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...[Readmore]

More Short Meditations from Mexico

by BaxterIf 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 MeditationFor the second day of my retreat, I was thinking of how to incorporate the concept of flexibility...[Readmore]

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 underpoweredBuy Kubota, John Deere is mostly outsourcedBuy from your closest dealer, service really mattersDon't worry about the dealer, do the service yourselfBuy...[Readmore]

Decide Each Day What to Do

by NinaLast Hike by ShitaoIn 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...[Readmore]

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...[Readmore]

Short But Sweet: 10-Minute Meditations for Healthy Aging

by BaxterEven 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...[Readmore]

Medical Yoga Symposium at the Smithsonian

by TimothyGreetings 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...[Readmore]

Friday Q&A: How Do You Keep Fit?

Newberry Crater by Melina MezaQ: 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...[Readmore]

Winter Ice, Fear of Falling and Yoga

by BaxterDespite 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...[Readmore]