Tonight!   Funky Friday at 6:45, regular class rates apply.

Tomorrow, free Q&A for the yoga teacher training at 3:30

Sunday, 108 Sun Salutations at 3:45, regular class rates apply.

See . . . → Read More: Weekend Events!]]> Don’t forget, events each day this weekend.

Tonight!   Funky Friday at 6:45, regular class rates apply.

Tomorrow, free Q&A for the yoga teacher training at 3:30

Sunday, 108 Sun Salutations at 3:45, regular class rates apply.

See you soon!

Alex

May 3rd 6:45 . . . → Read More: Funky Friday, this Friday 6:45pm at Kaivalya!]]> Flow Yoga/Trance Dance/Healing Breath – 50 minutes of warm vinyasa nights – Flow Yoga, followed by 50 minutes of Ecstatic Trance Dance, ending with in a 10 minute blissed-out Savasana.  All levels of experience welcome!

May 3rd 6:45 – 8:45pm Kaivalya

Transition to Spring by completing the 108 Sun Salutations mala. Most people who have done this say they feel even 10X better from it than a yoga . . . → Read More: 108 Sun Salutations this Sunday! (3:45p)]]> Get rid of finals stress, prepare for finals, or get the best detoxing of your life!!! , and cleanse … at 3:45 this Sunday… a special class!

Transition to Spring by completing the 108 Sun Salutations mala. Most people who have done this say they feel even 10X better from it than a yoga class! The constant rhythm creates some amazing detoxing.
You can work to your body’s capacity, but I promise, if you can do 25 Sun Salutations… and be mindful you can do 108! (This is my 38th time leading this class and this has been the consensus).
This will be handled as a regular yoga class… drop in or use your package.
For about 3000 years, yogis have done 108 malas or ‘countings’ at the seasonal shifts. There is a sacred significance to 108 in many spiritual traditions. (54 letters in the sanskrit alphabet x 2). For instance, there are 108 beads in the mala (beads) and the rosary. Whether or not you put much into the 108 number (I don’t per say), this is a great way to transition to the new season! As we practice this meditative flow, we burn off the impurities of yesterday and come into the light of the sun more vibrant than before.

Challenge yourself to complete a traditional yoga mala.

Looking forward to seeing you Sunday at 3:45pm.

I will be hosting a Yin Yoga Workshop this Sunday at 3:45pm.   What is Yin Yoga?  … you might be thinking – it may be, quite simply, the deepest opening yoga of them all.  If you’re looking to get rid of stress and if you’re looking for flexibility, yin yoga is the ultimate focus . . . → Read More: Open Deep – Yin Yoga Workshop on Sunday]]> Hi Kaivalyaites!

I will be hosting a Yin Yoga Workshop this Sunday at 3:45pm.   What is Yin Yoga?  … you might be thinking – it may be, quite simply, the deepest opening yoga of them all.  If you’re looking to get rid of stress and if you’re looking for flexibility, yin yoga is the ultimate focus on both of those.

This workshop works deeply into muscles and connective tissues through extended holds of postures. It is the perfect class for meditators & those who lack flexibility because we will work deeply into the connective tissues and the joints. These are the deep yin tissues of the body, relative to the more superficial yang tissues of muscles and skin. Yin Yoga opens up these deep, dense, rarely touched areas.

Most forms of Yoga practiced in the U.S. are Yang; they emphasize muscular movement, contraction, and stabilization (all of which are important). Yin Yoga targets the connective tissue especially in the hips, pelvis and lower spine, and emphasizes deep tissue opening and restoration. This type of practice complements the more muscular styles of Yoga like Bikram, Hatha, & Vinyasa Flow.

Years of a dedicated asana practice will make anyone healthier, stronger, and more flexible, but at some point the muscles will have reached their limit of flexibility. New depths in postures, deeper ranges of motion, or an increased flow of energy may only be achievable by focusing on the deeper tissues of the body. This is why so many students are finding Yin Yoga to be the perfect compliment and balance to their more active, yang practices. For most, this class is one of the most challenging, yet totally relaxing experiences they have.

Look forward to seeing you Sunday!

Members $10

Non-Members $22

To others its a left over relic from a medieval and superstitious period in yoga’s history.

Actually, its neither.

We all know that yoga affects not just our body, but also our state of mind.  As a matter of fact, you can’t really affect one without affecting the other.  This body-mind connection is . . . → Read More: What is the Chakra System?]]> To some its an other worldly spiritual realm.

To others its a left over relic from a medieval and superstitious period in yoga’s history.

Actually, its neither.

We all know that yoga affects not just our body, but also our state of mind.  As a matter of fact, you can’t really affect one without affecting the other.  This body-mind connection is why you feel so damn good after a yoga class; and feel good in a way that is much different than the good feeling of a run or other form of exercise.

Yoga has attuned itself to this connection and has evolved as a physical activity not designed to lift the most weight or get somewhere the fastest, but to bring you into a more spacious state of mind.  You have have noticed yoga allows you to, at times, cruise through mental and emotional blocks that once held you back.  Or you may have noticed yoga inviting you to a place in yourself beyond your thought, emotion, and conditioned way of being.

The ancient yogis figured much of this out years ago and put together a very sophisticated map of the mind-body connection.  The Chakras are not otherworldly.  They are here, in this flesh, in this bone, in this world now.  Not in the way that a pancreas is in your body, but in the way that poetry comes from your human heart and mind.  The Chakras are about the experience of being human, a metaphor for the deepest ways a human being can become more, and they are very real.

I will be leading a teacher training caliber (but open to the public) weekend on the Chakras from Feb 22 – 24. In this weekend, you’ll explore this primordial spiritual psychology.  In theory, and more importantly – you will be taken through the subtle openings in your body that allow self-integration and healing to complete.  I’ll be covering the primary psychological stumbling blocks and potentials for joy in this human ride.  If you are interested in getting a tangible experience of your chakras; if you want to learn more about what this system means to the practice on your mat; please join us!

Check Out More On the Weekend Here

This workshop, like every workshop we do has a 100% Money Back Guarantee No questions asked and no disapproval or judgments   If you don’t believe this is worth every penny you paid, if it doesn’t rock your world, we’ll refund you all the way.  There’s no reason to miss!

So, am I saying that I don’t believe energies exist?  That its all merely metaphor?  Before I answer that question, let me say this.  We will cover energy.  By energy, I do not mean anything other worldly.  I mean something very tangible in your moment to moment experience - YOUR LIFE FORCE.  YOUR VITALITY.    That is the important part – your moment-to-moment existence.  Are there actually energies within that science cannot detect (yet) or is all this Chakra stuff an artful way to talk about what’s going on in the physical body?  My first answer is that it doesn’t matter.  Whether science discovers spiritual energies or whether science proves that it is all going on in the nervous and endocrine systems will not change the fact that the model has worked for over a thousand years and it relevance to bodymind connection.  You don’t have to “believe” it at all.  Personally, I tentatively believe there is something going on beyond what we currently accept in mainstream science, but if I’m proven wrong, it won’t matter because, like acupuncture  the model works.  It is within your moment-to-moment experience.  In other words, the Chakras are not beyond your body, they are deeper through your body.

“The body asks only to be loved, lived, and illuminated. It is not some rigidly separate, self-existing mass but is continuous—and not just elementally—with all that is, at essence being but precipitated Being, spun from gravity and boundless light. The body is not just matter! (And for that matter, matter is not just matter.) The body is not a burden with which we’ve been saddled, nor is it an obstruction to realizing our true nature. Whatever its wrapping, our body is a gift. We need to shift from having a body to being a body, and from being a body to Being. In permitting a fuller, saner embodiment of our essential nature, we make possible a deeper life for ourselves, a life in which we cannot help but breathe integrity into our stride, developing a deep intimacy with all that we are.”   — Robert Augustus Masters

This weekend will revolutionize how you see your body and your practice on the mat.  Go beyond the “body-mind . . . → Read More: Chakras On the Mat : Transformation East Meets West Weekend Workshop]]> To Read:   “What is the Chakra System”  – click here first.

Full Weekend or by Session at Kaivalya Yoga 777 University Ave.    February 22nd – 24th, 2013  with Alex Pfeiffer & Sunday Evening guest teacher Keith Borden

This weekend will revolutionize how you see your body and your practice on the mat.  Go beyond the “body-mind connection” as an abstraction or generalization, and embody it to a dozen layers of your self!  This weekend will be a unique perspective on the Chakras as it will come largely from Alex’s personal experience working with the Chakras as a yoga teacher and bodyworker and will reference only those areas that he has confirmed with other such practitioners and / or psychological studies from developmental psychology.

Friday February 22nd

One Evening Session

Session 1  :  The Chakra System as Potentiality and Development, 7 – 10pm

Alex gives an introduction to the Chakra System that will integrate modern psychology, western scientific research, and Human Anatomy into this ancient Tantric system.   Learn the keys of bridging east and west and begin to make more sense of consciousness, energy, and spirituality in their ground of everything it means to be human… the physical body.

Saturday February 23rd

3 Sessions

2  :  Mat Practice ”Grounding & Pleasure” for Chakras 1 & 2,  9am – 11:30am

We continue to explore the body’s connection to human experience.  Have you ever felt “ungrounded” or that your were somehow becoming numb to life’s pleasures?   In this morning practice you will be guided through a restoration of your foundational existence using the principles you learned on Friday:  Grounding with openness to your primal capacities to experience pleasure.

3  :  Love, Empowerment, and the Authetic Self,  12:30 – 2:40pm

Alex presents the Chakra System in more detail as it concerns the development of living a connected life.  We will navigate some of the most significant paradoxes on this road such as how can Compassion co-exist when you’re angry?   … Is it co-dependence or authentic Compassion?   Love is a tricky path to follow without a map.

4  :   Mat Practice ”Human Potential” for Chakras 3 & 4, 2:50 – 5pm

We pick up where we left off with a practice for the heart and ego.  Experience why these two ultimately need each other and amplify your raw energy to engage relationships, deep confidence, boundaries, direction, and empathy.

Sunday February 23rd

3 Sessions

5  :  Transpersonal Path : Starting Over to Embrace Your Full Humanity  9a – 11:30

Alex completes his presentation on the Chakra System by opening up the transpersonal levels of this system.  These Chakras are the foundation from which we discover our true identity moment-to-moment, and where we can make a pivot from our Unique Self to open radically to unqualifiable isness.

6  :  Mat Practice ”Intuition & Creativity” for Chakras 5, 6, & 7, 11:45a – 2:15pm

Join us for the most unique and full yoga practice of the weekend.  Particularly for those who’ve been through the entire weekend, this practice will be the culmination where we are no longer in the domain of ‘body-mind connection’ but, instead, in the domain of ‘bodymind’.

7  :  Chakra Sequencing with guest instructor Keith Borden, 3:45 – 6:45pm

And now that we’ve traveled through the whole Chakra System, Keith takes us home by sharing how to sequence your home practice or (for teachers!) your class, in order to find that miraculous “more than the sum of its parts”  result that will make every practice connect to deeper layers of being.  There is more to our existence than our physical bodies of levers and pulleys.  You will have learned that there is a vast, multi-layered subtle body of which the physical is simply the most familiar and visible. With this in mind we can build an asana practice designed to go deeper than this outer costume as we discuss the body’s energy centers or chakras, and how to use them and positively affect them through the asana practice.

We look forward to you joining us for this very unique and insightful weekend!

Per Session Price: $35  early bird  (by Feb 19), $45 after
Full Weekend Price: $199 early bird  for all 7 Sessions!  (by Feb 19), $259 after

Catalog prices applicable for RYS200 Trainees.

Sign up at Kaivalya Front Desk, with Alex in person, or email:   alex@integralnest.com

Alex Pfeiffer has been exploring the chakra system through bodywork and yoga since being certified in both in 2004.  He has experienced its power first hand as a method of healing old wounds and as a source of energy from which to live life from a vibrant place.

Keith Borden has been the lead instructor with Laughing Lotus Yoga College, training yoga teachers since 2007.  We are honored to have him bring his expertise of sequencing using the Chakras to our training in downtown Madison!

This workshop, like every workshop we do has a 100% Money Back Guarantee No questions asked and no disapproval or judgments   If you don’t believe this is worth every penny you paid, if it doesn’t rock your world, we’ll refund you all the way.  There’s no reason to miss!

From 9am to 12:15, I’ll be running a workshop on Hot/Detox Yoga.   In this workshop, I’ll be teaching  you how to use yoga, particularly hot yoga to get the most out of  your detoxing..  Plus, get a rockin’ 3 hour detox session and . . . → Read More: Hot Detox Yoga Master Class on Saturday!]]> Come join me at 9am on Saturday Morning for a special Master Class!

From 9am to 12:15, I’ll be running a workshop on Hot/Detox Yoga.   In this workshop, I’ll be teaching  you how to use yoga, particularly hot yoga to get the most out of  your detoxing..  Plus, get a rockin’ 3 hour detox session and get your semester started  fully cleaned!

Workshop prices are 2 classes ($10 members)