Dear ones,
Blessings for this New Year! What a time it has been. As we Awaken on a Collective level there has been much stress and incredible division and fracturing of our systems and society. We all have our lived experience of this now. As we continue to deconstruct and open to new ways and perspectives we are asked to not only put down our swords but also pick a different one up. The sword that divides must go down as we don our new gowns for peace and discernment. The year of 2022 brings in much heart-opening for most of humanity and compassion and perspectives are gained as the spiral of the divine feminine weaves awareness on a greater level for all. The light workers, empaths, the sensitive ones need to be aware of themselves this next year. Not to over-give, be taken advantage of and to be on guard for fatigue and strain from collective trauma, grief and fear. Acknowledge your stress, or the stress your naturally sensitive and attuned heart will register in the world around you, but don’t allow it to chip away at your innate divine sanctuary. Taking on the reality of mainstream consciousness can be like throwing a cover over your light. Have compassion for others but also for yourself. It is your task to be true to your own hearts, to your own worth, and to shine the light without agenda or fear. Open your heart and become more aware. Courageously call Kali to eat fear and use it for creativity. “As a light worker you are practicing a form of spiritual healing specifically targeting personal and planetary evolution through spiritual growth. Light work is intimately connected to healing and evolution of consciousness on Mother Earth.” (A. Fairchild)

SYI Updates
At SYI we have spent the last year crafting our Mother Ship for spreading these teachings and serving as Mentors to the evolution of sacred animism, art and Yoga in the world for love and liberation. We have some new faculty to introduce and some to honour as they leave our folds to spread their work and love in the word.
Firstly a big mother OM to our beloved Gate Keeper and Admin Angel, Teacher, Student and Friend, Cindy Stockdale. She will be stepping away from her gatekeeper and admin role for the school this coming year. We thank you for your over a decade of service to the vision of this school. There are no words to convey the gratitude for the magnitude of service and love you have given to this work and your teacher. Thank You. We look forward to hosting Cindy as she makes rainbows in her upcoming courses.
Taking her place as Gate Keeper for our school is longterm student and teacher Andrea Sentesy of Squamish. We are so grateful for Andrea stepping into this position with the school and being our first point of contact for incoming students. What a gift they will receive with Mama Killa welcoming you to this work and our community.
Anita Weimann is our first graduate and teacher who has purchased our sellable curriculum to run her own spiritual practice and Medicine Wheel courses! We are so proud of Anita, it’s your time sister! She has been training and assistant teaching with SYI for many years and recently completed teaching a Medicine Wheel in Ucluelet and Nelson for the school. She will be running her own medicine wheel trainings with the SYI curriculum next year. Anita is also an amazing artist and was our marketing magician for many years before teaching. We are forever grateful for Her!
Next introduction is for Blaire Embrey! She is currently enrolled in our new Teacher Mentorship Program training to teach for SYI Medicine Wheels and the White Global Mesa Mastery courses. She is bringing the Medicine to California with Verena Futiger this coming year. Blaire is also our new Marketing Magician. We are warmly welcoming this new position for Blaire and her art making mysticism to bless our schools growth and fruition.
We are launching our first Teachers Mentorship Group with a collective of medicine teachers we are welcoming to our faculty this year to spread this work further! Look out for their upcoming courses around the world with the Shamanic Yoga institute these coming years.
Squamish Outdoor Medicine Wheel – West
We cast our circle in the abundant waters of the fall equinox and fortified it in the days leading up to the winter solstice, amidst one of the most beautiful snow storms I have ever experienced. Learning on the land put the teaching of being negotiable into practice; we tracked perceptions, judgements, and places of contraction around the way we think things should or could be different. We witnessed these distortions in ourselves, our bloodlines and in karmic ties that bind us to lifelessness and addiction. The work was rich, cathartic, and filled with renewed commitment to live awake. A new collective of earthkeepers walk these lands, and we are so honoured to make tracks together.
Mentorship with Christine
This month, we will gather on New Year’s Eve to harvest from the dream realm in our expressive art process. What aspects we bring to the piece is open-ended; tracking movement, lines, edges, action and reaction, places and people, sensation and emotion. Participants have been invited to work with mixed-media or another artistic modality of their choosing. We look forward to seeing how these individual pieces inform and reform the direction of the collective ship we are navigating together.
Dreams are impartial, spontaneous products of the unconscious psyche, outside the control of the will. They are pure nature; they show us the unvarnished, natural truth, and are therefore fitted, as nothing else is, to give us back an attitude that accords with our basic human nature when our consciousness has strayed too far from its foundations and run into an impasse. Carl Jung, “The Meaning of Psychology for Modern Man” (1933)
SHAMANIC YOGA 300-Hour Teacher Training 2022
SOUTH March 25th – 29th
WEST May 13th-17th
NORTH June 24th-28th
EAST August 12th-16th
REGISTER BY DECEMBER 31st and WE WILL WAIVE YOUR $250 DEPOSIT!
PROMO CODE: NEWYEAR-250
https://shamanicyoga.ca/300-hour-shamanic-yoga-teacher-training/


December Blog
This month, Rochelle writes of the art of the Earthkeeper, the Pampemesioqs, and the modality of the despacho:
The light carriers, medicine people, mystics and artists who find their way into our community self-select as stewards of the more-than-human world. They yearn, consciously or unconsciously, to experience an intimacy with the ancient heart of the sacred that goes beyond partnership and familial ties, one that sings of our own wilderness. It is no coincidence that the main initiation of Mountain Shamanism is the Pamemesioq Rite, which opens apprentices to the voices of the Earth. When we are listening, she shares with us the greatest lessons of love and belonging, the miraculousness of life, death, and rebirth, and of patient forgiveness. It is from her that I am learning that love is not something to be bartered with. To be an earthkeeper is live our commitment to ayni – to right relationship – by putting love into action without looking for credit or grasping at a particular exchange.
Joan Parisi Wilcox, a life-long student and teacher of Andean land-based spirituality, describes pampemesioqs as “expert ceremonialists, the keepers of earth-based rituals and knowledge. They are healers, with a thorough knowledge of herbal medicines. They are masters at making despachos and performing the ceremonies connected with them.” This is one of their greatest gifts to the worlds.
The despacho is a sacred art that holds practitioners accountable to active prayer and creating beauty. Comprised of natural items, where each ingredient represents an aspect of nature, a symbol or tool, the despacho is an art of alchemy. The specific elements added are dependent on intent and they are imbued with purpose and meaning through the prayer of the breath. Attributed to the high Andean medicine people, this ceremony requires the creator to sustain the highest vibration throughout: one of gratitude.
At present, with the new year upon us, we mark the threshold of the return of the light. This is an auspicious time for an earthkeeper to create her despacho. They are built in response to the needs of one’s community and beyond and often created during life or seasonal transitions to nourish, heal, and pray for balance. We share with you a recipe that holds the intent of unity, an offering to Shakti, through the honouring of her parts. By participating, you can begin this next turn of the sun aligning with gratitude and vision.
Continue reading at:
https://shamanicyoga.ca/envelopes-of-dreams-the-art-of-the-earthkeeper/

Once back in action:
Karma Yoga Classes: Sundays 5:30 – 6:30 pm
Bhakti Yoga with Christine: Thursdays 9:30 – 10:45 am
Bhakti Yoga with Rochelle: Fridays 9:30 – 10:45 am
@ Shala Yoga, Squamish
To stay in the loop, visit:
https://shamanicyoga.ca/events/
