Each spring we experience the explosion of sensory delight as we witness the renewal of lifeforms…plants and animals blossoming and birthing. April is the month of Easter, the Christian celebration that reminds us that rebirth follows death. It is a natural time to remember what meaningful aspects of your yoga practice you may have strayed away from and renew them! Perhaps it was a daily breath practice or meditation time, or a focus on the health of the body through diet and asana practice.

This month, we focus on the fourth yama, brahmacharya. The most common interpretations of this yama are celibacy, abstinence, and restraint. However, we can look at those states as the results, not the causes, of spiritual practice. T.K.V. Desikachar in his book The Heart of Yoga, defines brahmacharya as “a movement towards the essential.” For a traditional yoga student, the goal of practice is remembrance of the highest reality, the divine, the absolute truth, or the presence of God. The accomplishment of this goal, in turn, creates brahmacharya.

To understand that the senses are doorways of deeper perception to “know thyself” makes it easier to enjoy them without being seduced by them to want more and more. With that understanding, enjoy your senses and celebrate the smells, tastes, and sensations of this beautiful world.

In April, we invite you to renew the intention that drew you to your practice of yoga and to practice with us in one of the many ways we are here to support you and each other on the yoga path.

Special events:

• Book club meeting on Sun., April 2, at 1:30 p.m. Join our host Cassandra and other members of our community to discuss Baron Baptiste’s Perfectly Imperfect: The Art and Soul of Yoga Practice at our second 4yoga book club meeting. The book is available from the Warren County Public Library in both print and digital formats. Please bring a vegetarian snack to share; we will provide hot tea. We will conclude our discussion by 3:30 p.m. so that participants who wish to do so can attend the 4 p.m. Basics class.
• Restorative class on Sun., April 9, at 5:45 p.m. For a special opportunity to relax deeply, join Angie for the monthly Sunday-night Restorative class. Create your own mini-retreat by taking Nicole’s 4 p.m. Basics class that afternoon and then staying for Restorative!
• Brahmacharya focus for Living Our Yoga. This month’s Living Our Yoga class, on Fri., April 28, focuses on the fourth yama, brahmacharya. In this class, Alice and Angie combine the traditional yin asanas with thematic readings and teachings to enhance students’ experience and to create conditions that may take them deeper into the mind, body, and spirit aspects of their practice.
• Two monthly classes at The Downing Museum. In April we continue at The Downing Museum for our second-Saturday yoga class and fourth-Saturday meditation class. The class fee remains the same as at the studio, $5. We are grateful for the demand for these classes and for the opportunity to practice in such a beautiful space every month. See this post for to the online registration forms, which will be disabled when the classes are full, and instructions about how to be added to the wait list.

For a full list of April classes, please see the online calendar or pick up a hard copy at The Pots Place. We also post updates each morning on our Facebook page, should you find it convenient to keep up with us there.

Accessing studio after class has begun: Remember that even if the front door is locked when you arrive, you can still join us for class. Just come to the back door of The Pots Place (look for the blue building) and ring the buzzer. The teacher will then unlock the door remotely for you to enter through the pottery studio.