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Hammock Enlightenment: A Mother’s Call to Action

May. 04, 2011

The wise yogi knows “the inaction that is in action, and the action that is in inaction.”

from the Bhagavad Gita

So much has happened this year already.  Wars, retribution, elections, revolutions in the Middle East, earthquakes and tsunamis. Our world is turbulent right now.   The time has come, as poet and activist Joanna Macy writes, for the Great Turning.  We have a choice to move from a world centered solely around conventional economics – what author David Korten calls the Age of Empire – towards an Earth Community, a world where the values of community, sustainability and love inform our lives in a powerful way.

As I was bringing in a new baby into our world earlier this year, I couldn’t help but think that it is both a challenging as well as an imperative time to bring new, conscious souls into our universe.  After all, we need some help don’t we, to move towards that Earth Community? I also felt strongly that in order to withstand the ebb and flow of our life in these challenging times, I had to turn toward a meditation practice, to find strength and peace.

Yogi, Blissologist, surfer and all around renaissance man, Eoin Finn, who, full disclosure here, also happens to be my husband, believes that you can find inner peace in a hammock. He calls it hammock enlightenment and says he discovered it while on one of our Yoga, Ecology + Surf retreats in Costa Rica, where he came closest to what he has sought for many years in his meditation practice.

Eoin recently gave a Ted Talk on why getting into a hammock can change our world.

“By slowing down, we become kinder, more compassionate beings” he says. “We start to pay attention to our relationships be they with our yoga practice, our intimate family, the food we eat, our communities and our environment.”

Don’t worry, I’m not just talking about an afternoon siesta, it’s about so much more.

Hammock Enlightenment in Vancouver, Canada

Hammock enlightenment is about being outside and experiencing the spirituality in nature, in becoming present to life as it unfolds.  And yes, you can find it right in your own backyard or under a leafy tree on your city block, you don’t have to retreat to a forest, though sometimes that can help.

Says Eoin, “Hammock enlightenment is a pathway towards sustainability.  We cannot protect our planet unless we truly feel what is sacred in it.  We need to feel connected to something in order to want to safeguard it.  We have to love something in order to fight for it.”

Mother’s Day is approaching.   This year will be my first year to experience it on the other side.  As I write this, I feel connected to my own mother, our lineage of mothers, and to our universal mother, the Earth.  It is time, now more than ever to shower our Earth with that sacred love and connection she has so long cocooned us with.  As James Cameron showed us in Avatar, the consequences of ignoring the heart of our planet are terrible.  And as art mirrors life which mirrors art, we see aspects of this throughout our world.  The planet is heating up, something’s brewing.  We have to act now.

And sometimes action can mean the opposite of what you think, it can mean slowing down, so we can reset and begin to honestly evaluate our actions and create change.

Here’s Eoin’s talk.  Listen and let me know if it inspires you.

  • Do you think slowing down is an antidote to our modern way of life?
  • Do you think slowing down will allow us to become more present, more kind and more connected to our communities and to our planet?
  • Do you think slowing down will allow us to change course?

Thank you for subscribing to this blog.  I am going to do my utmost to sneak away during my baby’s naptime and post at least once and hopefully more each week!

namaste,

Insiya.

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Category: Blog, Parenting Tags: avatar, blissology, david korten, earth mother, eoin finn, great turning, hammock enlightenment, james cameron, joanna macy, mother's day, mothers, sustainability, yoga, yogue

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Comments

  1. Cindy Aiello says

    May 5, 2011 at 2:45 pm

    Yes, I am a strong believer on Eoin’s Theory about Hammock enlightment. I agree that slowing down even a little to take note of what we are doing where we are going and what it is effecting will make a difference. Off to lye in my hammock for a bit. Have a beautiful day.

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ABOUT YOGUE  Hi, I'm Insiya. Journey with me as we live slow, scatter beauty and tread lightly on the planet.

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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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