Hey There Lovely Friends,

Let's not so randomly chat about sitting with what would usually be considered less desirable emotions.

I remember many moons ago inspecting a house I had purchased a few years prior because I wanted to move back in.

• Of course, this house was purchased in 2008, when it was actually possible with six months of savings and a smile.

(finally, a reason to share this cartoon I adore ).

I saw the state of the bedroom. The whole room was FULL of beds. Literally, a queen bed, a single bed next to it and another single at the bottom placed longways.

I went straight into "Annika in her early twenties judgment mode. " How ridiculous for a family to put all the beds together in one room. You cannot physically open the door to the en suite.

I obviously didn't understand the concept of having dependants at the time.

Fast-forward over a decade, and here I am, moving another bed into the main bedroom so four humans can...

Hello there friends! 

Last week, I asked a dear friend if she could permit me to flake.

I had been sitting with this feeling for a few days.

We had put together our Studio Christmas Party and had even gone to the lengths of organizing live music and celebratory sound healing at the end of the community potluck.

I locked out the date, which was already surrounded by a rainbow of Google calendar colours of other shindigs.

As I did this, I could already feel in my belly that it was going to be a lot, but at the time the feeling of what I felt inclined to do was stronger, so I stuck with the mindset of "it will figure itself out later" (which btw, very much works a lot of the time in family and business life).

As the days started to fold over, however, unlike other times, this feeling didn't go away.

I was excited to hang out with teachers and students without yoga clothes on for once. Keen to listen to live...

Hey Beautiful,

I was dwelling on the weekend about a comment my baby daddy made to me last week in regard to the last newsletter.

We were sitting in our spare room (also known as the room we dump all of our laundry in) ... folding laundry, and I was talking to him about how I have been feeling overwhelmed (I try not to use the world busy, but life is full at the moment, and sometimes it overflows).

He then went on to mention how he listened to a podcast earlier in the day about 4 ways to relax 

It took me a moment (as it usually does with his witty one-liners), to notice that he was talking about the studio "podcast" (the one where I read out this newsletter) and how last week was about four different ways to take mini-meditations throughout the day (if you missed it, you can read it on our studio blog).

At that moment I felt a lil silly. Who am I to give advice on how to be chill?!

Hence the inspo for this...

Hey There,

Yesterday I spent some of the day with our dear teacher Suzie (she starts teaching a regular Sunday night at St Marys in a couple of weeks too btw!), prepping things for the Teacher Training coming up in just under 2 months.

We were talking about why someone would join a Yoga Teacher Training in the first place. Deepen their practice? Career change? Help shift some stuff?

She then started to share about her own journey. How she started yoga at the age of 12 by going to class at the gym with her father, and then leaving right before Savasana to instead to go do chin-ups downstairs 

This story reminded me of one of my very first yoga classes also. I think I had justttttt finished high school and a friend of mine asked if I wanted to try yoga.

I don't remember any of the poses we did... except of course... Savasana.

Why would I just lay here for no reason? Why is the teacher telling me to stop?...

Hey Hey,

As I write this (on Monday), I'm sitting at my computer desk at home, coflo to the side, ready to type.

I usually have the baby for the whole day, so the writing happens while sitting at the reception at the St Mary's studio in the evening, but baby daddy is home and he has strapped her to his body and taken her for a walk.

Sunday was a big day for us. Well for me and the little ones. I took them both with me to a Teachers Circle and Art Class at the Penrith Studio (hosted by our in-house art teaching superstar Karen Gruber of course).

I had the chance only to spectate the watercolors moving along the paper (thanks over tired baby!), but little Miss 4 years old was happy to take a seat and get amongst it with the other teachers and past graduates of previous Yoga Teacher Trainings.

We also met in circle, hosted by another one of our teachers and graduates, Mihaela Zotta, to do a check-in with how...

Good Morning /Afternoon,

Over the weekend I was having a chat with one of our Yoga Teacher Training students about how it hasn't rained in ages and how we were going to fill up our bird baths.

Well, looky looky here! It rained!

I almost forgot rain was a thing.

It got me thinking... how filling up bird baths feels as much yoga as the pranayama (breathing exercises) teaching practice the students had for their teacher training afternoon (oh and btw, they all totally rocked it! You have some fineeee yoga teachers coming your way in a few months!)

You know when the yoga teacher is like "ITS ALL YOGA!".

Well to us it makes sense... but I am assuming for the student on our two-week trial (there are so many of you at the studio atm, thank you for being with us... please stay, we adore you!), we probably sound a littleeeeeee loopie.

So, why is it "all yoga"?

It's a bunch of things.. one of them is a lil...

There is a bunch of oh so wonderful things that sort of bring together the teachings that are yoga. Things that make yoga that lil more special. The reason why so many come to yoga not just to be able to touch their toes, but to learn more about themselves, and to be able to sit with their discomforts.

One of those layers in that yoga onion, is of course, the Yamas and Niyamas.

Yamas and Niyamas are fundamental principles that first originated from Indian philosophy. They provide guidance on how to live that balanced and fulfilled life we all secretly or not so secretly are striving for, by cultivating certain positive attitudes and behaviors.

You can break them down like this:

1. Yamas: Yamas are moral and ethical guidelines that help us interact harmoniously with others and the world around us.

• Ahimsa (Non-violence): This is about avoiding harm to others, both physically and emotionally. In everyday life, it means treating others kindly and avoiding...

Welcome to August!

The first thing that came to my head?

A pinch and a punch for the first day of the month NO RETURNS!

Can you believe that this is still winter? I got a suntan over the weekend in my backyard. Shell pool out and Miss 4 years old had her bath out in the sun.

Amongst the pool parties however, we have been busy beavers with a handful of changes at the studios the last week. If you are curious about our updates, here are some below...

Website: We have merged our main website to be on the same platform as our online platform (there are still some glitches to fix but it's mostly done!). This means easier access to all the Nin Yoga things, as well as an opportunity for us to create more online courses. We just offered a Free Vinyasa Krama course, we will also start creating a 4-week online beginner yoga course soon, and our Yoga Teacher Training will have a bunch of resources to reference on there too.

Timetables: We also merged...