Life is Suffering, Just not for my Kids

11 May
by Alison, posted in Blog   |  No Comments

The Buddha said “Life means suffering”, but every mother thinks, “just not my kids, leave them out”.

When my children were growing up, my first and immediate response to thier physical or emotional pain was, of course, to prevent or cure it. As they grew older there were more hurts that I couldn’t prevent and couldn’t fix. I also learned that there were times when my attempts to take away their pain did more harm than good.

This past week I watched my grown son’s grieve deeply and profoundly. As I walked through the first shock and then all the rituals that surround a death, I remembered that being with a child in pain requires skills, not just empathy. Continue Reading

Peace: Ending The Mommy Wars Within

03 May
by Alison, posted in Blog   |  No Comments

A new round of debates about motherhood and feminism have been spawned by the book, “Conflict”,  by Badinter. In  The Eternal Internal Mommy Wars, Dell’Antonia describes the debates as an expression of the constant war within mothers (and now more frequently within fathers) between satisfying their own needs and those of their child.  This dichotomy is a false one and causes endless suffering. More often than not, what is good for mommy is good for baby and visa versa.   A beautiful example of this convergence was expressed by Anna Quindlen in an interview on Fresh Air , in which she spoke about her decision to stop drinking… Continue Reading

Ending Parent Self-Neglect: One Downward Dog at a Time.

26 Apr
by Alison, posted in Blog   |  No Comments

Child neglect is a form of child maltreatment. In the absence of poverty, child neglect can be defined as a deficit in meeting a child’s basic needs like supervision, nutrition,  rest, emotional nurturing, shelter. Thank goodness, most parents do not neglect their children. As a matter of fact most middle class parents are giving their children more than they need; more stuff, more attention, more worrying and more protection from minor mishaps, frustration and hurt feelings. In order to do this, parents are neglecting themselves. Yes, there is an epidemic of parent self-neglect in this country. Parents who neglect their own basic needs for rest, nutritious food, relaxation, couple time and friendship, end up depleted, tense, and over the long course, sick.

Yes, there is an epidemic of parent self-neglect in this country. Continue Reading

Yoga, Parenting and The Dandelion Wars…

06 Apr
by Alison, posted in Blog   |  No Comments

“Everybody thinks their opinion is the right one. If they didn’t, they would get a new one.” Anne Lamott

I spent the afternoon harvesting dandelions for dinner tonight. I haven’t always had a cozy relationship with the so-called weed. For years, the beginning of spring heralded what I fondly referred to as the Dandelion Wars. With my trusty weeding tool in hand I headed out to the back forty–a small patch of lawn wherever I lived– to get rid of the dandelions. For the past few years I knew that you could eat this prolific weed, but I continued to fight the good fight. Then a few days ago something shifted, perhaps it was the yummy recipes I heard about (flower fritters, sauted greens in olive oil and garlic) or maybe it was something inside of me. I am still digging dandelions, but “harvesting dinner” has a really different feel to it than “weeding”.  There are lots of things worth fighting for, like human rights and environmental justice; a weed-free lawn is just not one of them.  As a mother I felt like I was dressed for battle a lot of the time. Getting my son to sleep through the night, getting him to slow down,  eat healthier food…on and on and on.

Are there battles that you are fighting? Yoga invites us to soften our stance and open our minds to consider our beliefs in a new light.  Are there battles you would like to cast off? Continue Reading

Recognizing The Teacher

30 Mar
by Alison, posted in Blog   |  No Comments

This week Adrienne Rich died. She was known for her influential poems and defiant political stands, but she was also a mentor and visionary for many silent readers; women who read her work and recognized themselves but never spoke. I loved her work for it’s unapologetic uncertainty and her humanity. And I loved, especially, her brutal honesty about motherhood. She said what I felt but couldn’t say out loud.

“My children cause me the most exquisite suffering of which I have any experience. It is the suffering of ambivilence: the murderous alternation between bitter resentment and raw-edged nerves and blissful gratification and tenderness. Sometimes I seem to myself, in my feelings towards these tiny guiltless beings, a monster of selfishness and intolerance.”

There are teachers everywhere. The voices of wisdom abound, we must seek them out and spend time among them, especially when the voice is our own, hidden or silent. And we must allow our teachers their humanity, uncertainty and fallibility. We must be as compassionate with our wise ones as we are with our children. Be on the look out this week for the quiet voice of truth within and the wise women and teachers around us. Continue Reading

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  • Meet Alison!

    As parents we breathe, we come to our hands and knees, we take a stand, we balance and we fall. We stand up again. We push the edges of our comfort zone as warriors of love. We bend over backwards with open hearts, we become children, we play dead. We start all over again. We find grace.

    I created The Yoga Of Parenting because parents deserve love and nurturing as much as their children do. A yoga mat is the perfect place for parents to express and explore all of the poses of parenthood; joy, ferocious love, gratitude, frustration, boredom, guilt and more ferocious love, love, love. Parents, this one's for you. Read more