Jessica Girija Jewell

Recently, after a yoga class, I was talking with another practitioner about how much we both appreciate spending time in environments that uplift us. We wondered where we could find more places where people gather for elevating conversation, deepening spiritual practice, and expanding the sense of well-being in everyday life. When Yoga Together Lincoln was open, my primary motive was to create "an island of sanity," a place where people could come to remember that they are kind, generous,...

by Jessie Jewell I often think about things my teacher Kim shared with me. He noted that often people come to yoga classes for about two years and then leave. His theory was that at about the two-year mark, things start to get real. Inner awareness deepens and the ego often revolts. Yoga practice may include mystical experiences along with feelings of joy, peace, and wonder. That’s part of why we love it. But it also includes noticing the limits of our body and breath, the ways we push...

by Jessie Jewell I’m going to guess that nearly everyone who has gone to a yoga class or tried poses seen in a book or online has encountered a posture that feels really hard. It might be that a tight muscle won’t give, standing on one leg causes balance problems, or some part of your anatomy bumps into another part and you can’t breathe. I remember being in a yoga class when I had been practicing pretty sincerely for about three years. We were doing urdhva dhanurasana, upward bow pose. As...