻😉Learned a good lesson there 🤣 These are the gems that pop up when doing a good clean out. 😊 #yogajourney #yoga #whatisyoga
  • A new lunar cycle starts today with the new moon in Gemini. Some of you might not know that I’m also a professional astrologer since 2013. In the spirit of chatty and experimental Gemini, I thought I’d share some thoughts on it here. Take your cues from Gemini at this moment and skip lightly through your life, regardless of what is happening now - it won’t last! Changes that we have decided on in April and May are going to be triggered throughout the summer by the upcoming lunar cycles. The results will be seen in September and October, so continue to refine your plans and work towards the outcomes you’d like to see as of September and October. For the rest of the year until the exact conjunction of Saturn and Pluto in January, each new moon configuration will be relating to this energy of profound change and upheaval. Continuing with the theme of unpredictability, the best solution to going forward is to keep an open mind and have a sense that what you thought you could rely on previously might no longer be reliable. This doesn’t have to be a bad thing necessarily, as change can often bring very positive results and can stimulate us to think about challenges in new and creative ways. Mars is conjunct the North Node which is energising your sense of direction and purpose. Don’t look for lasting commitment now, things are shifting. Think of each choice as a step forward not as the ultimate destination. We are changing for the long run so there’s no need to have all the answers now. Recognising that your life and society are changing at the same time leads to a lot of moving parts. It’s all part of the process of massive change we have been undergoing over these past few years and continues dramatically in 2020. Enjoy the ride! 😄😎🙏🏻 . . . . . #new moon #astrology #gemini #transformation #astrologer #tropicalzodiac
  • Hé zeg! My book is now available at #raaklijn in Bruges! ☺️ Right next to the healing hands of Barbara Brennan 😉 #bookstagram #teachingyoga #yogabook #yoga #bruges
  • The quiet work of nature is all around us. It’s been a while since I’ve stopped to just observe the genius of other creatures like this.🐛🌝 #slowdown #mindfulness #natureinthecity #happyjune
  • Going home after a wonderfully rich weekend! With Shantala @veda_belgium and @expatclub #krakow #friends #lovetotravel

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RECENT POSTS

  • A Meaningful Full Moon
    In Blog
  • Bearing Trauma
    In Blog
  • Truth or Dare?
    In Blog

Categories

  • Blog (139)
  • Events (27)
  • Featured (11)
  • Uncategorized (2)
  • Videos (3)
  • Workshops (3)
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