OM Blog + Press

Once a year, thousands of people embark upon an epic journey to Black Rock City, where they seek fun, adventure, and an almost unavoidable taste of self awareness and ideally personal expression. The OM Collection is known as a yoga clothing company, but at our core we seek to help women and men feel beautiful and embodied so that they may better express their true nature.

by Ombassador and Spirit Warrior Jill Emich

I am a rebel. I am a master of my destiny. I live my truth. I choose. I choose not to dwell in any shame but instead celebrate. I choose not to focus on my weakness but transform them in to strengths.

I turn 40 this month and lets just say, some parts of my life I adore and some I may have a different opinion about. I am a single woman. I have no children of my own. But I love my work and I live passionately and from the heart. I am so proud of what I do bring in to this life and the gifts I have to offer. I am not going to say I do not have longings, because I do. I am not going to say that I didn’t wish I had a beautiful authentic connected partner in my life, because I do. But I can also celebrate the reality without having it have to match my plan of what others or I think it should be because as it turns out HERE I AM.

This longing is nothing more then me wanting to experience my own divine nature. It is only calling me into my best light.

I know this and I celebrate this.

So I am a rebel. I respect my individuality. It is neither less then nor greater then because we are all so unique that it is impossible to compare. A rebel does not mean I act out, it is more my essence-MY WAY. It is my way of respecting myself as an individual with my very own blueprint and very own path. I respect my own freedom and the freedom of others. I believe what life has in store for me is just for me and will lead to my own personal life transformation and experience. As is for you.

I live from a place of balance, acceptance, freedom, joy, and abundance of what IS.
I love my work. Shine is a place for all of us to congregate, celebrate, transform and heal together as individuals and in community. It is a blessing and a gift on so many levels.
I feel blessed to a triplet and having a deep soul connection to my two sisters and their beautiful families.
I have loving and supportive parents.

I have a brother who is mentally and physically “challenged” and he teaches me patience and unconditional love and acceptance every single day. And that is his path.
I am love. I am light. I radiate love and joy. I experience magic all around me every day.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.  

Love After Love

The time will come

When, with elation,

You will greet yourself arriving

At your own door, in your own mirror,

And each will smile at the other’s welcome.

 

And say, sit here. Eat.

You will love again the stranger who was your self.

Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart

To itself, to the stranger who has loved you

 

All your life, whom you ignored

For another, who knows you by heart.

Take down the love letters from the bookshelf.

 

The photographs, the desperate notes,

Peel your image from the mirror.

-Derek Walcott

Our fabulous OMbassador, Shakti Sunfire, teaches yoga and hooping around the world. Many of our followers are teachers of dance, yoga and other movement arts. Shakti wrote this just for you, as a few tips on what to avoid when teaching.

To take the seat of the teacher is to self-own and self-resource FIRST. Before anyone else can believe in you and will want to learn from you, you have to believe in yourself. In that way it is a fundamental giving of PERMISSION for you to occupy the role of teacher completely, unapologetically and wholeheartedly. 

When I first began to teach - scratch that - for YEARS after I began teaching I struggled with nerves. I would shake and tremble when speaking, I would spend hours that day prepping what I wanted to say, and it’d all go out the window anyway. I wouldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep well. i’d have dreams about flopping, disappointing the promoters and my students, loosing the opportunity. Letting myself down. I was all over the map. 

I would regularly say to my teachers and friends who encouraged me relentlessly;

“whatever you see in me, I don’t see it in myself.”

I felt uncoordinated, unworthy, small... and what I didn’t know then, but I certainly know now is that what I was really focused on and concerned about was being judged. What I was really concerned about was the chance that this offering - this HEART craft - be minimized, belittled and laughed at.

What I didn’t know then, but I know now is that I was really good at giving my power away and believing myself less-than, like an impostor in my own skin.

Nine years later and I look back on those times and sorely wish that someone had told me what I’m about to tell you...

To teach masterfully requires you to have a deep-seated knowing that your visions, ambitions and offerings as a teacher have a place in the world...and a purpose. That is what fuels you. That is the power behind your words that exudes charisma and clarity. It will keep you living, breathing, speaking, acting and dancing YOUR truth in a way that serves the whole.

To teach masterfully is to meet your students in service of them - that really it’s not about you and whether or not you’re perfect, or whether or not you look good up there, nor how deep your words are. In fact, what self-owning is NOT is to think yourself perfect, the best, or without shortages and to reprimand yourself when your humanity shows through.

Only YOU can give yourself permission to fully and completely take the seat of the teacher. It is a glorious seat - one of deep fulfillment and a real sense of purpose, AND it is also a seat full of personal and collective responsibility, humility and exposure to high wind and weather. 

As a Master Teacher You Will Need:

• magnetic appeal/charisma
• self-confidence
• powerful voice projection
• to command an audience
• to inspire respect

Sometimes As a Teacher You Will Get:

• pulled in many directions
• projected upon with energy and emotion that isn’t yours!
• push-back
• placed in uncomfortable positions for you
• less than ideal classroom settings
• surprises!

All of these things are solved or resourced from the seat of the teacher in your heart. You can think of it like the deep roots that can weather any storm and that are constantly drawing energy, nutrition, life-sustenance and insight from an unseen source. If you cultivate the capacity to access this source you will be able to compost ANY ENERGY that comes your way - good or bad, and alchemize it into food and fuel for your work in the world.

5 Things You Can Do Right Now to Begin to Cultivate This Capacity:

1. Hold SPACE for yourself at the beginning and end of class. 

Give yourself time at the beginning and ending of your class that prepares you psycho-spiritually for teaching. Take what ‘you’ time you need, so that the time you spend in front of others can truly be about them.

2. Connect with your BODY (physical intelligence).

As movement guides we know the body is gateway to the soul. Ground your energy in the here and now by connecting with your breath, the connection of your feet on the earth, and use physical sensation as anchor.

3. Practice, and listen for, sacred speech.

We are often taught to play small, that it’s safer not to be noticed, to not push others around, but active voicing is truly a compassionate way to speak if you are in the seat of the teacher. Using active voice will let your students relax into their role as student, into the arms of you, as teacher and leader. They want that. You want that. Everybody wins. Switching from the habit of using passive voice to active voice may take some time and dedication, but drawing awareness to the power of your word choice is a step into taking the seat as leader and teacher.

• Speak to the truth of the moment. Let that set you free.
• Passive vs. active voice
• Projection - say it like you mean it

4. Take a course that helps you connect with your soul purpose and essential self.

The best teachers are eternal students. One of the easiest ways we can stay connected in the seat of the teacher is to teach only what is truly ALIVE for us. Not a memorized recital of somebody else’s languaging. Be the student, embody your passions, and teach from that place.

5. Work with your inner critic or any other sub-personality work that may be “steering the ship”.

As guides it is our responsibility to identify and work with aspects of self that may be sabotaging our time in service to others. Read Bill Plotkin’s Wild Mind; a fantastic resource that will help you to speak and act from a place of wholeness.

And finally, surround yourself with people who believe in you and what you're doing. Ask for help when you need it. Ask for mirroring when you feel defeated, and know that by definition, the teacher leads the pack, and therefore is equally exposed to the refiner's fire. Learn to embrace that energy, and you will soar.

Often times our perception of how we think things are 'going down' may not be what's really True, with a capital T.  Have you ever created a whole scenario in your mind of what you think someone has done, to later discover that your interpretation was completely wrong? 

Take a moment to watch your OT Coaching Tune-Up by clicking the picture below. Hear how a client started to go into a story about a situation that only left her feeling worse and more separated from herself and her friend. Through coaching, she learned that it was not only a lot of wasted energy, but how she can rise above it by simply shifting her perspective.

Home Play:

*First step, as always...Become aware: "Oh, I totally want to jump in and react.  Am I creating an entire scenario in my head, without even really knowing the whole picture?"

*In that awareness, practice being gentle and forgiving toward yourself for feeling those feelings.  You are human, after all, and have most likely experienced some pain and upset in your life.  Saying something to yourself like, "It makes sense you are reacting right now, because this feels like a past situation.  It's ok to feel upset, and it's ok to feel what you are feeling."

*Pause, go back to what you are feeling.  Begin to inquire, what are these feelings really about?  "How might what I am feeling be my own stuff, and am I now blaming this person for putting it on me?

*Look beyond the story: Ask yourself, "How might I look beyond the story of what I am creating in my mind and see this person as someone who has also experienced pain in their life?" 

Simple?  Yes.  Easy? Not necessarily.  The more we practice, we begin to strengthen our ability to respond instead of react, and not give our power to our old limiting beliefs.  This leaves us feeling not only more connected and compassionate towards self, it also leaves room for others to be human and have compassion for their wounds.

Feel stuck in shifting the story? You are not alone!  Shoot us an email to find out the myriad of ways you can get support with OT Coaching.  We would love to support you.

Until next time....expect GREAT things!

Live from your Spirit, love your life

“Rise women! Rise sacred feminine! I am not afraid. I welcome you. I am at your service.“

- the Divine Masculine

The healing of the masculine and the feminine is the work of our time.  

Last weekend, we embarked on our Medicine Path of the Priestess Women’s Beltane Retreat fully aware of the enormity of our undertaking. We knew the intentions we were working with would stir us deeply. As women, we have immense trauma from our experience with men, both from this lifetime, and in our collective memory of thousands of years of patriarchal persecution.

As a community of women, we told our stories, we held each other, and we wove a tapestry of our collective experience in a female body.

We knew that in order to truly heal with the masculine and open to the experience that we profoundly desire with men, we must first let go of the deep-rooted residues of fear and oppression that we hold within ourselves.

The great mystic Lucia Renee talks of the roles of women and men in these paradigm-shifting times: “At this moment, women are being asked to stand in their power. Not to stand against something, not even to stand for something, but to stand in the energy of the Divine Feminine, an alignment where the polarity of for and against comes to rest.”

We must unplug ourselves, energetically, from the grid of patriarchy that exists within us as a result of our social conditioning. We must emerge like grass, and stand in our feminine power.

And for the men Lucia says, “At this moment, men have a very different task: to reclaim the energy of the heart, to honor women while they do their sacred work, and to process their response to the crescendo of female power.”

With this intention, we welcomed a few sacred men on the final day of our retreat to hold our prayer with us. The men were given the task of preparing the land for our Beltane Maypole Ritual, as well as the invitation to make an offering to the women and our sacred work.

The Divine Masculine showed up with the radiance of the sun and met us beyond our wildest expectations.

They guided us into an experience of being completely held, honored and cherished as the powerful feminine. We began at the Beltane fire where we were invited to burn a root, representing the release of the roots of fear within us that were already dead and simply needed to be dug up and burned. Yes.

They held a safe space for us and spoke tender words, and the tears flowed from our eyes and our hearts opened wide as they led us on a journey of receiving. In these men, we experienced healthy, balanced masculine energy.

We gave back to them in song, dance, and abundant blessings. In our unconditional exchange, we wove threads of trust, healing and respect.

We danced together in joy and love, and our lives were forever changed. 

I am grateful beyond words for this past moon cycle and the deep study of the healing of the masculine and the feminine, both inside of us and in the world. And on this delicious Full Moon as we celebrate Lunar Beltane, may we honor all that we our healing and transforming in our own lives and for humanity as a whole.

May our hearts guide us and may we rejoice in the fruits of our devotion and love.

Blessings of the Goddess ~
Dayna Seraye

Owning our story can be hard but not nearly as difficult as spending our lives running from it. Embracing our vulnerabilities is risky but not nearly as dangerous as giving up on love and belonging and joy—the experiences that make us the most vulnerable. Only when we are brave enough to explore the darkness will we discover the infinite power of our light.” ― Brené Brown

In honor of the heart.

This is an invitation for you to explore. Make this a journaling or meditation exercise to help open your heart and make you shine.

The Om Collection would like to ask for your support for one of our photographers, and friend of The Om Collection, Merrick Chase of Merrick Chase Photography and Merrick Chase Weddings.

Merrick has entered what we feel is quite a striking image in a prestigious photo industry competition (PDN's Top Knot Contest) and you can help him win the People's Choice portion. 

Merrick's image is currently in sixth place out of nearly 1500 entries and needs only 250 votes to be in first place! Please click on the link below to show your support for our great friend and photographer and please share the link with your networks if you, too, love the image like we do. Thank you very much for your support and good luck, Merrick!

http://www.topknotscontest.com/bin/Rate?image_id=2014001758

See more of Merrick's Photography...

I was having a conversation with a dear ex-boyfriend of mine and he pointed out that sometimes I sit on the shore in a place of worry, feelings of not being good enough, and doubts, instead of swimming in the sea of everything I am and desire.  Well, it got me thinking (the visual was very helpful), and I decided I want to swim in the sea of everything I want to bring in to my life including prosperity, abundance, success, love, passion-YES, I want to bathe in it!  All of the sudden I was picturing basking in the sea in the feelings of all of these things that I am calling in and it really lit me up!

Hosting tips from OMbassador Jill Emich, owner of Shine Restaurant & Gathering Place on creating a perfect intentional gathering for the holidays, New Years Eve, and throughout 2014!

Gone are the days of the huge blowout drunken bashes where we all drink waaaaaay too much and make poor decisions we regret later. What the world needs now is connection sweet connection. Entertaining with the purpose of connection is where it is at these days and it is a bit of an art. With people’s busy lives and the social media and texting obsession, people crave quality face-to-face time. We need it now more than ever.

Here are my tips on the four elements of great intentional party to help you and your guests connect for a memorable nurturing experience.