Contentment, Happiness, and My Family

by Nina “I know what house my house will be. It will be just right for me. And a house just right for me must have a fireplace inside, daisies in the yard, cows in the pasture, and, most important, a friend near by.” —from Boats Finds a House by Mary Chalmers When my brother was a kid, his very favorite book “Boats Finds a House” was about cat that embarks on a search for his perfect home. The cat, Boats, has a very specific list what is...

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Four Ways to Survive the Holidays with Yoga

by NinaHegel's Holiday by Rene Magritte* We’re quickly moving into the full-blown, end of the year holiday season that is Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanzaa topped off by New Year’s Eve. For many of us, this time of year is very challenging. We have too much to do. We’re traveling through snow and rain to get some place and then a few days after that slogging home again. And when we’re together for days at a time with family members, old behavior patterns...

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Contentment and Yoga: An Overview

by NinaSandy Carmellini by Brad GibsonOne of our readers told us that she started taking yoga when she was 48 and recovering from Hurricane Katrina. She wrote, “My first tears shed during my first Savasana, six months after the storm. The asana forced me to accept the world as it is.” Although a long health span is one of our main goals for healthy aging, we believe that cultivating contentment is also an essential part of aging healthfully. For...

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Santosha: Happiness and Longevity

by RamChicken on Hawaii Beach by Brad GibsonIn the Sadhana Pada of the Yoga Sutras by Patanjali we are introduced to the eight rungs/limbs/steps of yoga whose practice helps us to develop attention as a tool to discriminate between ignorance and awareness and truth from illusion which is the means for liberation or enlightenment. The first two of these rungs or limbs are the yamas and niyamas that can be looked at as universal morality and...

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Yoga and The Pursuit of Happiness

by Nina“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” — Declaration of Independence, United States of AmericaI don’t know about you, but I’ve always found it was a bit surprising that one of the three “unalienable rights” the U.S. Declaration of Independence recognizes is “the pursuit...

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