Once a month, we will be highlighting a Qoya dancer in the community.  I’ll ask a woman who has embodied Qoya and it’s philosophy to share what it means to her.  Today, I’m delighted to introduce our first interview with Kitty Cavalier, who teaches Qoya in New York City and is the founder of the School of Charm and Cheek where she shares her gifts teaching Qoya and burlesque classes, Seduction as a Spiritual Practice Workshops and Retreats, as well as other fun things like make-up tricks and magic candle rituals!  Enjoy her words here.

Check out this 5 minute Qoya Bhangra 101 video here and see if it is true for you too!  Remember, Qoya is an EXPERIENTIAL path.  It is not about understanding the concepts, but feeling the pulse of them in present time in your body, mind, heart and soul.  In other words, instead of a mental exercise of nodding your head as you read, get up and move!

Bhangra from Rochelle Schieck on Vimeo.

Expect a Miracle,

QOYA RETREAT – Costa Rica April 6th – 13th 2013 from jodi jones on Vimeo.

Do you remember that Qoya translates in Quechuan as Queen? Not a bejeweled and emotionally distant Queen in a castle, but a feminine manifestation of higher consciousness that is confidently seated on the throne that is her life. In a way, that is one of the best ways that I can explain all that I have come to study and learn about December 21, 2012.  This is our individual and collective opportunity to shift our consciousness into it’s highest vibration to embody and radiate our inner Queen, which is another way to say, our divinity.

My friends over at Astrostyle.com explain this auspicious day on December 21, 2012 as marking the end of a 5,125 year cycle of the Mayan calendar and the beginning of another era. It’s more of a “the end of the world as we know it,” than a literal Armageddon. In fact, the Mayans call the post-2012 era The World Of The Fifth Sun or The Fifth World. The Mayans were profound record keepers and mathematicians, both astronomers and astrologers. Another occurrence they predicted for December 21, 2012 was that both the Earth and the Sun would align with the Galactic Center– an event which has not happened for 26,000 years (the time the Ice Age began). Just as the Sun is the center of our solar system, the Galactic Center is the gravitational field that the entire Milky Way revolves around! So, this alignment of Earth, Sun, and Galactic Center connects us to worlds beyond our own, fiery and mysterious with an indescribable pull. This post is my offering for a guide to the end of the world (as we know it), with the intention of centering into your own essence as wise, wild and free and seated powerfully on the throne of your life.

How?

GO WITHIN.

I meditated deeply on “where to go” for the solstice.  Mt. Shasta? Hawaii? Back to Minnesota where I was born? New York? LA? The mountains? The ocean? The answer I received was, “There is no where to go out there. The only place to go is within.” For those of you who are sensitive to the subtle energies shifting, be sure to take time to align yourself with an internal focus.  When researching guidance on how to navigate through these changes, the Shamanic wisdom that came forward was, “The assignment each person is given during this time is to listen deeply to and trust themselves and their intuition.”  This is the perfect application of all the practices of yoga, meditation, clearing your system with green juices and eating organic whole foods and other self-development healing practices that all of us have been exposed to up to this point. This advice need not be applied from a place of fear.  Regardless of the Mayan Calendar ending and the predictions for an evolution in human consciousness, even if you don’t personally feel a huge shift in your world right now, it’s never a bad idea to establish a more powerful connection with trusting yourself.  And since it has been 26,000 years since we were aligned with Galactic Center….why not? Just do it. Go in. Trust yourself more deeply than ever before.

Here are three invitations to take you deeper in for your own guidance today.

1) Click here to do a 20 minute December 21, 2012 Forgiveness meditation with Alberto Villoldo, founder of the Four Winds Society. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIZi1ODXueI&feature=youtu.be

2) One of my favorite tools for going deeper within for answers is the labyrinth.

A labyrinth is an ancient symbol for the meandering path of the soul that goes from light into darkness and emerges once again into light.  It’s a maze, but there is only one way out and that’s the way you went in.  The metaphors here are endless.

How do you walk one (or dance one)?  The way I was taught to walk a labyrinth was to go in with an intention and as you walk into the center, let all of your questions come up, all of your doubts and all of your fears. Feel yourself asking, curious and seeking for an answer. Make your way to the center and when you arrive, pause.  Sit down.  Soften.  Surrender.  Let yourself be held and seen and loved in the sacred center of the labyrinth and stay as long as you need.  Release all that binds you until all that no longer serves you is gone.  Trust that you will know when the releasing is complete.  When your inner voice tells you you’re ready, begin to walk out and instead of asking questions, allow yourself to be simply in a state of receiving.  Give your inner voice an opportunity to share what it longs to remind you of.

 How can you make one? You can make one out of yarn in your living room, out of sticks in your backyard or in the sand at the beach.  Make a labyrinth by making a spiral starting in the center and energizing and charging it with your presence as you make circles around it.  As many as seven spirals around, as few as two, do what feels right and whatever you have room for.

3) Do Qoya.  Qoya is based on the idea that through movement, we remember.  We remember our essence, our truth, our spirit as wise, wild and free.  Here is a free hour long Qoya class with the theme Feel As Much As You Can and access your inner knowing and feelings as a guide to navigate this sacred time.

Feel As Much As You Can from Rochelle Schieck on Vimeo.

I am so grateful for your support of Qoya and honor your courageous soul as we dream a bigger dream for ourselves and for humanity.  A return to love.  A remembering of spirit.  A dance that feels honest and true.

Blessings on your journeys- inner and outer!

Rochelle

P.S. Please join us in Costa Rica April 6-13, 2013 for the quintessential Qoya experience.

QOYA RETREAT – Costa Rica April 6th – 13th 2013 from jodi jones on Vimeo.

Right now, I am on a two month, but looking more like two year or two decade pilgrimage to reclaim the divine feminine (and am writing articles about what I find on the Huffington post).

Why?

I have a passion for women’s empowerment, my own and the collective’s.  To me, women’s empowerment, is simply the freedom to live as one desires to live.  I have witnessed, in myself and in others, that when we align with our ego, we are filled with limitation and when we are aligned with Spirit, our perception becomes limitless.  When connected to Spirit/Source, all things become possible and you can feel your place in the interconnected web of life.  But to do that, one has to be conscious of what their relationship to that Source is.  Hence, why I am traveling and writing on reclaiming the Divine Feminine is because, as a woman, if we can’t find our gender in the map to enlightenment, it’s harder to find ourselves.

Sometimes, it’s best to start at the beginning.  My religious and spiritual journey started as a child who went to a strict Baptist babysitter.  This babysitter of mine had daughters a little older than me who were twins and who I looked up to and adored.  I wasn’t invited to their birthday party because I was told, “only kids from church were allowed to go.”  We lived next door to each other, so imagine me young and lonely, looking out my window at their birthday party wishing I could be part of it.  Not for long.  I took matters into my own hands and told my babysitter I wanted to start going to church.  One way or another, I was going to get to that party.

My first religious immersion began by enrolling in church summer camp, which was a lot like normal summer camp- except having breakout sessions to ask everyone if they had accepted Jesus as their personal savior (with all the adult camp leaders staring at you with their encouraging/condemning eyes).  I didn’t know what it meant at age ten, but I took a leap of faith into trusting the adults before me and raised my hand too.

What ensued was studying the bible, becoming a sunday school teacher for younger kids and eventually feeling like I was definitely going to hell.  Somehow, skipping school and dancing on my couch to Madonna’s “Like a Prayer” video on MTV resonated more than being still and silent during a church sermon, which in hindsight is perfect foreshadowing to my own journey. Even though I was a straight A student and an overall nice kid (see photo), somehow everything I did seemed to feel like I was going against the will of God and would be punished.   The main thing I learned from my early experience in religion was not love, but guilt. And so, out of guilt, when I went to college, I signed up for a class called Introduction to Christianity. I didn’t see myself going to church on Sundays anymore, so I thought this class would be the perfect filler to continue my fear based faith.  However, the class did just the opposite.   From an academic perspective, we covered that the Bible was not a book written by God, but a book written (and re-written) by man.  We learned about during the times of Jesus there were several different interpretations of his teachings and the age old story that history is written by the winners and hence the version we have now is the one that was used by those in power to kill and eradicate anyone who believed differently like in the Crusades, Inquisition and other puritanical religious wars.  This class confused and liberated me at the same time.  I lost my map.  I lost the formula or the equation that explained where we came from, what we were here to do and where we going.  In exchange, I received my freedom.  No longer bound to words written on a page, I was now free to experience all of life and through my own experience have the authority to assess what resonated as truth.

And after fifteen or so years since that class, I have been searching for this truth in far away places like with yogis in India, ancient ruins in Cambodia, mediating with Buddhists in Thailand, with shamans in Peru and then some, I found my strongest connection to spirit right here through moving my own body, which is why I do Qoya.  And why I pretend Qoya is an exercise class is for two reasons:

1- It is.  You do experience the traditional benefits of an exercise class- increasing one’s strength, flexibility, balance, agility and overall health.  The difference is those become the bi-products of your workout.  You don’t exercise to burn calories, you move because it brings you joy and connection to the deepest part of yourself.

2- Movement is the one of the most effective portals into experiencing spirit.  The revelation that I am working with and teaching my next three workshops in Minneapolis, MN, Oslo, Norway and Greece on is best described by author Sue Monk Kidd when she writes, “Embodiment means we no longer say, I had this experience; we say, I am this experience.”

The shift for reclaiming the divine feminine is to embody oneself as the divine feminine.

When I first started teaching yoga, I would often say at the end in savasana, “Remember we are not human doings, we are human beings.  Just allow yourself to be.”   May we all soften our search to allow the Divine Feminine to just live, breath and be in us today.

How did your relationship to Spirit/Source begin?

How do you access Spirit/Source now?

Do you believe that you can do it through the simple action of moving your own body?

I do! Join me for an experiment to see if it’s true for you too.  You can always move with me for free online at EmbodyQoya.com under the Intro Section or join for $30 a month and have access to over 50 videos, including full 1 hour Qoya classes.  I will also be teaching a workshop in Minneapolis, MN September 4-9th, 2012 at Four Gates, a workshop in Oslo, Norway September 20-24, 2012 and a Qoya Retreat in Greece Sept. 29-Oct 4 (with an optional add-on for 3 nights in Athens and 3 nights in Istanbul) this fall.  Would love to dance with you!

With love and leaping,

Rochelle

P.S. Thank you for all your support for my Huffingpost Blogs! My most recent article on my time in Rome is up and you can find it here. xo!

Thank you so much for being with me on this journey of Qoya to share the message that through movement, we remember.  We remember our essence is wise, wild and free.  Through the wisdom of yoga, wild and creative expression in dance and the freedom to enjoy ourselves through sensual movement, we reconnect to our truth and feel it through all the different levels of perception; physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, soulful and energetic.  We align ourselves in integrity with our deepest truth and from that spot- we dance.

I am so honored to be dancing with you in spirit, through these blog posts, in classes and retreats and would love for you to join me on another journey. I’m taking a two month pilgrimage to reclaim the divine feminine and just wrote my first blog for the Huffington Post that talks more about it.  Would love to share it with you and hear your stories in the comment section if the spirit moves you.

Also, I’m loving sharing EmbodyQoya.com with women.  Be sure to check out the free 10 days to Embody Qoya video or join for $30 a month and have access to over 50 videos so that you can feel that wise, wild and free woman in you.  Check out the site here.  I recommend beginning with Day Number 3 called “Serenity Now.”  Notice how just massaging yourself for 5 minutes can shift the energy of your day.  Go straight to that video here!

Enjoy the full moon today and all the blessings that cross your path.

With love and whirling dervish devotion,

Rochelle

The goal is being emotionally responsible right?  Definition of responsible being able to respond.  Not collapsing into our wounds like a child.  Not dismissing them like an emotionally unavailable way-too-busy-for-this adult.  Right in the middle.  For me, it’s going deep into the darkness with certainty of what is on the other side. Hint: love and light.  I shed tears.  I wondered why, what could I have done differently.  I blamed myself for getting sick…and then I didn’t.  I let go to surrender into the experience of what was happening, knowing that it would get better.  And, when I couldn’t surrender, I watched movies of other people’s challenges that they overcame.  I also cheered my immune system on.  (I think she liked that.  I should write her a thank you note).  As I swallow in this moment without wincing, I’m writing to you from the other side.

The other side of those moments.  Those moments when you really feel like the unknown is too much.  It is too scary.  The pain is too great.  When will it go away?  The bills are due next week, where will the money come from?  Your heart is bleeding to create your art, but what if “they” don’t like it, what if it’s not good enough? You care about him or her so much, but if you tell the truth will they leave?   Those moments where you can become so paralyzed in the what if’s, you can really get lost.  You can forget.  And, sometimes you need someone or something to help you remember.

Qoya is based on the idea that through movement, we remember.  Through movement, we remember our essence as being wise, wild and free.  We remember how to locate and identify our essence through movement and then use our connection to that essence like a compass as we navigate our lives in this world.

Recently, Kitty Cavalier, a burlesque dancer and the creator of the School of Charm and Cheek, (who is one of the women that went through the Qoya teacher training in Costa Rica last spring and who is pictured to the left with me) wrote a blog post about her inspiration to start teaching weekly Qoya classes in Manhattan. You can read it here.  (I also encourage you to take her classes if you are in the city. They’re perfect.) As I was recovering from not feeling well, faith still strong, but a little lost, I read her quote me in her blog with the words I said to her, “Just start. Whatever dream it is you have, just start with what you have in that moment, but just start.”  It was the perfect thing for me to hear in my back in the saddle state and it was something I had already said, already knew, but just forgotten.

Sometimes the best advice is your own.  Know yourself well enough to know the ways that you can connect back in with your own inner wisdom.   It can be through movement like Qoya or yoga, meditation or prayer, being in nature or on a pilgrimage, getting a good night sleep or taking a long hot bath.  Investigate which ways really work for you and maybe write a little list to keep, so when you need them and forget, they’re still there.  Another way to evoke hearing your own advice is to imagine how you would advise your best friend with the issue that has come up in your life.  Offer yourself the same honesty, compassion and kindness that you would to him or her.  Most spiritual teachings guide you to remember that all you seek is already within you.  The next time there is something looking to be discovered, resolved or created- go within to find it.

My last class in New York City for a little while is Sunday, July 15th at Sacred Brooklyn.  The theme is the next paragraph which is a poetic collection of the song titles and lyrics from the playlist I’ll use.  Come dance with us in Brooklyn or with us in spirit by listening to the playlist on spotify, click here.

Take up your spade and break ground.  

The Sun is up, a new day is before you.  Sun is up, wake your sleepy soul.  

Sun is up, hold on to what is yours.

There is no greater love than being able to say thank you sun.

Like a moth to a flame, burned by the fire.  My love is blind, can’t you see my desire?  

That’s the way love goes.

Drive while helplessly hoping to stay strong and keep your faith alive.

The Wolves, the man on fire and passion may take you out,

but even when the stars go blue, hide tide or low tide, I’m going to be your friend.

I believe in a better way and a higher love and am here to remind you, you are not alone.

Come dance with me up on the hill where they do the boogie or

with me and julio down by the schoolyard.

Follow your own advice.  Follow mine if it resonates as truth in your heart.  My advice for the day is to try Day 2 of the free 10 day into to EmbodyQoya.com.  The theme is Just Move (kind of like Just Start, but with movement)! Here’s the link to check it out with a free 5 minute video to get your body moving.

I look forward to dancing with you at the perfect time.

With love and two dancing feet,

Rochelle

“At the end of all our exploring,

Will be to arrive where we started,

And know the place for the first time.”

-T.S. Eliot 

My last blog post was titled 3 easy ways to learn how to listen to your intuition.  If you’re going to write about encouraging others to listen to their intuition, it puts oneself in a position of moral obligation to do the same, in order to be in integrity. So, when I received a clear intuitive message that said, “Go to Minnesota for your birthday and (specifically) go to the physical land that you were born on,” I booked my ticket and packed my suitcase.

The first couple days of my visit in Minnesota, I found myself completely enchanted with my friends and family, with the beauty of all the gorgeous gardens, parks, bike trails and outdoor concerts. I went to a bunch of delicious farm to table restaurants like the Birchwood cafe, Lucia’s, French Meadow and vegan oasis Ecopolitan. I was overwhelmed by the amazing women who attended my Qoya weekend workshop at Four Gates and I found myself thinking “…maybe I could move back here and make Minnesota my home base?”

I looked up the address of the hospital I was born in and was off for my pilgrimage to visit the place where this trip around the sun first began. When I arrived at what used to be the hospital where I entered this world, I couldn’t believe what had replaced it- a beautiful (and chic) apartment building that just opened.  In that moment, my intuitive vision became clear – I’m coming home.

After having my intuition guide me so clearly to my next home, I went for a walk in the closest part to this apartment building and came across this poem by T.S. Eliot.  The words were the stamp and seal of approval, the poetic synchronicity that describing goes beyond words.  When you can feel your place in the web of interconnection amongst all things.  To feel your intuition is to feel plugged in and supported in a way that is stronger than isolated and alone.  Reading this poem, could make anyone want to go home- to go back to the beginning, back to the space between two waves of the sea.

I believe that the easiest way to tap into your intuition, into your happiness, into life- is to learn how to feel it through your body, through movement.

Qoya is based on this idea that through movement, we remember.  We remember, as women, that we are inherently wise, wild and free.

That through movement, we can experience our own way home.  Back to the place we started our journey in our body and knowing it for the first time.

On my birthday, something else happened.  I launched the Qoya online studio!  It’s a growing collection of videos ranging from 5-10 ,15, 30 and 60 minute videos that remind you that your body is an incredible resource of wisdom to answer your deepest questions.  Videos that remind you that your body is a vessel to wildly and creatively express your essence.  That your body is one of the easiest ways to be liberated, to feel free and to have a daily experience of your power, purpose and pleasure.

Some is free; like the 10 days to Embody Qoya (which are 10 days of 10 minutes of movement a day to get you going!) and the Qoya Kids page (which has a 15 minute video and pdf print out to guide movement for ages 3-5, 6-9 and 10-12).   The rest of the site has a membership fee of $30 a month. Check out it’s first unveiling here at EmbodyQoya.com.

My dream is to share all the things in which I have been blessed to experience and learn and create them in a format that is easy, effective and fun to serve, nurture and inspire others on their  journey. Do you have 5-6 minutes today to do the first day of the 10 Free Days to Embody Qoya? A little movement goes a long way.  Just a moment of remembering can be the kickstart you need.  It can be like control-alt-delete to reset your system again.  It can be the realigning of your compass, so that your body’s wisdom can guide you home.

For the pilgrimage back to one’s body, there’s Qoya.  And now, you can have access to Qoya through your internet connection with dozens and dozens of videos on EmbodyQoya.com as well.  And then, there are retreats, which are sacred time to live the philosophy of Qoya morning, noon and night with morning meditation and breathing, longer Qoya classes, healthy delicious meals, adventures and learning how to sit with the sacred in ceremonies and goddess rituals.  The next 2 retreats are planned for Greece in the Fall and Costa Rica in the Spring. I’ll also be teaching classes in NYC at Sacred in Brooklyn Sunday July 8th and 15th at 5:15pm and another workshop in Minneapolis Sept 4-9th.  I am so grateful for the growing community of dancers, for all the blessings that are and all the blessings that are to be.

Love doesn’t even begin to describe it,

Rochelle

I hope this finds each of you doing well in whichever season it is in your heart. Maybe you’re feeling like hibernating and contracting like winter in the morning and warm and expressive like the summer in the evening. Maybe filled with enthusiasm and the sparkle of possibility like spring when you think he or she might call. Maybe the pain of letting go, like when the last leaf falls off the tree in autumn, and you’re the one who knows it’s best for both of you if you don’t call. Wherever you are, with all this valentine’s day hula-a-baloo the inner romantic or cynic in us is easily evoked.

Valentine’s day is the dramatic obsession with the quest for finding love outside of yourself, as in, your valentine.  However, most wisdom teachers encourage you to first go within.  Qoya agrees.  While there are hundreds of books and classes to help you heal your heart, open your heart, find your soul mate, manifest your perfect lover, conjure true love, keep it once you have it and along the way learn how to love yourself, I was deeply moved recently when reading new book by author Agapi Stassinopoulos Unbinding the Heart where she simply says,

“There are no seven or eight simple steps to unbind our hearts, but there is one choice that we all have, and this is our golden opportunity in every moment of every day, whatever small or big challenges it brings: Do I shut down or do I choose to open up one more time, even deeper?”

Reading those words are liberating from the how to’s of studying the magic equation to bring love into our lives.  With this example, loving becomes a simple practice in each present moment to be willing to open your heart one more time?

Are you in?  Can you feel the physical sensation in your heart of contraction or expansion? Do an experiment and think of someone and notice how your body responds.  Are you closed?  Can you open?

I invite you to think of this the next time your phone rings, the next person you have a conversation with or the next time you look in the mirror. Can you choose to open up your heart one more time, even deeper?

A friend put this quote on my Facebook yesterday, “those who don’t move won’t notice their chains.” Agreed. I invite you to open your heart just a little bit more than feels safe and to dance just a little more wildly outside your comfort zone. To help, here is a preview of one of the shorter videos that will be on my online Qoya studio. This is called Dancing your heartbeat and is less than 5 minutes of movement leading with your heart.

The most effective and enjoyable way I know into the heart, into our essence, into the well of love is by going within. The fastest and most pleasurable way I know in is Qoya. The movements of yoga, dance and sensual movement unbind and release us to express our wise, wild and free essence and that’s why I show up and offer Qoya to you as a gift from my heart.  May we all realize that it is not the question of whether we are gifted, but what are our gifts.  And with whatever gift we are blessed with, may valentine’s day be less about the fairytale of romantic love, but the love of life and sharing of our gifts from our heart and the dance of it all.

Love big. It doesn’t matter how big, but just a little more each moment that you can.

With a dancing heart,
Rochelle

P.S. Qoya updates! If you’re not in New York, know that I am so excited when I can offer you EmbodyQoya.com. So so so excited. Until then, if the spirit moves you, please consider joining us for the next Qoya retreat in Costa Rica April 21-28, 2012.

If you are in New York. I’m here too!!! and teaching Qoya in Manhattan Saturday mornings 9-10:15am and in Brooklyn Sunday afternoons 5:15-6:15pm. See more details here.

All my Qoya classes the next three saturdays in Manhattan, are donation based and all donations go to Gems. See more about them here!

Would LOVE to see you and dance together.

Know the people who inspire your life.

Know the movements that refuel your soul.

If I asked you the three places in the world where you feel the most like you- would you know what they are?  The places where you feel deeply grounded?  The places where you feel like you have the most joy?  Where you have the most epiphanies?  The places where you feel the most powerful?

What if I asked you about the people who inspire your life?  The ones that have been around so long, no action is requrired for you to be moved by them, just knowing they exist is inspiration enough.  The new ones that captivate and catapault you into a higher realm of consciousness, fun or both!  Who are the mirrors of light when darkness is around and are like a bonfire in which your spirit can warm itself up on the coldest of nights?

What are the movements that refuel your soul? That GIVE YOU ENERGY for your journey?  How can you move in a way that you instantaneously remember that there is a part of you that is sacred, eternal and divine?  Do you know?   Wouldn’t it be fun if you did?

It’s up to each of us to take the time to notice and what you look for is what you see.  The next time you flip through your travel photos remember how it felt.  Where were those magical recharge stations?  Whenever you find one- be sure to go there more often.

When your phone rings, watch how your body responds.  Are you avoiding the caller? Sulking in obligation? Excitedly answering?  Stay close to the people who light you up.

The next time you go to the gym, go for a run, take a yoga class, twirl around in pole dancing, leap in dance class, strengthen your core in pilates or explore the wise, wild and free woman in Qoya~ notice what movements illuminate the path back to yourself.

Qoya is based on the idea that through movement, we remember.  We remember as women that we are inherently wise, wild and free.  My vision is that as you become centered in your deepest truth and feel empowered as you embody your essence, you dance with pleasure along your unique path that leads to the highest destiny for you and for all of us.

If you’d like to try Qoya, check out these videos online: a one hour Qoya routine called Paradise, a 10 minute movement ritual for Dreaming Bigger Dreams or a 5 minute exploration of sensual movement.  (Password to videos is: qoya.)

I’d love to hear what your favorite moves are as you dance, your favorite spots on the earth and some of your favorite people and why!  Please share with me on facebook and share this with a friend if you think they’d enjoy it.

Love,

Rochelle

A quick note to wish you a magical New Year.  May the blessings that you put into the world boomerang back to you a million fold.

Here’s also an invitation to join me in my New Year’s ritual this year.  I sat down and wrote my top 11 gratitudes for 2011 and shared them with a friend, then we wrote our top 12 desires for 2012. The final part of this exercise is to then take the desire list of your friend and write your desires for him/her x 10!!! Take their desire list and magnify it, expand it, make it a shooting star, add your creativity and love of this person to see something bigger for them that they may not be able to see for themselves.  Let them do the same for you.

Gratitude is a great way to ground ourselves in the blessings of our lives and is the most fertile ground for planting the seeds of our desires.  We all love to dream, but sometimes we fall out of practice.  Holidays are a great time to press pause long enough to reflect on the past, savor the present moment and vision the future.

Know that you can do this ANYTIME, with a friend or on your own if you desire!  New Year’s Day, New Year’s Week, the New Moon, Your Birthday, Your Anniversary…or just because it’s a Tuesday.

I believe that when you dance, you access your true essence and feel the sacred pulse of life in your body, from which all creation arises.  So, to tap into even more power and magnify your dreams, I am also gifting you this 10 minute movement ritual for DREAMING BIGGER DREAMS. (The Password is: qoya).

Thank you for a beautiful year of dancing with Qoya in 2011.  I am so grateful for you and your support and look forward to dreaming bigger dreams together in 2012! (Maybe in Costa Rica?!?)

With love,

Rochelle

P.S. Click here to do the Qoya 10 minute movement ritual on Dreaming Bigger Dreams! (Password: qoya)  Happy New Year! xo

I’m talking about paradise literally AND figuratively.

Literally, I bought a one-way ticket to Hawaii.  Starting January 2nd, I am leading the New Year’s Qoya Kauai Retreat. After that, I’m still open to the universe/spirit/god/goddess/my intuition to guide me.

Figuratively, I am inviting you to get your own one way ticket to paradise and join me. There is the paradise “out there”. The paradise that seems elusive and temporarily experienced on a vacation, in the acquisition of a desire or in the daydreams and fantasies of the mind. There is also the paradise inside, that is available to us anytime regardless of external circumstances. It is the place where we feel ecstatic. Alive. Awake. Aware. Wise. Wild. Free. Ourselves.

The gift I am offering to you is a map to your inner paradise through movement.

Qoya connects us back to ourselves so that when you move your body in a way that feels good, you start to tap back into your essence, your truth, your radiance, so you can source from that center.

Once you have that tangible and measurable sensation in your body to reference, you can use it like a compass when making future decisions.  Does taking this job make my body zing like the way I felt when I was dancing?  Does this food make me feel lethargic and tired or full of energy like when I finished the Qoya routine?  Once you have experienced yourself at a high vibration naturally by simply moving your body, you know how to create the conditions to experience it again anytime you need it. (You move!)

The whole point is to notice what works.  What lights you up.  What makes you feel alive and more connected to yourself, spirit and others.  Then, do that more often.  It sounds simple, but sometimes we forget.

Qoya is based on the idea that through movement we remember. We remember, as women, that we are inherently Wise, Wild and Free. Wise, Wild and Free are also the essence of the movement forms that influence Qoya. Wise comes from the wisdom of yoga. Wild is from the creative expression in dance. Free is from the pleasure found in sensual movement. The focus is less and less and less on how it looks and more and more and more on how it feels. When you’re moving your body and it feels good to move, you’re doing it right.

Here is the link to a one hour Qoya routine called Paradise (Password: qoya)! It and dozens and dozens of other videos like it will be on EmbodyQoya.com (the online Qoya movement studio I am working on as I travel), but until that launches, I would love to share this with you and encourage you to explore finding the way that your body wants to move, finding your map and your way to your inner paradise in 2012.

I know there are many of you on this list who have never actually tried Qoya. Thank you for your support and I hope that you enjoy this video as an appetizer and that we can dine together and feast on Qoya in person sometime in a class or retreat together. For those of you who I have danced with, I hope this will be a reminder that takes you back into the physical sensation of remembering and expressing your true self through your body.  Please let me know how you like the video!

***To prepare for your Qoya class, wear comfortable clothing (the movements are a combination of yoga, dance and sensual movement).  Most people prefer to do the class barefoot.  Before doing any exercise, it is best to be well hydrated and have an emptier stomach.   Always listen to and honor the unique needs of your body.  The class is one hour long.

Here’s the link to the class again! Password: qoya.

May we remember how to connect to the joy and pulse of life by feeling paradise in our body.  And if you’d like to join us in person for Qoya’s next excursion to Paradise, look at the Spring Qoya Retreat in Costa Rica April 21-28, 2012 at the beautiful Blue Spirit Resort.

Dancing in gratitude,

Rochelle