The two main systems of understanding the 18 month process of growing a baby and nourishing a newborn could be simplified to allopathic and holistic. As these two systems arose out of different paradigms, cultures and eras, the language both use to describe a healthy pregnancy, birth and postpartum experience differ tremendously depending on what lens your seeing through. Most western empowered women today would be surprised that they are even looking through an allopathic lens. They may attend yoga class, eat organic fruits and vegetables at every meal, have cut out coffee AND chocolate, hired a doula and still not be empowered by a deeply holistic paradigm. This is demonstrated, in particular, in the absence of a comprehensive support plan for the first 40 days postpartum.

When pregnancy becomes a path of our own awakening into a larger consciousness – our own evolution through the process – it becomes an intentionally honored rite of passage. Ayurvedic medicine has a wealth of wisdom to awaken our higher consciousness and cultivate an innate dynamic inner balance through this rite of passage.  Interestingly enough, the mother in this ancient family culture is revered in this system as the person with the deepest shakti (life-giving energy) and therefore the clear and powerful inner knowing (jnana). The mother knows the knowledge of life – the microcosm of her family – and the macrocosm of the Earth. She is honored as the locus of her family. The most intense rite of passage know to humans is the act of childbirth which creates the opportunity to bestow this deeper energy and wisdom.

When we put a woman in an allopathic paradigm much is lost; not only a pregnancy that awakens the depth of a woman’s inner understanding of her own transformation, but particularly, a deeper, more ecstatic and intrinsically healthier postpartum mother and newborn.

Clip from Interview with Cate & Jessica Jennings, certified Anusara teacher & prenatal guru.
[audio:prenatal-clip1.mp3 | titles=Interview with Cate & Jessica Jennings]
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Cate Stillman, Clinical Ayurvedic Specialist and Certified Anusara Yoga teacher is offering a live Teleconference Course, Enlightened Childbearing, beginning May 20^th!

A tidbit on the course:
What we will journey together in is what is the most applicable to the postmodern yogi mom…what can be shelved, and what should be cultivated daily so that we can get out of the way of life moving through us in this 18 month journey of the beginnings of a new human being.