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HEALING RETREATS AND SPAS
November / December 2000 |
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On a knoll with expansive views of West Los Angeles, Tara Guber has
created the ultimate spiritual yoga sanctuary, The Yoga House. Here,
she offers private evenings and intimate workshops where leading teachers
in spirituality, healing, and higher consciousness share their wisdom
and insight with those walking a spiritual path.
In the middle of the inner city of South Central Los Angeles lies
Tara’s dharma, passion, and inspiration: The Accelerated School.
Built on the site of a former garment manufacturing plant, it has
become an innovative model charter public school that incorporates
yoga and meditation into the curriculum, a project empowered by Tara’s
love and commitment to children. “I feel so blessed to be able
to bring meditation skills to kids in the inner city,” she says.
“The results have been impressive.”
“I’m grateful to the board because they listened to my dream
of giving children back to themselves . . . helping them get in touch
with their inner mentor. We spend so much money trying to help our
children from the outside, but I believe there is an inner mentor
and when we get in touch with it, it helps us discipline ourselves.”
Tara calls it taking a “time in” instead of a “time
out.” Time in means stopping and going inside and taking a moment.
Asking, what can I do? And, who can I be, in this moment? “You
don’t have to know anybody, go anywhere, or buy anything,”
says Tara. “You only have to stop and be. It’s the easiest
thing in the world. Everyone has the ability to do this.”
Teachers and children have found that when the classroom gets silent,
the energy changes; the childrens’ school work and their relationships
with teachers, peers, and parents improve. The yoga helps the kids
to concentrate, and, says Tara, “When children are centered and
focused they do better on tests and presentations. And not only are
the kids enjoying the yoga, but the teachers and parents want to learn
now, too!”
Yoga is incorporated into the curriculum through the physical education
classes. Approximately half of the class time is physical exercise
and half is yoga. Tara explains, “The class comes together in
a circle. Often the children create their own postures and share their
favorite postures with the class. The instructor asks the children
what they would like to accomplish for the day. Then they close their
eyes and we teach them how to create clear intentions for themselves.
It is so empowering for the kids.”
Tara, with the support of her friends, is also providing a Yoga House
on the campus for the students and for the community—a house
of Spirit, as she calls it, that provides meditation, yoga, therapy,
and a mind–body wellness library. “Once Spirit resides in
a space, the energy is transformed,” she says. The children will
use the Yoga House during the day and it will be available to the
community after school lets out.
Tara has been practicing yoga for twenty-four years. Her dream was
to create a model school with yoga and meditation in the curriculum.
“I think my dream came from my years growing up in Brooklyn and
from being a school teacher in the ghetto. I saw so much inequality,
which made me feel that everyone should have more. My empathy created
a huge desire in me to give these children back something. I discovered
that through yoga I could get kids from feeling stressed-out to being
present and centered. Yoga showed these kids that they had the power
to truly embrace who they are. Knowing the impact and power of yoga
and meditation I wanted to put it into the schools. This is my dharma.”
Twilight in an enchanted garden imbued with a spiritual and vibrant
energy. Tara and the Living Arts catalog, a Gaiam company, are hosting
“An Evening of Song and Spirit,” a benefit for Gaiam Yoga
For Life. The Gaiam Yoga For Life program provides yoga curriculum
materials and support to inner city public schools across the nation.
This evening, popular recording artist Seal (a close friend of Tara’s)
and kirtan singer Krishna Das are sharing their musical talents, along
with children from the Accelerated School. Whole Foods (who also provides
snacks for the yoga classes at the school) is catering the buffet.
Well-known yoga enthusiasts Deepak Chopra, don Miguel Ruiz, Madonna,
Sting, Christy Turlington, Mariel Hemingway, and Goldie Hawn are just
a few of the celebrities lending their support.South Central is changing.
The neighborhood is becoming more positive and empowered. In the middle
of the inner city, where uprisings took place on Martin Luther King
Boulevard and Main Street, now stands a beacon of inspiration for
children: The Accelerated School.
How to Discover Your True Purpose
Tara believes that in order to discover your passion and purpose,
you need to have a clear intention. To find this, you must ask yourself
such questions as: “What am I here for? What are my passions?
What do I enjoy doing? What makes me feel fulfilled? What gives me
the most joy?” Meditation can help you eliminate thoughts, ideas,
and beliefs that no longer serve you. Meditation can give you clarity
and help you sift through the stuff of the day. If you give yourself
enough time, eventually the mind stops chattering. You will find what
gives you happiness and passion. You can read all the books you want
about personal freedom and discovering your dharma, but you’ll
only find those things inside yourself.
“Many people that have achieved success and abundance want to
give back and share themselves,” says Tara. “The greatest
gift that I can give is yoga. It’s my dharma. That’s what
the Yoga House does, it gives the gift of yoga and transformation.
Yoga is not an exercise, it is a way of life. It is breath, it is
prana, it is the life-force.” |
