Types of Yoga Classes offered by Ashley Lord Yoga

Kundalini Yoga with Ashley: The Yoga of Awareness

This powerful yoga works to strengthen and balance all systems of the body (glandular, skeletal, immune, etc.). Connect with your breath and test your mental limits while you de-stress. This class will not only energize you , but also help you shape, tone and strengthen your entire body. Kundalini yoga works on growing your self-mastery so that you can can experience life from your highest consciousness and self.

This type of yoga combines Kriyas (movements/routines) with relaxation and meditation.

Hatha Yoga with Ashley: Style inspired by Moksha and Ashtanga

This toning, muscle building and well rounded yoga class will leave you sweating. From beginner to advanced student; put yourself to the challenge of movement. All classes end with a deep relaxation and optional meditation. 

Private Yoga Lessons with Ashley: A privately guided yoga class designed for you

Ashley will help you build a yoga practice that works for you! These sessions are tailored with your goals and focus in mind, while providing a safe and inviting experience for you to start or continue to grow your practice.

Ashley's Running and Yoga: A brief run followed by a yoga session

Designed specifically for runners or runners at heart that have not laced up their shoes yet; this yoga will concentrate on lengthening and strengthening the joints and muscles that are impacted during a run. Combining deep breathing techniques with long stretches "running and yoga" will completely balance the body. You will leave this class feeling energized, strong, satisfied, and ready for your next run!!

Power of Movement - Yoga Challenge

The Power of Movement is a Nation-wide fundraiser to raise money and awareness for Arthritis!
I have joined forces with Moksha Yoga Waterloo in hopes to collectively raise $2500.
We are challenging ourselves to 30 days of yoga - with everyone across Canada in the fundraiser, coming together on the 22nd of Feb. to practice yoga at our chosen studio!

Being part of this team is exciting and rewarding and I am looking forward to the challenge!

www.powerofmovement.ca

Chapter Six: The Life Fluid

Main Idea/Concept:

Blood is the life fluid that carries nourishment to all parts of the body. It is circulated throughout the body with the heart as its engine. Clean or new blood leaves the heart through the arteries and returns via veins which first go through a cleansing process in the lungs after picking up dead cells and waste etc from all parts of the body. Blood accounts for 1/10 a human’s body weight (in muscles, in circulatory –heart, lungs, arteries and veins, in tissues/organs, in the liver) (1/5 of all blood is utilized by the brain).

• Blood starts it journey in the arteries and branches outward from there down other canals, getting smaller and smaller until it is in the capillaries –
• Capillaries - resembling very tiny blood vessels – this brings the blood in close contact with the tissues – ex skin or tissues surrounding organs etc. The journey of waste, dead cells etc starts in the capillaries – continuing on through the veins.
• Lymph is another fluid that circulates through the system and resembles blood. It mingles with the blood in the large veins on its return to the heart
• Blood is what each of us make it in our body – as it is determined by the food we eat

New Concept:

I found it interesting just how much blood is in our bodies

Questions:

-How much blood surrounds the spinal cord? –Where and how does it surround it or nourish it?

Chapter Five: The Laboratory of the Body

Main Idea/Concepts:

The laboratory work depends on the organs of the digestive system to assimilate and nourish the body. Mastication is the initial process of the breakdown of food, the jaw (mandible) teeth and tongue manually break down the food into smaller pieces.

• salivary glands secrete saliva to moisten/saturate the food for swallowing commencing the digestion process. Saliva also converts starchy foods into sugar. The tongue – an organ of taste is one of the first gatekeepers – making judgments about which foods are let in the body.
• lower part of the throat (gullet) performs muscular contractions, pushing the food further down the passageway to the stomach (starchy food into sugars is also completed in this step of swallowing).
• stomach performs chemical changes – vitamins and nourishment is absorbed through the stomach wall and into the blood stream. It mixed the food around by churning it back and forth into pulpy matter – using about 1 gallon of gastric juices every 24 hours! Food leaves the stomach (as chyme) through a one way door (the pyloric valve) into the small intestine.
• *Dyspepsia – a fermentation process that upsets the regular functioning of the stomach may occur with bad eating habits. Food will not be broken down properly becoming an active “yeast pot” – glands becoming clogged, half digested food passes into the sml intestine, gradually resulting in the entire system becoming poisoned and improperly nourished
• Bile (produced in liver, housed in gallbladder) is secreted into the sml intestine from the gallbladder – it assists in readying/saturating fatty foods for absorption. Villi (plush like hairs on the inside of the sml intestine) make up the velvety lining and gradually push the semi-liquid food matter keeping it in constant motion while also aiding in absorption.

New Concept:

The proper use of teeth is an important hatha yoga principle. When a person consciously chews their food properly at the beginning of the digestion process it allows every other part of the process to run smoothly. It will not leave other organs to do its work and the work of the teeth. This is why people must take time to eat, enjoy food – not rush the process, as it does not make for a good digestive/nourishment transition in the body’s laboratory.

Questions:

Where does metabolism fit in? Is this how fast the stomach grinds or intestines move?

Do people that don’t gain visible fat on their bodies still have clogged arteries? Is the fat being stored in an alternate place?

Chapter Four: Our Friend, The Vital Force.

Main Idea or Concept:

There is a vital force within us that is constantly doing its best for our bodies. Disease is the way this vital force attacks our bodies to let it know something is out of line with nature. Heath is the natural state of man, and disease is the absence of health. When one complies with the laws of nature he cannot be sick. There are principles of this vital force that awaken the being and for those that believe the vital force exists, let flow naturally through the body knowing it is taking the course of action that is in the best interest of the body and mind. They aim to awaken their greatest state of health and repose great confidence in the force.

• The concept of self preservation is that humans naturally strive for survival.
• Male and female are naturally attracted to preserve the human race
• Man will sometimes go against civil behaviour and eat a comrade if stranded together – survival of the fittest
• Disease results to often rid the body of toxins as our behaviour may have allowed carelessness and shock to the system
• Damage is repaired in the body with this force – broken bone for ex.
• Health is life under normal conditions, disease is under abnormal conditions.
• In our way of life now, the vital force finds it hard to do right for us – we have unnatural diets, sleeping patterns, breathing habits etc. – it could be argued that we are without health

New Concept:

I was unaware that the yogi holds this principle of the vital force in such high regard. It makes sense that our society is arguably living in a state of non-health. Its amazing that everyone’s body does more or less the same when it comes to reconstruction and renewal, believers or non-believers of this force.

Questions:

Does the state of a male and female’s bodies at the time of conception (their state of health) directly affect or determine the state of health of the fetus or child? What is the likeliness that the disease will carry over to their baby?

So why do some diseases result in death? Why are those specific people dying, is there a force that controls that?

Chapter Three: The Work of the Devine Architect

Main Idea – Concepts:

The body is what it is because of the Intelligence behind it. God has given each person a physical machine (body) – to adapt to his needs – to fix if broken

Keeping this Intelligence in mind – the representation of the body as “issued/governed” by divine law – the yogi philosophy is to keep this “machine” functioning to its ideal health and strength. Maintaining the idea that there is always that intelligence presiding over every function of the body, that intelligence “the soul” needs to inhabit a fleshy body to prosper.

• when man goes against this divine law (intelligence), disharmony results and disease presents itself
• That Intelligence, what we call the manifestation of “nature” is how the body invites and rids disease.
• Disease is the body stepping away from the body’s natural cycle – warning signs that pieces have become out of alignment with nature
• The pieces though, can be put back on track – diseases are fought against by resorting back to nature – disease is a beneficial action to rid the poisons we have put in our system
• The soul needs the following (fulfilled by the body): a mind (brain) – still in evolution as much of the brain % is not used currently, nerves to connect between the brain and different parts of the body, means to communicate with nature, muscles to move around the world, a framework of muscles to keep it firm – give it strength

New Concept:

This entire chapter’s concept is somewhat new to me. I think of my body as a temple – and what I ingest or put in it (food, drink, medicine etc) ultimately results in different effects, but never before have I though of the concept of divine law. The idea of my body being governed by a force more powerful then my own mind is something I need to debate in more depth with myself at this time.

Questions:

Why then if each body is governed by its own divine do diseases pass from mother/father to child in conception?

Chapter Two: The Yogis’ Regard for the Physical Body

Main Idea & Concepts

Yogi’s believe the body is the “temple for the spirit” – they physical body is not in fact the “real man” – but rather a house that the spirit occupies and uses. In addition the development and care of this body is of utter importance. The development is ultimately regarded as coupled with the development of the mind. A strong mind needs a physically strong body and vise versa.

• A yogi would insist the body be brought under perfect control of the mind – the instrument is finely tuned to be responsive by the mater; the spirit.
• When the body is cared for and properly nourished only then can it undergo its highest form of transformation and development – its responsiveness flourishes.
• A yogi tries to attain control over the voluntary and involuntary parts of the body to breed mastery – every muscle, cell, organ is important
• To attain this control and mastery over the body is the ultimate goal – comparable to a master violinist’s conquering of famous compositions.

Interesting Concept:

A mastery over anything is an ultimate goal when practicing at something. It is the ability to achieve the highest possible connection to that feat with ease; because at the point of mastery it has become second nature. This concept when applied to the maintenance and development of the mind and body is an umbrella or starting point to achieving all the other imaginable goals. Master the mind and body – master the self and nothing is impossible anymore.

Questions:

Can we quantify the results – should such studies be conducted? Measuring for example the monetary success of those who practice yoga on a regular basis (living the hatha yoga philosophies) against those who do not?

Is it important to measure the benefits of yoga in such a way? Who is to determine this?

If research results with a higher number of person’s practicing on a regular basis achieve larger monetary success – is it ethical to use these facts and directly link them in marketing campaigns to sell “yoga for increased income”

Chapter One: What is Hatha Yoga?

Main Idea - Concepts

The yoga of physical well being, hatha is a branch of yoga that deals with the physical body – its care, its well being, its health, strength and all it takes to maintain a healthy body in as natural as state as possible.

• The body is like the temple for the spirit – the healthy body is the ultimate instrument for the spirit to “be”
• This book is not designed as a “doctor’s manual” but does touch upon important functions of the body – to provide reference to the “western” terms and diseases. The goal of hatha yoga is to venture back to the natural state – and to conquer illness/disease in such a way. No specific cures are mentioned only the concept that the body is eager to return to its natural state.
• It’s believed that what will keep a healthy man healthy will also turn an unhealthy man healthy.
• The following chapters in this book proceeds to detail what hatha yoga is – on the philosophy that any man or woman can follow the hatha yoga path to bring their body to a naturally healthy state. Entrusted is also the idea that if we observe a healthy man or woman’s habits – how they are as healthy as they appear, how they have combat illness – then we too can try to do the same.

New Concept:

There are such radical perceptions of the yogic lifestyle and how people define a “yogi”. Understandably yoga may appear as “foreign” to many westerners, but in India, the birthplace of yoga, there exist “yoga freaks” so they could be named. Those who pose as hatha yogi’s but do not have the slightest conception of the underlying principles of the yogic lifestyle. Gaining muscle control over the digestive organs – inserting objects in the anus to reverse the peristaltic action of the bowls – completely reversing the action of digestion. This is just one example of the fanaticism of these “false yogi’s pitied by real yogi’s who value the principles of hatha and include them in their life’s philosophies.