The Recipe

4 inches of fresh crisp organic turmeric root
1 inch of organic ginger
1 organic Mikan (satsuma tangerine)
2 organic ruby grapefruits
1 organic granny smith apple
1 small organic lemon (optional)

Plunge all the ingredients through a juicer being mindful to keep the turmeric in the middle rather than last to go through. This will ensure you get every last drop of the healthy goodness and less stain on your juicer parts.

Turmeric is known for its antioxidants and anti-inflammatory properties. While it is spicy and bitter, with a little sweetness from the grapefruit, tangerine and apple makes the turmeric flavor come alive! Be well, enjoy and let us know what you think of the juice in the comment section below!

Pomelos, in case you have never heard of them, are pretty much my favorite fruit. They are similar to a grapefruit with a much thicker skin. What they lack in thin skins, they make up for in taste and texture. Pomelos are slightly sweeter and less bitter than their grapefruit friends. The texture is actually delicious. Pomelos come apart nice and dry, but are loaded with juice once you bite in.

To peel the pomelo, use a knife to score a line along the equator of the fruit. Dig your fingers into each side and peel the whole half off each side – usually you can do this in one piece each side. Then cut the fruit in quarters so it will fit in your juicer.  To read about the benefits of juicing and tips on what kind of juicer to get, read this article.

Meyer lemons are like regular lemons except they have a thinner more orange-yellow color, and their flavor is like a lemon perfume, which lends a signature taste to any food you prepare with this fruit.

Of course I had to try some juicing combinations in the kitchen with this kind of citrus on hand.  Here was the winner:

Exotic Citrus Green Juice

1 Small Meyer lemon

1 Pomelo, peeled

1 Anjou pear

2 Small cucumbers or one large

1 Head of Romaine lettuce

1 Large handful of baby spinach (optional)

Make sure all produce is organically grown. Wash carefully and push through your juicer.  The lemon can go in un-peeled. To make sure you maximize the juice in the spinach, put the cucumbers into the shute, then pack the spinach in around the cucumber before plunging.  Enjoy this refreshing, good for you libation!

After leading groups on wilderness lake trips, portaging canoes for miles, building a shelter out of an overturned canoe to sleep in, and countless other sailing & mountaineering skills acquired along the way, I achieved the highest rank in canoeing in my final year at the camp. It was a huge moment for me to have worked toward something so rigorous and succeed. In fact, it was that accomplishment that helped me get myself through intense yoga teacher certifications later in life.

It had been a long time since I had paddled, but three years ago I was introduced to Stand Up Paddling and instantly fell in love.

In August of 2012 I teamed up with Boardworks, a leading Surfboard/ Stand Up Paddle Board company to help define the relationship Yoga has with Stand Up Paddle boarding.

These are two of the fastest growing activities in the world, and have become a way of life for the those who practice or paddle. One child’s pose floating on the water was all I needed to know that yoga on the board, while it would never replace what I do on the mat, is certainly heaven!

The combined benefits of the cardiovascular exercises, core stability and yoga on the water provide for an all body workout as well as access to nature in a watery environment.

Yoga on stand-up paddle boards, also known as Yoga SUP is an interesting niche, and there are a rapidly growing number of Yoga SUP classes being offered around the world in lakes, open water, waterways, reservoirs and more.

Boardworks believes there is a bigger connection between these sports, and that it is more of a mindset of the demographic that they share; health, wellness, nature, fresh air, and play.

I am very excited to partner with Boardworks to help connect two of my favorite passions…this is another way to expand on yoga and while taking my yoga practice outside.  We are seeing more and more Yoga SUP happening at yoga events around the world!

According to Boardworks National Sales Manager Ryan Guay, “We’ve seen organic growth of the Yoga SUP lifestyle and it’s a natural extension of our brand. We have specific models that work perfectly for yoga applications and believe our products to be ideal for this purpose. Amy hosts retreats in beautiful places around the world. I am excited to get involved with these events and help expose people to SUP.”

To learn more about Stand Up Paddle Boarding and get a board of your own, visit Boardwork’s Website.

Join me and a bunch of great yogis in Costa Rica to practice therapeutic yoga and get in the water on SUP boards every day! Visit the retreat page.

For those friends who shutter when thinking of eating raw kale, the shredded texture of the kale chiffonade, the creamy avocado and the sweetness of the pomegranate make this salad much more palatable!

I get very artistic arranging all the ingredients and always enjoy putting it together, so if you have children in the house, be sure to ask them to help out – they’ll have a blast.

Ingredients (Makes 3 large servings)

Salad:

1 bunch red butter leaf lettuce

1 bunch curly kale

Seeds from ½ pomegranate

½ large avocado or 1 small avocado

A handful of chopped raw almonds

Dressing:

3 tablespoons Olive oil

Juice from a lemon

Himalayan sea salt to taste

Instructions:

Whisk dressing ingredients in small bowl and set aside. On a serving dish, place 3 large butter lettuce leaves in a circular formation face up.  Then place 3 smaller leaves inside the large ones.  These will be “lettuce cups”.

Remove stems from the kale and chiffonade the leaves. (Google how to chiffonade and watch a how-to video – it’s worth it!)

Place chiffonaded (is that a word?) kale in a medium sized bowl and pour dressing on top.  Wash your hands well and massage dressing into kale until the leaves are tender. The dressing will “cook” the kale much like ceviche.

Spoon the kale mixture into each of the butter lettuce “cups”.  Spoon pomegranate seeds and almonds on top of the kale mixture (or you could also mix them into the kale after massaging and then spoon into the cups).
Drizzle the whole platter with balsamic vinegar (optional).

You should be able to lift each large leaf cup (with its contents) right off the platter to serve on a someone’s lucky plate.  Enjoy!

While teaching yoga in Iwate prefecture in Japan, I had the chance to connect with yoga students who lived in areas like Sendai which were utterly devasted by the 2011 Tsunami.

So many people were affected by the tragedy last year.  An attendee from the workshop came up to us at the end of class with a picture book on the tsunami. She showed us a picture of her town in the book before the tsunami and pointed out her house in the picture. She turned the page and there was a picture the same land, utterly in rubble.  She showed us the empty hole and debris that was once her home.

She explained how she was safe inland, but when the tsunami came her mother and grandmother were at the house and got separated in the maelstrom. Rescuers found her grandmother barely breathing and she died outside of a hospital that was too full to accept her. They have yet to find her mother.  She is using yoga to help make sense of what has occurred.

Since the tsunami, countless people who have lost their homes have been living in sterile, pre-fab housing that resembles storage units set in concrete parking lots, without trees, grass, flowers, devoid of nature or aesthetics.  These people not only lost property, but they lost family members, friends, and any sense of normalcy.  Needless to say, incidence of clinical depression in these housing units is high.

A small percentage of the homes lost were traditional Japanese structures that were loved and passed through generations for over 400 years.  These were more than just houses; they were treasured landmarks that represented the history and tradition of an entire culture.

What made these homes even more distinct were the thatched roofs that grew wild grasses and flowers.  Not only were they beautiful, these roofs held the significance of architecture that co-existed with nature through hundreds of years (its origin could trace back even thousands of years), and were deeply revered by their owners, as well as all of Japan.

During the workshop we met a yoga student named Ayako Shida who, inspired by her archival research on these 400 year old “living” homes, had started purchasing potted flowers from disaster area nurseries to help stimulate the local economy. Since the Tsunami she has been organizing volunteer crews to plant these flowers easonally at the temporary housing units for people who lost their homes.  She calls it the Hanasaki Project, literally meaning “the Flower Blooming Project”.

She wanted to do something to improve the living conditions, to brighten the mood, and to help the residents with emotional healing by letting them know that people cared.  A few of the yoga teachers we work with in Tokyo have organized fundraiser classes as well to keep this work alive, as there is no telling when they will be able to settle into to real homes again. We were so moved by her cause that we pledged the workshop proceeds to the project.

Sometimes all it takes to rekindle hope is to know that someone out there cares and to spread a little beauty.

If you are looking for a way to help the recovery efforts from Hurricane Sandy here are just a few of the organizations and businesses who my New Jersey and New York friends have recommended as making the most out of donations and volunteer efforts.  Please donate!

Occupy Sandy

Help the Cinnamon Snail Food Truck Serve Vegan Meals For Sandy Relief

HONY & Tumblr Hurricane Sandy Fundraiser

The hope is that if more people understand that sharks are more valuable alive than dead, the better chance we have of preserving our oceans and the oxygen we breathe.

Imagine only one year ago the Whale Sharks in this area were getting finned.  Thanks to photography and awareness exposing the harms of shark finning, the village now runs eco-tours to view the sharks.  As if that wasn’t heart-warming enough, now these sharks are part of art!

Above: Roberta Mancino an Italian skydiver, BASE jumper, wingsuit flyer and international model. She has participated in more than 7,000 skydives.

Shark Finning is Bad Business

88 million to 100 million sharks die every year for finning  – all for a Chinese delicacy called Shark Fin Soup. 1/3 of open-ocean sharks are threatened with extinction. Shark finning is not only cruel it is totally unnecessary. Shark fins add no flavor, nutritional, nor medicinal value to the soup yet the soup is considered a symbol of prestige in China. The stronger the Chinese economy becomes, the more demand for the soup increases.

Besides how ruthless finning is (fishermen typically haul sharks out of the water, cut off their fins and toss them back to make more room on their boats where they then suffer up to 3 weeks before suffocating to death), there are much broader issues at stake.

Hannah Fraser, professional Mermaid, ocean environmentalist, performance artist and model, posing with the sharks. She is an underwater pro!

If Sharks Die, It Won’t Be Pretty

Because sharks are at the top of the food chain and have few predators, their numbers are slow to replenish when a population is overfished. At the rate things are going, we’re set to extinguish sharks entirely in only 10-20 years.  Being apex predators, sharks keep the populations of everything else in the food chain in balance. Sharks are critical to the ocean because they keep the numbers of other fish and mammal species in check and weed out the sick, injured and dying so that populations of fish stay strong and healthy. Without sharks the balance of the ocean’s food chain is severely threatened. With an excess of fish eating all the algae, oxygen production on the water’s surface decreases.  Climate change anyone?

What you can do:

• Do not patronize a restaurant if you see Shark Fin Soup on their menu. Tell friends and family to do the same. Organizations like WildAid are doing great work to advocate for sharks. Make a donation!
• Join me next summer along with Taro and Shawn Heinrichs on the Seva Trip of a lifetime!  We’ll be swimming with Whale Sharks in Isla Mujeres, Mexico and raising money for WildAid.  Subscribe to get the latest updates on the trip.

Above:  Taro is the one the left in the scuba suit pictured with Hannah Fraser. Hannah made her childhood dream of swimming like a mermaid into a career. She can hold her breath forever!

Above: Roberta Mancino with Kristian Schmidt. When she is not modeling underwater or on land, she does it while jumping out of airplanes!

Above: Great one of Hannah Fraser with Kristian Schmidt in the background catching the shot.

This video captures the undercover investigation conducted by our friend Shawn Heinrichs who has been a champion for marine conservation. He and Taro have schlepped all over Asia documenting shark finning.

In recent weeks I’ve been asked about this frequently and thought I’d post a reply on my blog.

Yoga Teacher: If I put myself on Facebook in beautiful yoga poses, create a brand, and a website, doesn’t that go against yoga’s values?

Amy:  This question is a hot one right now.

If you teach yoga it is likely you have:

• Put hundreds of hours of teacher training under your belt
• Done copious amounts of continuing education
• Traveled long distances to learn
• Invested greatly in your education
• Live and breathe teaching
• Served students to the fullest

Despite this many yoga teachers are poo poo’ed as unprofessional, flakey, scattered and/or held in contempt for promoting themselves.

This can be infuriating when you’ve invested so much time building your skill set and creating something of value to offer.  You’ve worked hard on making your offering authentic, proficient and meaningful.

Unlike other professionals, the yoga teacher finds themselves in a conundrum between what is considered “yogic” and what many in the media have been calling “the commercialization of yoga”.

Yoga teachers may get “push back” from the media and others who feel that self-promotion and spiritual practice is like mixing oil and water, and that marketing is at best, tacky and inappropriate.

Yoga teachers, much like any other professional (such as healers, doctors, massage therapists, computer consultants etc), want to get the word out about their services.

Unfortunately the result of this push back toward yoga teachers is that they are petrified to get the word out or to use social media for their cause.

We could debate the philosophical arguments on whether spirituality and self-promotion are in fact so diametrically opposed. Historically there are some traditions that argue for asceticism and renunciation, but there are also those traditions (way less prominent voices in the conversation) which invite us into the physical world where engaging in money and transaction are actually considered part of living a skillful life as a yogi.  The teacher has a responsibility to provide meaningful teachings and the student is also responsible for choosing which teacher suits them best.

We’ll leave that topic for the scholars to more fully flush out.

That said, if we look at what yoga does for people, the benefits and virtues are notable:

• Improves health & wellness
• Cuts back on stress (the cause of most disease)
• Connects people to spirit
• Saves lives
• Decreases health care costs
• And on and on…

It’s a shame that this conundrum around marketing and spirituality has made yoga teachers gun-shy about promoting themselves when they are skilled at offering the very things that help people gain access to these benefits.

If yoga teachers don’t inform people about the merits of yoga and what they can offer as a competent teacher, then how do people find the path to those benefits?

Of course, not all yoga teachers have escaped cheesy marketing strategies and their promotions can come across as a bit tawdry.  Given the sensitivity and “push back” in the yoga world, how can a yoga teacher get the word out with sophistication and finesse?

3 Steps to Healthy Self-Promotion as a Yoga Teacher

1. Define your gifts & goals as a yoga teacher.
Do you excel teaching one-on-one? Or do you prefer to teach groups of 10 or less students? Do you work best with children? Women? Men? Or can you more effectively work with a larger reach? Make it clear who you work with in your promotional materials and reach out to that kind of student.

2. Craft Your Distinct Message with Sensitivity
Once you are clear on your assets and goals find a way to craft your message that is authentic, totally you, and make it classy.  You can’t go wrong if your message shares who you are and what you have to offer with sincerity.

Part of tasteful yoga promotion is recognizing that there is indeed touchiness in the yoga world around promotion; therefore, cheesy marketing that overly glamorizes or emphasizes you is not going to cut it.  Instead focus on what the student will receive by working with you.

Show your promotional material to close friends and students who know you well to get feedback before making it public.

3. Confidently Send Out Your Offering!
Be confident and enthusiastic in sharing what you have to provide with others, knowing that you are in service and that what you do makes a difference in the lives of your students.

Be unapologetic about your offering.  Spread your gifts on a website, professional Facebook page and by email. Some will like it, some will not.  You never know, there may be a student out there that has a tremendous shift in their world, because of you!

Learn more about our professional education programs for yoga teachers here.

That was before I learned from experience that Yoga Teacher Burnout can be just a phase if handled right away.  If a teacher can learn to recognize the early warning signs, they can nip Yoga Teacher Burnout in the bud by taking action on some key areas of their life and teaching.

People become yoga teachers because they fall in love with the practice.  Yoga helps us feel complete, able to share meaningful experiences with others and can save our lives. Teaching yoga, for many, becomes an extension of that love affair.

Despite all that yoga goodness, most yoga teachers will not argue that their teaching can become stale and even boring sometimes.

Yoga teachers often are barely making ends meet, or working so many jobs that they don’t have time for their own practice.

Many are on autopilot, running ragged, and wondering if they need to change professions.

They have lost their love of prepping classes, teaching from their heart, and connecting with their students — these are just a few of the signs that they are going through a “Yoga Teacher Burnout” phase.

Warning signs of Yoga Teacher Burnout:

• Gives little or no hands-on adjustments in class.
• Snaps at students when they don’t understand instructions.
• Presentation has become uncharacteristically stern, austere and unsympathetic.
• Seems to be the unhealthiest and most stressed out one in the room, um…even though they are the yoga teacher.
• They don’t practice yoga any more, they just teach it.
• Overly uses sound bites and cosmic flowery language that seems like they pulled it out of thin air (or their butt).
• Gives an adjustment and throws out their back or gets hurt way too easily (because they don’t practice anymore).
• Mis-directs anger and frustration onto innocent bystanders like their kids and/or significant other.
• “Forgets” to get a sub for their classes or subs all of their classes out.
• Grouchy. Snappy. Cranky. Irritable. Crabby. Cantankerous. Prickly. Huffy.

I’ve been there, and I’ve seen it in my colleagues. No yoga teacher is perfect.

To be clear, I’m not talking about those difficult days when we must teach through tough times (loss, divorce, illness, etc…) – everyone must go through that at one time or another.  I’m talking about holding up our end of the bargain to model a balanced lifestyle, and use the tools we have at our disposal to get the TLC we need.

The good news is that these warning signs in no way suggest that a teacher is doomed.  Being burned out can be wake up call and an opportunity.

These action steps can quickly make Yoga Teacher Burnout disappear:

• Going to local classes taught by other teachers
  Looking at the calendar and finding at least 2 classes a week to attend, taught by peers or a favorite teacher, can be just the ticket to feeling nurtured and inspired again.
• Social Gatherings
  Teachers who hang out with their students every now and then are naturally more connected to their student’s lives and will not surprisingly get more stoked to teach.
• Scheduling in down time as though it is a paying gig
  Teachers should not wait to see if they have any extra time to do a home practice, get a massage or hike in nature. Scheduling in down time as if it were a gig is the only way to make it happen.
• Optimizing teaching schedule
  If a teacher has given a class a good 6 months to fill and nothing seems to help, it may be time to find a better time slot. Consider other factors that can cause burn out such as commute, parking, inconvenience to family, etc…
• Revisiting basic texts and being studious again
  Improving an understanding of yoga philosophy, anatomy or hatha yoga keeps a teacher fresh. Spending 10 minutes day reading up on the subjects that need strengthening is an instant shot in the arm for weary teachers.

With a little focused care, any teacher can re-kindle the enthusiasm of sharing yoga with others and be the best they can be for their students.

Have you noticed any of these warning signs of Yoga Teacher Burnout in your yoga teacher? Got any additional remedies to add that have worked for you? Or do you teach yoga and relate?  Leave a comment below, I’d love to hear.

While playing around in the kitchen this summer I discovered what might be the yummiest (and healthiest) green drink I have made yet!

It’s a heavenly alkalizing green coconut milk shake.  Full of protein, good fats, minerals and delicious, rich, creamy, icy flavor  — this is a filling yet cleansing breakfast treat in the summer!

And best yet, for those not ready for pure green juice without the fruit (which can be sugary), this is a great way to get your greens while still satisfying the craving for a sweet and creamy indulgence.  I would have this for dessert it’s so delicious!

Ingredients

1 1/2 Cup Pure Fresh Green Juice with no fruit.  Check out the first part of this blog entry to get ideas.

1 1/2 Cup Raw Nut Milk (can be almond, brazil nut, pine nut, macadamia or a combo!) Check out the second part of this blog to learn how to make nut milk. Until you get a nut milk bag for straining, a panty hose knee sock will do the trick!

2 Tbsp organic hemp seeds (Nutiva is a great brand)

1 handful of organic spinach

1 heaping Tbsp Coconut Manna/coconut butter

1 tsp cinnamon to taste and for garnish

½ tsp himalayan sea salt (Real Salt is a great brand)

6-8 ice cubes (or freeze coconut water or coconut milk into ice cube trays for an even creamier/sweeter taste and tecture)

Dash of raw green stevia powder

Blend everything in a Vitamix or Blendtec for best results, however a regular blender may work fine too.  I promise, you’ll sigh a satisfied, “ahh” after every succulent slushy slurp!

Ingredients:
2 large cucumbers
3 Handfuls of baby spinach
1 bulb of fennel including stalks
Handful parsley to taste
Handful fresh mint with stems to taste

Put fennel into the juicer and plunge.  Put a cucumber in with out plunging and fill the space around it with the baby spinach, then plunge.  Do the same with the second cucumber and the parsley and mint. This way the leafier greens gets juiced rather than spun through the juicer.  Serve on ice and use a fresh mint garnish for bonus points.

Enjoy and be radiantly healthy!