All posts by petersan

The revelation for An

August 18, 2021Customerspetersan

1. What is your main reason or motivation for taking yoga classes?

The yoga is very relaxing for me, because of the breathing in combination with the movement.
It works quite meditative.
Twice a week I feel really relaxed after yoga.
They make my weekly two hours with myself (-:

2. What makes you feel motivated to keep taking the classes for so long to this day?

I’ve become a bit addicted to it (while I used to think that yoga really wasn’t for me).
I miss it when I can’t take some classes.
It does not only does good in my mind, my body is also relaxed and I feel more flexible.
I also need the verbal guidance to do the series of postureses, I don’t think I could do it alone or have the discipline to do so.

3. Why do you take the classes here at Yoga Kitchen, instead of going to another yoga studio ?

I’ve never been anywhere else. I am satisfied (-:
Once I did 1 class of a very active yoga style, but it only hurt and they seemed like impossible postures to me.
With the Prana yoga I also found the first classes very difficult. Now I find the recurring sequence of movements easier to do and it’s also nice that things come back.

4. What do you particularly like about the yoga classes / approach / atmosphere here at Yoga Kitchen?

I really like the individual adjustments, and also the fact that you stop to think too much about things, consciously emptying your head etc.
The private session with you concerning my chronic hyperventilation proved very instructive. Because of this, I apply things more during the classes, but also outside of them.
I notice that in the live classes this is attention for the individual is even more important, with small adjustments for those who need something.
I appreciate that we are invited to learn to listen (consciously) to our own body.

5. Are there any perhaps purely practical elements that make you choose the yoga classes here?

For me it was during the COVID lockdown with the online classes of course that I started, also because I had more time available in my schedule then.
I love being able to do it from home, from my friend’s house or whilst on holiday.

A massive thank you for your answers, An, and see you soon!

Peter

Sanne’s idea

August 18, 2021Customerspetersan

1. What is your main reason or motivation for taking yoga classes?

For me, yoga is a way to get out of my head and stay physically flexible.

2. What makes you feel motivated to keep following the classes for so long until today?

I feel better when I practice yoga, I have less back pain and I am more relaxed.

3. Why do you take classes here at Yoga Kitchen, instead of going to another yoga studio?

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It’s a nice location, close to my home, small scale, no big gym, pleasant atmosphere.

4. What do you particularly appreciate about the yoga classes / approach / atmosphere here at Yoga Kitchen?

I prefer the longer class of 1.5 hours. There is a good balance between relaxation and effort. The approach is individual, everyone does the exercises and postures in his/her own way.

Thank you very much for your feedback Sanne, and see you soon!

Peter

Group class and daily practice

July 31, 2021yogapetersan

You can attend as many group classes as you like. There are two facts you cannot ignore:.

Yoga postures were originally intended as a preparation for (daily) meditation.
Yoga was originally conceived as an individual, daily discipline.

Group classes or no group classes

Even though I like to teach group classes a lot, the finality of a group class is that they cancels themselves out at a certain point. That happens when you manage to create and maintain the discipline of a yoga moment at home on your own every day and make it to a daily ritual.

Only then does it make sense to take group classes.

But I myself also started my discovery of yoga through group classes in my former work environment. In a group class you acquire a good basis. From each yoga teacher you carry pieces of valuable knowledge with you. Group practice also has a unique, special energy and atmosphere that many people love. Especially people who need to be close to other people.

Group classes are also a simplification. Because every body, every soul, every mind, every individual human being is different. A group class cannot possibly fulfil all the individual needs of the moment. Even if the yoga instructors do their best, a group class will remain a “middle of the road” approach.

Those who practice yoga alone at home can make it a highly individual event, followed by a daily meditation practice that is also tailor-made.

Morning yoga

I myself practice yoga for 20-30 minutes maximum in the morning, before meditating for 20-30 minutes. This morning yoga completely changes the energy of my day. It also helps to get rid of the morning stiffness. Afterwards, I can meditate quietly whilst experiencing my body in a pleasant way. Or rather, I hardly feel my body at all. So I can meditate all the better on a mental level.

Some exercises, such as balancing on one leg, are much easier to me in the morning than in the evening. I have atypically shaped feet which give little support, making these postures an extra challenge. In the evening, when I have already been through the wringer of a very active day, I am much more wobbly than in the morning. This wobbling also happens during the group lessons in the evening. Then I am no longer “the yoga teacher who demonstrates the posture to perfection”. And I am fine with that.

Level one

You practice yoga for yourself, with yourself. With the body you have. And that body is different every day, it changes in time, because nothing is permanent. Yoga is therefore an exercise in changeability. And in accepting imperfection. The atypical foot. The occasional wobbling. One shoulder lower than the other. The somewhat crooked spine. It’s not about the perfect alignment, the flawlessly held pose or the aesthetic result.

Physical yoga practice is level one meditation. It means going through a physical and energetic experience that makes you aware. It is about becoming aware of your physical body and your vital energy.

How Christine feels about it

July 31, 2021Customerspetersan

1. Christine, what is your main reason or motivation for taking yoga classes?

The classes are a good way to keep fit – the combination of concentration and doing exercises feels particularly good to me.

2. What makes you feel motivated to keep taking the classes for so long to this day?

Despite the distance, due to my actual job, I like to take the classes with you. It is also convenient that it can be done online now. I also do not like to change “supplier” especially if I am satisfied.

3. Why do you take the classes here at Yoga Kitchen, instead of going to another yoga studio ?

The small scale and personal approach appeal to me and of course the fact that the classes are also in Dutch. Not always easy to find in Brussels.

4. What do you particularly like about the yoga classes / approach / atmosphere here at Yoga Kitchen?

You can easily adapt the pace and intensity to your possibilities. Yet you can work up to your limit and challenge it a bit.

5. Are there perhaps purely practical elements that make you choose the yoga classes here?

Practical? It’s not as practical as it used to be when I could come from work on foot. Maybe the good price – quality ratio with the 10-classes pass.

Thanks for the time you spent on these questions, Christine, and see you soon!

Peter

Koen’s opinion

July 31, 2021Customerspetersan

1. What is your main reason or your main motivation to take yoga classes?

My inner balance, both physical and mental.
Yoga practice is quite complementary to my passion for climbing, and also to the other sports I like to do. And at times when I have a harder time mentally, I find great benefit in attending the yoga classes.

2. What makes you feel motivated to keep taking the classes for so long?

The way the yoga is taught over here: in small groups, and therefore personalized, with intensity and precision. I also like the nature of yoga and it is in line with my excellent experiences in Berlin when I started practicing yoga. By nature, I mean the fluidity of the movements in sync with the rhythm of the breathing. Your way of teaching radiates calm and conviction.

3. Why do you take classes here at Yoga Kitchen, instead of going to another yoga studio?

The proximity to my home is a plus, but it’s mainly what I noted above that counts.
I also really enjoy the setting of a stylish small town house. It’s part of the rich architectural heritage of Schaarbeek.

4. What do you particularly like about the yoga classes / approach / atmosphere here at Yoga Kitchen?

The participants are, each in their own way, committed, respectful and intense. The small groups make it easier to get to know people.
I also really appreciate the cup of tea at the end. It is a nice gesture of thanks and it brings people closer.

5. Are there perhaps any purely practical elements that make you choose the yoga classes here?

Not really. I think what I mentioned earlier perfectly describes my appetite for these classes.

Thanks for the time you spent on these questions, Koen, and see you soon!

Peter

Lisa’s choice

July 31, 2021Customerspetersan

1. What is your main reason or motivation for taking yoga classes?

Yoga is for me the way to calm down my body and mind and become much more in tune with each other. It puts the focus more on my body and breathing and I can get rid of all the chitchat in my head. A second reason is of course to achieve more strength, balance and flexibility for my body.

2. What makes you feel motivated to keep following the classes for so long until today?

I’ve been taking the classes for a long time because I find that they really work for me. After one hour of yoga from Peter I feel totally recharged on several levels, both my mind and body are grateful for each class and I can rely on that renewed energy for a very long time. The motivation is there every week and of its own accord. I don’t have to make an effort or convince myself to go to class week after week.

3. Why do you take classes here at Yoga Kitchen, instead of going to another yoga studio ?

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I have tried several yoga classes / workshops, but have not found what I experience at Yoga Kitchen. Because Peter keeps the focus on your breathing during the whole lesson, you really achieve what you want during a yoga class. Not only to maintain your body/muscles, but also to train your mind not to wander, but to stay with the exercises and your body. The combination of the physical exercises and the mindfulness is a great added value and it really makes these classes complete. What I also like is the structure of the class: the build-up of the class follows a fixed structure so you know what the class will look like and that gives a great deal of peace. On the other hand, we do different types of postures in every class, which means that you do and discover something new every week. The fact that the lesson starts and ends in the same way makes it feel familiar and safe. You also feel that every posture has a purpose and is not just randomly chosen by Peter. He often explains why we move in a certain way, which makes you feel even more involved in the class.

4. What do you particularly appreciate about the yoga classes / approach / atmosphere here at Yoga Kitchen?

Peter is so professional and knows his passion through and through. This is not just another yoga class, here you come for the essence of yoga and you really notice that when you join the class. At Yoga Kitchen Peter has an eye for every participant and even adapts exercises for you if you suffer from an ailment. Everyone is welcome here and can get his advice and tips. He will also come to you and improve your postures, always friendly and careful. This personal way of teaching is top!

5. Are there perhaps purely practical elements that make you choose the yoga classes here?

I lived a few blocks from the studio so I chose it. You can also attend each class online. It’s really good quality and also an added value. For this price you will find nowhere else such good and fine classes!

Thanks for the time you spent on answering these questions Lisa, and see you soon!

Peter

The Art of Centering

June 21, 2021meditation, yogapetersan

It is an image that will stay with me. During a large demonstration for freedom and democracy, thousands of people gathered at the start of the procession. There were loud speeches from a podium. There was music, drum rolls and the murmur of thousands of people. A soundscape so intense to my ears that I feared I would have to come to my senses for an hour and a half at home.

And there the man was. With long greying hair, clothes that indicated that he probably came from the yoga tradition. He sat cross-legged on the floor, hands in a mudra, eyes closed, meditating.

Balance

Undisturbed by what was happening around him. No matter how noisy and chaotic it was. When you walked past him, you just felt energetically that there was a field of soothing energy around him.

It was reminiscent of the Yin/Yang symbol. For in the middle of the large, white, curved drop-shaped plane of the turbulent, heated, agile and noisy Yang energy is a small black dot, which represents the opposite of Yang: the Yin. Yin stands for stillness, coldness, immobility. It indicates that there is no Yang without Yin, and that there is no Yin without Yang either. They keep each other in balance.

A symbolic ritual

That is why the ancient Chinese often built high, dead straight pagodas in landscapes that were otherwise completely horizontal and flat. The Chinese emperors had a summer palace in the North of the country and a winter palace in the South of their empire. At the height of the summer (Yang), the emperor and his court moved to the summer palace in the North (Yin). And in the winter (Yin) the court moved to the winter palace in the south (Yang). This symbolic ritual was there not only to avoid being subject to climatic extremes, but also to symbolically keep the balance between the two poles.

Centering

The meditating yogi at the manifestation was an illustration of what is called “centering”. It is the turning of one’s attention inwards, after completely detaching it from the external world around you.

Sometimes, during a relaxation moment at the end of a yoga session, yoga students become first irritated and then obsessed with disturbing elements from outside, which disturb or absorb their attention. It sometimes leads to complaints like “I could not relax because … ” there was that shouting in the street, that klaxon of that car, or the light snoring of the other yoga student next to them, who had gone from relaxation straight to deep sleep. Or it is about itching or itchiness which suddenly manifests itself.

An inner state of peace

These external disturbances are only disturbing insofar as you give them that power. However, they can also be the ideal elements and tools to learn to stay calmly at your own centre, no matter what is happening around you. Because accessing a quiet, calm, peaceful and neutral inner state is something that the current reality of our noisy planet rarely provides the ideal conditions for. That peaceful inner state, that point of rest and balance, is accessible to anyone at any time of the day, under any circumstances. We just need to learn not to cling to those elements of the outside world that we have labelled as distractions.

Your daily soup

May 1, 2021nutritionpetersan

Eating plant-based begins with eating more plants – what’s in a name.
For many people, this is where the health of their diet is lacking.
Everyone has heard the message, once or even repeatedly, that for good health and strong immunity you should eat more vegetables. However, we come from traditions that gave vegetables a third-rate role by definition.

Plant Power

Fortunately, for more and more people, things are moving in the right direction!

An excellent way to drastically increase the amount of plant power in your diet is a daily soup.

A good soup is home-made, with fresh, organically grown vegetables, possibly with some legumes for more vegetable protein and a more solid texture.

Best ways

It is best to keep the cooking process as short as possible to preserve as much nutritional value as possible. Vitamins and enzymes break down in too much heat and too long a period of heat.

Good cooking processes for soup are :

– Cold raw soups
Raw vegetables are ground in a blender with herbs, possibly some nuts or sprouted legumes and cold water (e.g. summer soups such as gazpacho)

– Lukewarm raw soups
Raw vegetables are ground in a blender with herbs and possibly nuts or sprouted legumes with the addition of hot water, i.e. without boiling the soup. The result is a soup that barely exceeds 40°C.

– Classic hot soups prepared in a pressure cooker with a short cooking time (10 min. under steam)
Raw vegetables are cooked with herbs and pre-soaked and rinsed legumes such as lentils and beans in water under increased pressure. After steaming for ten minutes, the soup is ready and can be mixed.

If necessary, add vegetable stock to season.
Sea salt or miso is fine as a means of salting.

Enjoy !

Our real home

April 30, 2021healthpetersan

What is the real home we live in?

Do you invest in the profitability of bricks and concrete or in the quality of the only real home you will live in all your life?

This interesting question arose when I was looking for a possible alternative home that would better suit my changing needs.

I visited an expensive flat that was being sold by a charming and talkative man who had once bought the flat on plan as an investment, and now wanted to get rid of it because he considered “the profitability to be insufficient”.

I listened and observed the man carefully as we walked through the fairly recent flat, which as usual had a mixture of good and less suitable features. It also struck me as a little “boxy”. I immediately felt like wanting to tear down the partition walls and opening up the space.

The man himself did not look healthy at all. I felt something like high blood pressure and could not help feeling that he was on medication. Nevertheless, he had a successful career in the medical field. A bit like the prototype of the hardworking, socially successful worker with lots of savings and many investments in “real estate”.

Vital energy

I realised that “real estate” is somewhat illusory. The only thing that remains real is change.
I had the feeling that there are two relevant dwellings in which we spend our whole lives. On the one hand, the energetic and physical entity of our individual body.
On the other, the larger home of this planet where we as privileged beings may temporarily reside.

How do we deal with these houses?
Where do you invest your money and life energy?

Respect for one’s own body and the larger body of this earth creates the basic conditions for a meaningful and successful existence, where you can let the best of yourself flourish in a sound relationship with the greater whole.

Vegetables first

March 8, 2021nutritionpetersan

What are your fillers?

Feeling stuffed quickly

Virtually all conditions of obesity, lack of energy or digestive problems are caused by a wrong choice of food products.
In general, everyone has one or more products that are used as “fillers”.
A filler is a food that is relatively easy to prepare, which quickly gives a “full feeling” when eating. After all, an empty stomach is quickly misinterpreted as hunger. However, having an empty stomach is no sign at all that your body is hungry at that moment.
In our society, the fillers are often bread, pasta, white potatoes or rice.

Low quality fuel

Consequently, meals are still traditionally composed on the basis of such a filler. A plate is often filled with potatoes or pasta, and then topped off with sauce, a limited amount of vegetables and a protein source. Think of something like spaghetti bolognaise, a sandwich this or that or french fries with xyz.
The problem is that these common filling products are very poor in real nutrients, such as vitamins and minerals. You can think of them as a form of low-quality fuel.
In fact, you can stuff yourself until you almost pass out into a food coma, and still your body is waiting in vain for real nutrients. This is one of the reasons why (real) hunger quickly rears its head again, which you might smother with the same fillers. And so the cycle continues.

Systematically inflated profile

Here you have the recipe for the fastest-growing phenomenon in the world of health. More and more overweight people with a lack of energy. Paradoxically enough, obesity is in most cases not the result of overnutrition but of systematic malnutrition. The body does not know what to do with all that nutrient-poor, calorie-rich food. It converts the excess into fat and/or water. The body has too many acid-forming toxins to process. And to remove them from the bloodstream in time, there are only two solutions. Store them either in fatty tissue or in extra water pushed between the body cells. And there we have the recipe for the systematically inflated profile of most Belgians and Europeans today. We learned it from the Americans, and it is now quickly making school in Asia.

Healthy eating style

The lesson is simple: build every meal around a large amount of vegetables. Prefer green (leafy) vegetables, cabbages and coloured vegetables supplemented with root vegetables according to the season. Preferably strive for a nice balance between raw and lightly steamed. Vegetables are typically low in calories, but score very high in nutrients.
It’s a bit of a godsend, but the adage proclaimed for decades that “eat more vegetables” is not a free option. It is no more or no less than the single foundation of a healthy eating style. Without that foundation, the house of your health slowly collapses over the years.

Prosperity and ignorance

We are not exactly helped either. We are subject to traditions and habits about eating and cooking, handed down from mother to daughter. Our typical Belgian plate of today is the direct heir to the eating practices that have taken off since industrialisation. The standard diet of the working class person was cheap, “empty” filler food. Like the almost archetypal brown bread and the daily “cooked potatoes with sauce”. And if one was lucky on Sunday, a piece of cheap meat of the worst kind. The rich indulged in refined flour products and large quantities of meat. Vegetables played a totally secondary role in either case.

Diseases of affluence: really ?

And on the sidelines, the food industry, with its refined technologies and social marketing and engineering strategies, is aiming for one thing only: to make you buy and eat even more than is healthy for you.
There is no such thing as “diseases of affluence”. This term makes it seem as if you have to take it or leave it: either you have prosperity and you have to take disease with it as part of the deal, or you have no prosperity. What comes closer to the truth is “diseases of ignorance”. Or “profit driven-lack of legislation-lobbying diseases”.

Create your menus around the vegetables
So from today, reorganize your plate wisely and start eating a large quantity of varied vegetables of the season at every meal.