Wanderlust Weekend in Lake Tahoe, California
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I am still on a yoga high from last weekend at Wanderlust California. The fest was amazing!
It was such a blissful experience being in the mountain air and sunshine for yoga classes, hula hooping, paddleboarding, live music, eating free samples from all the healthy vendors, people watching, and connecting with other yogis.
On Friday, my friend Lindsay and I took a Dharma II/III class with Dharma Mittra in the morning, and attended his Pranayama and Meditation workshop in the afternoon. There were so many heartfelt moments and insightful pieces of wisdom shared, and I kept finding myself laughing at Dharma's hilarious jokes.
At one point we were doing positive breathing, a technique that requires you to breathe through the right nostril only by closing the left nostril with vishnu mudra. He looked out at the big group of yogis and said, "Now, make sure you breathe through the right nostril, not the left! If you breathe through the left, you'll go kooky!"
He also proceeded to explain how after a round of positive breathing, anyone will be ready to face a firing squad with a smile on their face. :)
In only the short time I spent with him, it became very clear that Dharma Mittra is an incredible human being with a beautiful soul and a practice worth modeling after. Thanks to him, I'm inspired as ever in my practice, and I'm back to a vegetarian diet!
Post-yoga, we took an awesome hooping class with Shakti Sunfire of One Hoop 1 Love. She covered a lot of hooping basics, and we spent a good portion of the time practicing lifting the hoop from the waist to the sky and bringing it back down.
We also learned a few tricks-- one where you transition from "walking the dog" to rolling the hoop up your body and onto one arm.
This was definitely a highlight of the fest, and so fun to play, dance and feel lighthearted and free.
In between our scheduled activities, we had a blast wandering around the festival grounds and trying out new adventures in balancing. I even did some aerial yoga and some slackline yoga!
It was so inspiring to watch talented performers with a real passion for their practice. One couple did the most insane and amazing acro-yoga/ hooping I've ever seen...
At night, the yogis of Wanderlust rocked out. I loved seeing Gramatik the first night, and Quixotic and Moby on Saturday. We all went crazy dancing and having a great time :)
On Sunday morning, we got up early to do a free class with MC Yogi and his wife Amanda Giocomini. They theme was "Yogi Revolution, Love is the Solution," and it was seriously the most fun, dynamic flow I've done in a long time.
Both of them are such thoughtful, sweet people with a lighthearted style that keeps you smiling through the poses. We did some playful partner yoga and ended with a big, joyful session of jumping around and dancing to one of his newest songs.
If you want to watch, the whole class was live-streamed online by Lululemon and the video is still available.
I feel so blessed to have been able to attend Wanderlust and I hope to go again next year.
To all of the beautiful people who taught and practiced and and shared in the conscious community, you rock! Thank you for truly embodying the meaning of namaste.
