Why just Rise when you can SOAR?

With 5000+ square feet, I can’t blame them for the question. Centrally located on Main St., right in the heart of downtown Ashland, the former location of a long-standing and once-bustling business, now stripped bare and dusty, 27 W Main Street is experiencing a transformation and its drawing attention. “What’s going in here?” is a perfectly valid question. But dressed up as Mary Sanderson from Hocus Pocus complete with false-eyelashes and elbow deep in green cotton candy, and with 999 sugar-crazed children looking on, “A yoga studio,” was the only answer I had time to give. That answer didn’t suffice the looks of wonder in the eyes of the historically curious as they take in the 18’ tin-covered ceilings, the 100’ run of maple-wood floors, or the grand-oak stairway inviting exploration of what once had been mysteriously shrouded. 

Right now, Studio Rise is a yoga studio. When we move, the yoga studio will move with us. But with 5000+ square feet, that can’t be all. In speaking succinctly, the best short answer I can come up with to the question “What’s going in here?” is: Rise Studios, a Health and Wellness Collective. A collection of people, professionals, experts, and programs all with the mission to provide customized wellness experiences for optimal health and wellbeing--under one roof and with the same yogic foundation of self-awareness and mind-body integration.

What exactly does that mean? It means nothing changes with everything you’re used to. You can come to yoga classes as you always have. It also means that when those yoga classes cause sore muscles we have massage therapists available to rub away the tightness or to extend the savasana. It means when simply attending yoga classes expands into a “yoga lifestyle,” you can incrementally begin a nutrition plan built for your unique body type and lifestyle. It means when old traumas come to the surface and you don’t want to leave them unresolved, we have a spiritual director to lay a path with you for healing.

OR it can start somewhere else. Perhaps you begin with spiritual direction and yoga is recommended as one of the practices for your healing. Luckily, you don’t have to find the right kind of class by trial and error. It’s here in the same building, exactly what you need. OR you’re stressed and you know you need to do something but you’re overwhelmed by all the Google options. Here, we’ll hear you. We’ll hear what stressors you have and provide mind, body, and soul suggestions on how to manage that stress--YOUR mind, body, and soul. OR you’ve been doing yoga and body weight resistance is great, but you’d like to add weights and cardio. We have a gym for that. Maybe you’ve tried out the gym (Yes, a gym, still under the same roof) and you need to create musculoskeletal balance with yoga classes. You’ve guessed it, it’s all here.

Sometimes your stress, your lifestyle, your habits can lead to a chronic illness and you want to do more than manage the symptoms. You are ready to reverse the effects of the illness and really heal, “What’s going in here” is a program called SOAR Method to help you begin to do that. Maybe you’re headed down a path of unhealth and want to change the trajectory to prevent chronic illness, SOAR Method also functions in that capacity.

While we have all these solutions under one roof, it can still feel overwhelming. SOAR Method is the plan that puts it all together. SOAR stands for Spiritual, Occupational, Anatomical and Relational. These are four of the eight dimensions of wellness. I believe if four become attuned, the other four will align as well. (Emotional, intellectual, environmental, and financial are the other four) SOAR Method is a 90 day compass, orienting yourself by understanding where you are and then directing you on a path toward your goals. SOAR Method is a compass, not a map. With a guide or three, the map will reveal itself over the course of our time spent together. Together, we will create a plan that incorporates movement, nutrition, ways in which to live into your life’s greater purpose and a tether to your why which is larger than the self--offering accountability and support along the way. SOAR Method will begin to create a lifestyle that feels true and whole.

And that’s all, folks. (Not really. I have plans for bead bars, herbology, retail items, and other fun little things, but I’ll have to talk about that in another email.) Even though there isn’t a quick and easy answer to, “What’s going in here?” we believe the long answer, your health and your life, are worthy of it. In the meantime, we’ll keep educating and talking and teaching. Feel free to forward this email to anyone you think will benefit from a health and wellness collective. And, please, feel free to email me with any questions you have!

I can’t wait to begin this work with you!

I hope you understand a little more about the “what.” Now, don’t ask me when... (That’s always the next question. I’ll answer that one in future communications)