DURVASANA-POSE OF THE WEEK (POW)

JUST BREATHE

Pranayama is one of the eight limbs of yoga but when people first start the practice of yoga they are often resistant to the practice. Yoga is about expanding the consciousness into a state of ananda. Ananda is BLISS!

So is Asana. The connection between the state of asana and bliss is the vehicle of the breath. It is often hard to really focus on breath as we move from pose to pose so sitting and tuning up the breath vehicle. One of my favorite breathing exericses to practice or teach is the balancing breath of nadi shodana, or alternate nostril breathing.

The Hatha Yoga Pradipika gives many variations of this practice but the simplest way to start is to just sit and close the nostril on the right side and breath into the left. Right away you are accessing a state of pure consciousness by accessing the right side of the brain. Then closing the left you open the right and exhale. The next inhale is into the right and then closing it, you exhalte out the left. This balances the brain on both sides. This is a scientifice practice and you can build on it by increasing the lengths of the breath and retaining between in and out takes of the breath. Five rounds will lead you into a state of bliss. Build up to 20 minutes and you will be moving towards a deep state of meditation without even thinking about it.

Also don't beat yourself up if you get frustrated or if it brings up anxieties or other emotional issues. It is supposed to. Like the asana practice you have to consistent and keep practicing.

I love seeing students in a blissful state of pranayama at the end of class. The whole class starts feeding into a state of community bliss and awareness.

So keep breathing everyone. Start right where you are and just start focusing on your breath awareness.

STRICT TEACHER

"I was disappointed to find that so many novice students have taken Ashtanga yoga and have turned it into a circus for their own fame and profit (Power Yoga, Jan/Feb 1995). The title "Power Yoga" itself degrades the depth, purpose and method of the system that I received from my guru, Sri. T. Krishnamacharya. Power is the property of God. It is not something to be collected for one's ego. Partial yoga methods out of line with their internal purpose can build up the "six enemies" (desire, anger, greed, illusion, infatuation and envy) around the heart. The full ashtanga system practiced with devotion leads to freedom within one's heart. The Yoga Sutra II.28 confirms this "Yogaanganusthanat asuddiksaye jnanadiptih avivekakhyateh", which means "practicing all the aspects of yoga destroys the impurities so that the light of knowledge and discrimination shines". It is unfortunate that students who have not yet matured in their own practice have changed the method and have cut out the essence of an ancient lineage to accommodate their own limitations.

The Ashtanga yoga system should never be confused with "power yoga" or any whimsical creation which goes against the tradition of the many types of yoga shastras (scriptures). It would be a shame to lose the precious jewel of liberation in the mud of ignorant body building.

K. Pattabhi Jois, Ashtanga Yoga Research Institute, Mysore, South India

This post is in honor of Guruji's birthday this week. I think he would have been 96. Wish I could have practiced with him but I am still hoping Iyengar hangs around long enough for me to go to India.

Dude was a strict teacher. That was written in 1995. I am not sure how he felt about the system of Power flow or Vinyasa in his latter years, but obviously he was against the systemized marketing of American yoga as Ashtanga based. i.e. see Gym Yoga previous post. Is that yoga? A lot of earlier protegees from the west have stayed true to what he taught and others came up with derivative yoga from Ashtanga to meet the desires of the West.

The point isn't that he is being mean or righteous but that he is honoring his teacher and what he was taught. In the yoga tradition the guru relationship is not to be messed with. You disobey, you are OUT. I see in his writing a traditionalist who believes what he teaches and what he was taught so I am glad there are people out there that stay in tradition. They keep the pure essence of the practice what it was meant to be. These teachings are ancient yet relatively recent in their presentation to the rest of the world.

I have been been spending a lot of time studying Anusara and I know John Friend was a student of Iyengar. Whenever I work with an Iyengar based teacher who has moved away from the tradition, I see a similar thread of knowledge passed down. Anusara is wildly popular and one of the fastest growing styles in the world. It seems like Friend is everywhere.

I enjoy all practice and my first classes were Ashtanga so still have a deep love of the practice. I am all over the place with what I practice and teach but always feel there is an essence to some aspect of real yoga in every style.

GYM YOGA

Got up and did elliptical at five am. I am currently splitting my day. Cardio in the morning and yoga at night. A lot of gym rats resist yoga because they don't feel it is a complete workout. I have done some research on this and the findings are that yoga doesn't pump the heart rate up like a good run does. No surprise there, although some vinyasa moves pretty fast. I am NOT a fast yogi myself. I like a deeper class, with longer holds, so I add cardio in. My goal this summer was a lot of biking, but due to the extended humidity I switched it back indoors for cardio.



The gym I go to has yoga and I look at the sign up sheets and normally they get one to three people although Spin looks packed. I looked at the yoga teachers credentials and it looked like she had pretty minimal training. I would bet the class is hatha style and doesn't contain a lot of strengthening moves.





I used to work out on weights and although I got stronger, especially in the legs, until I started doing a lot of planks, dolphins, and inversions in yoga, I just never got the upper body strength doing isolated movements with dumbbells. I have goten much stronger in the upper body incorporating more muscles into bigger movements using my body as resistance. It has taken a while but I am sure I am the strongest I have even been in the upper body. This is crucial for women especially who struggle with strong upper body.

As I look around the gym, I see a lot of NEED for good yoga. For example, when I see very elderly people on the elliptical plugging away at a slow walk I think it is great they are doing something, but they need more and I don't think weights are the answer. Doing yoga moves to open the shoulders and the front chest up would help them walk taller. They could do strength moves and get their upper body strong with planks on the wall.

When I see people with light dumbbells going through the motion I feel I have been in that trap before. I have to lift pretty strong weights to even feel my biceps so I have no clue what two pound weights do. Also for the younger people that are really in shape and obviously do a lot of weights/cardio, I see a lot of bad posture.

I auditioned once for a gym yoga class and didn't get the job. It was early in my teaching career. They didn't want to breath and seemed to want to do more jerky core movements on the back that strain the neck and don't really teach you to USE your Core.

NOT IN MY CLASS

Gym has etiquette rules just like yoga studios do although they are not spelled out. Some common ones that I see:

1. Two people talking LOUD on cardio equipment so I can't hear my music on my Bose headphones.
2. Running or walking flat footed. Ouch to the knee, hip, and ankle joints.
3. Smoking a cigarette outside the gym. (I didn't actually see this but my husband did.)
4. Eating hash browns at McDonalds after your workout. (I ran in for a coffee once and saw an older man doing this who had just been at my gym.) Not technically etiquette but caught ya!
5. Obvious one in the pic. Talking loud on the cell phone. People do this everywhere though and I am always surprised how much they 'share' for the eavesdroppers.
6. Cothes that cover parts that need to be covered. (This is actually a huge issue in yoga too! I see A LOT that I don't need to.)
7. Hitting on people or talking to me when I am on the elliptical. Take it elsewhere especially if you are holding equipment up.
8. Using drugs or alcohol before you come to the gym. I have had this in yoga. I had two women last year admit to me that they had been to happy hour before my class. They giggled and talked through class and I have no clue why they thought I was okay with it. I have a book I am reading on 12 steps and yoga that I will be reviewing soon. Anyway. INAPPROPRIATE.

I am sure there are more. Future post: When studio yoga becomes Gym Yoga. Not appropriate for all of my audience!

RECENT CANNING

I have already canned all the beans we will have and last night started on pickles. There will be more pickles. And I cut back on growing cucumbers this year too from last year but they will be pretty thick this year. I planted two types of cukes, one that I liked for pickles and the other, not so much. The one type turns yellowish and the nice ones are dark green on the outside. I need to find the seeds and figure it out. They will all taste well.

Tomatos will be my biggest crop. We have a zillion and a lot of different types. I planted three plants with a variety of small tomatos and we eat those on a daily basis. One is a round yellow cherry and they are just starting to ripen. With the sunny days we have I can actually look out at the back yard and see them ripening over a period of several hours. The other small one I like is a red grape tomato. It is really firm and is not too big. Picking them warm out of the garden is amazing. My husband eats them as he mows the lawn and goes back and forth. He grabs a handful when he goes by the garden. There will be about a billion small ones.

I was reading the Stryker book last night and my first impression is that this book will be popular with Western yogis. Using the eastern Hindu philosphy, he talks about how to live a rich and fulfilled yogic life without becoming an ascetic monk who takes a vow of chastity, poverty, etc. It is tantric. We have to live in the real world. He talks about the different relationships we have in our life and that part of our dharma is to come to terms with them, whether they are mother/daughter, husband/wife, or boss/worker. There is a lesson in all of these relationships and they can all lead us to a higher wisdom. Running away from them sounds good but realistically we can't. I know I would like to run away a LOT from some relationships and the difficulties inherent in them. I would be a good ascetic. Heck, I raise my own food so I could even avoid the grocery stores.

Again, the thing I love about the book, as well as the Freeman book, is that these are total asana yogis and yet their books are much deeper than move your left hip back two inches etc. That is for yoga class and that stuff is all good and really opens you into deeper levels of concentration and awareness, but how do you move off the mat?

NEW SITE COMING

I have been busy today building my blog in a new permanent place. Look for that next week. I am excited about it as well as some design work I want to have placed in the site. It is a process and I have a direction I want to move into that I will reveal more about later.

Above is a picture of Richard Freeman, an esteemed yoga teacher. Primarily an Ashtangi, I look forward to doing a silent retreat with four teachers later this year and he is one of the primary teachers. Obviously a very accomplished asana yogi, I am reading his book, THE MIRROR OF YOGA. There is no asana involved in this book. He delves into the spiritual pursuit of yoga and makes a good case for asana as the vehicle towards enlightenment and presence. It is not a light read. I would recommend it for students familiar with the sutras. He is a beautiful writer and I find myself reading passages over and over. It resounds of the philosphy of Buddhism and I connected to it because of my training with Tias Little, who is also a part of the retreat. Check the book out here:



As I have said I am a mulitasker (unfocused person) and just order the following book on Kindle which is also written by a strong asana based yoga teacher but is more about contemplation. I have heard great things about Rod Stryker and recently took a strong class from one of his students. The book is called The Four Desires and is more based on traditional Hindu yoga philosphy. I am guessing the dharma path is similar to Freeman's so will look forward to cmparing the two in a later blog. Here is the link:



I also changed the blog so you can leave comments if you choose. If there is anything else you wish covered in the world of yoga, gardening, canning, politics, just asked. I have really been biting my tongue on politics lately.

HOME PRACTICE - SEE WHAT HAPPENS

I gravitated to home practice out of necessity and will. Necessity due to the constraints of time equals if I want to take a class today I am going to have to tack on additional driving and preparation time and I don't have that time. Will due to equaling I am not always getting what I need in class and need to refine my practice.

Setting up a home practice involves, first of all, well putting a mat down on the floor. The next hurdle is what do I do? This is the most perplexing issue for people comtemplating a home practice. Luckily there are a lot of options. You can practice your favorite studio class. If you can't remember the poses or sequence of your favorite class, you can always buy a dvd or find an online streamed class. There are many options and this at least gives you a structure.

You can always start with sun salutations. That is a normal yoga warm up and a lot of times it will lead you into following your intuition. For me, a few sun sals move me into a place where I can access my intuition. Maybe I decide to focus on balance poses. One day last week I did almost all inversions. Of course, this method will be harder for a new practitioner, but you can always start somewhere. Just sitting on your mat might lead you into some nice hip stretches or core work.

My main problem at home is FOCUS. I don't have a lot of focus to begin with. Also, I am a NOTORIOUS muli-tasker so a lot of times I find that my practice at home can involve laundry, cooking dinner, vacuuming the hall, wiping a floor, and weeding the garden too on really unfocused days. Luckily I RECOGNIZE when I start losing focus and then I resort to dvds. I have a large library of great dvds from all my favorite master teachers. Even if I never get a chance to go to a training or workshop with teachers I admire, I can get a little taste of it at home.

Even though a lot of people have no interest in home practice, I usually get a lot of questions on students immersed in daily practice who have an occasion where they can't get to studio, like a vacation or a business trip. You can always use google to see if there is a studio you can visit. I have found this to be a lot of fun and usually going to a new studio is a great learning experience. Also since the yoga community is always so warm and welcoming I always feel at home in a studio when I am away from home.

But remember, if you are going somewhere with no studio, mats are mobile. Take one with you and destress in meditation or do some sun sals on the beach or in your hotel room just to get into your breath and body. Follow your intuition and see what happens. You might access your great internal teacher - YOU.

VISMAMITRASANA

This was the apex pose in Noah Maze's class on Friday and I did it for the first time. The key was in the preparation. I had the similar experience with Noah that I had the first time I took a workshop with Steve Emmerman and Talya Ring from Turbodog and they talked me into Eka Pada Koundinyasana, which was successful. I wasn't even that strong in Bakasana and here I am in a harder arm balance.

It made me believe that anyone that can do Bakasana can learn any arm balance based on their level of practice and flexibility but Vismamitrasana was really fooling me.
So breaking it down it basically is a side plank, a deep hamstring openener, and a deep spiraling of the spine. Add in some shoulder flexibility. All of those things are really strong points in my practice.

So the key from Noah's class is the set up. He had us a do an exercise in the sequencing class on poses to build into a balance pose and then he incorporated it later in his class. Sneaky of him. I like. While I was brainstorming to figure out the poses that warm up to the standing balance poses I was pretty spot on with what he did in his class, but didn't realize that was a pose that also built into Visma. Genius! It worked for me.

So I tried in my Saturday am class and a lot of students were successful or very close to it. Most important I hope they were closer than they thought they would get. That is key. It isn't important to get in the pose, but to find the point of struggle in the practice, whatever it is, where everything stops. Then you have to stop and look at what your mind and heart are sayng. Of course if you say I CAN'T, YOU WON'T. You figure out what you CAN do RIGHT now, then you proceed. That is the success of yoga. Finding the moment of success, struggle, epiphany, anguish and stop and LOOK at it. It just is. Then ask where do I go from here. What are my choices.

Today I am practicing at home and working on deep hip openers for the theme NEXT week. I will continue to work on Visma and other stuff this coming week.

I have to go can my beans now. Happy Sunday!

DID YOU WORK YOUR CORE TODAY?

Find the nearest tree and work the Core today.

HARVEST

It is not even August but the canning will commence tomorrow. Sigh. I love the results but this is a lot of rewarding work. It is one of those duties that you fulfill and it manifests as something worthwhile and tangible. You can hold it in your hand as the veritable fruits of your labor. Last year I filled up my pantry and everyone was impressed with it.

I think canning makes a lot of sense and for a lot of people in my age group it brings a lot of memories back to childhood when moms and grandmas canned their own jams, beans, pickles, etc. My husband lived on a farm so it was a way of life.

Although I do not NEED to grow my own food it brings it closer to home and let's face it, good food it not cheap. Neither is gardening. But I am sure I am saving money. The best thing about it is that is so nourshing to open something in the dead of winter and be able to recall the freshness of newly picked produce. It is delicious. It is so much better than anything I buy at the store.

I don't have time to hang around the farmer's market but that is a good source of fresh local produce. It is usually expensive. In a few weeks we will go and pick the organic berries that make up my raspberry jam. I never buy jam from the store. I rarely buy tomatos any more. I am eating them fresh this time of the year, and will use them in stews and soups etc the rest of the year. Store bought tomatos, well, they SUCK.

I went to Moksha yesterday and took an amazing 2.5 hour Anusara class with Noah Maze. I can't move my arms today from all the side planks and variations. Loved it. He got me into poses I have struggled with and it is his sequencing and prep. He preps you and sequences you for your level. Amazing teacher. I will definitely be exploring more Anusara workshops.

I am tired today so going to rest and then out for dinner.

More yoga tomorrow on the blog.

OFF TOMORROW

Tomorrow I won't be posting because I teach my early 8:30 am Rockstar Intermediate Class and then I am off to Moksha Yoga in Chicago for a workshop (spending spree in the boutique) with Noah Maze. I am going ALONE. I think I will take pics of said Rockstar class tomorrow for the blog.

I love going to Moksha for workshops. They have the best. Every weekend there is a great workshop. I would go all the time if I lived there and would be a workshop junky. Here is the link to their events/workshops:

http://mokshayoga.com/eventsall.html

They also have the BEST retail. I always buy yoga clothes there. They have brands outside of the normal Lululemon/Hardtail/Alo. They usually carry a known line there but there are always several others that I am not familiar with. I bought the coolest pants and top a few years ago with huge elephants (Ganesh) on them that I wear for pajamas.

It is also a chance for me to go where I can just engage fully in practice and learning. So it definitely takes me out of my box.

This am I started with a long session on the elliptical on the gym. The gym was packed this morning at five am. I suppose it is because it is too hot to go outside although I do see runners, walkers, and bikers out super early before it gets way to bad.

This weekend I will probably be canning beans and will provide pictures. There are way too many out there for John and I to eat so I will send him out there to pick and then I will can, which is great to do when you have the air conditioner on. Not so great if it is hot and you don't. We will also have a trillion tomatos this year. During the hot spell we water every night but pretty soon dinner will be cukes and tomatos with balsamic and something grilled, burned, and dragged over the grill. I love end of summmer with harvesting but it is also a lot of work.

The results are amazing. I love the end of the season fully stocked pantry with pickles, beans, tomatos, jams, and carrots for the winter.

YOGA SHOES

These shoes remind me of ballroom dancing shoes. I knew there was a way I could incorporate my ever expanding dancing skills into yoga. I could brand it into BallGaRoom Dancing. YoBallroom Dancing. Any ideas? I can't do the bind to get into this pose and I wish I had worked on it during all of those hundreds of Bikram classes I did. I could have practiced the bind in what Bikram refers to as Tadasana instead of folding my hands in Namaskar. Probably would have gotten yelled at though since it isn't proper Bikram.

As I have stated, lotus type of hip rotations are a struggle for me. Practicing these types of movements standing as well as sitting are a great way to practice and expand the whole area of flexibility into the hip joint. I love standing pigeons and they are much harder than the normal one laying on the floor.

I have students who can get into this pose with no problem. They can bind and are flexible in the hip rotators AND the hamstrings. So this is a BIG opener pose. It is very Ashtanga Primary Series, which I love. I couldn't do it when I practiced only Ashtanga either.

The SHOES though take it to a new level.....allowing you to stretch a little higher in the hamstrings and really releasing the low back. Very pretty in the heels! Don't try this at home!

My practice was very basic Tias Little today, which is very Ashtanga/Iyengar based and always makes me more mindful about standing poses we do every day. It is very easy just to move through them not staying conscious to what the pose really is doing. Standing poses root you into the lower chakras AND open the hips, inner leg, and outer leg TIGHT fascia, which really helps to open you when you get to the seated poses.

I am signing up for a weekend with Tias in November which is a weekend of Anatomy of the Chakras. Can't wait.

No heels in class this week!

FRIDAY WORKSHOP

I am going to part of this workshop at Moksha on Friday. There are two sections, one on Anusara sequencing and a long vinyasa class. My interest has been tweaked lately in Anusara and although I doubt I will attend the long training, I am hoping to get the flavor of it from this workshop. Who knows. Maybe I will get hooked into the whole thing. Anusara training is extensive and takes a long time and I am almost up for a challenge.

Sequencing is always interesting to me anyways because it is the fun part of teaching. I love coming up with new themes and new teaching methods. I think it is VITAL for teachers of yoga to continue to train after their 200 hour. There are so mnay great teachers out there and I have worked with a lot of varieties of yoga and teachers.

Someone asked me a few weeks ago what 'style' I teach. I couldn't even give an answer. After the Forrest Advanced training I was teaching very Forrest styled classes, but now I would not say most of my classes are Forrest. They have elements of Forrest, but I guess the best answer is Mutt Yoga.


Devising your own 'style' would take years and it would probably be very organic for a long time. I probably like the kind of yoga class Tias Little teaches but I haven't taken enough of his training to really be able to translate it into my classes. I have somewhat but will be doing more later. I am taking some more training with him in December and next April. I will probably eventually have done all of his training.

Last night I practiced ball room dancing yoga. Ha ha. My husband and I take lessons. We are actually getting pretty good. It was so AWKWARD and CLUNKY at first. I have pictures of our teachers, Pam and Bojan at Fred Astaire above.

Pam is the blonde in the pic with her partner and Bojan is dancing with the chick in the yellow dress. Isn't Pam GORGEOUS with her partner/fiance. They are really great teachers. Bojan dances SO light. He has taught my husband a lot about leading and he likes yoga too.

Anyway ballroom dancing has retaught me how it is for beginners in yoga but like anything else it takes practice. Yoga is still my first love though but I sure would love to learn some hip hop dancing moves too.

See ya on the dance floor.

6 AM CLASS

WOW The 6 am class this morning at http://www.innerfireyoga.com/ was like a master class. Everyone was in sync and the asana was beautiful. A little short on breath though, but I feel it is the teacher's responsibility to get them in to breath. Normally this class is very good on their ujjayi, but we have a heat wave and with the humidity I think they may be preserving themselves. Maybe they are unconsciously trying to create a little less heat in their bodies. Which makes sense. It was a strong class and they ended calm. Which is a good way to approach Monday morning.

In addition, I moved them slower and stronger. Without a lot of sun salutations so they should have gone a little deeper into asana.

I do work at an unheated studio in addition to Inner Fire, http://www.blissflowyoga.com/. It is funny, because my hot yoga students can't IMAGINE not practicing in heat. My Bliss students get hot and sweaty though so I think you need to be aware that there isn't a right or wrong or better method. Everyone has their preference. I am not married to heated yoga in any way, shape, or form. I can sweat in my air conditioned home if I am breathing right and moving a lot. I did a LOT of inversions at home yesterday and was VERY warm.

So, beautiful morning to all the am yogis. You guys could have been in a Yoga Journal shoot. Awesome group.

BUDDHA GARDEN TODAY

Well it is much better than last year. I went out and trimmed a little and weeded but definitely a little wild but still beautiful. A few things are dried out but I will still have a few flowering plants this year. The baby's breath I planted is tall and green, but still no flowers. I have a lot of purple coneflowers this year. They are thick and flowering. I really had to battle the rabbits for those. The first year I planted them they keep eating them down to the root and then they must have changed their minds and went for something else.

I planted a beautiful flower behind the lavendar and I will have to move that out in the front next year. The neighbors are enjoying it. I don't remember what it was but it is thick and still has beautiful purple flowers.

I need to do a little mid summer mulching. I noticed the better gardeners doing that this week. I have several houses with gardens I admire and I stalk them for ideas.

Mulching is the best for weeding. I did a lot of it this year and the weeds are manageable. Now that we have this heat wave coming I know I won't get out to tend for a week or so. Maybe for some shorter durations. But as a mode of meditation I can't think of a better metaphor than weeding out the extraneous items you want rooted out.

FOREARM BALANCE

I don't know if my students yesterday are feeling the deep backbends today. I am, so today am focusing on upside down and pelvic/shoulder stability.


The picture on the left shows a guy holding forearm balance but his shoulders aren't stable. He might have the strength to hold the pose, but his elbows are way to wide and you can see his upper body sinking. Because he is not properly locked into the shoulder girdle, he is in danger of injury or falling.

The pic on the right shows a great set up for forarm balance. She is stepping in close to her elbows in dolphin, without sinking into the shoulders. She is keeping her core/legs strong. This pose is a good warmup for full forarm balance. Holding dolphins longer and working on strengthening the whole body in breath will make you crazy strong. It takes a lot of patience. I could not do forearm balance a year ago and now with a lot of core dolphin work, I know how to patiently move into the pose. The key is patience. Dolphins with legs up strong are hard with a straight knee but they teach you where to move the energy. When you get tired, you have to adjust your thinking. You have to ask how you can get back in the pose. Do you need to really come down or do you need to use your legs.

It is crazy hot in Wisconsin now so I will practice a lot in my cool house this week. So this morning I will focus on upside down. Later this afternoon I might pull out Rodney Yees's Advanced Hip opener dvd and get into the hips and release low back from yesterday. I love this dvd. Rodney does not rush you through anything. Do not be afraid of the word advanced. The hip opener sequence is great for all levels.



I will have more updates on Buddha garden and a blog about transitioning out of mid summer. I felt a huge - SHIFT - energetically the last few days. I have been reading a new book that I can't put down so will review that too.

YESTERDAY I TAUGHT A CLASS OUTSIDE...

Lots of people showed up. Wish that blonde girl could learn to use her bandhas! Hey assistant, get her to stabilize the pelvis and shoulder girdle. Please bend your knee OVER the ankle. Rotate the front hip out. Girlfriend must be in her first class, but man she knows how to work the hair in Warrior 2.

TODAYS FOCUS - BACKBENDS

Today I am breaking up my practice into two parts, an hour this morning and an hour later focusing on backbends. This morning I spent the hour warming up, twisting and focusing on core. After working with Ana, I am a strong believer in preparing the spine for deeper backbends. Also from working with Forrest yoga, I realize that a backbend is intricate and needs more focus than just bending back.

The rib cage needs to be expanded, the core warmed up, the shoulders open, and spine needs to be supple. Going into deep backbends early in practice is energizing and feels strong, but really opening into the backbend takes a lot of work.

I am trying to work on the viparita above and am using blocks to support the sacrum. While I can lift off, my shoulders are still a little too tight and I need to work on upper thoracic stretching to really expand the chest as in this version.

This afternoon I will work on the actual backbends. I will rewarm the areas I worked and then work on shoulder flexibility. After several sets of wheels, I will work on viparita and probably end with inversions.

HOME PRACTICE

Today I am back on track from not doing a yoga session since the class in Chicago last Tuesday! This is a tribute home practice to Ana. I love her new book and when I did her training last summer, I love that she took "I can't" out of my language. Even "I can't right now" sounds lame, but I don't make excuses and I don't believe I have limits.

By the way it is okay to have times when you can't prioritize what you should. You learn from it. My perfect day of the week is Sunday morning. It is the only day I don't have to go anywhere. I spend a leisurely two hours practicing, then a little meditation and the rest of the day is always great.

So what to work on today? I am focusing on a variation of Eka Pada Bakasana that I would like to teach my students. It takes a little more core so will continue to work hard on Core. I have a slight stomach ache from the residual anxiety that usually comes in a form of numbness. Numbness is bad because it means I am blocking out physically/mentally/spiritually/all of the above. Forrest Core always drives it out.

LET"S GO OUTSIDE AND PLAY

SEEKING BALANCE

Crazy people need not apply. Ha!

Balance is one of my favorite yoga themes in yoga asana class. I find balance poses, in general, can be some of the hardest for new students. People already know coming into class where their flexibility and strength challenges lie, but balance is elusive until you try them. I love a good hard balance sequence. I think I am actually pretty strong in balance poses, no doubt from the 100s of Bikram classes I have taken. They have given me a good foundation for balance practice, because if you have done a lot of Bikram consistently you gain the focus and strength required to understand how balance works and how to work balance.

And then there are days that you feel you have tennis balls attached to the bottoms of your feet. The thing about difficult balance days is that, well, they balance out. Usually the next day you nail the poses like you have two by fours attached to your feet and you can hold the poses endlessly.

Of course theming balance in practice to balance in life is a no brainer. Everyone struggles with balance in life, between work, family, home, social life, yoga practice. Who can fit it all in. Right now I am out of yoga balance because the last week has been so insane. So my yoga goal this week is balance and prioritizing my practice. Step one, blog daily about what I practice, so starting tomorrow I will share my daily practice on the blog. And we will see how....

It all balances out.

HANDSTAND PRESS

I love this pic of handstand press up. Three points to notice:

1. Shoulders in front of wrists.

2. Elbows straight.

3. Legs active and feet strongly flexed.

I am sure her bandhas are full out engaged and yeah don't forget the drishti between the index fingers. Keep pressing into those hands and one day the feet lift off the floor!

KARMA YOGI AND OVER THE HILL

Not sure if Bono has ever done a down dog and doubt you would see him in a Bikram class but nonetheless he is one of my yoga idols. As a karma yogi, one whose yoga is the yoga of seva, or service, he is an example to everyone. The definition of yoga service would be to follow your dharma without expecting anything in return. He is among others, Al Gore or Angelina Jolie who do good work for the sake of good work. We forget these people sometimes as we idolize the teachers who teach the yoga of asana and pranayama if we are lucky but yogis don't have to have a sticky mat. Pretty cool right. I think people who live like this are truely enlightened. You can see Bono lighting up that screen directly over the stage at the U2 concert from July 5 at Chicago Soldier Field.

I was right under it. I have many great phone shots from the concert. My husband stood out in the hot sun for two hours and then I met him to get in the inner circle. We waited all afternoon to get this place. I have to say this was worth it but definitely the LAST ROCK CONCERT WE GO TO. We decided we are offically over the hill for this. I am exhausted and sore two days later from all the standing. It was totally worth it as I LOVE U2, but standing for hours in close surroundings made me nauseous, panicky, and stressed. My feet hurt and my husband was tired too. So at least we went out BIG and had FUN.

I really have never felt like I was aging or getting too old for much until this occasion so this is definitely a key point in my life. It made me evaluate how I want to grow old. I don't want to give up but am not going to push the edge. I want to to enjoy every moment but not feel like I have to do everything or get things done. I think this is key as we age. And not to live in regret. You can't do everything. You have to pick and choose. You have to decide what is worth it. I am actually looking forward to slowing down, maybe not working some day. Maybe find more karma yoga to fill my time, whatever it may be.