Welcome to the Galaxy!
I’ve been waiting almost a year for the opportunity to say this catchy little phrase!
When I decided to change my Instagram handle to “the moving galaxy” in winter of 2022, I didn’t really know if a studio was in my future, but I joked with a friend that I’d have the perfect opening salvo if I ever did. And the idea of a curated collection of brilliant things I was passionate about seemed like a better description of who I am these days than Shakti Shack, RIP Shakti Shack.
So now, I’m getting ready to re-open the Urban Om space as the moving galaxy, and absolutely overwhelmed, in the best way, by all the good wishes and excitement around it. It will look a little different (if you follow any of my home design projects, you’ll know I’m definitely a very colorful maximalist), but many of the faces will be familiar to you, as will the style of practice - spirited, flowing, good playlists, and welcoming and community-oriented.
October’s Theme: Embracing Darkness
Every month at the moving galaxy will center around a broad teaching theme, and though there are no public classes in October, the theme this month is Shadow Work. I love the embrace of our darker and scarier sides that comes along with all things Halloween, and I find that by looking at the things that scare us, or the parts of ourselves that we conceal, there’s a lot we can uncover and integrate. I’ll be releasing some old school Shakti Shack classes from Octobers past via our website, for rental - and there will be some good atmospherically spooky playlists, too. As promised, here’s an October favorite from a few years ago, a 60-minute practice about The Hungry Ghosts.
Studio News and Save the Dates
Looking ahead to November, our current plan is to celebrate a fun opening weekend starting on Friday, November 3rd. We’re planning a weekend of special classes, meditation, opening ceremonies and celebrations. Booking for all classes will open mid-October, and we’ll notify you via email so you can grab a spot with all your favorite teachers in all your favorite classes.
If you haven’t, like us on Instagram, because there will be a few swag giveaways in October, to help us spread the word to Milwaukee that we’re up and running. November will also feature special founder’s pricing for memberships, so you’ll be able to lock in our absolute lowest class pricing all that month, and maintain that pricing as long as your membership is active.
Looking into next year, keep your eyes peeled for our first teacher training, coming in spring of 2023. The format is something I’m really proud of: we’ll start with a practice immersion that will allow anyone who wants to learn more about yoga to do that, without committing to teach. At the completion of that first portion, anyone who wishes may progress to our teacher’s apprenticeship, which focuses specifically on how to teach the practice, with some great opportunities to work one-on-one with some of Milwaukee’s most dynamic teachers. We’ll also be offering a stand-alone teacher’s immersion in early 2023, for teachers who want to hone their skills and work one-on-one with me in a mentorship capacity.
What I’m Reading
For my monthly book recommendation, I’m going into the dark woods to suggest a re-visit, or first time visit, to the stories collected by the Brothers Grimm, Wilhelm and Jacob. This is partially inspired by these amazing paper cuttings that I scored on eBay last month (I’ll probably need to start a separate blog about my vintage finds at some point…)
But back to the Grimms! Head to this amazing National Endowment of the Humanities post that tells all about who they were, if you’re intrigued. The long and short of it is, while students at the University of Marburg, and still in their teens, they traveled through Germany to collect tales in the oral tradition, to preserve them for history. Over the course of their wanderings and collecting, they refined the tales to become a bit more literary and less in the oral tradition, and created some of the foundational figures and characters that we know as “fairy tales.” These stories aren’t really for children, though - they are dark, violent, surprising, and sometimes outlandish. Many lay outside of the realm of the happy ending. The Grimms understood that storytelling is a way to create order, ritual and community, particularly in hard times. We are defined by how we tell our stories, and when we tell it with the richness of both shadow and light, we create dimension, wholeness, and healing.
The Grimm brothers said of their work, “Wherever the tales still exist, they continue to live in such a way that nobody ponders whether they are good or bad, poetic or crude. People know them and love them because they have simply absorbed them in a habitual way. And they take pleasure in them without having any reason. This is exactly why the custom of storytelling is so marvelous.” I hope you enjoy a few of these classic fairy tales from the Black Forest, and embrace a little of your dark side.
I’m partial to this version, edited by Jack Zipes, with absolutely fantastic illustrations by Andrea Deszo.
Poem from the galaxy
I’ll leave you with a quote from my favorite John O’Donohue poem, all about the interplay of darkness and light. Thanks for reading the first of the Galaxy Dispatches, and I can’t wait to see you in the studio soon!
“Light cannot see inside things.
That is what the dark is for:
Minding the interior,
Nurturing the draw of growth
Through places where death
In its own way turns into life.”
