An evening with Dr Christiane NorthrupAn evening with
An evening with Christiane Northrup, M.D. Visionary pioneer and beloved authority in the field of women’s health and wellness. The stage was lit with reflections of light that crisscrossed and spilled on to brightly colored trees dressed in shades of gold and orange. You just knew something wonderful was going to be shared in the room that night. Sue Dumais, Owner & Co-founder of www.familypassages.ca eloquently introduced us to the evening. Her ease and confidence were noticeable. It was as though she had somehow been here before. And she had. In a dream that started as a little seed of thought and transformed into making the evening possible. A dream she was sharing with us in that very moment. Sue acknowledged everyone that came together to make the casino evening possible. She guided us to take a moment to prepare, to center ourselves, connect to our breath, connect to the moment in time, reflect on a dream that we may have inside of us and then get ready to share our brilliance and grace with the world! The stage was set!
Dr. Northrup took the stage with a big smile and told us how much she loved Vancouver. As she looked over the harbour she thought she was in heaven. She was so pleased to see Vancouver filled with a multitude of holistic and traditional health practitioners thriving and complimenting each other in the same community. She talked of tapping into our intuition, reminding us it is something we instinctively know as the truth without needing scientific evidence to prove it. Our Canadian hockey hero Wayne Gretzky had this instinct. He trusted his intuition to help him know where the puck was at all times. He was always in the right place at the right time and instinctively knew where he needed to be to take his shot. She encouraged us to go beyond reaching for just adequate health and to strive for Optimal health. Nutritional supplements help to bridge the gap between adequate and optimal nutrition. Most of what we think is normal about ageing is Not! It’s not “normal” that we will shrink, shuffle, stoop, close our chest in and round our backs. Sending positive message to ourselves about aging can even add years to our lives. Today, we’re living longer, and we all want to be active and healthy into our seventies, eighties, and even nineties. Dr Northrup’s mother is a shining example of this. She climbed to Mount Everest base camp at 84 years young! Yoga leads to Optimal health. She spoke about the positive effects of meditation, slowing down, enjoying the moment, allowing the life force, the chi, the prana to flow freely. And reminded us to stretch our fascia and not neglect this amazing connective tissue that binds together our muscles, blood vessels, and nerves, and extends uninterrupted from the head to the tip of the toes. She shared a funny story about her struggles with the wheel posture ending with a broken baby toe but motivated her to keep going and enjoying. She guided us to get up on our feet, shrug our shoulders, release them down, open the chest, reach up through the crown of the head as though being lifted up by our ears, making ourselves tall. She commented that she found us Canucks to be very grounded people, what a great compliment!
She encourage us to stop the chain of pain and go ahead and deliberately pursue pleasure. And when we do, we should never feel as though someone else is being deprived or suffering because of it. In fact when you increase your own happiness and pleasure that vibration lifts up and extends outwardly through the world. You can be angry or you can have pleasure and beauty. The two can’t co-exist. Her daughter Kate asked her earlier in the day “What’s your favorite thing that happened today?” What a great way of thinking.
She ended the evening by inviting Kate on to the stage to instruct us through an exercise to help us deliberately pursue our pleasure. The crowd was intrigued! The next thing we knew we were moving our hips in big slow sexy circles to the seductive tune “Fire” by the Pointer Sisters. We looked Fabulous! There were a few men in that audience also enjoying the benefits of our pleasure. The world is a better place because of Dr Northrup’s courage to speak and live her truth.
The event closed off with a lovely poem, and the audience left feeling uplifted and inspired. OGod Help me to believe The truth about myself No matter how beautiful it is! Written by Macrina Wiederker
For more on Dr Christiane Northrup: Hear her interview podcast on: Drishti Point Vancouver’s Yoga Radio Talk Show http://drishtipoint.ca Special mention to the extraordinary talented musicians: Taryn & Kristin Ronning performing Dolly Parton’s Coat of Many Colors Theda Phonies & Will Blunderfield performing Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah
Article written by Kathryn Turnbull http://vancouveryogainstructor.com
Sue’s Dumais’s introduction to the evening
