Last week, Lunge Yoga + Health ran its spring seasonal intensive. The five-day intensive included a total of seven yoga classes, five pre-dawn beach shuffles and seven nutritious wholefood cleansing meals. The week’s activities focused on activating the gall bladder and liver expanding energy lines to improve our flexibility, openness and inspiration.

The changing of the seasons affects the way we feel in our body, which in turn affects our mind. Lunge’s seasonal yoga and health workshops are designed to help keep the body and mind clean and flexible as we move through the seasons.

The spring intensive begun every morning at 5:20am with 45 minutes of stretching, beach shuffling (dynamic meditation) and ocean dipping followed by an hour of yoga which each day focused on a particular energy line in the body aimed at preparing the body and the mind for the warmer weather ahead.  To end off each class we took a few quiet minutes to focus on the changes in our body and a hot bowl of homemade miso with veggies, gomasio, tamari-roasted seeds and brown rice to give us some great, clean energy for the day.

TUESDAY MORNING focused on the lung and large intestine energies. We started with some strong up-dog/down-dogs to get the breath going then worked into the waist with some dynamic twists and side stretches that created a great foundation for the rest of the week!

WEDNESDAY MORNING’s yoga built on yesterday’s yoga, creating more tone in the sides and belly, to improve digestion and keep our energy levels up! It was a physically challenging class but the good pounding massage and hot breaky to finish made it all worth it! The class also helped to dissipate some of the aches and pains that had begun to emerge from the cleansing process.

On THURSDAY MORNING we started off with some powerful standing poses to stretch out our tired sides. We focused on activating the gallbladder and liver energy through means of many many hips raises and thigh squeezes.  It was a strong class but it created a beautiful relaxed state in everyone at the end of class.

FRIDAY MORNING’s class focused on the liver and stomach energy to improve digestion and our ability to let go. To release some of the tightness that had built up over the last 3 days we stretched out our tight sides and lower backs with some hip and leg raises, back bends and of course some team sit-ups.

The FRIDAY NIGHT class focused on consolidating all our hard work from the week and finished off with a supporting group shiatsu massage. We were also spoiled with a delicious dinner of hearty adzuki bean and pumpkin stew with chopped spring onions, gomasio and a cup of freshly brewed Bancha twig tea. Everyone left ready to fall into a deep sleep.

SATURDAY marked the end of the spring intensive. Throughout the week we focused on stimulating specific energy lines and areas of the body to help give us a healthy kick-start for spring and summer. Saturday’s yoga focused on activating the expansive heart energy with some strong sets of leg pumps and lengthening arm positions to open and lighten the upper body.

After our last class, everyone enjoyed a gorgeously nutritious 3-course lunch prepared by the talented Charlotte of Charlotte’s Living Harmony and consisted of:

• Red lentil, corn and boy choy soup.
• Leek and tofu tart with a freshly milled spelt flour crust, simple dressed green lettuce and sautéed cabbage with cinnamon and cloves.
• Spiced cranberry cake with homemade orange custard sauce and fresh berries.

Here are more details on all the seasonal workshops at Lunge.