Beginner Yoga by Nancy Weshkoff
Beginner Yoga
By Nancy Weshkoff
If you have never tried yoga before, the best way to start is with a beginner yoga class. It is in a beginner yoga class where you will begin a wonderful journey to better health and well-being.
Contrary to what you might think, beginner is not just for people who have never tried yoga before. Beginner yoga is great for everyone. In a beginner yoga class, you will move at a slower, gentler pace. In doing so, you can concentrate more closely on your pose and really feel your muscles moving and stretching from posture to posture. You can focus on linking your movement with your breath which helps you move more deeply and brings you renewed energy. And you can pick up some helpful tips on how to improve core, fundamental poses.
Prior to becoming a yoga teacher, I spent many years practicing yoga at various studios. I often attended beginner classes, even though I had several years of yoga experience. I enjoyed the flow of a beginner class as it gave me an opportunity to concentrate more deeply on my movement. I also enjoyed talking with new students and encouraging them while sharing my yoga experience.
Newer students have asked me how long they need to take a beginner yoga class before moving to a more intermediate level. Each person is different, and there is no set period of time. I strongly encourage everyone to be truly comfortable and understand the basics of core, essential yoga poses before trying something more challenging. You may find, as I did, that beginner yoga is perfect for you at every stage of your yoga practice.
If you are looking for a great beginner yoga class with a great yoga teacher, Moonflower Yoga has a wonderful variety to offer you. We have beginner yoga classes on weekends, weekday mornings, and evenings. Whichever time frame you pick, you will have a find a class that meets your needs. If you are in the area of Bellmore, in Long Island, New York’s Nassau County, come give one of our great beginner yoga classes a try! Our class size is small and semi-private so you can receive personal attention, and our instructors pay attention to you so that you can have a wonderful yoga experience. And remember beginner yoga is a fabulous choice for everyone!
A Special Place written by Nancy Weshkoff
A Special Place
Written by Nancy Weshkoff
When I formed Moonflower Yoga in 2012, I wanted the studio to be more than just a place where people learned yoga postures. It was important to me that the studio also have a feeling of community where people could come together and share and support each other. Moonflower Yoga has been a success in both of these areas: The great yoga classes that we offer have enabled people of all ages and fitness levels to enjoy the wonderful benefits of yoga. Moonflower Yoga also has a community of like-minded people who have helped and supported each other, have contributed to charitable drives, and who have fun learning new things together through our workshops and the Moonflower Yoga Book Club.
What has also happened is that Moonflower Yoga has become a special place for spiritual development. Through some of our great teachers, such as Connie and Chris, they have introduced us to ways to explore our spirituality and souls. And as that happens, people are becoming more at peace. They are supporting each other when things are challenging but they also share laughs as well. And when I sit quietly at the studio in between classes, I can sense a wonderful energy at the studio.
If you haven’t yet visited Moonflower Yoga in Bellmore, New York, in Nassau County (Long Island), come give us a try! Your first class is free. Learn something new and join the growing community of people who have helped make Moonflower Yoga a special place.
Goodbye Winter Doldrums written by Nancy Weshkoff
GOODBYE WINTER DOLDRUMS
Written by Nancy Weshkoff
It has been a brutal winter here in Bellmore, on Long Island, New York. Our snow fall totals have already reached approximately 60” and there is another snowstorm on the way later this weekend with the prospect of possibly 10 more inches of snow. Mother Nature has not been kind to us this winter.
I am, however, shaking off the winter doldrums. While the temperatures are still cold outside, there are signs of better days ahead. Officially spring is just 3 weeks away. Have you noticed the extra daylight? It is no longer dark at 5 PM. And when the snow is cleared away in my garden, there is beauty coming from the earth. Several of my spring bulbs already have a couple of inches of green foliage. A few of the spring perennials also have some green growth. The robins have returned. The flowers and birds know that spring is just around the corner.
There is something wonderful about the prospect of spring. It marks a new beginning. Are you ready for spring?
Warmer weather means shedding those baggy, extra layers of clothes that have kept us warm. It is time to start thinking about getting in shape for the lighter clothes of warmer weather. It is a great time to get off the couch, wake up our bodies, and get toned and stretched. If you start now, you’ll feel fabulous and be ready for the warm days which are ahead.
Moonflower Yoga has some great yoga classes to help you get in shape for spring. If you have never practiced yoga before, or have been inactive, start slowly with one of our fantastic beginner yoga classes which are offered several times a week. We have lots of props on hand to help our students as you are getting back into shape. Ready for something more challenging? Try our Stress Reduction Vinyasa Flow class on Monday night at 7:30 PM or Sunday Flow at 9 AM each Sunday. We also added a wonderful Move and Stretch class to the Tuesday schedule at 6:15 PM, and there is a fun Stretch and Flow class every Thursday morning at 10 AM. We have an Iyengar-style Level One class on Tuesday at 10 AM and Thursday at 6:45 PM to help you tone. If you are working in the vicinity of Bellmore, Long Island, we added a Yoga Lunch Express class on Mondays at 12:30, which is a great 45-minute lunch class: skip the heavy calories and try a wonderful class to energize you.
Remember spring is just around the corner. It is time to shake off your winter doldrums! Come visit us at Moonflower Yoga in Bellmore, New York, in Long Island’s Nassau County, for a great yoga class with our dedicated team of yoga teachers to help you get into shape and feel great. Hope to see you soon!
Calming and Healing Your Spirit written by Nancy Weshkoff
Calming and Healing Your Spirit
Written by Nancy Weshkoff
Life brings us many challenges. The strain, tension, and stress can weigh down upon us. It is so important that we take a break from these challenges and take care of ourselves. Doctors all agree that stress is one of the leading causes of diseases. You CAN do something to help relieve your stress.
Moonflower Yoga is proud to announce a new series of classes on Wednesday nights at 7:30 PM. The new series is entitled “Calming and Healing Your Spirit”. During each one-hour class, you will learn and experience a de-stressing activity to help bring you inner peace. In our first class on February 5th, Anthony and Mindy of Happy and Healthy Now, will lead a Reiki Healing Circle. Reiki is a fabulous way to release negative energy. In our second class on February 12th, Chris will teach you “Tapping” (Emotional Freedom Technique), a wonderful tool that you can self-administer to help remove negative reactions to certain situations or people. Members of our military are using “Tapping” to help them with the after-effects of combat duty. In our third class on February 19th, Connie will lead you into a deep meditation, as you recline on the ground nestled in warm blankets, with soft candlelight, and leave your worries behind. In our fourth class on February 26th, there will be a special evening of Moonflower Yoga’s very popular Candlelight Restorative class, as you melt away stress while comfortably supported on bolsters, blankets, and pillows. Our March classes will include a lovely Chanting class on March 19th led by Diane, with more classes to be announced shortly.
I hope you can join us for these wonderful Wednesday evening Calming and Healing Your Spirit classes at Moonflower Yoga. Whichever class you choose, led by one of our great teachers, you will feel more relaxed and renewed from an amazing de-stressing class. We could all use some more relaxation!!! If you are in the area of Bellmore, Long Island, in Nassau County, New York, come give this a try. You’ll be glad that you did.
New Year, New Start, New Goals written by Nancy Weshkoff
NEW YEAR, NEW START, NEW GOALS
Written by Nancy Weshkoff
Welcome 2014! There is something special about the start of a new year. It gives us a chance to close the door on things that happened in the previous year and start anew. It is a great feeling to start with a fresh slate.
As we start the new year, we often make New Year’s resolutions. Perhaps you want to become more physically fit, lose weight, change careers, etc. Do you have an actual plan on how you are going to accomplish your dreams in 2014, or are these half-hearted resolutions?
You can accomplish your goals if you create and follow a realistic plan on how to reach your dreams. Empty promises made on New Year’s Eve are not successful. A plan that you commit to paper with milestone steps and visualization is what is needed to help you reach your goal.
Before Moonflower Yoga, I held senior executive positions at a major entertainment company overseeing a large staff. There were many goals that needed to be met. I successfully completed these by creating and following written plans of action. I also used these same principles to help me with personal goals.
As it is the start of a new year, it is a perfect time to set your personal dreams into action. Moonflower Yoga is hosting a great Goal Setting and Vision Board workshop on Sunday, January 12, 2014, starting at 2 PM. During this workshop, you will be shown how to create your own personal plan of action. After you have established your goal and plan of action, you will create a vision board with positive images to help motivate you.
If you are in the area of Bellmore, New York, on Long Island’s Nassau County, please join us on Sunday, January 12th, for this fantastic workshop at Moonflower Yoga. Let yourself soar in 2014!
Reflections on 2013 written by Nancy Weshkoff
Reflections on 2013
Written by Nancy Weshkoff
As the remaining days in 2013 start to dwindle, I have become a bit pensive as I reflect back on 2013 and what has occurred throughout the year.
At the start of 2013, Moonflower Yoga was still in its infancy. Since then, the studio has grown significantly. So many students have walked through the front door of Moonflower Yoga. A lot of these were students who never tried yoga before but were coming to Moonflower Yoga to experience their first class, and I am very proud that they chose Moonflower Yoga. These students liked the small-class setting with personal attention, had a great yoga experience, and have become regular students of the studio.
Moonflower Yoga has accomplished many other positive things in 2013:
Our class schedule has grown to offer many options to our students so that people of all experience levels have a great place to practice. Tai Chi and Meditation classes are amongst the newer classes.
We launched lots of interesting workshops on a variety of topics where people learned something new and had a fun evening.
Our Moonflower Yoga Picnic at Eisenhower Park was a blast, and we had perfect summertime weather.
Moonflower Yoga was the only yoga studio selected to give a yoga demo at the annual Nassau County Health and Wellness Fair.
Corporate yoga has been added to the slate of offerings at Moonflower Yoga where a Moonflower Yoga instructor goes to a local office and introduces yoga as part of a corporate wellness program.
We were able to give back to the community and help those in need with several charitable events. Our children’s storytelling workshop raised money for the Make A Wish Foundation. The film screening on the life of BKS Iyengar helped support the Iyengar Institute which brings yoga to many. For Thanksgiving, we helped feed 800 hungry families. And at the at end of 2013, we collected over 60 toys for the Toys for Tots program run by the USMC which donates toys to children who would not otherwise receive a holiday present.
We had another successful weekend at the Bellmore Family Street Festival where over 100,000 people from all over came to Bellmore.
But most important of all is our relationship with our students. I feel truly blessed each day as I greet the students arriving to attend our classes. Watching students enter the door feeling stressed from the day, and then watching them leave at the end of a great yoga class more refreshed and at peace, brings me a sense of joy knowing that we were able to help someone feel better. I am so grateful to the students, as well as my great staff of teachers, for making Moonflower Yoga a very special place. I can look back on 2013 with a smile, and I know the future will be even better. Thank you to everyone for your support!
If you are in the area of Bellmore, New York, in Nassau County on Long Island, please stop by and see us. Join us as we launch another fabulous year!
Is Christmas Stress Driving You Crazy? by Nancy Weshkoff
Is Christmas Stress Driving You Crazy?
Written by Nancy Weshkoff
Christmas is just two weeks away. And, as we get closer to Christmas, I witness people experiencing more stress than normal with holiday obligations. With that stress comes some bad habits such as overeating or eating high carb sugary foods. We also tend to not get enough sleep. There is one other thing that happens: we often stop exercising and taking care of ourselves.
When we stop taking care of ourselves, bad things start to happen. We gain weight from poor food choices and not exercising, putting more strain on our body. Our reserve of energy becomes exhausted. We are much more likely to become ill when our bodies are pushed to their limit. And if we are not breathing properly, our body is not functioning efficiently.
I would like to suggest a different path this holiday season: Set aside some time for yourself!!! One way to do that is with a great yoga class. You will gently stretch your muscles relieving muscle tension. During the yoga class, you will also take deep breaths to increase the oxygen to your organs, which helps with stress reduction. And by moving your body you are burning calories, keeping your weight in check. Most importantly, you will generally feel better. And when you feel better you can start to enjoy the holiday season rather than feeling overwhelmed.
Moonflower Yoga in Bellmore, New York, in Long Island’s Nassau County, has some great yoga classes that can help you feel better and more relaxed this holiday season. And because we have small class sizes with a maximum of 6 students per class, our teachers pay personal attention to you making sure that you are comfortable and having a great yoga experience in your class. Our students always say they feel so much better after just a one-hour yoga class. You may also find that you sleep more soundly on the evening when you attend your yoga class, and having a good night’s sleep is essential.
So take a bit of time for yourself this holiday season. When you do that, you may find that you enjoy this special time of year a bit more, while you are also keeping yourself healthier. Hope to see you soon at Moonflower Yoga in Bellmore, Long Island!
Being Grateful This Thanksgiving written by Nancy Weshkoff
Being Grateful this Thanksgiving
Written by Nancy Weshkoff
As we celebrate Thanksgiving this week, I am taking a moment to pause and think deeply about the holiday. If you look at the media blitz around us, you would assume Thanksgiving is about shopping for items you probably don’t need at discount prices. Stores are opening earlier and earlier, and this often means families spend less time together as the rush to get to the mall begins. What happened to this wonderful holiday with its family traditions?
Instead of the craziness of shopping, I am instead listing a few things in my life for which I am very grateful:
I am grateful for the many students who walk in the doors of Moonflower Yoga to attend a yoga class. It is such a blessing to have them at the studio each week, getting stronger, feeling better, and sharing a part of their lives at Moonflower. I love meeting each person as they walk in the door and catching up with them each week. Thank you to all of you who have made Moonflower Yoga a success.
It was 2 years ago this month that my life changed forever with the news that my job in corporate America was coming to an end with a forced layoff. Although that news was devastating at the time, it gave me the opportunity to try something new that I always wanted to do. Moonflower Yoga was born as a result of that, and I am grateful that my life changed for the better. As Gandhi very wisely said: “Be the change that you wish to see in the world”.
Making a life change would have been very challenging if it wasn’t for the support of my husband, Bob, who has been my rock for the last 40 years. Bob, together with friends and family, supported me and Moonflower Yoga, and I am very grateful for their love and support.
Moonflower Yoga has great yoga teachers who work alongside of me each week and bring their love of teaching and helping people to Moonflower Yoga each week. I could not run the studio without them. And there have been wonderful workshop presenters as well, who have taught us some very interesting things that we didn’t know before and helped us learn something new. I am grateful to all of the teachers and workshop presenters for making Moonflower Yoga a special place.
I am grateful to my hometown of Bellmore, Long Island, in New York’s Nassau County. I have been welcomed in the town as a new business, and it has been great to establish my business roots here as well as my home roots. I always learn something new at the Bellmore Chamber of Commerce meetings.
I am grateful to my yoga teachers who helped me discover the wonders of yoga many years ago. Yoga has been my rock when things were stressful, and now it has become my life. It all started with attending my first yoga class, and it grew from there. Yoga can help you too!
What are you grateful for this holiday season? Take a moment to reflect on the blessings in your life. You will feel inspired! Have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday.
The Changing Season by Nancy Weshkoff
The Changing Season
By Nancy Weshkoff
This weekend we changed our clocks back one hour from Daylight Savings Time to Standard Time. And while it was nice to have that extra hour of sleep on Sunday morning, the changing of the clocks also reminded us of something else: the changing of the season to cooler temperatures and less daylight as it is dark by 5 PM.
When it gets darker and cooler, we naturally spend more time indoors. While that is understandable, it is important that we continue to move our bodies during the cooler months. We need to keep your muscles flexible. At Moonflower Yoga in Bellmore on Long Island’s Nassau County, all of our great yoga classes emphasize stretching and flexibility. Did you know that tight hamstring muscles can cause back pain? You can keep your hamstring muscles loose through yoga. Our Stress Reducing Vinyasa flow classes, Level one and Level one-two classes, Sunday Flow, Beginner, Tai Chi, Stretch & Flow, Adaptive, Easy Beginner & Easy Flow yoga classes are all great choices for keeping you flexible. And being active can prevent weight gain over the winter months.
Aside from our physical body, our mental state can also change with the cooler temperatures. We spend less time socializing outdoors. For some people, this means spending more time watching television, playing video games, or with social media sites. While these can be fun in moderation, they may not help you deal with stress in your life. Stress can be harmful and health care professionals all agree that it is a contributing factor to many health problems today. You can reduce your stress through the physical movement of a yoga asana practice. You can also reduce your stress through meditation which provides a wonderful opportunity to let go of things that might be bothering you and to teach you to focus on the present moment. Our bi-monthly Meditation class is fantastic for this. We also have a lovely Candlelight Restorative class on alternate Tuesdays, which rotates with the Meditation class, where you have an opportunity to completely relax and refresh yourself while you stretch on bolsters, pillows, and blankets. If you are looking for a combination of light movement and restorative, there is the Unwind and Relax class on Thursday night which is a perfect way to end your day.
You can combat the winter blues, stay in shape, and feel better through a regular yoga practice. Hope to see you soon at one of our great yoga classes.
Bucket Lists by Nancy Weshkoff
Bucket Lists
By Nancy Weshkoff
This past week, I suffered a personal loss in my life. My Uncle Lenny, my mother’s brother and the last surviving sibling from my grandparents, passed away after a long battle with cancer. He was very special to me. Because he lived around the corner from my parents’ house, we saw him frequently. When I entered the work force, we were both employed in lower Manhattan near the former World Trade Center site. This gave me an opportunity to travel into New York City with Uncle Lenny and have some great talks. Even later in my life, when Moonflower Yoga opened its doors for the first time, Uncle Lenny was there with my Aunt Betty and cousin Catherine to wish me well and offer support.
During his memorial service, many wonderful memories of Uncle Lenny were discussed amongst the crowded room of people that came to say goodbye to a special man. He adored his children, grandchildren, and wife. Although his life was a simple one, he lived it to the fullest. He worked hard and was proud of his job. He raised a great family. When retirement came, he used it to do some projects, spend more time with his friends and family, travel whenever he could to explore something new, or do a simple challenge such as assembling a new jigsaw puzzle. His son, Lee, said at the memorial service that his father always emphasized that you should enjoy every single day that you are given. Uncle Lenny had no bucket list – he was happy with the life he led and cherished each new day. And even though he battled cancer and other illnesses for a couple of years, he still retained this positive attitude.
The mention of bucket lists sparked something inside me. Although it can be fun to dream about things to do in the future, we shouldn’t ignore the present moment that is in front of us. We all have some struggles in our daily life, and things may not go exactly the way we want them to go. Yet there are many wonderful simple things that happen to us each day that we may be ignoring: a beautiful sunrise or sunset, a hug from someone you love, a smile on a child’s face, a silly joke that someone tells you, etc. It is all of these things – and more – that make life special.
At Moonflower Yoga in Bellmore on Long Island’s Nassau County, I emphasize in my yoga classes the importance of being in the present moment and enjoying each day as it comes. When you stop worrying so much about things that may not happen in the future, you can feel so much better. And after having a great yoga class at Moonflower Yoga, we spend several minutes in quiet relaxation to appreciate the goodness of the present moment.
Are you feeling stressed and worrying too much about your own bucket list? Come and join us at Moonflower Yoga to feel better, de-stress, and learn to enjoy the beauty of the present moment. As with my Uncle Lenny, it is the culmination of many present moments that make a wonderful life.
