Tag: karma yoga

1st Yogathon for Victims of Domestic Violence

by L. Valdez Karl

My long-time readers know that I have taught yoga and meditation at a domestic violence shelter as a volunteer since 2004.  October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month so I have always tried to do a yoga fundraiser for the shelter.  Many of you also know that I no longer teach at yoga studios so I have not been able to do this fundraiser for a while due to lack of a space.  This year the director of the dance studio where I do Nia has generously offered her studio so I am back on track.

Getting local newspapers to take any interest in this has been close to impossible.  In fact, getting ANY local people to take any interest in this is close to impossible.

So I am going global and I’m asking for money.  Big money….because I want to start a consistent trauma sensitive yoga program at the shelter.  If yoga bloggers can ask their readers for money to fund their teacher trainings or travels to yoga fests, I can also ask for some do-re-me.  The money does not even have to go to me, it can go directly to the shelter to be specifically dedicated for a yoga program.

I am looking for socially-minded corporate sponsors, whether in Illinois or anywhere in the world, to help fund my proposed Trauma Sensitive Mind-Body Program.  I study yoga therapy in India; I’m certified in Trauma Sensitive Yoga….I got the goods, people!  All my yoga tools are for the women at the shelter.

My TSMB program will provide structured yoga sessions for domestic violence survivors to give them tools to address their habituated patterns and symptoms that lead to relapse into the cycle of trauma.  I will offer a research-based yoga curriculum based on the ways in which mind-body practices facilitate traumatic stress recovery.

The shelter depends on grants and donations and the money goes toward keeping the doors open for the women.  After 7 years of teaching only once a month, I finally sat down last month with the director to talk about starting a dedicated weekly or twice weekly yoga program.  She said they would look for grants for money to fund my teaching but it will be a long process.  I said that I was patient because after all, I’ve already been teaching there for 7 years.

I am not a non-profit organization (although I am looking into re-organizing as a “low profit” corporation, a new business entity) so I can not apply for grants on my own.  Once I tried Kickstarter to help raise money, but they refused my project because it had nothing to do with the arts, it was not “creative” enough.  Even the local yoga magazine has refused stories in spite of two of my students contacting the editor over the years.  I’m calling you out, Yoga Chicago.

I admit it — I get a bit down when I see others get featured for their karma yoga projects.  Not jealous because they are doing valuable work…just depressed because I’ve been doing the same thing for a long time and maybe if I got some news flash, some local money would flow into the shelter to start a program.  Or maybe just some help or advice.  Whatever.  I just keep plugging away.

As naive as this sounds, I am looking for a benefactor for this program.  A sugar daddy.  Or mommy.  An anonymous benefactor or maybe a rich person can leave us some money in their will.  Another Oprah.  Hey, Oprah!  You had Rodney Yee on your show years ago and talked about how wonderful yoga is…so help a sister out, will  ya?

Blech.  I’m just tired of banging my head against the wall.  It’s very tiring when you’re the only one doing this without any emotional support.

I know a lot people from all over the world read this blog.  If you can help us out, contact me.

But in the meantime, if you are in the Fox Valley area of far west suburban Chicago, consider attending the First Yogathon for Victims of Domestic Violence.  Nearly three out of four (74%) of Americans personally know someone who is or has been a victim of domestic violence.

Help some sisters out.

October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month

by L. Valdez Karl

I am a survivor.

That is why my seva is at my local domestic violence shelter for almost 10 years now. It is my favorite class to teach because my students are also my teachers. Someone you know is a survivor of domestic violence, sexual assault, or both.

Consider these facts —

Domestic Violence:

Half of all married women in the United States are physically abused at some time in their marriage.

One in 10 teenagers will be involved in a violent dating relationship before graduating from high school.

A woman is beaten every 10 seconds.

Domestic violence is the most under-reported crime in the US.

Domestic violence cuts across all socioeconomic backgrounds, regardless of race, religion, or level of education.

Battering often occurs during pregnancy.

10 women a day die at the hands of their husbands or partners.

Every five years the number of women in the US who die at the hands of their partners is equal to the number of males who died in the Viet Nam War.

Abused women comprise 20% of all women presenting injuries at hospital emergency rooms.

Sexual Assault:

Every 5 minutes a woman is raped.

One-third of all rapes occur in a woman’s home.

Rape itself is a violent act, but 85% of all rapes are accompanied by more violence or the threat of violence.

Only 7% of sexually assaulted women report rape. This makes the actual number of rapes in the US as high as 2 million a year.

One in three girls and one in five boys will be sexually assaulted or abused before age 18.

In a Cornell University questionnaire, 92% of the respondents listed sexual harassment as a serious problem. 70% had personally experienced some form of harassment.

American women are 8 times more likely to be raped than European women and 26 times more likely than Japanese women.

One third of the sexual assault program clients at the shelter where I teach are children between the ages of 3-13; 50% of these clients are boys between the ages of 3-10.

October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month. Instead of wearing a purple ribbon, find a DV shelter in your community and do you seva. Walk your yoga talk for these women and you will be repaid 10 times over. Last night one of the women brought her little boy and he got on my mat and started teaching with me. Priceless.

Karma yoga = yoga love.

Karma yoga = peace.

May all beings have happiness and the causes of happiness.
May all beings be free from suffering and the causes of suffering.

donation update and until we meet again

by L. Valdez Karl


I mailed a check today to the Seva Foundation in the amount of $200 asking it to be used specifically for the Kilimanjaro Center for Community Ophthalmology. You can read about the eye clinic here.

A big hug and thanks to:

Shelley

Bob

and Svasti

for their donations!

If anyone else wants to donate, please DO NOT send the money to my Paypal account, send it diretly to Seva as per the instructions in my link.

My wish for the Universe for 2010 are the Four Immeasurables, compassion, loving-kindness, sympathetic joy, and equanimity:

MAY ALL BEINGS HAVE HAPPINESS AND THE CAUSES OF HAPPINESS

MAY ALL BEINGS BE FREE FROM SUFFERING AND THE CAUSES OF SUFFERING

MAY ALL BEINGS NEVER BE PARTED FROM FREEDOM’S TRUE JOY

MAY ALL BEINGS DWELL IN EQUANIMITY, FREE FROM ATTACHMENT AND AVERSION.

This is my last blog post of 2009. I leave for India and Africa next week for the yoga adventure of a lifetime. I’ve written about it and you’ve read about it…now it’s time for me to run into Ma India’s arms and return to my soul’s home….(the quote is a link to another post)

“I was alone, finally, with no one to protect me. I wanted to sing for happiness — a rare, raw, immediate sort of happiness that was directly related to my physical situation, to my surroundings, to independence, and to solitude. The happiness I felt that morning had nothing to do with the future or the past, with abstractions or with my relationships to other people. It was the happiness of entering into something new, of taking the moments simply for what they were, of motion, of freedom, and of free will. I loved not knowing what would happen next, loved that no one here knew me. I felt coordinated and strong, and the world seemed huge and vibrant. It was a relief to be alone…

My happiness was a feeling of physical lightness, of weightlessness, like drifting on air…”

Mother India, I’m coming home.


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The Banyan

by L. Valdez Karl

The Banyan

my visit to The Banyan

Ideas are percolating to start my own line of yoga clothes…renewable resources regarding the cloth, fair trade, empowering women, giving back…one day I know this will happen…just as The Banyan started as a seed and grew into a beautiful tree….

I vow that a percentage of my sales will go to The Banyan…please watch this video and listen with your heart…these are the faces of your sisters and mothers and daughters and grandmothers…they are us.

People ask me why I would want to help people outside the United States when there are so many needy people here. That is very true, there are thousands (probably millions) of people who need help in the United States. Many Native Americans live in what are considered third-world conditions which is why I donate to Native American causes. But the difference is that there are hundreds if not thousands of social service agencies in the United States, many of which receive federal funds. That concept is unheard of in places like India or Africa or any other place in the world where people literally earn $1 a day or who are still sold into a type of slavery — please visit the website Global March Against Child Labor. You can also check out 50 Million Missing: An International Campaign or my post about the campaign.

Poor Americans have opportunities that many people in the rest of the world do not have — scholarships or grants to go to college, small business loans to start their own businesses, among other things. It may be paltry but there is also public aid and food stamps, two things that I did not hesitate to take. I ate plenty of government cheese back in the day.

Despite the fact that the United States does not have any form of national health care, I would rather live in poverty in America than anywhere else in the world.

That’s why.