RESTORATION AS REFORMATION (Thursday January 8th)
with Abbie Galvin

Restoration is the work of returning something to its former state and relaxation is the state of freedom from tension or anxiety. Our goal is reformation; the act of improving or making changes for the better. This endeavor is often not as relaxing as one may imagine because organizing the body and calming the mind is actually a lot of work. In this session we explore a theoretical overview of what restoration really is and how the kidney system and waters of the body play a key role in this renovative effort.

THE NERVOUS SYSTEM (Thursday January 15th)
with Ty Watson

Think of the nervous system as the electrical circuitry of the body. The most important thing to do with any electrical system is to ground the wires. Within the body that means working on the ground floor of our personal abode, the realm of safety, stability, substance and equilibrium. In this session we theoretically explore and move through a lower body practice, to establish the pelvis as the housing of stability, the potency of practice and the surface upon which to materialize our thoughts and insights, freeing us up to be more mindful, meditative and magical.

REDEFINING REST (Thursday January 22nd)
with Chelsea Delle Palme

Within the experience of real rest so much is actively happening, heart rate slows, blood pressure drops, digestion is ignited. Yang always exists within the yin. So often our relationship to rest is made of up unconscious rituals to soothe ourselves, but there is so much more to discover. In this session we make the unconscious conscious by looking at ways to actively engage the parasympathetic nervous system, toggling between alertness and tranquility through practices of breathwork and meditation, in order to access our deeper creative drive, enhanced perception of the senses and an embodied sense of peace.

FROM DOING TO BEING (Thursday January 29th)
with Evan McClain

The upper body governs doing, the lower body governs being. The restorative effort is all about working in the lower body to access the ground of our being. Restorative practice gives us a route from the effort and output of doing to the parasympathetic states of being, where repair and reorganization become possible. In this session we will explore liminal states, the nervous system’s architecture of recovery and how a formal ground-of-being practice reorganizes the system, expands internal space and brings us into an unhurried relationship with time.

THE COMMAND CENTER (Thursday February 5th)
with Rose Lamont

Once our energy is freed from the constant mental activity being generated by the mind, it begins to operate at an accelerated level. In this session we explore the tools of Yoga Nidra — the art of transformational sleep — and Meditation, which take us beyond the personal mind. Using these practices, we directly explore the third floor and the command center of Room 9 — the geometric center of the brain — explicitly engaging the hypothalamus, pineal, and pituitary glands and implicitly tuning the Third Eye, the aspect of ourselves that connects us with reality beyond personal memory.

RESTORATIVE SET UPS (Thursday February 12th)
with Abbie Galvin

Yoga sequences are recipes. And like a recipe the ingredients are measured and designed to work together for a product that is nourishing. The poses are chosen for how well they combine their individual properties to create our body as a container whose function is to hold and grow a seed of consciousness. For consciousness, the implicit, only thrives in an explicit container, in other words when embodied. In this session we use props as scaffolding to rally a renovation of our metaphorical house to hold ourselves in the containment of archetypal forms for the expansion and exploration of consciousness.

RESTORATIVE CHAIRS (Thursday February 19th)
with Brima Jah

A chair is magical tool. We can use it to give us access to a particular angle, getting us over, under, around or through ourselves. Using a chair for practice gives us a tool for leverage and a point of reference outside of ourselves. A chair can serve as a boundary for containment, a surface that holds, lifts and offers new angles for insight. With the grounding support of a chair all parts of the practice including stability, ability and vision can be made accessible for all bodies—each on their own, and integrated together as a whole.

COSMIC LIFE FORCE (Thursday February 26th)
with Chase Connolly

In Yogic texts, the body contains the cosmos, and the cosmos is the body itself. The primordial elements are located in the body at each of the first five chakras. They are used as points of pranic focus and meditation to contemplate the nature of Reality. By understanding how to use the breath to focus the mind on these points, we can cultivate a somatic understanding of the the five elements and their correspondences in the body. In this session we explore breath practices and visualizations that will offer a template for self-led practices of pranayama, contemplation, and meditation.

KIDNEY HEALTH (Thursday March 5th)
with Abbie Galvin

The kidneys are considered the "root of life" and the storehouse of the body's vital essence or Jing. This finite Jing governs growth, development, reproduction, and longevity. Winter is the crucial time to store and replenish this energy for the rest of the year. So our task is to build Qi to buffer the use of Jing. As winter is our most Yin season, our practice, this time of year, invariably leads our energies inward to build wisdom, discernment and emotional stamina, via the presence of our attention. In this session we discuss how to strengthen and support our kidneys for the epic task of storing our vital essence.

REGENERATIVE BREATHWORK (Thursday March 12th)
with Ty Watson

The breath is our life force, the energy with which we can renovate our bodies, regenerate our minds, renew our spirits and revitalize our souls. Utilizing breathwork as a technique for restoration cools down the nervous system, recovers emotional equilibrium and brings our interior worlds into clearer definition. In this session we explore the myths, maps, and metaphors of the breath woven into our culture and practice slower breathing patterns that can be used to clear the mind, clarify the emotional climate and soften the internal pressure that builds as life challenges us.

RESTORING INTELLIGENCE (Thursday March 19th)
with Ally Bogard

True intelligence is not a faculty of the mind, but a state of a body in complete presence. Through a quieter inner state, we can work with self-observation, inquiry and contemplation to aid in physical, mental and emotional ease. Restoration through the lens of meditation requires exploration as to how stillness, breath and awareness can become tools for deep repair and nervous system balance. Through guided practices, gentle inquiry and reflective rest, we learn to soften effort and allow the body’s innate intelligence to restore itself.

HOME RESTORATION (Thursday March 26th)
with Abbie Galvin

When we practice by ourselves we access our more soulful self. We make the journey inward with the aid of techniques to get us there. Our physical practice, our breathing, our imagination are the ingredients we use to find our way in. A home practice is developed and created by virtue of repeating refined technique over time. Our home practice is an endeavor to regulate our first nature so that we are not at the mercy of our emotions. The dimension of this practice includes the mind, body and breath to dance with our third nature, having a conversation with ourselves and using oneself as the teacher.