Stand in Stillness

Come and listen to our Host, Gia-Raquel Rose, for our "Victory Over Fear" Podcast Mini-Series.

This powerful series explores what it truly means to move forward despite uncertainty, self-doubt, and life's challenges. Through authentic conversations, personal stories, and practical wisdom, we uncover how courage is built one step at a time. Fear may be loud, but it doesn't have to have the final say.

Together, we'll discover how healing, faith, resilience, and action can help us overcome the barriers that keep us stuck. Whether you're facing a major life transition, stepping into a new opportunity, or simply learning to trust yourself again, these conversations will encourage you to embrace bravery and move confidently toward your purpose.

Join us as we celebrate the strength found in vulnerability, the growth that comes from taking risks, and the victories that happen when we choose courage over fear.

Gia-Raquel Rose, owner of Airs Above Yoga, LLC and a real estate sales associate in Tewksbury, New Jersey has had a love for horses stemming from early childhood. Growing up in “horse country” afforded her the privilege of beginning to ride from the tender age of four. It was a childhood illness, which brought her riding aspirations to an abrupt halt. It took twenty years before she was able to reunite with her long lost passion for horses and their ability to heal. In that time, she received a Bachelor of Arts in Corporate Communication from Arcadia University and became a twice two hundred hour certified yoga instructor in both Hatha and Vinyasa. It was the loss of her mother, Rose, to breast cancer, which ultimately shifted her trajectory from the corporate world to the internal work for which yoga, as a practice, is renowned.

Mother’s Day brings up grief, fear, and a very personal link to cancer, so I talk about yoga asana in a way that honours what hurts. I explore why stillness, surrender, and listening to the body can be a form of courage when life feels out of control.

• Mother’s Day as a triggering day and a doorway into grief
• Cancer as an unwelcome invader and the limits of “fight” language
• Fear of mortality and the unknown as a daily human theme
• Stillness as my answer for meeting fear and grief
• Mountain Pose (Tadasana) as facing reality with roots
• Key alignment cues for a stable, supported Tadasana
• Forward folds and Child’s Pose as surrender and release
• Reframing fear as something to embrace without giving up
• Hero Pose (Virasana) as grounded, quiet strength with props
• Heart openers like Camel and Wheel as an arc toward joy
• Nurturing yourself first and listening before the body “screams”
please feel free to share the same with your loved ones.

For more goodness, follow me on all the socials at Above the Ground Podcast and visit my website, airsaboveyoga.com.

For more Divas That Care Network Episodes visit www.divasthatcare.com

Transcript

Welcome And A Different Asana Talk

SPEAKER_00 0:00

It's Divas the Care Radio. Stories, strategies, and ideas to inspire positive change. Welcome to Divas that Care, a network of women committed to making our world a better place for everyone. This is a global movement for women, by women, engaged in a collaborative effort to create a better world for future generations. To find out more about the movement, visit divas that care.com after the show. Right now, though, stay tuned for another jolt of inspiration.

SPEAKER_02 0:31

Namaste, and welcome to the Divas That Care Network. I'm your host, J. Rekel Rose, owner of Airs Above Yoga, and you are listening to Above the Ground Podcast. If this is your first time tuning in, our network is going into its 16th year and is listened to in over 30 countries. I would like to personally thank you for giving me the gift of your time. As always, it is my honor to hold space with you. And today we are going to talk about yoga asana, but we're going to do it a little bit differently. Today is a pretty triggering day. I'm going to go with triggering day. It's a wonderful day, but it's also a triggering day for many different reasons. And I just want to unfortunately touch on something that today is a day that affects everybody's life. And in addition to affecting everybody's life, it's also a day that for me has a direct association to another thing that affects more lives, and I think that we are comfortable with.

Mother's Day, Loss, And Cancer

SPEAKER_02 2:23

And we did a whole sequence on that. So I encourage you to go back and have a listen to all the warrior poses because there's a warrior within every one of us. And that leads me to the thing that uh is a is a thread for many people, almost everyone, I would unfortunately wager. Um, and that is a pretty unsavory, unwelcome uh guest, uh invader of our bodies, and that is uh cancer. So today is Mother's Day, and um for those of you who know me, know I lost my mom to cancer. And it just seems to be a theme, some of the most important people in my life. Um, it runs in my family, it runs in the family of uh friends of mine as well. And it's just it's it's not, you know, people drop the F bomb a lot when they talk about it. Um and when it comes to yoga and it comes to yoga asana, I think that there are a couple different ways, right? Yoga is wonderful for healing in general. Um, it's wonderful uh during treatment, post-treatment, pre-treatment, always. Um, one of my favorite yoga instructors, uh, I call her my yoga mom, fitting for the day. Um, she is a survivor and uh a warrior, and she is one of the strongest and most wonderful women that I've had the pleasure of knowing as I embarked on my journey um with yoga and as a yoga instructor. And, you know, I think we often go to the the fight aspect, you know, when we're talking about cancer and the battle and the fight, the fight, fight the cancer. And um, and the thing that's unfortunate about that is that while it's necessary, right, there's also an element of the correlation with an autoimmune disease where, you know, in one way you're fighting your own body, right? It's it's the treatments for cancer take a massive toll on the body, and much like an autoimmune disease, it's you're fighting yourself in a way. Um so when you talk about the idea of victory in the face of fear, you know, courage or bravery is is being afraid and big fat doing it anyway, right? Um, and then and then the flip side of that uh old adage is the line between bravery and stupidity is a thin one, and kind of based upon the outcome of the success of the same, right? If you succeed, you're brave, if you fail, you're an idiot. Um, just to inject some levity into uh a not so joyous discussion. Um, but when it comes to

Fear Of Tomorrow And Present Moment

SPEAKER_02 5:03

not only the fear of right, our mortality, the inevitable, um, but the fear of the unknown, right? And I think all of us all of us choose to ignore that reality. We know nothing about tomorrow. That's why yoga and being in the present moment is so important. Um, we don't know what we're gonna face. We don't know if we're gonna get hit by a bus or if we have a tomorrow, or you know, what what it's going to bring. So the unknown is is a theme, right? It's a thing. It's it's we're faced with it every day. And I think that when you start to look at that, you know, you can fear can be crippling, like think deer in a headlights, right? It can be destabilizing, it can shut you right down. Um, and I think the bravest thing is is to take the next step, whatever that step may be, in whatever direction it is that you hope is for your highest and best good. And I think that when it comes to when it comes to loss, grief, cancer, battle, disease, uh, the unwit the the things that are outside of your control, which let's face it, the majority of our existence lives beyond our control, but we are responsible for how we react. That is the one thing we can control. And what is it in yoga and in asana that that brings us into recognition of our fear in a way that we can become one with it and still move forward? And I believe my answer to that is not the right answer, and it's not anybody else's answer. My answer is the stillness. Um being with it, sitting with it, not just necessarily fear, but grief, you know, is a big one too. Um, running is a huge thing, type A, right? Avoidance is a huge thing. But being with it, sitting in it. And so the asanas, while one might not link these two, or these asanas, I should say, these particular poses with the idea of victory in the face of fear. I feel like people are gonna go warrior, right? Or people are gonna go, you know, like some aggressive standing posture, right? Like I'm gonna go with mountain pose. I'm gonna go with tadasana. I'm gonna go with with stillness, I'm gonna go with the opposite ends, the heart openers and the forward folds,

Stillness As Courage In Tadasana

SPEAKER_02 7:47

the the opening yourself up to the inevitable, whatever's coming next, by opening your heart, and then the surrender to that which we cannot control in your forward folds, in your child's pose, for example. And I think that you know, mountain pose today's another one that we you know kind of gloss over as uh it is it is the staple pose, it is standing still in place, um, being the mountain. And you can get into all the different aspects of the body mechanics, and I will, because of course I will. Um, but the feet are are the source, the solace in this, and the the base of your mountain, right? The four corners of the feet. You actually are gently internally rotating your legs so that you have the feeling of your kneecaps being lifted, your quads are engaged, your lower back is releasing because you're you're allowing that rotation, which I talk about all the time for those for those ladies that have some lumbar unhappiness, or or gentlemen that have lumbar unhappiness, or you know, no gender, whatever you choose, whatever. If you have lumbar unhappiness, you will know. And having this very, very strong, stable center up through your core, and then this relaxed but active feeling through the shoulders and the neck. And whether you decide to raise your arms up or have them at your sides or take them in prayer, the idea of a mountain pose, not dissimilar across across the board with standing poses in Asana and our warriors are nothing if not standing poses. Um, but the idea of of just being the constant for yourself and sitting in that stillness, being still and you could say processing, you could say taking it all in. Everyone has a process, good, bad, and different or otherwise. Um but when it comes to sitting with reality, sitting with the truth, whatever truth, reality situation, circumstance that you have to face that is out of your control on Mother's Day, right? It's been almost 20 years since I've lost my mother. And I'm still, I full disclosure, I hate today. I hate today. It is my least favorite, second least, the day she died, but second least favorite day of the year. So 20 years later, and I still sit with the emotions of that. Um, and then there are still things, life still goes on. There are other, there are other things that we have to stand and face. And so I think a lot of times if you watch, I like to think of like David and Goliath, or you think of these kind of archetypal um moments in history, in movies, in culture, in stories, where you know, there's the I'm gonna use the metaphor, David and Goliath, there's there's the big bad guy, right? And then there's this just little tiny human just standing there, standing, turning to face, and and just being in that position. And that's why I think for me, mountain pose is the pose of not only facing reality, facing your fears, being the mountain for yourself, being that constant, immobile, grounded, tall space, being that for yourself, um, being that for others is is so important. And as you begin to move through the emotions, whatever they may they may be, whether it's fear, whether it's grief, whether it's anger, whether it's pick your poison, right? Because all of these emotions, unfortunately, they are valid and they are true to the human experience. They're not the most high vibe air quotes for those. I have to say like every episode air quotes for those of you who are not watching. You know, we talk about high vibe and like, you know, there's a lot of there's a lot out there about like toxic positivity, blah, blah, blah, you know, retrain your mind, be to Lulu, all of those fun, fun, fun insta words. But at the core of it, there is there is val, there's validity to retraining your inner dialogue 100%. I do it every day. I do it. Um, so I'm not discounting that as a as a wellness self-love practice. But there's also there is the the thing in front of us that we're dealing with, the thing that is within our reality that we have to attend to. And being in that place of singular strength, of coming to your mat, of showing up to face that reality, of standing in your strength, standing in your power, having roots. And I think that's why for me, mountain pose really just kind of came at me as like the pose to discuss. Um, and the different variations, because you know, they they call them by different names. But if you think of the beginning of a sun salute, you're standing in mountain pose, you inhale, you reach up, and now you're reaching up longer in your mountain pose, but you're still in mountain pose, and then you reach out and you humble yourself and you bow and you come into a forward fold.

Building A Strong Mountain Pose

SPEAKER_02 13:18

But in essence, you know, you're still a very strong base, and then you are still surrounded. There is that surrender from celebration to surrender. And I think that such is life, right? Such is life. So we we have we are our own standing mountain throughout our lives, and that will but that will remain unchanged, right? Um, and there will become times where we're reaching up in celebration and joy, and times where we're bowing in surrender and humility. And knowing, you know, what to pick at what time is really an intuitive practice, right? It is it is between you yourself and you know your higher self god or whatever it is that you communicate, commune with, communicate with. And so when we talk about a yoga practice, we talk about the asana and the fact that you know when you come to your mat, you're you're becoming one with your body, and then we we we talk about something like cancer, right? Um it there is an element of literal fight or flight, and we come at it from a very like pitchfork and fire torch kind of like place, and I find the the contradiction to that so hard to wrap my head around because we have to attack our own bodies in order to fight for our lives in that instance. And so, how do we support our bodies as we move through these these challenges, no matter which side of the cancer fence you're on, whether it's happening to you or it's happening to someone you love, like it it takes no prisoners. So obviously the win is victorious being victorious over cancer. That is the goal. But but also as you go through the process in your body of of and you know, knock on wood to date. Um, I have not had to, um, you never know. But as you go through a process, and I've witnessed the process, friends, family, um, it also happens to be the birthday today on Mother's Day of a dear friend of mine who passed away much too young of cancer, and and the toll it takes on the body, and the toll that the the medications take on the body, and how do you support the body through that? And I think that's where that's where the the yoga comes into play, that's where the surrender comes into play. So as your body is going through this aggressive treatment, what can you do to support yourself and your body? Um, aside from you know the obvious medical treatments that coincide and you know that support you in that way. Can you come to your mat? Can you meet your body where it is? Can you stand in silence? Can you sit in silence? Can you take a child's pose? And can you surrender to your own fear? Can you surrender to your own grief? Because again, no matter which side of the of the fence you happen to fall on, let's be honest, there's a fear of losing yourself, there's a fear of losing your loved one. Um and you can fight that fear, but how is fighting that fear any different than avoiding and running from it? So can you can you stand in mountain pose looking your fear in your face? And can you then surrender? Can you forward fold? Can you come onto your mat in child's pose? Can you can you kneel? Can you bow your head? Can you I've cried onto my yoga mat before in child's pose. Can you can you breathe? And can you be in the stillness to meet your fear? And maybe instead of looking at it as a fight, look at look at it as a form of union. Becoming one with your fear, embracing it, surrendering to it. And this is not me saying you should surrender to your cancer, in no way am I saying that, but can you surrender to can you steal the power from the

Forward Folds And Child’s Surrender

SPEAKER_02 18:07

fear by embracing it, becoming one with it, and just allowing it to be? And in that way, overcoming it, potentially being Eric Holtz again, spoiler alert, victorious over it, can the surrender, can the stillness bring you in touch with the parts of you that you are afraid to face? And can you ease the burden truly of that shock and awe? So when we talk about the body and we talk about, you know, storing trauma in the body, and we talk about disease processes and you know, all of the mind over matter kind of conversations that one has when dealing with these discussions, there's an element of you know, change change the tape, change the tape in your head, right? Um focus, positive energy, think positive thoughts, and all of that is a hundred percent true and good. And I support it and commend it and acknowledge it and clap and cheer. But I also feel like there's a part that needs to be integrated that we we often that's the part that gets in the way of the the fight, right? The fight, and I'm gonna use a terrible metaphor, so forgive me in advance. But if we're literally thinking of like a battlefield, and it's a very masculine, and again, no gender, but you know what I mean, traditionally masculine kind of mental image, mental picture, and the the battle of you know, spear on spear, let's say, um, just I'm gonna go back to like ancient time battle for this metaphor, and the the bloodshed and the and the the pain and the angst and the the energy beating into itself versus and again mental image with me here. So go to your mind's eye. And the the mental image that just came to my mind is I believe it was the Vietnam War in the 60s that had that very, very what would be now a viral image um of you know the hippie girl that puts the flower in the the soldier's gun. I think most people, many people should have a vague idea of what I'm referencing. But what if what if two of those warriors at the front line put their spears down and and embraced each other? And that's what I mean when I'm talking about not fighting your fear. The idea of not giving up the battle against the disease process, but but facing your response and your reaction with love, with acceptance, with I will do a meditation. It's already, it's already it's already percolating. Um next week I will do a meditation on this, but the idea of the and I don't even because it's not about the shadow self, right? This is actually nothing to do with the shadow self. Although you could you could argue that fear is an aspect of your shadow self that needs to be integrated, and you can make that that. That correlation for this conversation as well. But I'm not talking about your shadow because the shadow is usually like the negative parts of us that we avoid. This is there's something in front of your face that that is terrifying, right? Um, you know, whether it's a natural disaster, for example, or a personal, personal natural disaster, right? An earthquake in your body, right? Your body turning against you. Um and and putting down the spear and hugging it. And that doesn't mean that you are loving your cancer away by any means. Again, F bomb cancer, 100%. But there's gotta be, there's gotta be an internal conflict. And my only personal experience to date is the autoimmune disease where I know that my body has turned on one of my organs, my immune system has turned on me, right? That's my only at all metaphor correlation that I can get into. And it's not the same, it's not the same at all, but can I hug my tiny little thyroid? Right? Like, can can you can in the acceptance can you facilitate the healing process by being your own mountain pose? Can you facilitate the healing process by surrendering to the air quotes again, reality of the situation? And that's where, like I said, the poses that for me equate to surrender are prone forward folds, like a child's pose. Um another pose that comes to mind for this specific this this couldn't I don't want to say confrontational, but this standing in the face of is hero pose, which is a rough one for the knees, very, very rough one for the knees. Um, but if you can practice, you can put a bolster under an hero pose, is where you are actually kneeling and block bolster pillow. Your knees are ever so slightly wider on your hips, so you're almost sitting right in between your heels, which is where you would place a bolster pillow or block, and you would sit to relieve the compression of the knees, you would sit on that. And obviously, it's also called hero pose in English. Um and it's it's pretty it's pretty aggressive on the knees, but um it's again, it's a

Embracing Fear Without Giving Up

SPEAKER_02 24:44

way of grounding and being very, very still, and in that stillness, your mainly your quads and the tops of your feet, your shins are releasing and opening and stretching, and you're breathing into it, and you're just it's one of those all yoga poses you can just be in them and breathe, right? That is yoga, but some of them to me equate to this idea of standing tall, and you do in hero, you lengthen very, very tall. Um standing very tall, being very grounded, being very supported, and facing forward, facing whatever it is that you are coming up against or is coming towards you, uninvited, let's say, uninvited. So hero is another one, and child's pose to me is is you know, your your ultimate surrender pose, your ultimate head to the floor, knees wide, hips back. Cry if you need to, let it out, let it out. Pigeon's another great one, but I talked about pigeon too much. Pigeon did come to mind for this. Uh, and it's a hip opener. So, you know, if you have store trauma in the body and it happens to be in your hips, which it can be for many people, that's a that's a that's a big one. And the other one that that spoke to me uh in this way, and I know I've talked about it before, but you know, are heart openers, and I think that there's a similar little flow between Varasana or hero and camel pose. And camel pose is essentially again kneeling and lifting up your heart, and a lot of people it's a backbend, right? Um, and the ultimate kind of expression of heart opener backbend in yoga is is probably wheel pose, and it's not an easy pose, especially if you have any neck or shoulder injuries um or lower back injuries for that matter, but it is a full upward bow or wheel pose where you're standing on your feet, you're pressing your entire hips and spine up, and your arms are behind you, ideally, palms in line with the shoulders, um, and you're pressing yourself all the way up off of the ground. Um, and it is a deep, deep back bend. You can also mimic a wheel posture by rolling on a ball and starting to open up through the through the front of the hips and through the heart and through the abdominal muscles to start to prep for a full wheel and build strength, building strength up in the arms and and openness in the shoulders to get yourself there are another way. These are the postures that came to mind for me when I was putting this together. And wheel is probably the most aggressive posture. Um, it is a deep heart opener, and it's it's honestly wheel is like a celebration of joy. So I I I saved it to the end because to me that's the victory. That's the that's that's the I I that's the that's the culmination of it, right? It's like you're putting your body into the shape of a rainbow, and it's like I've I've embraced, I've embraced, I've embraced this, I've I've integrated this fear into myself, I've become whole, I've used yoga, means union, I've used, I've I've become one with this aspect of me. Um and I don't want to say that I've become one with cancer, that's not what I'm saying, but it's in there. And what if we addressed the healing from a place of what does my body need to support itself? And I I know we do, this is not like I'm coming up with this idea, just just just to put a pin in that. But what if we put the pitchforks down and and embrace what we need to move through, to be still, to find out what it is, to hear what it is that we need, to feel what it is that we need, however, it comes to you in your body to understand, to meet your body, to say, you know, how did this happen? Why did this happen? That's always it, right? Like the anger, the fear, the the grief, it all comes from the the how, the what, the why, all the questions. Um and mountain pose, standing still, being still, standing in your strength, standing in your power, having that conversation with yourself and and listening to your body. I know I say that a lot. I say that, say that hopefully every episode because that's what this is all about. Listen to your body. What is it trying to tell you? Is it telling you that it's tired? Is it telling you that it's weary? Is it telling you that you're pushing it too hard? Is it telling you that it needs rest? And are you loving your body or are you using it as a beast of burden? And I'm guilty of that, we all are. So the whole practice, right? Yoga is a practice, the whole practice is listen.

SPEAKER_01 30:42

Be still and listen. Be still and feel, but be still.

SPEAKER_02 30:50

And like I said, mountain pose, it is the stillness, it is sit standing still, be your own little David

Heart Openers, Wheel, And Self-Nurture

SPEAKER_02 30:59

versus Goliath, obviously. So, but be that for yourself and give yourself that space. And no matter what it is, it can be something physical, it can be something mental, it can be something emotional, it can be something outside yourself. Oftentimes it is something outside yourself, unless we're talking about something that's attacking you from within, or the call is coming from inside the house, right? So no matter what it is, my answer is always gonna start with be still, meet yourself in stillness, and allow the tears, allow the screams, allow whatever comes out of your body to come out for you, go somewhere quiet, bring a yoga mat. Give yourself that because as women, yes, and on Mother's Day, I'm just gonna say as women, and I'm not gonna sugarcoat that. I'm not gonna non-gender and I'm not going to, you can crucify me, no offense. God crucify me for that later. As women who give birth, in theory, right? Who have a a natural Darwinian predisposition to nurture, you know who we never nurture ourselves. And I'm not gonna get into this is because it's not my it's not my not what I do, but oh, nurture yourself first. Nurture yourself first. And how you do that is different for everyone, but it is so important. Don't wait. Start today. And that doesn't mean be a selfish, horrible human being. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying nurture your body, nurture your heart, nurture your truth first, and stand in that truth like your life depends on it, because my darling,

Sharing The Show And Closing

SPEAKER_02 33:30

it may ultimately, and as someone who has denied their truth, overlooked their truth, bent over backwards for others to her own detriment. Yeah, we're done with that. We're done with that. So on Mother's Day, for my mom, for all the moms, for all the daughters, and even for all the sons, and everyone in the middle, everyone in between stand on your truth, be still and listen to your body before your body screams in the only way it knows how to get your attention.

SPEAKER_01 34:29

So from there, I would like to share how much I appreciate each and every one of you for sharing this space with me.

SPEAKER_02 34:38

And if I may ask that you please feel free to share the same with your loved ones. For more goodness, follow me on all the socials at Above the Ground Podcast and visit my website, airsaboveyoga.com. Don't forget to check out all of my amazing sisters at the Divas That Care Network and also any of my other episodes. You can find us on Spotify, Odyssey, Apple, Amazon, iHeartRadio, YouTube, or anywhere else that you feel guided. Again, my name is Jira Kell Rose, owner of Airsabove Yoga, and you are listening to Above the Ground Podcast, where every day, even the crappy ones, is a good one.

SPEAKER_00 35:22

Thanks for listening. This show was brought to you by Divas That Care. Connect with us on Facebook, on Instagram, and of course on divas that care.com, where you can subscribe to our newsletter so you don't miss a thing.