Balance Point: Marking the Equinox at Yoga x Life
Twice a year, for one day only, day and night stand in exact balance. It's a small astronomical fact with a long history of being treated as something much bigger; and this September, we're marking it across three special events built to stand alone and work together.
What the equinox means, across traditions and why it still matters now
In yogic and tantric thought, the equinox isn't just noted, it's used. The idea is straightforward: when the outer world sits in balance, that balance becomes easier to find within. The equinox is treated as a threshold day - a point of transition rather than a fixed state - and thresholds are where tradition says the deepest work happens. It's considered a day especially suited to stillness, to loosening the grip of opposites (light and dark, masculine and feminine, effort and ease), and to meeting a more settled, less divided state of awareness. Meditation, breath work, mantra and purification practices held on the equinox are understood to carry a little further than they would on an ordinary day, simply because the day itself is offering more support.
Shamanic tradition arrives at something similar from a different direction. Here, the turning points of the year - solstices, equinoxes, full moons - are read as natural invitations to pause, to take stock of a cycle closing, and to consciously set the tone for the one beginning. It's less about balance as a fixed midpoint and more about balance as an ongoing practice: knowing what to release from the season behind you, and what you're choosing to carry, or plant, into the one ahead. Cacao, ceremony and journeying work are traditionally used to support exactly this kind of honest, embodied stock-taking.
None of this requires you to take any of it on faith. Strip away the tradition and what's left is genuinely useful: a fixed point in the calendar that gives you permission to stop, notice where you actually are, and choose what comes next rather than drifting from one season into the next on autopilot. Most of us don't get many built-in prompts to do that. The equinox is one, if you use it.
Three events, one arc
We've built three sessions this year that move through the equinox together, each one a different way in.
Sunday 20 September, 6–8pm - Cacao Meditation with Debbie. The opening move: heart-first. Debbie holds ceremonial cacao, breathwork, gentle movement, meditation and shamanic journeying in one evening, creating space to feel what you're ready to release from the season behind you, and what you're drawing into your roots to nourish through the one ahead.
Monday 21 September, 6.30–8am - Sunrise Raag & Bhuta Shuddhi with Nick and Chris. Two mornings out, we shift from the heart into the body. A live sunrise raag from Nick — music built specifically for this time of day — opens into Chris leading Bhuta Shuddhi, a practice that moves through the five elements one by one, clearing and settling each in turn. It closes in quiet contemplation, meeting the gathering equinox energy with awareness and gratitude rather than rushing into the day.
Wednesday 23 September, 6am - Equinox Yoga Mala with Chris. The equinox itself. Chris leads Yoga Mala, 108 rounds of repeated, focused movement synchronised with breath, closing with Deha Shuddhi, a purification of the body. Yoga Mala has been part of Chris's own practice, and part of the Yoga x Life calendar, since he first led one in 2012. This year, it's the only Yoga Mala he's leading so if you've been meaning to experience it, this is the one.
Taken together, the three sessions trace a full arc: open the heart, clear the elements, meet the balance point. You don't need to attend all three for any one of them to stand on its own - but if you can, they're built to be felt as a sequence.
How to join
You can find our the full details and book each session individually at the links below
Book Cacao Meditation with Debbie →
Book Sunrise Raag & Bhuta Shuddhi →
Come to all three for less than your membership already costs
If you're a member from Elevate upward, all three events are already included — no separate booking, no extra cost, just show up. If you're not yet on Elevate, it's worth doing the maths: booked individually as drop-ins, the three sessions come to £78 (£30 + £18 + £30) - just £1 short of a full month of Elevate, at £79. Which means for essentially the same money, membership gets you the whole series plus every regular class you attend that month, rather than three sessions and nothing else.