Can You Change Your Blog Format?

Q: Dear Editor, 
I got so used to the previous website that the present one is a bit of a challenge to navigate. I have a couple of comments that can make my (and other's as well) experience more easy.
 1) Can you provide a direct link on this site to the YFHA's Facebook page URL as well? 
2) Your scroll bar overlaps with the Right tab keys (subscribe, labels, archives etc). So when I have to scroll down, I invariably hit the right tab keys which is a pain in the .....
3) Your SEARCH function is not very user friendly. It does not give all the older posts. It gives only some of the topics? Can you do something about it?
 Thanks, and if my complaints are not valid, kindly ignore. This old man may be asking for more comforts, that is all.

A: Of course your complaints are valid! But before I address the specific points you raised, I need to give you—and all our other readers—a bit of background about our blog and the way it is put together.

We are using a prefab format for our blog that is provided by the Google Blogger software. There are two reasons we are using Google Blogger: 1) it’s completely free (our blog is not monetized so we have no income to pay for web site hosting or a custom format) and 2) it’s very easy to use (we’d rather spend our time writing content than doing HTML programming). Unfortunately, using the prefab format means that we are stuck with certain features (or lack thereof). One day we will create our own web site that has all the features we (and our readers) want, but that will take an investment of time and money we’re not quite ready for. In the meantime, there are a lot of features that we just can’t control from our end. For example, one reader wrote in to ask why we didn’t have a Print function, and the answer is that with the Blogger, you just get what you get.

Obviously the shift from the old format to the new dynamic format was a huge one for our long-time readers. I was especially concerned about the new functionality for subscribing, and for searching for labels and archived posts (see the How to Subscribe and How to Search pages on the blog). But I decided to make the shift because the new format is much cleaner and easier to read, and certain features work much better (including the comments, the ability to share on Facebook and Twitter, and even the Search function, which I’ll discuss below). However, certain functions that used to work in the standard format just don’t work in the dynamic format. For example, the Facebook “badge” that used to work on the old format just doesn’t appear in the dynamic format. (I have done some research and learned that certain Blogger “gadgets” just don’t appear in the dynamic format, even if you have included them in your page layout.)

Now I’m going to address your points one by one:

The Facebook link that used to be on the blog's home page no longer works automatically the way it used to. If there is someone out there who can help me fix this—probably with some custom HTML programming—do let me know! (In the meantime, I have added a direct link to the YFHA Facebook page on the How to Subscribe page as well as at the bottom of this page.)

I’m not sure exactly what you mean by the scroll bar overlapping the right tab keys because I haven’t experienced this problem but it is definitely not something I can control from my end. It may have something to do with the platform you’re on (the operating system) or even the particular browser you are using to visit the site. Obviously you can’t switch operating systems (though perhaps you could upgrade) but you might try a different browser to see if that helps. Shari found a problem she was having was resolved by using Firefox instead of Safari. But without knowing whether you’re on a Macintosh or PC, I can’t help you more than that. Again, if there is anyone out there who can help with this, let me know.

Finally, the Search function is provided by the Blogger and I can’t control how it works. However, I actually think it works better than the old one. My initial instructions in the How To Search page were incorrect (and I have since updated them). Instead of typing the search phrase followed by Return, type your search word or phrase into the box, and as you are typing the phrase, a pop-up window will open that displays the titles of posts that contain that word or phrase.

You can then move your mouse down to the appropriate post title and click on it to open the post. That being said, if you can’t find the older posts you want with the Search box, try using the index (the Label function) as I describe on the How to Search page.

I hope this helps you. Although I have a number of wonderful writers and a wonderful editor assisting me with the contents of the blog, I alone am responsible for the blog’s format. However, as I’m not an HTML programmer, I obviously have my limitations. So I’m open to advice and guidance from anyone who will provide it!

—Nina

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More Short Meditations from Mexico

by Baxter

If you are up for it, I'd like share some new meditations with you that I’ve been teaching this week at my retreat in Yelapa, Mexico. Now, if Tuesday’s theme is a good one for you right now, then by all means continue to use "strength and stability" for a while. But if you’d like to experiment, here are two more possibilities.

Flexibility Meditation

For the second day of my retreat, I was thinking of how to incorporate the concept of flexibility into my meditation and that of my retreat group. And as I was gazing down on the surging and receding surf on the Yelapa beach, I realized I’d like my own flexibility to reflect nature's undulations. The rhythm of the waves on the shore mirrors the waves on my own breath in meditation. The mantra or meditative phrase "fluid as the sea" seems fitting, so try repeating it mentally on your exhale for your ten-minute sit today. Hope all follows well from there!

Digestion Meditation

On day four of my retreat, we turned our focus to an area of the body that has special connotations in the yoga tradition, the upper abdomen. This is where the digestive fire, known in Sanskrit as the jathara agni, is said to reside. Convenient, as the anatomical stomach sack and the first part of the small intestine are also located there! Instead of narrowly focusing on digestion as related to healthy eating, I broadened our vision a bit. As my friend and colleague Scott Blossom, a yoga teacher, Ayurvedic practitioner and acupuncturist (a triple threat!) has said to me, we not only are digesting the food we eat, assimilating what is beneficial and eliminating what is not, we are also digesting the interactions we've taken in throughout the day on an emotional/mental level as well.

So I asked the students to consider some situation they were still chewing on and come up with a word or two that would distill down its essence, not unlike a memorable meal where one ingredient stands out and can come to represent the bigger meal eaten—like those porcini mushrooms that one mealtime in Italy, but I digress! So once you have quietly sat for a minute or two and have come up with an appropriate word for your unfinished meal, use that word as your mantra for your ten-minute minute sit today. Remember that a primary purpose of a mantra is to create a consistent focus for the mind to distract it from its usual habit of generating all kinds of thoughts, many of which can be stressful. Secondarily, this particular mantra may allow for new insights to arise following your mediation regarding the "meal" at hand. Several hours after practicing with this focus myself, I find my mind returning to the mantra again and again and spending some valuable moments in reflection on the original event I had taken in earlier! Tasty!

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Building Unity Farm - Automation Arrives

Over the past few months, I've asked a dozen farmers what automation is best for Unity Farm's 15 acres of woodland management, manure movement, trail maintenance, food storage, and orchard harvesting.    I received thirteen different answers ranging from:

Buy John Deere, Kubota is underpowered

Buy Kubota, John Deere is mostly outsourced

Buy from your closest dealer, service really matters

Don't worry about the dealer, do the service yourself

Buy Agricultural tires, they're absolutely necessary

Buy Industrial tires, since Agricultural tires will wreck your property

Buy a skidsteer/compact track loader for work in mud/snow and on hills.   A tractor is for pulling not pushing

Never buy a skidsteer/compact track loader, they lack flexibility.

What did we buy and why?

I know that at least 11 farmers will disagree with me, but we bought a Terex PT30 Compact Track Loader, pictured above in our orchard.    It weighs 3000 pounds, lifts 950 pounds, yet only has 3 PSI pressure on the ground, leaving the trails and turf untouched.   The machine is the evolution of the ASV RC30 and has an advanced track system that does not slip in mud or snow.  

To make the decision, I test drove several devices.   With the PT30, I was able to move 12 cubic feet of mulch, haul 400 pounds of logs up a 15 degree slope, clear the orchard road of snow, move 500 pounds of rocks, and execute numerous zero turning radius redirections on snow in less than 45 minutes.

Unity Farm is a "compact farm" with one mile of trails that are 5 feet wide.   I really do not want to widen the trails, since their current width gives an intimate feeling of being deep in a forest.    The PT30 works on all our trails and turning around in 5 feet is no problem.  Try that with a tractor.

Unity Farm has many slopes, rocks, roots, gates, and narrow passages around outbuildings.   I was able to drive the Terex through all of the them.

This weekend, I'll move a few thousand pounds of wood and a few cubic yards of mulch around 15 acres.   When I told the salesman that I had already moved 10000 pounds of manure, 10000 pounds of logs, and 10000 pounds of mulch with a wheelbarrow and wagon, he asked "are you nuts?".    The answer to that question could be debated.

Unity Farm was built by hand labor, but now that I'm almost 52 years old, I look forward to the automation as I move thousands of pounds around the property every weekend.

Admittedly that Kubota tractor did look appealing, so I did buy one…for my desk.

Another Unity Farm update.   I lecture frequently at Harvard Business School and write for Harvard Business Review (HBR).    My Harvard students and colleagues often asked me, "why didn't you go to 'B' school"?

They're completely right and I'm going to correct this deficit by enrolling in a nighttime executive  'B' school this semester.

I'll learn about Bee biology, site selection, hive manipulation, four seasons management, honey extraction, and disease control.

In addition to my degrees from Stanford, UCSF, UCLA, Harvard, and MIT, I'll proudly add the 'B' school certificate to my CV this April.

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Decide Each Day What to Do

by Nina

Last Hike by Shitao

In a recent NY Times article about weight loss The Empty Diet Claim Season, Jane Brody said something simple that I just loved:

“Make physical exercise a daily activity. Decide each day what to do rather than whether to do it.”

To me that’s not only good advice for people who are concerned with losing or managing their weight, it’s also good advice for people like us who are concerned with staying healthy as we age. In his book The Story of the Human Body, Dr. Daniel Lieberman, an evolutionary biologist, says that the human body evolved to support the physically active life of a hunter-gatherer who treks miles each day to hunt and forage. And he says that many of the diseases of modern life (and aging), such as diabetes and heart disease, are the result of a “mismatch” between the environment of physical activity and food limitations that the human body originally evolved to thrive in, and the modern environment of sedentary behavior and food surplus in which we now live. So to stay healthy, we do need to be physically active on a daily basis.

I mentioned in my post  Friday Q&A: How Do You Keep Fit? that I had surveyed the Yoga for Healthy Aging writers about their exercise habits, and while we all seemed to be quite different in what we did, it turns out we had three things in common:

• we exercise every day
• we practice yoga asana regularly for exercise
• we also do some types of exercise other than yoga

For me, each day I do exactly what Jane Brody recommends: I decide each day what to do rather than whether to do it. I usually practice yoga four days a week for 1.5 hours and take a two-hour class on Friday. Saturday and Sunday I take long walks in the city or hikes in the country, and during the week I also take walks around the city (I use my feet for transportation) to do my shopping and errands, to meet friends for lunch, or just as a way of hanging with a friend—or husband. But sometimes I like to mix it up. Why not? If it’s a beautiful day, I might take a walk instead of practicing yoga. If it’s dumping rain, I might stay in and practice on a weekend. I’m good as long as I get some exercise that day.

On Friday, I did recommend to the reader who wanted to get started with some gentle movement that she consider starting with short, but daily sessions to establish a new habit, and for that post I didn’t want her to become overwhelmed by reading about what us long-time yoga practitioners did on a daily basis. But since I did the survey anyway, I thought it might be useful to share that information with you now so you can see several different ways of making exercise a daily activity.

Baxter’s Exercise Routine

Lately, in addition to 30-60 minute home yoga practices several times a week, as well as a weekly Friday public class I attend when I am in town, I have been attempting to take a 30-60 minute walk/hike for aerobic fitness. I am also riding my bike to work when the weather cooperates, and once or twice a week I do some simple weight work at a gym where I teach to combat the sarcopenia (see Strength and Aging) that affects muscles as we age.

Shari’s Exercise Routine

I do daily yoga, in the past (pre-surgery) for 30 min and currently (post surgery) it varies from 5-30 minutes. I also do daily aerobic exercise either on a bike or indoors on a stationary bike for 30 min (now it is 15 and not aerobic, with no heart rate changes but range of motion for my healing knee). I also walk daily for 30 minutes either outisde or on a treadmill. In the past I would do specific strength training on the mat with free weights for targeted muscle groups maybe two times per week (now daily as part of my knee rehab but no weights yet) and timed holds for certain yoga poses (60 seconds) to build strength and bone mass.

Ram Exercise Routine

MONDAY-FRIDAY
6.00-6.45am-GYM
7.00-7.30am-Pranayama + Meditation
6.00-6.30pm-Pranayama + Meditation

MONDAY & WEDNESDAY
12.00-1.00pm-Yoga

SUNDAY
8.00-9.15am-Yoga (I teach the class)

Timothy’s Exercise Routine

I do a couple of hours of asana per day, but probably none of it would be counted as aerobic. I also sit for chanting, pranayama and meditation for more than an hour each morning. After many years of belonging to gyms and health clubs, in recent years, I've backed off from such vigorous "cardio" exercise. I always tried to get my heart rate high into the aerobic range and keep it there for 45 or more minutes and did this several times per week.  Now in addition to yoga, I do gentler aerobic exercise such as hiking, dancing, swimming and bike riding and pay little attention to my heart rate. Part of the change comes from my understanding of Ayurveda. Considering my fiery pitta nature, I believe that more soothing exercise is actually better for me. And it's a lot more fun….

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Management Lessons Learned from A Game of Thrones

A Game of Thrones is the first novel in A Song of Ice and Fire, a series of high fantasy novels by American author George R. R. Martin.

I rarely watch television, but for Christmas, my wife bought me Season 1 of  Game of Thrones, the HBO series inspired by the novels.  Don't worry, this blog post will not contain any spoilers.

Watching the characters jockey for power and influence reminded me of my experience navigating organizations over the course of my career.   Here are my top lessons learned from the series:

1.  Doing the right thing does not always work

I have strongly believed that the nice guy can finish first and that in the long term those with strength of moral character will triumph.    In Game of Thrones, some of the moral characters are outfoxed by manipulative, cruel, and deceptive characters.   One character notes "When you play the game of thrones, you win or you die."     I have no plans to change my personal philosophy or approach to life, but it is interesting to reflect that some battles cannot be won with honor if your opponents are truly evil.

2.  There should be alignment of authority and responsibility.

One character notes "The man who passes the sentence should swing the sword."   It's easy for management to make decisions when someone else has to implement them.  Over the course of my career, I've been careful to "eat my own dog food" using the products I'm responsible for creating, making hard decisions then executing them, and taking responsibility for consequences that even indirectly result from my actions.   In organizations where there is a disconnect between authority and responsibility, chaos reigns if you lack authority to manage change in your areas of responsibility or if you have authority but are not responsible for your actions.

3.  You need to choose your goals and stick to them.

One of the characters is torn between honor and family.   He does not know whether to stay with his new colleagues (as he as sworn to do) or travel to aid his family in a time of war.   He struggles with the decision and for a time pursues neither goal.   Eventually he chooses honor and is "all in" with that goal, knowing that many others will assist his family and all will be well.

4.  Strategy matters.

In the series, an extremely wealthy family attempts to win a war by being better resourced.   Another family with fewer resources strategically outmaneuvers the wealthy family by building alliances and separating their forces into two contingents, using the element of surprise to achieve victory.     Good planning is just as important as good execution.

5.  You can't predict the future, but you can react to events around you to make the future.

One of the characters is a young and untested leader, willing to grow and make thoughtful decisions as she gains experience.   Events occur around her beyond her control.   She reacts to them calmly and in the best interests of others.  Eventually circumstances change and she seizes the opportunity to move beyond her formal authority, creating loyalty with the informal authority derived from her unique abilities.


We all grow over time and engage in own Game of Thrones at a micro level as we journey through our careers.   Many of the characters in Game of Thrones and in our workplaces are morally ambiguous.   I live each day knowing that I cannot control the behavior of others, only my reaction to it.  Guided by my values, I've been able to achieve little victories in the game of life.

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Short But Sweet: 10-Minute Meditations for Healthy Aging

by Baxter

Even though I'm away leading a retreat this week, I'm thinking of all our readers at YFHA (kinda' wishing you were here!), as I'm focusing a good portion of our practice time here on developing a home yoga meditation practice. Since we have two yoga practice sessions a day here, we begin and end each if them with a 10-minute seated meditation practice. Monday was our first full day of practice together and the overriding focus was on the feet, anatomically, and the idea of "starting”—whether that meant starting something new, starting again, starting over—about taking the first steps on that new path. For me, the feet represent the base of our overall strength, as well as stability. So I suggested that the group might use the phrase "strong and stable" as their mantra (a repeated word or phrase for mental focus), during the final seated meditation of each class.

As you might have calculated, by doing four 10-minute meditations in class, my group is getting 40 minutes of time to practice this powerful method in manageable amounts of time. (I happen to have them doing two more 10-minute sessions on their own for a total of 60 minutes a day). This is a sweet amount of time, but at home, you can easily practice just one or two sessions in a day and still reap benefits. Try the "strong and stable" mantra for your sit today! I'll try to share other ideas this week as well.

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Medical Yoga Symposium at the Smithsonian

by Timothy

Greetings from India! I've come to Kerala once again to study with my Ayurvedic doctor and to get some treatments. It is so nice to be back in this lush, semi-tropical setting and to see my teacher and many old friends. But just before I left the States, I had the privilege of taking part in a weekend symposium on modern and medical yoga at the Smithsonian, in Washington, DC. The symposium was held in conjunction with their groundbreaking exhibition, Yoga: The Art of Transformation. (The symposium is available for online for on-demand viewing.)

The event started off with a keynote by Dean Ornish, in which he summarized his more than 30 years of scientific research that has found that a yoga-based program, including a yogic vegetarian diet, can reverse heart disease. More recently his work has focused on men with prostate cancer, and is again showing very encouraging results. And due the similarities between breast and prostate cancers, Ornish believes that his comprehensive lifestyle program may benefit woman with breast cancer. That's speculation at this point, but other research is finding beneficial effects of yoga for those with the disease, including allowing them to tolerate chemotherapy and other medical treatments with fewer side effects.

The program included Richard Miller and Larry Payne, long-time yoga therapists and the co-founders of the International Association of Yoga Therapists, which has become the leading organization in the field.  Miller has garnered significant experience in recent years using the guided meditation practice Yoga Nidra with veterans with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Payne founded and directs the graduate program in yoga therapy at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles.

Also significantly represented were top yoga researchers, including Sat Bir Khalsa of Harvard Medical School and Lorenzo Cohen of the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center and the University of Texas. As those of you who read my online newsletter know, Khalsa, Cohen and I, along with the world's most prolific yoga researcher (with more than 100 published articles!), Shirley Telles of the Patanjali Yogapeet in Hardiwar India, have agreed to co-edit the first medical textbook of yoga therapy. (We're just getting started, so it will likely be a year or two until it's published.)

The event was hugely popular, filling the Smithsonian's auditorium and selling out months in advance. More than 100 people attended my Yoga As Medicine workshop on Sunday, and I was struck by how many physicians and other health care professionals were present. One incentive was that, under the auspices of the event's co-sponsor, the George Washington University Medical School, physician attendees were awarded Continuing Medical Education (CME) credits, highly unusual for a yoga conference!

All of this speaks to the growing acceptance of yoga as a therapeutic modality. Indeed, there is now so much yoga research being published that Sat Bir, one of about a dozen full-time yoga researchers in the U.S., says he can't keep up with it all. This doesn't mean that yoga is already being fully integrated with modern medicine, but we are getting there much faster than any of us would have predicted 10 or 15 years ago, so stay tuned….

By the way, if you were unable to see the show at the Smithsonian, which was fabulous, it will be coming to San Francisco's Asian Art Museum from February 21 to May 25, 2014  and then travels to the Cleveland Art Museum from Sunday, June 22 to Sunday, September 7, 2014.

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Friday Q&A: How Do You Keep Fit?

Newberry Crater by Melina Meza

Q: How do you & other writers keep fit? I was wondering what a typical week of yoga/aerobic exercise would look like in a week (or, spread out over a couple of weeks)? I am curious how others build in other activities in their week besides yoga. A yoga session for half an hour with walking for an hour?

How does one keep fit? I'm in a slump and right now I just want to do some gentle exercise but know I need to do more………, I was hoping that having more of a structure would help motivate me.

A: One of the barriers people run into when they decide to start practicing yoga at home is being overly ambitious. They think they need to have a full-length practice (such as the length of one of their yoga classes) or it’s not worth their while to practice. Then, either because they can’t find that much time or because it seems too overwhelming to contemplate, they end up not practicing at all. But it is far better to practice asana several times a week for short sessions because you start establishing a new habit. And as you develop the habit of practicing regularly, you may find your sessions start to stretch out until they naturally become longer and longer (that’s exactly what happened to me!).

This is why almost all yoga teachers, including us, recommend that you start small. So rather than trying to set yourself up with an intimidating new schedule of a half-hour yoga session plus one hour walking every day, come up with something for yourself that feels easier and more doable (gosh, did I really just use that word?). Then, make it a point to do that practice six days a week. And if you find you don’t have time even for that, get on your mat and do at least one pose, whether it is an active pose like Downward-Facing Dog pose or even just a restorative pose like Legs Up the Wall pose (some days are like that). Establishing your new habit of practicing is what really matters! Eventually you’ll start to feel like your day isn’t complete if you haven’t practiced, but it will take you a while to get there.

I did actually survey the other blog writers to see how much yoga they did every day, and times ranged from 30 minutes to 2 hours. We all also include some other types of physical activities into our week, including walking, hiking, biking, weight lifting, treadmill, and so on. But after some thought, I decided not to go into details about who exactly did what because most of us have been doing yoga for many, many years. And I wanted to emphasize that for someone who is in a slump and wants to get some gentle exercise, starting out small (rather than trying to keep up with us) is the best approach. Also, any exercise you choose to supplement your yoga practice with should be one that you enjoy—and that varies from person to person—because if you dislike it, you’re not going to be able to force yourself to keep doing it.

I hope this helps you (and other people in your position), and I’d love to hear back from you about what you decide to practice and how you fare with your new routine.

—Nina

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Winter Ice, Fear of Falling and Yoga

by Baxter

Despite the fact that I have lived in California near the temperate ocean for the last 14 years, I still vividly remember the scary, slippery winter days when I lived in the Midwest in icy conditions. And I remember slipping and falling on more than one occasion. Perhaps because I was younger at the time, I avoided significant injury (except for that one ice-skating party my freshman year in college that started at midnight, when I fell while showing off and broke my arm—was there beer involved?). And as I’ve watch the national weather reports the last few weeks, I have seen icy conditions in the forecasts for a good part of the country. For many adults as they age, especially if they are not very physically active, icy conditions are enough to keep ‘em indoors for days on end, until the ice abates. Seems a shame! I wonder if there is any benefit yoga could provide to boost the confidence of those in such chilling circumstances?

As you probably have already guessed, yoga can definitely help on many levels. It can restore your confidence in your physical abilities, as you get regular with a practice geared toward the outdoor icy reality.  It can improve your strength if you have not been working your body out as of late, especially in the legs. Your standing balance can get better with targeted work in certain yoga poses. Yoga can improve your chances of getting up off the ground if you happen to go down, something we have written about in my post Transferring and Yoga Wisdom from Jane Fonda as “transfer” ability. And as many of my students have reported back after the fact, yoga can even can help you to “fall better.” Finally, if you are stressing out about falling on the ice before you even leave the house, some focused easy meditations can keep you mentally and physically relaxed as well as improving your concentration for when you step out the door and into that new, shifting reality of the winter wonderland (see Stress Eating and Healthy Eating Meditation Practice—you could use a different mantra, such as "healthy walking," for the second meditation).

Tell me more, you say! Let’s first talk about the strength, flexibility and agility that you need in icy situations. First off, you need strength and agility to feel your feet are under you and grounded to the earth, even if they might start to slip. And if you begin to slip, you’d like the strength, flexibility and agility to self-correct if possible. In modern yoga, practicing many of the basic standing poses, such as Warrior 1 and 2 (Virabradrasana 1 and 2), Triangle pose (Trikonasana), Extended Side Angle pose (Parsvakonasana), Standing Backbend, Wide-Legged Standing Forward Bend (Prasarita Padottanasana) to name a few, will allow you to start to address the strength and flexibility aspects beautifully.

Extended Side Angle Pose

Doing some simple Sun Salutations and Moon Salutations will crank up your agility skills by not only moving your body dynamically, but also making bending down to the ground and being on all fours familiar, should you still lose your balance on the ice. You could almost think of it as practice falling!

Poses with two bent knee poses, such as Powerful pose (Utkatasana) and Squat or Garland pose (Malasana), done both dynamically—in and out of it with the breath—and dropping as low as possible and holding the pose, are great poses to prepare you for a slip.  How so? Well, at the first feeling of a slip on ice, if you remember to bend your knees and not lock them, you can start to “sit down” toward the ground as opposed to tipping over like a falling tree. Sitting down is much less impactful (less injurious, perhaps) on the body than tipping over. And if you do find yourself sitting down from a slippery fall, you’ll have the strength, from having practiced these squatting shaped poses, to more quickly and successfully right yourself. In other words, you will be good at transferring down and up again. (See Featured Pose: Powerful Pose for detailed instructions on how to do the pose.)

Powerful Pose

And if you really want to advance things and improve your balance, you can start adding in one-legged yoga poses to the mix in case you slip and one foot happens to stay on the icy earth. Tree pose (Vrksasana), King Dancer (Natarajasana), Warrior 3 (Virabradrasana 3), Half Moon (Arda Chandrasana), and Standing Hand-to-Foot pose (Utthita Hasta Padangusthasana) will take you in all different directions with your legs and your spine, so again, you may feel more familiar with suddenly being in those positions in slick conditions. (See Featured Pose: Warrior 3 for three different ways to practice Warrior 3.)

Warrior 3 Pose, Easy Version

I can also assure you that my students who have fallen and lived to tell the tale (with minimal injury) reported back that they have the definite impression that their regular home practice and class attendance contributed to their ability to “fall well.” They reported that their reaction time seemed faster and that they had the ability to choose how and where to fall. And often they began to fall and “caught themselves” before actually going all the way down—save!

Now, I can hear some of you saying that this is all fine and dandy, but what I am I to do today? It’s icy out there now and I have been sitting on my butt for years. Well, there is no time like now, especially if you are not going outside today anyway, to start your new yoga home practice today. And the way things are playing out this winter, there is likely to be more ice in the weeks and months to come, so your future pay-offs will be huge by practicing one icy day at a time, beginning now. Go!

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Building Unity Farm - Winter Fermentations

It's the dead of winter in New England, with new snow on the ground and temperatures near zero.    The animals are clustered together in their barn spaces and heated buckets are keeping their water liquid.

There are many indoor tasks to do on the farm during winter - sharpening chain saw chains and other tools, reorganizing the workbench, ordering seeds, planning for Spring planting (we've been tractor shopping), and nurturing all the fermentations begun in the Fall.

Our fermentations include 3 kinds of cider, mead, cyser (a mixture of cider and honey), vinegar, sourdough,sauerkraut, and fermented pickles.   Here's an overview

1.   Cider, Mead and Cyser

Although we bottled 4 cases of sparking cider in the Fall, we still have 12 cases in the fermenters.    Fermenter #1 is a Champagne Yeast fermentation of 11 different kinds of apples kept at 52F in our mudroom to prevent Malolactic fermentation.  The malic acid in apples is a dicarboxylic acid with a sharpness/crispness that I like in a sparkling cider.  Think of it as the flavor of a green apple.    When I make sparkling cider, I add 6 grams/liter of dextrose at bottling to prime the cider for carbonation.  The malic acid and dextrose create a harmonious flavor that's very refreshing.   I typically have a 16 ounce bottle of sparkling cider with lunch on weekends.   After 2 months of aging, the ph of this cider is 3.75 and the malic acid taste is very notable.

Fermenter #2 is a Champagne Yeast fermentation of 11 different kinds of apples with added Malolactic bacteria culture.   After two months, the ph of this cider is 4.15, much softer and smoother given that most of the malic acid has been converted to lactic acid, which has only a single carboxyl group.  I'll bottle this cider uncarbonated - as still cider.   Malolactic fermentation changes the flavor a bit, adding the kind of butteriness you taste in most Chardonnays.

Fermenter #3 is a Champagne Yeast fermentation  of 11 different kinds of apples with added Malolactic bacteria culture.   The yeast has exhausted many of the nutrients in the cider due to a Keeving process  I used during the initial fermentation.  It's fermenting very slowly and I believe I will end up with a smooth cider with a small amount of residual sweetness.  I'll bottle this cider uncarbonated as well.   The ph of this Cider is 4.07.

The taste among the three is remarkably different and we'll see which one is best once I bottle them in the Spring.

The mead and cyser fermentations continue.   At the first racking, the specific gravity of the mead decreased from 1.090 to 1.030, yielding 8% alcohol.    The specific gravity of the cyser decreased from 1.085 to 1.010, yielding 10% alcohol.   We'll continue fermentation until the Spring and bottle them uncarbonated in 375ml clear wine bottles once fully fermented to a specific gravity of 1.000.

2.  Apple Cider vinegar

I separated 20 liters of hard cider from the other fermenting batches, added mother of vinegar  and stored it in the basement, open to the air.   When it is finished, the titratable acidity will be 5%.  It's currently at 2% and has a remarkable flavor without being overpowering.


3. Sourdough
We use the King Arthur Starter and keep buckets of active sourdough growing in our mudroom.

4.  Sauerkraut
We use a 5 liter Harsch crock and weights with the following recipe

3kg of cabbage
15 grams of salt

Remove wilted outer leaves of cabbage head, and the stalk. Shred cabbage.

Layer the cabbage, sprinkle some salt then press down with a fist until juice appears. Repeat until pot is full.

Lay on the weights and if there is not enough juice, add cooled boiled salt water (15gm salt per liter ratio)

Close lid, then add plain water to the rim (water trap)

Leave pot at room temperature for 3 days until you hear some bubbling.

Move to a cooler room for 4-6 weeks

Move into large Ball jars in the refrigerator.   Eat within a month.


5. Fermented Pickles

We use a food grade 2 gallon bucket and a plate on top as a weight
2 pounds freshly picked firm, unwaxed, bumpy pickling cucumbers, often called Kirby
2 cloves spring garlic, sliced thin
1 dill flower, or 5 sprigs fresh dill or 1 teaspoon dill seed
1/2 teaspoon coriander seed
1/2 jalapeño, seeded and slivered
2 tablespoons salt

Soak cucumbers for 30 minutes in a bowl filled with ice water to loosen any dirt. Slice the blossom end off each cucumber, which is opposite the stem end. If you aren’t sure which end is which, slice a little off each. Cut cucumbers into spears or chunks, if desired.

Pack cucumbers into one or two clean quart jars. Tuck in garlic, dill, coriander and jalapeño, if using.

Add salt to two cups boiling water. Stir until dissolved. Add two cups of ice (made with filtered water if yours is chlorinated). Stir well until the ice has melted and the brine is cool. Pour brine into jars, covering cucumbers.

Loosely cap jars and place in a bowl or pan because the jars may leak during fermentation.

Leave pickles on the counter to ferment. The brine will bubble lazily and become cloudy. Taste after 3 days, leaving on the counter another day or two if you want your pickles more sour, or refrigerating if they’re ready. They keep a month in the refrigerator.


It's time to put another log on the fire and listen to the subtle bubbling of our winter fermentations.

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