Creative Retreats at Huntingdon House 

Inspiring women to create the personal space needed to explore their creativity

We were inspired to create a gathering for women who have so much yearning to expand their lives:  to share, to create and to live lives of abundance and purpose as well as to feel healthy, strong and confident. This begins with allowing your soul to soar.

Too often our biggest challenge is finding the courage to bring our own well-being and creative ideas to the forefront.  We tell ourselves that we will pursue our dreams once the children are raised, once we lose the weight, once our commitments are completed, once there is time…..but there never is time.  Time is elusive, it can seem an eternity or it can pass in a heartbeat.  Once we make our own wellbeing a priority, then we make time.  No one ever said…I don’t have time to take care of my children or to brush my teeth!!

It is TIME for you to focus on you.

We are offering a retreat that gives you time to explore your creative side.  We all have creativity inside of us.  Do you like to write, or read/research or draw, or knit or practice an instrument or pick wild flowers and press them into a book?  Creativity is anything you want it to be anything that makes your soul happy.

Creative Retreats is designed to combine gentle movement and meditation to prepare your creative urges to flourish!  There will be blocks of time each day to pursue whatever your heart desires but if you feel blocked or unsure of how to move forward, we will have some guided practices for you to explore that for which your heart yearns….with curiosity, not judgement.

Join us on our Creative Retreats on the weekend of November 10, 11 & 12 at Huntingdon House, just north of Belleville on Hwy 62. Your Creative Retreats leaders are Laurie Rockman, dancer, cartoonist & artist and Terri Maracle, Serenity Yoga teacher & Lifestyle Coach.

Creative Retreat at Huntingdon House -overview

Friday November 10, 2023

Arrival at 3:00pm     Tea, meet & greet, round table discussion regarding the weekend events, walk about the premises, and settling-in                                         time.

5:00 - 6:30pm     Emotional Freedom Tapping discussion and experience - allowing your creativity to flow while releasing any                                                    blockages, preparing you for your creative weekend….with Terri

7:00pm             Dinner

8:00pm             Gentle Serenity Yoga session….with Terri YOGA MATS PROVIDED

Saturday November 11, 2023

8:00am            Wake up, coffee, morning ‘routines’

9:00am             Breakfast

10.00am             Gentle movement….with Laurie

10:30am-1pm     Creative time or Guided Practices

1:00pm-2pm     Relaxation time or lunch

2pm-2:30pm     Movement….with Laurie

3pm-5:30pm     Creative time or Guided Practices

5:30pm-7:00pm     Free/Social time

7pm             Dinner

8pm             Gentle Serenity Yoga session….with Terri

Sunday November 12, 2023

8:00am         Wake up, coffee, morning ‘routines’

9:00am         Breakfast

10am-10:30am Movement….with Laurie

11:00am         Checkout

11:15am         Weather permitting…Sharing time outside on the swings to discuss our take aways from the weekend.

Times are fluid to support your creative needs.

Investment

$375.00 plus tax   - Includes 2 nights with breakfast and dinner.  You may bring your own lunch items and wine if you choose, a refrigerator & microwave are provided. There will be options for breakfast and dinner which will be available upon arrival.

              - $150.00 non refundable deposit is required upon registration

              - Payment in full is due by October 27, 2023

For more information or to register please contact:

terriblairmaracle@gmail.com  or  laurie.rockman@gmail.com

Lilylayne Lifestyle Living - Living With Grace and Simplicity

 Lilylayne Lifestyle Living - Living with grace and simplicity

Lilylayne Lifestyle Living is a gathering place and yoga studio, both in person and on line, aimed at helping women live their best life.  We acknowledge that each person has much control over their health, wellbeing and destiny, but each must choose to take that responsibility.  Wellness is our responsibility.  Everything anyone ever wants in life is for one reason only and that is, how they believe it will make them feel.  Life is about feelings or emotions yet most of our lives are spent trying to 'think' our way out of those feelings.   It is easier to change the mind through the body than it is to change the body through the mind. 

I am a registered yoga instructor through the Canadian Yoga Alliance qualified to teach Hatha yoga, Kundalini Awakening yoga (which I have combined into what I call Serenity Yoga),  Consistency Coaching to rewire your brain and change your habits, Reiki practitioner, Aromatherapy practitioner & Life coach.

My yoga training concentrated on ayurveda and mediation, both helpful in calming the mind.  In a chaotic world, we learn techniques to slow down, and both heal and balance the mind, body and spirit.  Many of our diseases begin with either inflammation, stress or an imbalance in the body and left unchecked these issues bloom into disease. But what if we could address the inflammation, imbalance and stress before they affect our wellness?   Eliminating toxic foods (and these may be different for different people), calming the mind and exploring our curiosity are the pathway to living a life of wellness and joy.

Depending on your time of life, your needs and your desires, we have three areas of focus. It is not a linear progression, but a menu of options from which you can choose what is needed in your life at this time.

The Pathway to Serenity Series at Lilylayne Lifestyle Living

REPLENISH - We start from where you are, not where you think you should be.  REPLENISH is all about healing the wounds of your body, mind and spirit.  Gentle yoga, simple meditation, hydrating the body, balancing your sleep cycles and using silence as a tool to detach from a world that has our central nervous system on alert at all times.  We look at your current habits and routines and you will determine what, if anything, needs to change. The aim of REPLENISH is to find the balance that is the basis of a happy, healthy life.

NOURISH - Here we start looking at how you nourish your body, mind and spirit. NOURISH is all about giving yourself that which you need to have a happy and healthy life. Food, movement, relationships, self care, connectivity, curiosity and routines.

FLOURISH -  This is where the creativity begins!  You begin to FLOURISH in your life, not just exist through your life.  Through written or verbal prompts, we develop an awareness of the things that make you feel excited.  We explore the various aspects of ourselves and learn to welcome all these parts of ourself (the maiden, the mother and the wise woman), it is this unique combination of traits that make you so special and unique....and the world needs for all of us to show up in the fullness of who we are.

Within all three limbs of the Pathway to Serenity series, there are elements of:  yoga, mediation, discussion, self exploration, journaling, visualizing, nourishment, habits & routines, aromatherapy, aromatherapy massage, Reiki treatments and determining what it is that you truly want in this life.  Some classes are for our general well being and some are specifically geared to a particular focus such as anxiety or women's issues.

The Blog posts will help you understand the perspective from which Lilylayne Lifestyle Living sees life.  We are currently changing our program delivery and will soon be offering in person Serenity Yoga classes locally, small classes ( 4-5 maximum) in our cabin on the shores of the beautiful Bay of Quinte and on line groups for REPLENISH, NOURISH & FLOURISH.  Custom weekend getaways for 4 people can also be arranged. Individual sessions are available for those who would prefer the privacy.  Lilylayne Lifestyle Living is located in rural Ontario, centrally located between Belleville, Napanee and Picton.

 If you are interested in more information, please email me at terriblairmaracle@gmail.com 

Begin your pathway to serenity through grace and serenity with Lilylayne Lifestyle Living 

 

Anxiety

 

Much of our stress is caused by the difference between ‘what is’ and ‘what we think should be’.  We can become critical or judgemental when people or events don’t play out the way we assume they should.   Worrying about tomorrow deprives us of the joy we have today.  Have you ever wanted something so much only be become bored with it shortly after you obtain it?  We want a lovely little cottage, then we want a bigger cottage, then we want a bigger home again.  It can appear that we only get joy from that which is just out of our reach, but lose interest when it becomes ours. Often this is a symptom of the thought process where we believe that obtaining a certain item or person will make us happy. This ‘thought process’  is one that will never bring us happiness because happiness is always one step away. We think that if we just had more money, or a better relationship, that it would bring us the happiness and contentment that seems to elude us. 

It is not about what we want to have, but it is all about how we want to feel.  Pursuing things is a way for our mind to put the onus for our happiness on another person or another purchase and NOT on making us responsible for our own happiness.  Instead of thinking…if I only had a really good paying job, I’d be happy and content….we need to think, what I really want is to feel secure and loved.  If you can’t find security and love within yourself, no one or no thing will ‘give’ it to you.

Even in our big house with our perfect partner we still worry about what might happen, we worry about our children, our grandchildren, our friends, our family and all the ‘breaking new’ the media provides for us. What we WANT is contentment and peace, and there is nothing we can buy to give it to us, it must come from within.

It is not about what we have, it is about how we feel.  Remember, our feelings and thereby our emotions are NOT caused by what happens, but by how we perceive, interpret and react to what happens. A wild fire in the forest is nature’s way of clearing the old away to make room for the new growth, it is not good or bad, it just is…but when humanity builds homes and resorts in that forest, the wild fire is now a threat and we see it as a terrible or bad thing. Our perception is created by how we are involved in what happens because it is that involvement that creates our emotions.

So…how do you want to feel?  When you wake up in the morning or when you awake during the night…how do you want to feel? 

Being out of control is a common fear for most of us.  If we could just control the people and situations in our lives we could relax and be happy. When we feel out of control, the negatives begin to set in… anxiety, heart palpitations and addictive behaviours as examples. An interesting note is that we often think of ‘addictive behaviours' as negatives such as drinking, smoking, drugs, aimlessly scrolling social media and spending money shopping, but cleaning, cooking and exercising can also be addictive behaviours.  ANYTHING we do for the sake of numbing our anxious thoughts can be an addiction. Addictive behaviours keep our mind occupied to prevent our unconscious fears from surfacing.

Practicing mindfulness brings peace by reinforcing objectivity and perspective to our mind.  Yoga and meditation activate the parasympathetic nervous system which is responsible for our rest and restore mode.  Fear causes the heart to race, adrenaline to pump, temperature to increases, mind to race and breath is fast and shallow. We want to change this pattern. Instead of the feeling causing the mind and body reactions, we want the physical reactions to invoke the feeling we want.  Simply this, we will slow the breath, calm the mind, relax the body, and slow the heart rate to trigger the body into relaxation mode. When this occurs, we feel safe, secure, warm, calm, relaxed and peaceful.

Musings from my workshop research

Happy Summer everyone!  

I have been busy putting together a couple of workshops, one on healthy knees and the other one on helping us heal our anxiety.  The one that is 'tugging' at me is the one on anxiety.  As a Yoga Lifestyle Coach I am often surprised at just how many people suffer, or live with, some level of anxiety. We worry about everything, and I started to wonder....why? After a couple of months of researching and thinking about life, I have come to a couple of conclusions.  Two things, the global communication has become so pervasive that nothing happens that we don't know about immediately and our bodies have not had the time to evolve to keep up with the speed of change in our world.  My thought processes are below......

First.....Everyday, without fail, I hear about the consequences of global warming, wild fires, earthquakes, tainted drinking water, kidnapped children, politicians who have no regard for humanity, articles on how to deal with self absorbed people, well-meaning self-help gurus who appear to have all the answers for a spiritual life, superfoods that will heal everything from weak fingernails to cancer.....I could continue because unfortunately, the list is endless.  This constant bombardment of negative, fear provoking media reports must have an impact on my well-being.  Regardless of what is 'printed' on social media, you can bet your last dime that someone will be angry about it or be offended by it, and feel the need to rant and rave and....I don't know....convince the unknown author to change their minds???  The radio, the television, the cell phone, the media, everyone is determined to tell us every detail about the latest disaster or potential disaster.  Also let's not forget all the people who are so quick to share doom and gloom on their Facebook page or instagram accounts!  If I see one more post that starts..."I know which of my friends will post this" I think I may explode (can you say....subtle bullying)!!  Can you imagine how we would live if we followed all the well meaning people who 'share' this vital information with us?  We would never eat anything (parasites), travel in a car (someone getting in the back seat to kill you), sit on the grass (ticks, lyme disease), drink water (stagnant water run-off), go on vacation (murders), have an opinion (someone will be offended) or stay home (mould)!!! Yikes, somebody get me a bubble!

Now let me be clear, I really do take all of these things VERY seriously, our world is not perfect and we have to be responsible and take care to do our part to heal the earth, but allowing myself to be inundated with all this negativity, everyday, is doing nothing for my well-being or my mental health.  

So, for the next month, I will no longer be listening to the news, I will be skimming my media and passing by anything that remotely looks negative, fear mongering or just unsettling.  At the end of the month, I will see how my 'sanity' has been affected.  

I started to notice this barrage of 'news' quite a while ago, but it was only when I started doing more research on anxiety that it hit me.....how can we be calm and peaceful when we are being subjected to such unhealthy thoughts/words/ideas on a daily basis?

I will let you know how this negative media break works out for me.

Second.....Humans have spent thousands and thousands of years evolving into the people we are today.  We ate natural foods and we ate them when they were available and when we were able to acquire them (seasonally, not daily).  Our digestive systems evolved to adapt to this pattern. We slept when the sun went down and we got up when the sun rose.  We relied on each other because no one person could do it all.  Our possessions were based mostly on need with a few 'special things' and we only had what we could grow, make, trade for or find.  Fast forward to the present. We live on processed food (while inflammation is rampant), drive our vehicles while complaining about the transport of fossil fuels, expect that we should have whatever we want, whenever we want it (24 hr shopping, instant messaging, buried in debt), our relationships are becoming more and more virtual and less and less face to face.  Judgement has become the most popular 'game' in town.  Our bodies, minds and spirits have not had the time, let alone the ability, to evolve in order to adapt to the latest trends. Chronic stress has become an epidemic and it is showing up as inflammation, anxiety and physical pain.  AGAIN, I repeat, each of these things has merit and needs attention, my point is that if everyone is forcing their positions and opinions on us it becomes oppressive and people shut down.....or they develop acute anxiety. And now, I have come full circle.  I have come to believe that the source of anxiety is the overwhelm that occurs when we are taking in too much negative stimuli and have too little time to process it.

What if we all started leading by example?  Instead of criticizing, we listen, instead of forcing our opinions on others, we try to understand a differing point of view.  Demonstrate what it means to be kind. Smile when someone scowls, show compassion when you are presented with a differing opinion.  Choose not to engage in negative conversations, find peace in your own life and in your world, show the people around you what it looks like to be content and peaceful. 

Just so you know....I DO get the irony of this negative post and I can assure you it will be the last. But as a closing thought....the next time you want to share that picture of the starving polar bear, please take the time to research, you will find that it was taken by a National Geographic photographer and it is a very old bear, who is at the end of his/her life and was heading off to die....as bears will do.  He is NOT starving.  Yes, global warming is causing the polar icecaps to melt and yes, animals are being negatively affected, but sharing propaganda is not helping the bears and it is just one more negative news item that you are dangling in front of your friends. 

As a person who has brought yoga into my life, I have learned that yoga is not about your ability to perform postures, but how we gain control of our body, mind and spirit....our life.  How we become in tune with how we feel on all levels and act accordingly in our best interests.

If you would like to respond to me, please email me at terriblairmaracle@gmail.com 

I continue to have issues with technology and can't seem to get the comments section to work, clearly communicating via technology is not my strong point :)

A Personal Insight Into Monkey Mind and Yo Yo Weight, Part 1

I have struggled with weight issues and anxious thoughts for a very long time.

I never thought of myself as someone who 'suffered' from anxiety, but I did have trouble sleeping due to random thoughts which evolved into worried thoughts.  I would wake up and if some worrisome thought didn't pop into my head, my brain would scan for something to worry about....at least that is how it felt.  This became my pattern, never sleeping a full night without the negative thoughts invading my rest.

I have gained and lost so much weight over the years that my thought pattern became that I could lose weight and I could gain weight, but I couldn't maintain weight.  The trouble with this thought is that it became a belief.  A core belief about myself which drove my actions. The result...I was either in gain mode or loss mode, but the time I was the happiest was in maintain mode...BUT my mind told me I did not have the ability to stay there.  Hence my yo yo weight.

Despite the cycle of weight and anxiety, I continued on the same path and not surprisingly getting the same results....continued weight fluctuation and continued sleep disruption.  Recently (courtesy of one of my teachers and a yoga workshop I attended in Toronto), I was reminded of my university days and my neuroscience studies involving the purpose and impact of learning and memory, as well as the way our brains learn and develop habits, and why.  BOOM! The biggest Ah Ha moment I've ever had.

My issues with weight and with anxiety stem from the same source! The patterns my brain had developed, over my entire life, were so firmly ensconced in my brain that I was fighting an uphill battle to change what my brain saw as a comfortable, reliable way of life.  My routines had become super highways in my neural connections and it was time to get off that super highway and start taking the country roads!!  No longer was the 'familiar' going to be the default.  Change does not have to be bad.  The stereotype of this behaviour is the abused woman who stays with an abusive husband because remaining with the familiar is 'safer' in the brain than the fear of something new.  Another example is that of the butterfly...the caterpillar goes through the change to become the beautiful butterfly....the key word being 'change'.

We learn by making neural connections in the brain.  The first time we drive to a new friend's house we are watching every road sign, driving slowly so as not to miss anything and checking the house numbers of every home we pass.  Once we have gone there a few times we can easily get there while conversing with another or planning our grocery list.  WHY....because our brain has incorporated  the route into our working memory and now it is part of the default, background information on which we build our life.  We did this a lot as a child when we learned virtually everything! Once a child learns to walk, there is no stopping him, he no longer wobbles, he quickly learns to run.
Unfortunately, these same neural connections are the reason why I can not SEEM to control my weight or my anxious thoughts.....my brain has these strong neural connections to how I eat and how I think. It was time for a change.

The good news is that change is possible, but not by struggling with existing neural patterns but by creating new ones!  No longer will my brain find that eating an ice cream cone is the answer for loneliness and no longer will my brain think that night time is the time for rehashing every decision I ever made.  No longer will my weight fluctuate and no longer will my mind dwell "in the cellar" during the night (and sometimes during the day) but I WILL create new patterns so that when I am functioning on autopilot (as we most often do) I will have different patterns....and as I have proved with my lifetime of dysfunctional patterns, once these patterns develop into super highways, life will change dramatically, with little or no effort on my part.  But first....the work begins on creating new pathways, and I begin on the country roads.

Stay tuned for part two of  'A Personal Insight into Monkey Mind and Yo Yo Weight'.

Spring and Sunrise and New Beginnings

Something stirs in the soul when you see the sun rise.  The colours, the silence, the peaceful energy all lead us to the realization that each day is a new beginning.  We often lose the knowledge that at any point, on any day, we can recreate the life we lead.  Take a deep breathe as you view the sunrise and ask yourself....what is it that I want from this one life I have?  What makes my heart sing and my soul soar? Am I living my best life?  What do I love and what do I want to change?  Then, remind yourself that you have the ability to create that world.  You can change jobs, you can bring new people into your life, you can depend on your 'circle' to support you and most importantly you can put your happiness first.  Lead by example, show your children, your family and your friends that living the life your were meant to live is how you intend to live and that it is also what you want for them.  Remaining in a life that drains you of your vital life force energy is not what you would want for your loved ones....why is it something that you are willing to accept for yourself?
Start with the simple things...rather than decide what has to go....what do you want to bring in to your life?  Add things that bring you joy.  A monthy trip to an art gallery or museum, a book club, a Sunday drive to explore the area where you live, a yoga class, a meditation ritual, clearing out clutter one drawer at a time or taking time to nurture a relationship.  Something that makes your heart smile just a little, we are not looking at major changes or eliminating things from your life because large change brings stress and stress is the major reason we stop and return to the familiar.....no matter how unhappy it makes us.  As you slowly add joy to your life, your soul will gain strength and you will know when you are ready to make yet another change.  Over time, the changes will add up to a life you love.
Maybe it all begins with watching the sun rise one morning, a new day, a new beginning for the world and maybe, just maybe the beginning of something new and better for you.

Our Perspective on What Might Have Been

There are times we wish we could change, alter or delete things that have happened in our past.  We look for closure, hoping it will erase the pain of the memories, but the memories remain.
Closure is not just about letting go of what has happened to us, it is also about letting go of your fantasy of how things would have been.  We all have an ideal life that we hope to live and we ALL have things that have happened to us that we wish we could change.  Our mind is a wonderful thing and it gives us our personality and our quest for knowledge....and is also is a great storyteller.  We weave stories based on our limited knowledge about future events.  It can start as....I'll be happy once I....get a job, start a family, find my soulmate, lose some weight etc., etc..  We have a whole life in our mind as to how wonderful things will be or would have been and truthfully, nothing will ever live up to the fantasy that exists in our minds. Great authors have woven stories that have captivated the imaginations of generations of humans with their story telling abilities.  We too, have the ability to tell great stories, but sometimes we are so focused on the story in our mind that we lose sight of the story of our life.
If only I had gone to university.....but then I wouldn't have met my best friend; if only I had moved out west to take that job....but maybe i would have been in an accident; if only I hadn't moved to the city.....but by changing any one thing in your life, everything else changes too.  Think about that, what might you lose....a friend, a child, a partner. Every little decision we make in life affects our future from that moment on.  Which road to take, which friend to call, which course to study, which store to shop in....EVERY decision impacts EVERYTHING that follows it.
We can not change the past, but we can make decisions to take us forward.  Romanticizing the 'what ifs' in our past is just another way of beating ourselves up.  Our life would NOT be perfect today if 'that thing' hadn't happened or 'that thing' did happen, it might be better, but it also might be worse.  We will never know what might have been, but we do have the ability to have an impact on what happens next.  Find the people and experiences that bring you joy and relish the gratitude for those memories.
As in the photo above, the future is foggy until we make choices and move closer... with movement comes focus and with focus comes clarity.