Today we’d like to introduce you to Julia Horn.
Julia, before we jump into specific questions about your work, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I don’t remember a time without yoga in some capacity.
My mother practiced it when I was a child and we would often noodle around beside her in the living room as we all listened to the gentle guiding voice on the record player. Many poses and practices, I fell into quite naturally, as a kid running through the woods and jumping off of rope swings- movement, dance, and body exploration were all a huge part of my everyday experience. Also when I was young, I fell, seemingly naturally, into a space of widened consciousness when I was in the woods one afternoon- the Blue Ridge mountains in North Carolina. Those woods taught me more than I would ever learn later in school, and to this day, inform my life, however consciously, to some degree or another, it would seem. The experience I had that day would serve as a reference point for the rest of my life. The hours playing in the moss, the wildly diverse flora of mountains as ancient as those, and the impact of being immersed in nature, are guiding forces at every turn.
As a young adult, I was enamored by the art form of dance. I was blessed with copious opportunities to explore various forms and cultures and to utilize dance as a way of expressing the nonverbal. I could curiously tap into a geyser of emotion and universal information and let it ride the waves of my limbs like a tree dancing the truth of the wind or seaweed dancing the wisdom of the ocean. Nothing had ever felt so aligned.
This led to a life of dance, then back to yoga – with an insatiable curiosity directed at the unknown, which later became an amalgam of the two.
When my father contracted cancer, I began to explore more restorative and therapeutic forms of practice, both with the cancer populations and on my own. The healing that this brought was profound- it fed my soul and re-balanced my energetic inclinations. I started sharing these insights afield and was met with deep hunger for stillness and re-balancing from many in this hurried world of ours.
Now, I appreciate all of it – a happy melange of dance and active yoga, meditation, and therapeutics. Sometimes my body wants to move like the wind to feel strong and fluid simultaneously. Other times, I need to be still and allow the shields in the body and mind to part so that I can see what is within.
A life of travel and curiosity has afforded me lots of learning and has given me exposure to some of the world’s masters in the crafts of yoga, dance, and consciousness exploration.
At this juncture, however, I am very much appreciative of finding stillness, watching the seasons turn, and employing simple daily routine as scaffolding for the yoga and the sharing.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
Smooth, I should say not.
When a person puts forward a desire to know themselves in fullness, they should be prepared for a few bumps in the road if not the most ferocious mystic bucking bronco ride their wildest imagination could not even touch. I asked for growth and that the light be shown in all the dark corners and that is far from easy, and humbling to the bone.
At one point along my path, I had some pretty severe health challenges which lasted for quite a few years. These were some scary times, that had me stare down my own mortality and sense of existence. Sometime shortly after that, I had about three years of something hard to put into words, but what some might call the dark night of the soul. It felt like my whole psyche had been turned inside out and any tenant or belief, no matter how small or insignificant, was destroyed.
On the one hand, there are the mechanics of infections and traumas and stressors and how they affect the body and the mind, and on the other hand, it felt there was a divine impulse to life that seemed to help unfold, unpack, and allow… life itself. All served as pointers towards things that needed some ironing out, some holding and acknowledging and bringing back into a place of love and equanimity. Where the unconscious mind is concerned, anything is fair game. At first, it felt like there were things from my life to heal, then it felt like my lineage, then it cracked wide-open, multidimensionally in all directions of space and time, and there was no linear way to hold and to heal. Something else was required of me. All of my tools and years of practice did nothing, and it took me a while to figure out how best to hold these savage spaces within. Some of it was darn right magical- beyond synchronicity and into the matrix, but even that was a bit disquieting because everything was different and new. I had to work hard to find a ground beneath me. Unearthing the subterranean is not the gentlest of jobs. It reminded me of my childhood dream to become an archaeologist. Little did I know that I would see that to fruition- trading soil for the psyche and replacing a sieve with my awareness.
I don’t know how I had the strength to make it through, except that the perfect person was always placed in front of me at the perfect time, to relate to, and to help birth the next step forward. The alchemy of relationship and what is created in the spaces between two or more individuals, is what ultimately saved me and brought me back to planet earth and this beautiful gift of a body.
Please tell us about your work.
I specialize in creative vinyasa flow, restorative/ yin/ therapeutic yoga, practices to foster the divine feminine, women’s wisdom and seasonal alignment, wilderness and farm retreats, yoga for cancer care, pranayama, meditation, working with change agents, life design and coaching, health-coaching/ health advocacy, palliative care, shadow dancers/dark night of the soul initiates, helping people construct a home practice and mentorship for new teachers.
The active yoga that I practice and investigate is a creative one and blended with what might be considered dance-like movement. It emulates nature in that one thing spills right into another, seamlessly and organically, like a river after the rain, thereby increasing range of motion, synovial fluid lubrication of joints, lengthening of the fascia , and finds an impulse whose guidance has the ability to take us out of our heads and into our hearts. Much of life and even many forms of yoga focus on the forward and backward, but this form really explores the periphery as well, so that we can come back to homeostasis. When all nooks and crannies of body and mind have been explored and moved into, the center becomes more available, and to find the center of a thing- that is the aim, and that is what can bring peace.
The gentler forms of yoga have become my true love. What I offer in this arena is a blend of yin yoga, restorative yoga, and many other therapeutic modalities, along with numerous postures that sprang forward out of necessity when I was working with the cancer patients and other populations in need of deep healing- self-included. They sort of created themselves.
But what I am most proud of at this juncture, is what we are creating out at Eldorado Springs Art Center.
About three years ago, I was living in Austin, Texas, and became increasingly aware and moved by the places that felt fragmented in the world- especially, at that time, as it pertained to immigration regulation. It felt of upmost importance to have a place to safely be together. I was also confounded that there were many places one could go to be in stillness, introspection, and learning, but they very often revolved around a particular dogma or structure. What felt important, especially in light of people being pushed into the margins and abandoned in various ways, was to have a place where people could be together and practice or create in a way that felt real to them. I started working with a few folks in Austin to see what those parameters might look like, and we were even under contract to purchase a home that would house our project. The owner decided that she did not want to sell- I did not push as it felt like the improper way to start a thing such as this, and so everything was on hold. It wasn’t until I moved north and rather synchronistically fell into the Eldorado Springs Art Center, that it became clear that this was the space, and these the people.
The studio is owned by sculptor and visionary Giuseppe Palumbo, has additional in-house artists, Dona Laurita, Julie Maren, and Collen Nyanhongo, and revolving artists from the community as well as abroad. Snuggled deep in the arms of the canyon, alongside the sounds of running water from the creek, and adorned with a sculpture garden and long dining table outback, it makes for an almost fairly-tale-like setting with no lack of inspiration.
It is, a sort of make-shift, modern, tinkering tabernacle – a place for people to be together in practice and relationship, both with themselves, with nature, and each other. It is a place organized around beauty- be it in the form of music, art, or contemplative practices, that help us step out of the hurried stream of life and into places of balance. It is a place where we put aside our technology in order to find each other, and ourselves. I think I can say that our aim collectively, is to uplift and revere, various manifestations of beauty in the world while resting on a foundation of community and togetherness.
In the coming months, we will be bringing people in from the community to share and to teach- artists of every ilk, weavers of love, and masters of the beautiful. I teach two classes a week out here and we bring in a different teacher each month to offer our third weekly class.
Workshops and intensives will allow opportunities for a deeper dive.
And my favorite piece and something I find to be deeply profound is Community Mornings – two mornings a week where people can be together and allow the silence to express itself inside of them in whatever way it will, be it yoga, meditation, reading, writing, painting, sculpting, studying, resting, arts and crafts.. whatever.
To me, this allowance of a space, to defer to something deeper and wider, fosters not only the care and cultivation of our personal practices but also grows respect for our fellow humans, as we all find our unique way to engage and integrate the spaces within. One roof, many paths, as it were.
If you had to go back in time and start over, would you have done anything differently?
I don’t want to bow out of this one too easily but truly, there is nothing more or less to offer. everything on my path has led to this moment and it is perfect in its very imperfect way. And I mean, VERY imperfect 🙂
Contact Info:
- Address: 8 Chesebro Way,
Eldorado Springs, Colorado, 80025 - Website: juliahorn.org, eldoradospringsartcenter.com
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/_juliahorn/
Image Credit:
Dona Laurita Photography
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