TJ Expert (66)
Various Styles
Various Styles
By Marcel Duret and Fred Thomas
There is a traditional painterly approach to painting in which the techniques and styles run the gamut from impressionism, surrealism and symbolism to neo-expressionism, postmodernism and so forth. These artists place figuration at the service of illustrative concerns, whether those interests are philosophical, spiritual, emotional, historical, anecdotal, mythical or symbolical. Paintings by Robert Sylvain, Sylla, Kristo (Christian Nicolas), Dominik Ambroise and Alpi (Alphonse Piard) generally fall into this category.
Warrior for Confidence
Yoga & Wellness Advocate
JUDIT TOROK
A regular visitor to Tokyo, New York City- based yoga instructor and interculturalist Judit Torok shares her techniques for alleviating big city stress.
Warrior for Confidence
Body language and non-verbal communication have a profound effect on not just how others perceive us, but on how we feel about ourselves.
I N a TED talk (a platform for discussing technology, entertainment and design), titled “Body Language Shapes Who You Are,” Amy Cuddy, a Harvard Business School associate professor and social psychologist, describes her research on the effects of physical poses for regulating our emotions. She claims that a person’s level of confidence, self-esteem and determination, all of which are closely linked with higher levels of testosterone (competition hormone) and lower levels of cortisol (stress hormone), depends on what body shape or posture a person habitually holds. The way we shape our bodies communicates non-verbally to others and, more importantly to ourselves, how we feel. Cuddy explains that holding a pose for as little as two minutes can radically change our self-perception and lead to significant life outcomes. So to feel more empowered, we should shape our body into a pose that promotes confidence. While it might be “pretend” at first, the more often we shape our bodies into powerful poses the more likely we will become confident people over time.
These ideas seem very powerful, but how do they relate to yoga?
Yoga & Wellness Advocate
JUDIT TOROK
A regular visitor to Tokyo, New York City-based Yoga Instructor and Interculturalist Judit Torok shares her techniques for alleviating big city stress.
Bad Excuses
Obviously, these are bad and almost humorous excuses for not joining a beginner’s Spanish class. After all, not speaking a language is precisely the right reason to start learning a foreign language. Taking an introductory class is a safe and fun way to begin a journey toward understanding other cultures as well as learning about ourselves. A determined language learner also develops qualities such as persistence, willingness to make mistakes and overcoming self-consciousness.
Yoga & Wellness Advocate
Yoga & Wellness Advocate
JUDIT TOROK
A regular visitor to Tokyo, New York City- based yoga instructor and interculturalist Judit Torok shares her techniques for alleviating big city stress.
Fight Off Stress with Your Breath
Imagine you have an acquaintance, a person you've known for a long time - perhaps as long as you can remember. He comes to you house any time, uninvited, and stays for as long as he wants. Rude and inconsiderate, he imposes his presence on your life, makes a mess and doesn’t leave. You try to be nice at first and reason with him, but he only gets more annoying with time. You try to ignore him or even pick a fight, but he comes right back again and again. This unwelcome and annoying acquaintance is called stress.
YOGA ADVOCATE JUDIT TOROK
A regular visitor to Tokyo, New York City-based Yoga Instructor and Interculturalist Judit Torok shares her techniques for alleviating big city stress.
Yoga for Everyone
I recently read an article about parents of elementary school children in California who were outraged about their children practicing Ashtangastyle yoga at school as part of their physical education program. They claimed that yoga is inappropriate and dangerous for kids because they believe their children are being indoctrinated into the Hindu religion in a public school. I couldn’t disagree with them more. These parents, and unfortunately many other people, hold inaccurate notions of this ancient practice.
YOGA ADVOCATE JUDIT TOROK
A regular visitor to Tokyo, New York City- based Yoga Instructor and Interculturalist Judit Torok shares her techniques for alleviating big city stress.
Yoga on the Go
Traveling can take a lot out of us, physically and mentally. Running from trains to taxis, carrying and lifting heavy bags, standing and waiting in long lines and being jammed into tight and uncomfortable spaces – these are common for travelers. And through all of this we often forget to take care of ourselves and instead accumulate anxiety and strain on our bodies that can have serious long-term consequences for our well-being.
Yoga Crosses Cultures
ON any given day I interact with people from around the world. I attend meetings with colleagues from France, the Philippines and Bangladesh. I write emails to Japan and make Skype calls to friends in Chile. My neighbors are Greek and my boss is from Egypt. In this diverse but connected world I face the challenges of intercultural communications every day.
A powerful technique in cross-cultural interactions is empathy. Cultivating an empathetic feeling as we interact with friends, colleagues and strangers whose thinking and values differ from our own, helps to widen our perspective on the world. But trying to understand other people’s thoughts and feelings can also have a destabilizing effect on us. Through cross-cultural communication, it’s possible to become vulnerable and get lost in a medley of conflicting values, customs and rules. Empathy needs a force to balance it out.
Yoga: A Wabi-sabi Contemplation
Yoga: A Wabi-sabi Contemplation
In today’s media-saturated world, we’re told that our bodies are not perfect. Everywhere we turn, we feel overwhelmed by the glorified ideals of male and female bodies. There is a sense that we need to live up to these deceiving expectations of beauty and this urges us to purchase more products and services to change our physical appearance or hide our supposed imperfections. It’s so easy to fall prey to this style of consumerism and targeted advertisements that it’s no wonder we get obsessed with looking young and perfect all the time.
You never know...
You Never Know....
How often do you let people just pass through your life without much notice? Shared time can be anything from a moment, to a few hours or days; like the lady that smiled at you in the store or the man you met at the seminar. The investments we make in these unexpected meetings are often small. It’s common to assume that unexpected meetings will have little or no impact on the sequence of our lives’ events. So why bother? But what if these meetings could change your life? What if an encounter could change your life? If you embraced this idea, would you choose to live differently or greet the people you bump into in a different way?