Join me (Mollie) on Sunday, September 15th for a Full Moon Mala Making Workshop and Japa Meditation Introduction, from 10:30am-1:30pm. During this three-hour workshop, you’ll get to pick a mala kit of beads with a special meaning behind the stones like jade, amethyst, amazonite and more. We'll research stone meanings, so that you can assure you have the kit most suited to your needs at the moment. Then we’ll hand-tie our own malas (a knot between every bead!), and I’ll go over the basics of Japa, and how to use your mala. Before you leave, you’ll get to choose a Sanskrit Mantra that will help you re-write whatever thoughts are running through your head and then we’ll take on a challenge together, with a Facebook group for accountability. Cost is $65 per person, all materials included.  Click here to register! Monthly Unlimited Autopay members, reply to this email if you want to sign up, and I’ll register you using your card on file for only $45… that’s $20 off!

You know the saying...​ "You can’t pour from an empty cup"? 

Yeah, I’ve been there, too. 

I'm Mollie Busby, founder and owner of Yoga Hive Montana and Yoga Hive Studios. I know that feeling of overwhelm when you start your day staring at an unsurmountable list of responsibilities that keeps getting longer. I know that listless glance out the window, wondering how much longer you can last at your current capacity. I know that fleeting desire to throw up your hands, quit, and book a one-way ticket to a far-away place just to escape it all.

Whether you’re an entrepreneur on the brink of burnout, a working mom in need of a reset, or a gal with a vision to change the world (minus the motivation to actually get started): I feel ya, sister. There comes a time when we need to stop, take a hard look at our life, and reboot.

Ladies, it’s time to fill that empty cup — this Montana Yoga Retreat is for you.

Imagine having the time to meditate daily (and someone to show you how!). Afterward, you cozy up in a comfy chair outdoors, enjoying a cup of piping hot, locally roasted organic coffee while you journal your intentions for the day and take in the incredible fall foliage around you. You have the space to notice the warm sun and a gentle Montana breeze on your face. You look out over sweeping views of Glacier National Park, Whitefish Lake and beyond, awaiting the day’s transformational morning yoga class in a beautiful off-the-grid yurt.

And the pressure is off: There’s no experience with yoga or meditation required to attend this Montana Yoga Retreat!

Throughout our 4 days, and 3 nights together, you’ll be challenged (in the best way!) by interactive and incredibly fun deep-dive inquiry sessions to get to the core of how you want to feel on a day to day basis. You’ll laugh, dream, learn and plan in the company of other women who are working through the same discovery process alongside you. Discussion sessions, dharma talks, hikes, and a special trip up to the off-grid community of Polebridge, just outside Glacier National Park, are balanced out with ample freedom to chill, roam the 10-acre property among towering Larch trees and fragrant pines with abundant wildlife around every corner. Although you’ll be close to nature at The Busby Hive, you’re also just minutes away from Whitefish by car, so you’ll have a chance to explore our quaint downtown to your heart’s content during our time off. Evenings feature a more gentle yoga practice in the yurt, designed to reset your nervous system and fill your cup till it runneth over.

At night, rest easy... 
...with all the creature comforts of a shared room in our on-the-grid home with electricity, traditional bathroom and running water, a full kitchen and fridge, and high-speed WIFI. Or, rest closer to nature with treetop views and an off-grid experience with a full kitchen and fridge, electricity via solar power, deluxe composting toilet and indoor on-demand hot shower in our custom-built HGTV-featured cabin that sleeps 2.

Classes, coffee/tea, meals and discussion will happen in the round, in our off-grid 30-foot yurt — also featured on HGTV, Discovery Channel, Yahoo, Daily Mail and more.

Throughout the retreat, you’ll fuel up with nourishing, locally-sourced organic vegan cuisine, custom crafted to give your body the most balanced fuel so you can think, see and move clearly for the weekend.

Sometimes all it takes is a few days in nature to give you the boost you need — but this isn’t a vacation where you’re sad to leave after 4 blissful days in Montana. Oh no. 

You’ll leave this retreat with the best gift of all: A brighter version of yourself, with the tools to change your life for the better.

You’ll be excited to get home and get in the driver’s seat of your own life. To support you beyond our time together, you’ll be connected to a new sisterhood of women that you’ve spent this time with. And most of all, you’ll get your life back with a full cup — and the knowledge to keep it that way.

This fall, you have the chance to join me on this life-changing Be Bold: Montana Yoga Retreat experience: September 18-22. We only have 8 spots available… so the only question left is:
​
​What are you waiting for?

I read something posted in a Facebook group the other day that immediately caught my eye. Even though I wasn’t tagged and hadn’t spoken to that person in months, within a matter of seconds, I made the entire post about me. 
And this is how incredibly creative my mind is. 
 
I reasoned (in seconds, mind you) that this person had thought about me specifically, gotten angry, posted this post, in hopes that I would see it, and that I would read it. And then I would feel the bad vibes and become emotionally affected by it.  

And sure enough, there I sat, for approximately 1.5 minutes, emotionally affected by something that was NOT about me.
 
Even typing it, it sounds ridiculous doesn’t it? My teacher Anand put it best — I was so grateful to find this nugget in my notes on what he says about taking things personally:

Today, we usher in a New Moon — which means it's time for intention setting. And it could be the intensity of the heat this week... it might be all sorts of planetary retrogrades... it might be a teensy bit in my head.

Whatever it is: July was NUTS... wasn't it?

I know I'm not the only one that felt the gravity this last month. I was challenged in all sorts of ways... and I felt so many emotions I haven't felt in a long time. And not just a little bit... I was feeling things with intensity!  

At some point, I had to just surrender. I resolved to just feeling all the feels — and using my experience as a laboratory. I could clearly see the contrast as I would pendulum back and forth, and I used that information to decide how I want to feel, and how I don't want to feel on a day to day basis....

The first yoga class I ever took was awful.
 
It was 2008, and I was living in Wisconsin post-graduation from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. I was working a desk job writing for a women’s magazine, so I spent a lot of time sitting at a computer. I knew I needed to move.
 
I joined a gym and tried out every type of fitness class I could get my hands on, just to see what I liked, and what made me feel good. I tried it all… Body Pump, Body Attack, spinning, weight lifting… and then, there was yoga. I had zero expectations. It was just on the list, so I figured I'd try it out.
 
I was running late, and I walked into the room and the only spot available was right at the front. I couldn’t see anything without turning my head around because the instructor was walking around the class. There wasn’t any time for niceties after I got there — I dove in.

​..So I’ve been getting headaches more frequently than normal the last few months. At first, I chalked it up to stress or the travel. And then I got frustrated... distraught... I went through denial that it was a thing. And then came the day I allowed myself to wonder the dreaded question: Could it be coffee? 

Cringe with me: “Nooooooooo... NO! It can't be! I can’t give up coffee!” 
 
But after the last migraine, I decided it was worth a shot to not have to experience headaches like that anymore. As I write this, I’ve spent over two weeks without coffee (and I’m still living!). And this small example in my own life reminds me of something the great Yogananda once said to a student.

A tiny bit of background: Paramahamsa Yogananda's autobiography — titled Autobiography of a Yogi — is one of the most iconic books in yoga today, about his life spent bringing the yogic teachings from the Himalayas to the west in the early 1900s. (You'll even find it on our yoga teacher training required reading list because his Kriya Yoga practices and Meditation Technique are from the same lineage as what we learn in Yoga Hive's YTT!)
 
In Awake, the documentary about Yogananda’s life, there’s an interview with one of his students where he recalls a conversation with Yogananda — the one that popped into my head this morning. The student was asking his teacher what he's not allowed to do as a student of yoga...