I have to say that I am really loving the Twitter yoga community. I have met some awesome yogis and yoginis out there in Twitter land. One of the best things about Twitter is learning about great new yoga blogs, interesting articles, and the chance to learn more about my favorite sport of yoga.
So, I have to pass along two super cool things that I am going to participate in that I think you might be interested in.
Yoga Book Club
I’m a long-time fan of book clubs. I’ve been in bad book clubs and great book clubs and even wrote about how to form a book club that doesn’t suck. Book clubs rock because when you read something, it really enhances the experience if you can share your thoughts with others. Even if you didn’t like the book, you have a group of people to vent with or ask questions, and I guarantee the other members will open up your mind and offer different perspectives you hadn’t even thought of.
With that said, a group of my fellow yoginis—Erica, @spoiledyogi, and Meredith, @MeredithLeBlanc, got the idea to read Yoga School Dropout by Lucy Edge after Erica tweeted about how excited she was to get the book in the mail one day. We are going to start reading the book this week and tweet about it on the weekends and the conversation will be very casual. If you are part of the Twitterverse, you must follow Erica and Meredith and check out their blogs at the Spoiled Yogi and The Pondering Yogini and join our little yoga book club. We are using #ysdo as the hash tag when we tweet about it.
Gita in a Nutshell
What is the Gita? Were you supposed to read the Gita in yoga teacher training and never did? The Bhagavad Gītā is a sacred Hindu scripture that is considered among the most important texts in the history of literature and philosophy.
Bob Weisenberg is starting a weekly discussion group that is going to break down the Bhagavad Gītā in a new discussion group called Gita in a Nutshell. Anyone from Gita virgins (like me) to Gita aficionados are invited and will benefit from the discussion (and Bob has promised that they will pay particular attention to the needs of new readers). Bob is the author of Yoga Demystified, a smart blog that really breaks down yoga for people like me, who sometimes need it explained in simplified terms, so I’m thinking that his discussion of the Bhagavad Gītā is really going to rock.
You can follow the discussion on Elephant Journal, or if you fan the Facebook group, you will receive automatic e-mail alerts when a new discussion session is posted. The recommended text is Stephen Mitchell’s Bhagavad Gītā, but you can follow along with any version that you like.
The first installment of the discussion group aired yesterday (November 10) so be sure to join in the conversation, ask questions, challenge Bob with anything that doesn’t seem right, and hopefully be inspired by the Gita.
I’m excited to have two great new opportunities to spread my yoga wings and take part in some good clean yoga book discussions.
Yay! I’m excited about both of these, too. I love that we can put on our serious yoga student hats one day and have casual banter about a less serious yoga subject the next!
Wow, awesome! I’m not so sure I can participate just yet but please keep us posted as I would like to in the future. At the moment, I am feeling just a tad overwhelmed (yes, as I mentioned the other day in the blog…) with everything we are doing for our training! So I had best just focus on that and the rest of my life for now but I love that you are organizing this, the book choices sound great!
Hi, Maria. Thanks for this very warm endorsement of “Gita in a Nutshell”. It’s off to a great start, thanks to support from people like you.
Looking forward to #yogaschooldropout, too. For your readers who aren’t aware of it already, I had the pleasure of interviewing author Lucy Edge for Elephant Journal, and Lucy has also published three excerpts with pictures and all there. You can find them all on my Elephant page.
Hi Maria,
Thank you very much for introducing your readers to my book – I really appreciate your support.
And for anyone who hasnt discovered The Gita Guy yet…you’re in for a treat!
Great website! You’re now on my Favourites bar!
Lucy Dropout Edge
damn! i missed it! fml.
Lo – sounds like your life has been pretty hectic lately. You can still join in the fun – would love to get your hilarious take on this!
Lots of great discussion on Twitter this weekend. Thanks to all who shared their opinions and thoughts. Loved the funny observations about who should play the male roles in the film version of this book (Jude Law, Hugh Grant, Robert Downey Jr, Colin Firth – I’ll take any/all of them!). There’s still time to join the fun – pick up a copy of Yoga School Dropout and join the conversation on the weekends at #YSDO. The hastag changed from #yogaschooldropout to #ysdo.