Here is Growning Younger podcast #7 where Regula describes Ted’s job offer last July (yes, it’s been that long since our last podcast), the return of her MS, letting go and selling her house, suicidal dreams and thoughts, love from her clients and with her children, the move to Portland, and ultimately acceptance.
Here is Growing Younger podcast #6 where Regula talks about recent experiences with Sung Baek, Glen Phillips, tantra, and wholeness.
Here’s the latest podcast, Growing Younger #5: Commitment to Life
Regula and I sat down this evening to record Growing Younger #4, where we discussed her statement “I get excited when I see health,” her way of teaching, her upcoming volunteering with the MS Society, and the questions “Do you want to heal?” and if so “How?”.
We have a couple of new offerings for the spring at Regula’s Joy of Movement:
Children’s Pilates Fit (ages 8-14): Kids, this makes you feel good! And you get stronger and healthier. It relaxes you after a busy day at school. Parents, read what it says for the kids and know that it relaxes your child’s muscles in the back, therefore letting them grow with support from their core preventing misalignment (such as scoliosis) as they grow. Once they reach teenage years, Pilates Fit is a great way to focus on who they really are, giving them confidence and a strong self-image.
Integrative Restoration iRest (Yoga Nidra): For health, healing and awakening, iRest is a form of meditative self-inquiry which we engage for many reasons: to induce deep relaxation throughout the body and mind, eliminating stress, overcome insomnia, solve personal and interpersonal problems, resolve trauma, neutralize and overcome anxiety, fear, anger and depression as well as to enter deep meditation in order to unravel the mystery of life, and answer such questions as “Who am I?”, “Why am I?”, “What is all of this?”, and “What is enlightenment?”
MS Fit: Hope arises and strengthens by taking charge of your body again. With the help of other people with MS, learning from each other, and Regula (who has MS), sharing and guiding all that she knows: Pilates Reformer, aligning and strengthening the legs with precision; yoga, building awareness and trusting the innate support within the body (core, from which arms and legs originate), with the help of props; and much more.
After two weeks with this bad cold/flu. I started burning my periferal nerve and my dantien again, only this time, I was more sane. I figured out to burn the size of my pinky finger (not the size of my thumb), which actually was the advice of Dr. Baek. And though it did hurt, it was tolerable. Was it that I had to go through one and a half months overdoing it so that it now is a piece of cake? Maybe. Does it matter? No.
I used to lose my scab over the dantien daily. To start burning the next day, I had to create ashes from burning moxa to cover up the open wound. The trouble was, within the ashes there seemed to be some unburned moxa and when I burned the next pyramid, it sizzled into the ashes. I never shared how burning so big on the dantien, with the daily open wound killed my intimacy life. I was raw and needed time to heal, which I never did.
What I’ve now figured out is that when I keep the scab, intimacy before burning works very well. Hooray! I can do it now every day, all 5 points (9 piles each) take me half an hour, and I can listen to some meditative music and meditate myself while I do it. I really appreciate that half hour. Its like coming home.
Can you believe it? Two MS patients recently contacted me and were asking for movement therapy. One of them is traveling a lot, therefore inconsistent wtih the therapy. The otehr one is coming twice a week, for the last three weeks. I do with her what I know has helped me. From working on the chair with a ball between my thighs, to working standing on the wall, pressing my hands on the wall, lifting and lowering my heals, working on the reformer, leg work and leg circles, to neck release on the Functional Integration table. It’s hard work! But I love it.
This week, the lovely consistent lady came with me to see Dr. Neighbors. She had not read my blog. When John simply started to burn those five points, she kind of freaked out. “Will it hurt? How long does it take?.” I told her, “Just one breath.” And she said, “I know how long you breathe in one breath!” So we both had a chuckle.
John treated her the way he treats me, with the needles in the head, neck and bladder meridians, connecting the brain to the body and the body to the brain. John said to me, “I want you to do this for her.” Yes, I had gone to accupuncture classes for one year. And yes, I have received many brain treatments now. So I just need to trust myself, that I can replicate this, on someone else.
I simply feel good, to help others with MS. I don’t feel like I know more than they do about the lack of feelings in their legs. I’ve tried many different avenues, just like they have. We went for a second accupuncture treatment today so I could write down the path of the needles. I had taken moxa, insence and lighter with me to burn on her. She looked at me and said, “I told my mom that I’m doing this. And I told her that when I got burned, I felt it! It’s pretty amazing.”
When I opened my email this evening, I had an email from a friend in New York, telling me that her 32 year old sister just got diagnosed with MS and they both are very distraught. She was asking for listening and talking. I’m honored. Now I say, love creates me in my perfection. May this be the same for you.
It was just about a year ago that Regula started talking about her MS for the first time (after more than 25 years). She started telling her students, her friends, talking with her family, telling people in her life. That talking led us to local MS support group meetings, her moxa treatment, this blog, and to an activation of Regula’s long-held desire to help others with MS. The problem with not talking, of course, is that you can’t help others and they can’t help you, because neither one of you knows you both have the same disease. Now that Regula’s been talking so much, and acting on that desire to help others, including putting MS Fit classes on her studio schedule, people with MS are drawn to her, either directly through Google or through their friends and relatives. Its really fun to watch! I encourage you to talk as well, and act.
Regula’s been back to work for a few days after her Restorative iRest (Yoga Nidra) retreat and this conversation is about integration (back to work and iRest into her work).
Regula is back from her Yoga Nidra retreat. We talk about her experience there in this netcast. Please let us know what you think!
Regula and I recorded Growing Younger #1 this afternoon. The plan is for this to be first in a series, where Regula talks about her life with MS, what she’s learned, and what’s happening now. Please add comments to this post to tell us what you think, or if you have questions you’d like to us to cover in a future episode.
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