Yoga is a wonderful therapy for stress reduction and stress management. One of the many benefits of a regular yoga practice is that it can lower stress levels. By learning to cultivate attention to the present moment within our yoga practice, we can carry this practice on so that it spills out into our daily life. When we are in the present moment, we worry less about the future and spend less time fretting about the past. By being in the present moment more and more, our levels of stress tend to lessen and our joy at the hidden gifts that exist in our daily lives tends to grow.

Through working with the physical asana sequences in our yoga practice, we also release built up tension in our bodies. This releases stress in a physical way. For example, if we tend to sit at the computer for long periods of time, we may build tension in our shoulders and neck, causing pain and stress. By practicing poses such as threading the needle or a standing forward bend, we release the tension in our neck and decrease the amount of stress building up in our body.

By working with our breath in conjunction with our yoga postures, we also release tension and stress in our bodies. When we breath deeply the muscles in our body relax allowing us to reconnect with how our bodies feel in a space of rest.

Most importantly, yoga gives us a chance to stop and meet where our bodies and minds are. By taking the time to reconnect with how our bodies feel and how busy or relaxed our minds are, we can then take the time to respond in a way that will decrease the amount of stress in our lives.

Stopping, reconnecting and being with our breath, what a wonderful antidote for stress!

Whether you own your own company, manage a business for someone else or are an employee of a business, coaching can help to bring everyday balance to your work life. Working together by phone or in person, we can identify both long and short term goals that will help you to achieve better business balance. This balance may be in relation to many areas of your work life including: productivity, emotions, employee and client relations, communication, organisation and prosperity. Working with balance and vocation help to minimise the gap that you may feel exists between your ‘work identity’ and your ‘authentic identity’.

One of the most important aspects of coaching is that it can help you to identify your needs and values. Once identified we can work to create pathways to fulfil those needs and values in achievable steps. In my experience, by taking small concrete steps over time you are able to reach your larger goals with ease and affordablity, both financially and emotionally.

Working with a business coach can help you to get to know yourself as you are in the present moment rather than who you were five years ago or who you wish to be five years from now. By working with where you are today you can set goals that can allow you to begin to live a balanced life that you may have only dreamed of in the past.

The coaching process starts out with a short complimentary session whereby you can meet me in person or over the phone. This is a session where you can ask any questions that you have about the coaching process and then decide whether or not coaching is for you. After this introductory session, we will set up our first appointment which will include an outline of your coaching schedule. This schedule will be suited to the specific needs of you and your business.

For local individuals, sessions will be made up of in person appointments (either at your place of business or my consulting rooms) or phone consults. For interstate or international individuals, the sessions will consist of phone consults with email support. For a price list or if you have any further questions, please feel free to email me at chrisadler@everydaybalance.net

I have practiced yoga and meditation for over nine years and am a member of the Yoga Teachers Association of Australia. I currently teach Hatha and restorative yoga in the San Francisco Bay Area for groups, businesses and individuals.

I believe that as we live our lives at a faster pace, it is increasingly important to take time out to connect with the physical and emotional body through yoga and meditation. By practicing these skills regularly within a group setting, we are more able to begin to integrate them into our daily life. Having other people to practice with, even if only once a week, enriches your experience by creating a supportive context for your progress in the postures and in your regular meditation practice.

For the past two years I have taught at Qi Natural Therapies and Yoga on the Northern Beaches of Sydney. I taught a restorative yoga and meditation class that worked with intention and breathing techniques as a place to balance in the middle of your week. In the Nothern Beaches, I also worked with corporate clients in the helping professions by presenting meditation evenings for stress reduction. I am happy to say that my clients have continued this work even after I moved to the United States by employing another meditation teacher as they were experiencing such positive results.

The Lotus Room on the Northern Beaches of Sydney was where I began my meditation practice. I was an active  member of their meditation group for six years as well as presenting talks on meditation and Buddhism and helping to run the center with a team of dedicated and talented individuals including Stephen Malloch of Heartmind coaching and meditation.

I am available for individual, group or corporate sessions that can be tailored to the needs of yourself or your workplace. I can be contacted at email address: chrisadler@everydaybalance.net

B.A.Psych., M.App.Sci.Psych.Coach

My interest in positive psychology began when I enrolled in my four year Bachelor of Arts in Psychology at The University of California at Davis and continued as I completed a Masters Degree in the Psychology of Coaching at The University of Sydney.

I began my work with life coaching by teaching courses on creative life balance. These courses used a combination of writing exercises, meditation, visualisation and goal setting techniques to help individuals look at their lives from a different vantage point. Within this work, clients applied a combination of daily activities in conjunction with long term goals to bring more balance, understanding and enjoyment to their lives.

Working one on one with me, will allow you to work with similar tools based on the most recent findings in the field of positive psychology within the support of a coaching relationship.

As well has having a passion for coaching individuals to their most authentic goals, I have a background in meditation, having both studied and taught at The Lotus Room for six years as well as working with corporate clients in the helping professions in Sydney’s Northern Beaches. When I am in San Francisco, I attend regular meditation evenings with Jack Kornfield, as well as attending workshops hosted by many other inspirational teachers at Spirit Rock Meditation Center.

For the past four years I was fortunate enough to be the manager of Qi Natural Therapies and Yoga in Mona Vale. I worked with a number of talented therapists in fields such as massage, acupuncture, chiropractic and energy healing. I also coordinated the yoga side of the center and taught yoga and meditation classes at the studio for the past two years.  I am a member of the Yoga Teachers Association of Australia and a qualified first aid officer.

I also have a background in creative writing having studied at both The University of California at Davis and The University of Wollongong. I have attended several workshops at the South Coast Writer’s Centre in Wollongong, NSW and enjoyed being a part of many poetry readings that they hosted. My work has been published in literary journals both in United States and Australia. For samples of my work you can visit the creative writing section of this website. Through my poetry I hope to inspire mindfulness towards the present moment and a reverence for the details in life that we often overlook, but when appreciated can turn the ordinary into extraordinary.

Recently, we have moved to the United States where I am teaching yoga and working with life coaching clients both in the U.S. and by telephone to Australia. For more information, please visit feel free to contact me at email address: chrisadler@everydaybalance.net

• Bachelor of Arts Degree in Psychology, UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
• Masters Degree in the Psychology of Coaching, UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY
• Yoga Teacher Training Diploma, QI NATURAL THERAPIES & YOGA
• Internationally Published Author
• Reiki Level 2 Diploma

As a child, when I turned the large coloured calendar page to August, I would sigh. The second half of the year had already begun, the half birthday of the year had past and the school holidays were nearly over. I would get out my coloured pens and draw pictures of what I wanted to do and what I had already done and give them to my parents, or friends or to our neighbour Kay. When we are children, years stretch out endlessly like long colourful sheets dancing on the clothesline. Years were like that, long and languid, endless and filled with colour and possibility. As adults, years sometimes seem like handkerchiefs, small, white and contained. The months page quickly by and we wonder where the days have gone. As adults we let out a different kind of sigh, sadly often one of overwhelm, wondering how we will fit in all the things we mean to do, to become, to accomplish. At what point did we let the dream and the colour and length of our years disappear?

I encourage you this August, to turn the page with love, to handle each square of this calendar month with the joy of a child. Go out and buy a new large wall calendar. You’ll find the cheery ones still on sale, often at half price, glossy pages longing to be written upon. Choose one for the child inside, with pictures of kittens or sailboats or of a town you would love to travel to. Dare to connect with the fun and less routine part of yourself and trust in your own creativity. Spend a day this week and using coloured pens, write in the activities that you want to fill your August with. Perhaps going to a movie with a friend, calling your grandmother and asking her about her childhood, visiting a new part of the city, getting a pedicure, collecting beachglass at the edge of the sea or reading Harry Potter. Choose activities that make you smile, that for whatever reason call out delight for you.

When you are finished decorating your days, think about setting some goals for this last half of 2007. Use a journal or a few pieces of paper and set aside twenty minutes to write. In your writing, identify the goals that you’ve already accomplished this year (no matter how small!) and then explore two goals that you would still like to accomplish. Often when setting goals for ourselves, we tend to choose large and lofty goals, so grand that in the context of our daily lives, they can very quickly become overwhelming. This time start out small. Instead of renovating the bedroom, set the goal to clean out your closet. Instead of writing your novel, set a goal to sign up for a creative writing course in your local area. Write out those two goals and leave them for a few days. Come back to them later in the week and notice if they still feel right. If not, change them, they are your goals! Make them as specific as possible and allow them to be something that you ‘could’ do rather than something that you ‘should’ do.

On your new calendar, set one small step towards your larger goal on the first day of each month, giving yourself a tangible time frame to work within. This month, it might be buying a hanging shoe rack and next month taking out the clothes you no longer wear and giving them to charity. With so much else going on in our lives, taking our goals in small bites like this, allows us to experience success in reaching those goals. As a result we build self confidence towards reaching our goals and greater authenticity within our lives.

Taking the time to journal before setting these goals is an essential step not to be discarded. Often we carry around a blueprint for who “we think” we are and when we get our thoughts on the page, we realise something within us may have changed. By connecting with who we are today, rather than who we were last week or who we think we should be next week, we allow our goals to be meaningful to us in the present moment. The good news is that when our goals are authentic, research shows us that we have a much higher chance of reaching them.

This August, I invite you to join me in choosing cheap and cheerful calendars and a new journal if you don’t have one. Set aside an afternoon this week just for you. Clear your dining room table or desk and arm yourself with a pack of coloured pens, your new calendar and your journal. Make yourself a cup of tea and enjoy this time for you. Dream from the place where as children years stretched out far and wide, the place from where anything we dream is possible.

This is a monthly inspiration piece brought to you by ‘everyday balance’. If you would like to subscribe to this newsletter, please send your name and email address to everydaybalance@gmail.com or visit this blog in the first week of each month. For information regarding life coaching appointments in person, by telephone or online, send an email to the above address with your name and phone number.