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YOGUE

YOGUE

Yoga Inspired Life Style

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About

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insiya-about

What is Yogue?

A confluence of the many worlds that inspire me and that I hope will touch something deep in you.  It is a place where we revere the beauty of life, of spirituality, of movement, of showcasing ideas and material objects that wear the mark of their maker, of living with presence and simplicity and having the courage to dream big.

Yogue is about the small and large things that make our ordinary lives extraordinary. 

It is about the ritual of laying the dinner table for your family or friends, of the scent of wild roses that hit you when you walk into a room as well as the grit of city pavement under your feet.  Yogue is about that moment of joy when you suddenly begin to dance at a yoga class that you were ten minutes too late to and it’s also about the pause before you taste a soupy bowl of seasonal freshness that offers you sustenance and emotional sweetness.

It is about living with the awareness that to truly live, not just survive, we must be open to the bliss and sorrows of life.  

I am a writer and a lover of beauty. My goal in this life is to live it in harmony, with grace and with clarity and I believe that the only way we can is with an awareness of our actions and how they impact the many layers that hug the onion of our existence.

I am a mother.  I care about the legacy I (WE) will leave for our children.  I go out of my way, sometimes to extraordinary lengths to make sustainable choices in the life of my family.  Yogue is a place to share some of these stories.

I am a yogini, who grew up inspired by Yoga and the wisdom of Ayurveda in its birthplace, India.

Yet, it was only much much later, as an advertising executive following what I thought was my dream in Chicago, that I re-turned to Yoga and in that turning, on a mat where I sweated and twisted and re-found my way into and beyond my body, I found a path that at first seemed innocuous, only requiring my stepping onto my yoga mat, yet over the course of the last two decades, Yoga has taken me on a journey that is far from life I had thought I was supposed to have and in doing so I have taken the risks to leap and to create – to transform my life  – and to impact the life of so many truth seekers across the world.

For this I am deeply grateful and through Yogue, I want to share some of my meanderings in the world of Yoga and Wellness as well as offer a critical inside voice to all the chatter in the spiritual marketplace.

I love to move.  I have explored the worlds of dance, conscious movement, athletics and over the last decade, surfing. I am still getting to know my body and its potential to hold stories and release them.  I want to move for the pure joy of it, because it makes me smile.

I love design.  Design to me is the idea of creating and living with conscious alignment and presence.  This to me is “sustainable design.  I grew up at a time in Bombay, India, when we had one or two brands of processed foods, where shopping bags were home-sewn and the furniture we lived with was made in front of us by a skilled carpenter who was one of many generations of makers.  I think my experience of the process of creating and seeing it first hand has given me this love for beautiful and functional objects of life, where you feel that hand of the maker, the energy of allowing something to be channeled and imbued with the uniqueness of the handmade.

At Yogue, I want to celebrate things I love and meet the makers and creators who care about the objects we touch in our every day lives.

I love the beauty of food and the ritual of sharing a meal.  I am inspired equally by the wisdom of Ayurveda and its ability to truly make food your delicious medicine, and by the savouring of taste that you see in the cultures of France and Italy.  I want to offer you recipes that I know will offer you fresh insights and nourishment and take you on a journey with me to places we will travel to together.

Ultimately, I am not a yogi living in a cave atop the Himalayas.  I live in the real world, what the Vedas called the life of a “grihasta” a householder.  I struggle with desire, the same wants that we all have, for inspiration, to be a conscious parent, ideally without “losing” it, to find balance and space in the worlds of yoga, mothering, teaching, writing and exploring. I want to talk about these worlds. I want to share what I LOVE with honesty and a smattering of beauty.  I hope you are ready to travel with me.

I’m always looking for suggestions for stories to feature on Yogue, so please email me at info@yogue.ca
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insiyafinn

Yesterday was so life affirming and heart filling! Yesterday was so life affirming and heart filling!!! 

We got out on a hike in sooke and I’m so proud of my mama for traversing some steep climbs and even more steep and rocky downhill paths. I felt energized and so happy to be outside in a forest that smelled cool and fresh and pine-resin-y… @theblissologist and lion even got into the icy cold glacial streams and then we picked up grandma @carolefinnartist and enjoyed some delicious pizza on the deck @stokedpizzeria near sombrio…

My family kept cautioning me to not push myself - but honestly and truly I think I was just high on feeling alive and being amidst the waterfalls and green of what has turned into a very hot spring (climate change is real friends…)…

Yesterday was such an affirmation of how much we all need to be outside to reconnect within to what really matters…

Thanks ananda lion for making me a mama 12 years ago and thanks to my mom @sararasiwala for your love always… also it made me so happy that eoin got to see his mama too! Life is short. Keep those you love close and fill it with beauty and kindness.

Ps. I did wear a dress hiking (just because) and I am very tired today but was it worth it? YES ❤️

#yogue #mothersday #family #familymatters #healing #healinsiya #healcancer #cancerthriver
Photo sprinkles… Stepping out into spring. L- Photo sprinkles… 

Stepping out into spring.

L-R: A Saturday picnic w @yogalink + Carole + dingo the bali dog and my mom. Thanks for the chai @sararasiwala 😁 and the pic @theblissologist ✨
Blossoms on the hill.
Blossoms inside :)
Homemade spinach and mushroom quiche.. so good 💫
Pakoras by mom… aka delish chickpea fritters 
Daisies :)
And
Apricot nectar and strawberries yesterday… 
/ shadows and sunshine :) 
Heart shaped flowers…

Feeling all this golden light and springtime goodness. :) 

🌺💕☀️

#healingjourney #wholefoods #growth #changes #shift #insiyafinn #healinsiya #healcancer
So I decided to share this picture here because fi So I decided to share this picture here because firstly today was so special. I got to see a dear dear friend who I haven’t seen since before the pandemic and we got to finally connect a few steps away from home. Yes this is currently Victoria (or it was this morning when the sun was bright and warm)…

And yet this morning was hard won. Yesterday after weeks of things going relatively well I had what is called a partical blockage with my ileostomy. I think it was caused by my not chewing my lunch as slowly as I normally do…(I will blame this on both being v hungry and that my dear mom’s cooking is dangerously delicious) 😁 when my girlfriend came to see me yesterday, I had low energy and a strange cramping sensation in the stomach and lower rib area. This progressively got worse and worse until my body with all its wisdom tried to push my lunch out of me. In other words I threw up. Consistently and continuously.

Meanwhile life at home continued on. My son arrived home after a canoeing weekend. I needed back rubs w tiger balm or whatever would help in the moment; and tried to help organize dinner. And my friend later that evening shared how she felt the privilege of being here to help and to witness the rough stuff. Which just felt so dear and real and loving.

And this is why I want to share this story today. It feels scary to put all of this out into the world but I have been thinking that when we hide the hard things behind walls of fear or worry about what others will think, I think we curtail our capacity to be loving, compassionate humans. After all at our core we want the same things. To live and love well. I feel like I share a lot here but I have found it hard to write about the really gnarly moments. There have been so many. What I will say I am so thankful for however is that because I have experienced so much with the ileostomy, I knew I had to ride the waves of pain out until they stopped. And they did and I finally slept last night and stayed out of emerg at the hospital.

And awoke to a new day. And a new opportunity to make the most of this precious moment.

Thanks for being here!

#healcancer #healinsiya #viclife #oakbay #friendship
It’s three weeks post my big surgery. The last f It’s three weeks post my big surgery. The last fortnight has been a wave of highs and lows. It felt like every time I felt a little better something new would happen again that I needed to understand and navigate. 

Meanwhile my inner mind has been a whirling w so so much. I have so many thoughts and so many ideas every day. And having to still be quite still has forced me to pay attention to them. 

The word that keeps coming up is reclamation - reclaiming who I am and how I want to live my life moving forward… life seems a little less like I’m on the edge of a precipice - except in the middle of the night - but things still feel urgent - like I will run out of time before I get to do all the things I would like to. And I have been trying to stay true and listen to the emotions that come up as I continue to navigate the journey beyond - which as yet is a big unknown! 

Today was an easy day to reclaim how much living in harmony with our seasons means to me. How much I love being outside. This afternoon mom and I went for a glorious walk in the sunshine and then lion, our pup and I had some weeding fun in the garden. 

A friend asked me how I am feeling earlier today. I guess the answer today is so happy and grateful to be here and to live in such a beautiful place to call home close to the ocean and sea lions and the meadows and flowers and forests. I am cherishing these little moments. They feel big these days.

Thanks for being here. Xo 

#healing #gratitude #gardening #healinsiya #healcancer #coloncancercanada

📷 @sararasiwala 💖
Today is a reminder for myself and possibly you as Today is a reminder for myself and possibly you as well to not get discouraged… 

Recovery takes time.

there are moments of feeling on top of the world and there are others where I feel flat and tired. 

There is my mind trying to propel me forward beyond the constraints of my body; and my body then signaling with a sharp outcry - you cannot do X, please rest. 

There is life with all its chaos and wants and needs coming at you, because you don’t live in a bubble, the ones you are in relationship with also have needs… 

And so you remind yourself that all you can do is keep showing up now, in this moment, in the best way possible… don’t do more, it’s not necessary- especially right now…

Be gentle today. Happy Sunday.

🙏🏼❤️✨

#journal #healing #recovery #cancer #healcancer #healinsiya #slowlife #yogalife #mentalhealth
Home again. Short - very short and slow - walks do Home again.
Short - very short and slow - walks down our street.
Strawberries at breakfast.
So many Hugs from my son.
Back rubs from my husband
My mom’s continuous kindnesses that keep the day humming.
Friends saying hello and bringing food and tinctures.
And flowers that I cut from our wild garden tonight which is coming alive with all sorts of surprises.

I had tulips in my hospital room the entire 11 days and I can tell you how much they inspired me. As their petals opened up slowly I grew stronger and more able every day after surgery. I saw the colors shining against the dull hues of the room when I awoke each morning and in the sunshine they glistened.

Flowers have healing powers say researchers, apparently patients who can see trees and flowers from their hospital windows vs those who cannot, take less pain medication and have shorter hospital stays… and yes they both relax and uplift us. 

I’ve always loved flowers. Only now I understand why.

Happy weekend!
#grateful #flowers #healingpowerofflowers #healcancer #healinsiya #natureheals #holisticwellness
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