Pine trees, belonging to the genus Pinus spp., stand as stalwart guardians in the forest network. These evergreen conifers, characterized by their needle-like leaves and distinctive cones, possess an enduring visual and fragrant allure. Their presence is woven intricately into the fabric of our ecosystem, offering both tangible and intangible gifts to the environment and its inhabitants, including here at Nectar Yoga Retreat on Bowen Island.
Mosses’ diminutive size belies their resilience, tenacity, and ecological significance. Mosses are essential for retaining soil and moisture (as much as 40 times their weight), preventing erosion, and providing homes, insulation, and sustenance for various organisms in their ecosystems, including at Nectar Yoga Retreat on Bowen Island.
Known for its stinging leaves, Nettle is a herbaceous perennial that offers a myriad of benefits ranging from environmental rewilding to medicinal uses and even spiritual significance. Nectar Yoga Retreat’s wellness blog also includes lesser known fun facts, and three nettle tea recipes that do wonders for our complexions and general vitality.
Aparigraha is one of the five Yamas, or ethical guidelines, found in the 8 Limbs of Yoga by Patanjali. It is often translated as "non-possessiveness" or "non-grasping", Aparigraha encourages us to cultivate a sense of detachment from material possessions and desires. By embracing the principles of Aparigraha, we can reduce stress, increase mindfulness, and live a more fulfilling life.
The summer solstice falls on June 21 this year, the longest day in the Northern Hemisphere and the point at which the sun reaches its longest presence in the sky before beginning its cyclical return southward. The word solstice comes from the Latin sol sistere, meaning the sun stands still.
This day also marks the entry of the sun into Cancer, making it a seasonal peak and simultaneously an astrological turning point, the moment when summer's outward expansion begins its pivot toward the more inward, receptive, and home-like quality of Cancer season. At Nectar Retreat on Bowen, by late June, the forest is fully canopied, the sunlight filtering through the trees rather than shining directly.
This post offers a short yoga practice and a few ways to mark the summer solstice, whether you are on Bowen or anywhere else. Details on the ever-popular, in-person evening Summer Solstice Yin Sound Bath at Nectar are at the end.
Gemini's domain is the shoulders, arms, hands, and lungs. May introduced that territory and the practices that open it. June begins there and moves down into the chest, the ribs, and the breath's deeper capacity. Three-Part Breath, which this month introduces, reaches further into the body than box breathing does, expanding the lower belly, the ribcage, and the upper chest in sequence. It is the breath of Cancer's water element: receptive, layered, touching the baseline of the self.
In the Western astrological tradition, Cancer is ruled by the Moon, which governs cycles, tides, and the rhythms of the body that are not entirely under conscious control. The practices this month work with that quality. Where May's practices asked for steadiness and physical form, June's ask for surrender to sensation. The chest opens not because you push it open but because the breath makes room.
Beyond appreciating them in cooking, what are oyster mushrooms good for? Pleurotus varieties are saprotrophs that are involved in providing nutrition to its ecosystem as a primary decomposer of wood, especially deciduous trees, and beech trees in particular, though here in the Pacific Northwest, oyster mushrooms are also seen growing on dying hardwood trees. Their saprophytic function benefits the forest by returning vital elements and minerals to the environment in forms that are usable to other plants, other organisms, and general soil biology.
For the month of May, Taurus governs the neck, jaw, and throat, then Gemini, starting on May 21, governs the shoulders, arms, and lungs. May moves through both, meaning the month carries a natural arc from the lower, singular part of the upper body (the neck) toward the wider, dualistic, and more mobile one (the shoulders and arms).
