Eco-Chick · The modern girl's guide to living green & fabulous.

“Adventures in Om” in September Whole Living magazine

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by Starre Vartan · 08/18/11

Check out the September, 2011 issue of Whole Living magazine (on newsstands now!), wherein I’ve put together a few great destinations that combine yoga and fun adventures like horseback riding, rock climbing and surfing. I researched a number of cool retreats and getaways that combine some of our fave adventure activities with yoga programs specifically designed to accompany them. And check out that fantastic picture of the woman on the horse!

adventure, health, travel, wellness, yoga

Westport Connecticut’s Kaia Yoga: For a New Year Filled with Health and Peace

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by Starre Vartan · 01/14/11

Recently, I had the chance to check out the newest Kaia Yoga in Westport, Connecticut (there’s two locations in Greenwich too), and walked away from my visit with the wonderful post-yoga calm and a pleasantly full belly.

The former was due to an invigorating Vinyasa class in a gorgeously lit studio; the latter was the direct result of a smorgasbord of raw, mostly-vegan foods and juices I had the opportunity to try while I spoke with the center’s co-founder, Stan Woodman (the other half of the team is his wife, Gina Norman).

“The practice of yoga is a detox itself,” Stan told me. “When you do yoga, you are really feeling your body, and you can really feel how bad food affects you, so you make different choices.” The juices on offer, which are made fresh daily and can be taken to go or enjoyed in the super sunny cafe area (Yep, it has WiFi!), are the next step in ridding the body of toxins after a good practice. The center offers 1, 2, and 3 day juice cleanses too, a great way to kickstart a spring refresh (or get back on your New Year’s Resolutions bandwagon).

Food from the Westport Kaia Yoga mostly raw, veggie cafe.
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fitness, health, wellness, yoga

Connecting with Nature through TreeYoga

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by Alicia Lubowski-Jahn · 01/02/09

TreeYoga Inversions in Wimberley, Texas

Husband and wife Hal Preussner and Debra Pruessner have taken yoga to new heights with the TreeYoga Multi-Sling (TYMS) and founding of TreeYoga.  An alternative to the posh treehouses by builder Roderick Romero ($50,000+) or the towering elevations of tree climbing, TreeYoga offers yogis a bare-bones, gentle arboreal experience.  The padded slings support practitioners to hang loose and find steady footing on tree trunks and the surrounding ground.

As in the yoga posture (asana) of the Tree Pose (Vrksasana), TreeYoga beckons us to reflect upon a core principle of yoga — balance.  Like trees, yogis can now root themselves into the earth and extend gloriously up to the sky.  There is great beauty and playfulness in the flowering shapes of yogis sprouting from trees.

Trees also offer a profound lesson in the quieting and stilling of the mind, another aim of yoga. Contemporary spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle has described meditating on natural forms as a method to find presence: “Look at a tree, a flower, a plant.  Allow nature to teach you stillness.”  (Stillness Speaks, 2003, p. 5).  Indeed, it was beneath the sheltering Bodhi tree that, for Buddhists, Siddhartha Gautama became the Buddha (“the Enlightened one”).

Core Strengthening Using TYMS. Helen Stutchbury, Yoga Instructor, and Debra Pruessner on an old oak tree at White Rock Lake, Dallas, TX

Connecting with nature as a spiritual practice has implications for environmental consciousness and action.  TreeYoga has helped strengthen this link between earth-friendly living by taking the mat outdoors and into nature.  Tarzan would approve.

Debra Pruessner, Colorado Yoga Journal Conference, Estes Park

Previously posted on mebegreen.

trees, yoga

Simple Ways to a Green 2008 Holiday

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by Kimberly Jordan Allen · 12/21/08

Every year there are things we do to minimize the consumptive haze. This year, with the economy being what it is and people mowing each other down at Wal-Mart, many are choosing alternatives to corporate Christmas debris. Here are some of the tips that help my family to slow down, enjoy each other and breathe.

1. Get Outside: This is always the number one answer for us. When cabin fever settles in or the air is getting stale, we head for the wild. Today we took our screaming toddlers for a cross-country ski. The gray sky broke as the sun set behind snow-covered trees. My son, who only has a few words (mama, dada, eat, lulu doggie) said “Weeeeeeee” as my husband glided on the snow. Moments like this make it worthwhile.

2. Avoid wasting energy with lights, inflatable snowmen and massive automated plastic snowglobes (these strange spheres that send styrofoam snow in circles are perhaps one of the signs of the capitalistic Apocalypse?)

3. Make stuff: This year I made my tahini, garlic, lemon dressing for friends. My hubby makes a mean roasted butternut squash soup with garlic, ginger and cinnamon and we put it in mason jars with a bow. I have friends who knit, make homemade lip balm, and create art to share with loved ones.

4. If you use Christmas trees, there are several sustainable options. One choice is to use a potted tree. If you don’t want to keep it after the holiday, you can find a planter who will take the tree. Here is a great resource page on how to manage live trees. Some municipalities collect trees for mulching. Use Earth 911 to find your local waste management. Fresh Christmas Tree is a great place to find sustainably harvested trees, but by this time of year they are usually sold out. They might be able to refer you to local farms that are growing trees responsibly.

5. Recycle Wrapping: instead of spending money on wrapping I actually save old wrapping and ribbons. Gift bags get used multiple times in our house. Re-gifting is also a really good way to avoid wasteful spending.

6. Donate to a cause: For those who don’t need ‘stuff,’ giving to local charities is a great way to give a gift with meaning.

7. Give an experience: Yoga classes, massage, theater tickets, or an afternoon of hiking…

Here is an excellent resource for other environmentally conscious holiday ideas. Mahalo!
Wishing everyone warmth for the season.

bags, charities, Christmas, dress, Energy, farm, farms, giving, Hiking, holiday, Home, homemade, local, mom, Outdoors, plastic, recycle, soup, sustainable, Tea, trees, waste, yoga

The Green Yoga Association

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by Courtney Tenz · 05/05/08

Last summer, totally by chance, I met David Lurey, a traveling yoga teacher who preaches the values of being a green yogi. As a member of the Green Yoga Association, Lurey travels to studios around the world and consults teachers, students, and owners alike on how to make the yoga practice more environmentally friendly.

After Lurey left, I started working with a local yoga studio to help them green their practice and embarked on some research that eventually culminated in an article that appears in the Jan/Feb issue of E Magazine. Check out the article or have a look at the Green Yoga Association’s website if you want to know more about their philosophy – a sound one, I think.

One of the problems I’ve encountered, though, over the last few months of research and consultation is that, as with nearly everything else in the world, people are slapping the label “green” on yoga and not doing much to actually make it earth friendly. Or the steps some have been taking are baby steps … whatever works best without their having to change much of anything. Nothing infuriated me more at a recent “green yoga” conference than to listen to Nicki Doane and Eddie Modestini, who run an incredible sustainable studio on Maui, speak eloquently about the changes people can make to their everyday lives to be more sustainable while the conference organizers handed out plastic bottles of water – plastic that would, eventually, get burned according to local recycling rules (this is not an unusual thing so if this offends you, check with your local recycler to see if that’s what eventually becomes of your plastic bottles).

Instead of getting mad, though, I decided it’s time I help nudge this green yoga movement along by posting a few things to do to green your yoga practice that don’t involve buying anything. Though I devised this after talking to members of the GYA, it’s important to note that these are not their guidelines nor would they necessarily agree with me on all of this. I am a hard-core eco freak who does yoga not a hard core yogi who’s interested in all things eco and these guides reflect that preferential order.
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fitness, yoga