I love Sundays in New York. Everyone works so hard and so long during the week. On Sundays they stop. It’s a pure rest day. Slow, sleepy and quiet. It is completely divine. I love cooking a hearty dinner at an earlier time, and enjoy the whole process of preparing, eating and being nourished by a quiet meal with my beloved. We are total suckers for super high quality meat and make this bolognese with all organic veggies and local grass-fed ground beef. We also really love a nice glass of wine and some chocolate for dessert. I would have included a picture but, uh, we ate it all!

Sunday Supper Bolognese

Ingredients

• 4 large celery stalks
• 3 or 4 large carrots
• 1 pack white or baby Portobello mushrooms
• 1 big white or yellow onion
• 5 cloves of garlic
• 2 jars of tomato puree
• 1 package ground beef (about a pound)
• Salt
• Pepper
• Thyme
• Fennel

Prep

• Dice carrots, onion and celery. Place in a wide, deep sauce pan.
• Slice mushrooms and add to pan
• Add ground beef to the pan as well
• Turn heat to high and begin to sauté all ingredients.
• Chop garlic and add to pan
• Stir
• Add salt and pepper, thyme and some chopped fresh fennel tops
• Stir
• Once everything gets brown add the tomatoes.
• Simmer on low uncovered for about 30 minutes or more.
•  

Serve:

I don’t particularly love gluten free pasta. So I usually have my sauce over a huge bed of spinach or bowl of kale. Its actually great! 

I’ll be honest, moving to a new place and starting again has been difficult. When I say difficult I mean uncomfortable, lonely, and overwhelming. I have started new many times in my life.

I was the new kid at school, the new kid on the team, the new teacher in town—all of it. I have been new many times. There were times this starting new was a fesh shedding of skin and stepping into new freedom, possibilities and ways. The excitement outweighed the grief of letting go, or the fear of the unknown.

When you move and start in a new place not to be born again by the freshness, but to deepen into commitments and bonds to which you have dedicated your heart, the feeling is different. You feel all the feelings of grief for the home you had preciously created. You feel the fear of what-if.

The more new places I reseed myself into, the more I understand that the only real home is the home of the flesh. Home is the temporary temple of body that ephemerally houses the ritual you make out of time. Home is the breath. Home is the ground of feet.

Body-homes require constant upkeep and cleaning. So I practice yoga, dance, and meditation.

The only other real home is the home you find in peoples hearts and souls. The home you make inside the heart of your beloved. The home you make in the eyes of your friend that sees you truly, deeply.

These are the only real homes we have. And even they too are temporary.

Sometimes, when I feel adrift and frazzled I find myself saying to myself “I want to go home. I just want to go home”.  I have been told that sometimes as a young child, I was inconsolable crying, “I just want to go home” even though I was in my room.

In those moments of dissolution, I turn to the doorstep at the foot of my heartbeat. I enter into the pauses and rooms of space inside my own breathing. This body. This temple. This home. I am already home. Then I hang the image of my beloved on the walls of this home inside.

And when you are living in a place that doesn’t actually feel like the home you created with your own two hands and single heart, the home of the inside is a nice place to lay your head.

So the context of this sequence is yet again some more inspiration from the Iyengar Institute of New York here in Brooklyn and my continued studies with Christina Sell. I also have been paying particular attention to which poses open other poses in my body. So some of the sequence came out of that exploration too.

I find New York to never shut up. This makes it particularly challenging when my mind also will not take a quiet time-out. I highly doubt New York will quiet down any time soon so for solace and rest I am left with the mission to get quieter and quieter, softer and softer. And the listening makes my heart much louder (which I know is a little ghastly cliche to say). 

This also a sequence where i avoided vinyasas, chaturangas, and a ton of down dogs. I think its nice to give that a rest and focus on the work of the pose for the tapas of practice than using never ending flow to do it. 

Feel free to let me know how this sequence goes for you. One thing you might try paying particular attention to is the after glow of the whole sequence. Worry less about each pose feeling amazing and more about the feeling you have from the whole meal. 3

Enjoy!

Adho Mukha Svanasana with head on block- 3 min (lower height as needed)

Uttanasana with head on block- 3min (lower height as needed)

Supta Padangustasana Series -45 seconds each variation

Sirsasana cycle

Handstand – turns arms progressively out 45 seconds each of the 4 times

Paryankasana with a block 3 min

Pinch mayurasana 3x with 45 second hold

Prasarita Padotanasana

Trikonasana

Parsvakonasana (not the full post just crescent the torso toward bent leg)

Parsvakonasana

Vira 1

Vira 2

Parsvotanasana

Vrksasana

Utkatasana with thumbs clasped behind back head on knees/ Right leg lunge with crescent (crescent to the left)/ Twisted thigh stretch/ Parsvotanasana with front foot turned out 90

(repeat on the left)

Utkatasana with thumb clasp, head on knees/ Right leg lung with crescent to right and bent back leg/ Anjaneyasana

(repeat on left) 

Uttanasana (deep)

Janu Sirsasana

Ardha matsyandrasana/Ghomukasana

Supta Virsana-3 min

Camel pose x3

Hanumanasana

Supta Trivikramasana

Urdvha Dhanurasana 5x

Vipariti Karani – with bolster 4 min

Shoulder Stand

Supta Baddhakonasana- with support and strap 4 min