A Laghu like this

should not be followed by a drop-back that looks like this:



Oh, and Laksmi, this one's for you........I ought to call it "Timbeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerrrrrrrr..................!::



OK, you can smirk now, all you backbending prodigies.

YC yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

Somebody Loves My Blog!

This post from Em Dy really makes my weekend. Thank you, Em! In turn, here is my list of 10. May you spread blog love all around…
1. Chuckie’s A Day in the Life…. - for writing not just about your showbiz life but for showing us your humanity and spirituality in the face of adversity…
2. [...] yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

Pat Metheny Trio

Are you going with me? is a great example of how much this awesome guitarist is, well, awesome. As in someone to watch and listen to with awe. As I did last night. How could I have forgotten to mention that?

Last night the husband and I took in the Pat Metheny Trio's concert at Purchase College here in Westchester. Purchase is practically Pat's homebase at this point, even though he's a Missouri boy by roots.

Pat Metheny is the only musician that I follow around, if at all. I check out his concert schedule and if he's playing in the area, I will buy tickets. It doesn't happen all that often. But I got to see him twice in the past year, once at a tribue to the musician, Steve Reich, where it was just Pat playing a Reich composition before the Kronos Quartet took the stage, and then finally Reich and his many-piece orchestra.

I can't explain what it is about Pat Metheny's music that connects so deeply wih me. Obviously, I am not the only one. He has a career that spans something like three decades, and he's been awarded something like seventeen Grammy awards. He's played with Bowie. He WAS the music for the recent film, "A Map of The World."

I first discovered his music when I was about 16, and I was enamored with a boy named Stuart Feldman, whose group of kind-of-dirt-baggy friends all worshipped "Pat". At the time, there were not many albums. And what there was was, to this day, what I like the best. Evocative, poetic. Often acoustic. When I first got to Tufts, I remember going over to one of those second-hand record stores in Harvard Square and grabbing up "New Chattaqua" and falling deeply in love with the sound, especially the incredibly literal (if music can be literal, this one certainly is), "Daybreak".

New Chattaqua is the soundtrack of my freshman year of college and always will evoke the emotions of first being away from home, of autumn in New England, of the smell of beer and cheesesteak hogies, of my infatuation with another boy named, Tim, who really couldn't have cared much about me at all, and who definitely didn't appreciate Pat. Tim was a frat boy who had grown up in Apple Valley, Minnesota but who had moved to the slightly downtrodden Quincy (pronounced "Quinnzy"), Mass when his mom divorced. I thought his accent was adorable. My friend from across the hall, Anne, couldn't stand Tim, called him a "face-man", for his seeming insincerity.

Tim was the first and almost only boy who told me I needed to lose weight (there is one other, and I am still married to him), and he ended up marrying a tall, skinny wisp of a girl, he next girl he dated after me. Not that he didn't turn up like a bad penny now and then even after he was already seeing Susan. To this day, I still think of him every time I consider buying a pair of Levi's 501's because that was what he wanted me to wear, except that by the end of my freshman year, with all those cheesesteak hogies, I was too curvy at the time to pull off boy's jeans.

I really have no business reviewing a concert, but I've checked, and no one else has written about last night's concert, at least not yet, at least not on the internet. So, let me just say, it rocked. I wish he played more of his old stuff. But everyone says that at concerts. Performers will always play their new stuff, I suppose, because it excites them, and because it primes the listeners' ears for when the new album comes out. He did a wonderful piece that he wrote after Hurricane Katrina, a tribute to the people of New Orleans, and it reminded me of his old albums. And he also did a duet with Christian McBride, his amazingly talented bass player, of "My Funny Valentine". They made it their own. And at the end, he rocked out, as in ROCK. I had no idea he was interested in playing rock guitar. I think there was a lot of suprise out there in the audience. Not sure if I like this new development. But it doesn't matter because I want to watch Pat Metheny play anything he likes playing. Because watching him play what he likes playing is pure joy.

YC yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

Hatha Yoga Class - Yoga Poses for Menstruation

A new article, Menstruation and Yoga, by Kreg Weiss is now available detailing the reasons why women should avoid certain yoga poses, like yoga inversions, during menstruation. This article offers an anatomical understanding of how inversions can aggravate menstrual symptoms along with a list of recommended yoga postures that can help ease these symptoms. [...] yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

I am in India Now

India is the home of yoga and I am visiting here for the next month. I hope to share some insights with you during this trip and show you some pictures soon. So come back in the next few days
In India one of the most famous prayers is the Gayatrii Mantra or Gayatrii Rk. Here [...] yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

Greening Coffee and Tea - Part II

6. Loosen Up
Tea bags and coffee filters can be useful but are mostly unnecessary. Great coffee can be made at home with a reusable filter or a stovetop espresso maker. A quality tea infuser can last a lifetime and replace an untold number of (questionably compostable) tea bags. If you do use filters and bags, [...] yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

Krounchasana

"Next week Krounchasana."

That will be, for me, like getting Supta Konasana or Upavishta Konasana. It's just too within my comfort level to be exciting. Pasasana is very doable - I can get a finger bind on my own now, with heel up, though, and by walking my hands towards each other using a strap. But that's how I learned to bind Supta Kurma on my own, so I am sure I am on the right track. Notwithstanding how doable Pasasana is, it is still a very intriguing posture for me. There are so many pieces of that puzzle. There's the twist (duh), but a twist with a bind that is doubly longer to get around than the twist with a bind in Mari C - it's two legs, instead of one. And instead of sitting, you're squatting. So, that adds an element of balance. And there's the achilles lengthening action going on. And the lengthening of the side bodies and opening of the thoracic spine and the deep internal rotation of the arms. Finally, and this came as a huge surprise to me: there is some serious leg strengthening going on.

My legs are brutally sore these days. I feel like I've been running up and down stairs. I think it's the combination of spending lots of time in Pasasana (usually, I put myself in it, or attempt to, once or twice, and then I get help...) and working hard to stand up from backbends.

I kind of new a new pose was coming. How did I know? It's always this way for me when I am about to get a new pose: I get incredibly burnt out and bored with what I am doing, and I start doing my home practice more often. No, I don't think that my teachers start to get worried that I am leaving them or losing interest. I just think that there's a correlation between my readiness to add a new pose and a waning of my interest in being in the shala. I mean, right now, I could go days without any assists, except in Pasasana. Many days, I get no help in Supta K anymore because I can pretty reliably bind it on my own. Today, not so much, because, well, every day is different, and I think that some days, I would rather NOT bind it on my own because being put into it is soooooo much deeper.

But I digress. With very little to get help on, it gets to be kind of much to schlep out to the shala, driving 35 minutes through back roads or 40 minutes of highway (yeah, the highway takes longer because it takes longer to get to the highway). So, I end up doing some practices at home, and by the time I come back, my teacher tells me it's time for a new pose.

I chalk it up to my own understanding of what my body is ready for. And since it is my body,it stands to reason that I would "get it" before my teacher does. But usually, the time lag is only a matter of days or weeks.

So, Krounchasana. Yay. I really really really want to start working on what comes next though - the backbends. Because I like to be all warmed up for my backbending, which went amazingly well today, I might add.

Here's what I think is going on there:

1. I finally learned to press down just a teeny bit harder on my big toe when in up dog. Doing so releases that pinchy feeling in my low back. Technically speaking, what it does is it internally rotates the thighs.

2. I finally figured out why people go all penguin toed when standing up for backbends: the turnout only LOOKS like a turnout. The feet turn out, but the legs rotate inward, putting hard pressure on....what else but...the big toes! I had no understanding of this for such a long time. Now, it would be MUCH better to have the feet point forward and for the internal rotation to happen energetically, but, well, that's a lot to ask of someone whose backbends look like mine. Have you SEEN those painful updogs?

3. I finally realized that I am NEVER, at least not presently, going to improve my backbending via PRESSING UP into Urdvha Dhanurasana. Let's call that the "Basic Backbending" portion of practice. Before dropbacks. I have seen better backbenders than me really really juice it up in the Basic Backbending, leading up to some lovely stand-ups. But in my case, the Basic Backbending just serves to scrunch my shoulders. How much better it all feels when I drop back! Or when I come into Urdvha D from headstand or even from a handstand (yes, I can tock, but please, let's not get all pissed off about it). Or when I walk my hands down a wall, keeping my legs as straight as possible for as long as possible. Yeah, yeah, I do the stupid, jackassed Basic Backbending because it is part of the program. And I evn stand up from a that last Basic Backbend, like a good little Ashtangini. But the real juice, the real work, the real release is in everything else that I am doing, especially, the Laksmi-magic-half-dropback, and the wall-walking. Then I do my pressups, and....voila. I stood up twice on my own today. One was with the back hand drag. But the other...it was the best standup I have ever done. It was ALMOST normal.

Almost normal. Music to my ears.

Then I came home and spackled my front door with some concoction called "plastic wood". Then I got a call from someone's handiman saying, "I have Lewis. Is there a reward?" Oh crap. Yeah, well, how about 20 bucks. OK. I go to pick Lewis up, and it appears he has a sprained ankle. If only dogs could talk. I wish I could know what adventure Lewis had today. And if it was worth the sprained ankle. Do dogs even have ankles?

Time for a quick bath and then it's off to pickup the kids at "Safe at Home" class, where the moms and dads send their children to learn how to deal when mom's not home and there's no doorman.

YC yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

Impermanence

Yesterday the gardener blew all the fallen leaves off of the lawn and into the woods alongside my yard. It was a beautiful sight to behold. Gone was the parched grass of the mid summer, the browned and bare patches that had been burnt by the sun and eaten in secret binges by the four-legged residents who come out only at night. What remained was a velvet blanket of deep, jade green. When the sun went down, and the nearly full moon rose in the sky, the colors of fall were gone, but the pristine landscape remained.

I just returned to my house after a nice, long yoga practice to discover that the grounds are literally covered, not just sprinkled with, but covered, with yellow and orange leaves. Maybe I'm naive, or just new to this country lifestyle. Maybe my gardener is laughingly counting his money today. And maybe I miss the way the grass looked yesterday, suspended for a moment in pure, bright green. But I'm glad that I took the time to enjoy it. And I have to say that what I see today here is beautiful as well. Different. But beautiful just the same.

YC yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

Too much pitta? Or is it just hot in here?

On Thursday, Oni asked me if I had considered seeing Debbie, the resident Ayurvedic consultant at the CT Shala.

"You mean about the pitta?" I asked somewhat rhetorically, since I was dripping, no, gushing sweat from every pore.

I have to say that since I have been practicing at the CT Shala, I have been a veritable sweat factory. Two Surya Namaskar A's, and the schvitz is already rolling. Five in, and I'm already ready to roll out my Mysore rug. By the time I get to Padangustasana, I have to close my eyes to keep the sweat from pouring in.

I kind of like the sweat. It makes me feel clean when I'm done with practice. But I can see how it might be indicative of some sort level of pitta imbalance, especially since last winter, I felt quite differently. I couldn't get a good sweat going at all, and my head was spacey. Too much vata.

I guess.

I mean, how much of this is real? And how much is it just another version of old wives' tales? Or homespun voodoo magic? Lose your keys, and you have too much vata, lose your temper and you have too much pitta. Sounds suspiciously like a good se of excuses as I sit here and think about it. I mean, to say that I was late to dinner last night because of the earth's orbit into the Haley's comet meteor shower...well, I don't know. As the words were coming out of my mouth, I realized that I sounded like a nut. I also know that I sound like a nut when I extoll the virtues of young coconut and chai tea for balancing the "doshas".

I will say, without any shame or doubt, that young coconut is a miracle hangover cure. Doshas shmoshas. The stuff has potassium and it's far more organic than gatorade.

But I digress. Along the same lines, is spending more time backbending making me resposible for my walking out of the shala feeling kind of socially vulnerable? Or am I just making up reasons for things that just are what they are? When I was engaged in the deep opening up of the hips that is required for a good Supta Kurmasana and a flat-backed Badha Konasana A, I would attribute flashes of creativity to loosening the joints in my pelvis. There would seem to be a metaphorical connection between giving birth to babies and giving birth to, well, to ideas, I supposed. But again, was that just a bunch of hoodoo crap?

I feel cynical about this stuff right now. I feel as if it makes more sense to think less about why and just see it as how it is.

YC yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

As My Kids Fly the Coop…..

It takes getting used to but I think I am slowly learning the “let go” technique.
Our eldest daughter C1 just came back from a 5-day trip to Hong Kong with long-time high school friends (Gin, Pam, Cha, Meg) who also happen to be her schoolmates at the BLUE school. With them was their “friend-cum-bouncer-cum-bodyguard” Harold [...] yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

On Dreams, Backbends, and Yoga Mudra

Just the other night, in a dream, I did something I have never done before- - I stood up from a backbend without assistance. It was amazing. In practice the next morning, however, dreams did not become reality. I still need those two inches of plastic under my hands to get the [...] yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

Lululemon Beverly Hills Event Tomorrow (10/19)

Lululemon Athletica in Beverly Hills recently had to shut down because of a massive flood. They are reopened now, and, in celebration of surviving the flood, they are having an event tomorrow from 10-7. It’s also their one-year anniversary celebration.
There will be refreshments and live entertainment. I’ll be there from noon until about 1:00PM doing yoga [...] yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

Yoga Advice - Yoga and Weight Training

Can you tell me the best way to incorporate weight training and yoga? Is it advisable to do on same day - if so, what order? Every other day?
There are several approaches one can (or should) take when incorporating weight training and yoga. First, I would like to address the basic physiological principles with [...] yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

Super Soul Yoga

One of my favorite teachers, Raghunath Cappo, has started up a new yoga operation in Los Angeles. The current schedule is up on his website: www.supersoulyogala.com.
Right now, only Raghu and Prema (who does “yoga therapy) are holding classes. I and two other teachers hope to be doing some weekend classes at Super Soul Yoga, starting [...] yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

The End

I've taken a week to reflect (a little) on possible endings, yes, endings, for this blog.

Romantic

I enjoyed a long, leisurely breakfast surrounded by a circle of new and old friends. We ate fresh, hot muesli, curd, dosas. We ate fruit salads of every variety. We ate two different types of eggs. We had fresh milk and tea. We sat around a large wooden table on soft floor cushions, stretching our beings, trying to learn how to soak up small moments in time. The car arrived outside. It was white. Cars are usually white. And because it wasn't a rickshaw, I knew it was for me. As I waved goodbye, a light switched off inside of me, and I turned to look ahead to the road to come.

I slept the whole ride to the airport. I walked to the Kingfisher counter. I stared at the woman asking me for a ticket. She kept saying it and saying it and saying it and I kept not giving it to her.

The light turned back on.

"Actually," I said. "Can I change my ticket?"

I've never missed a flight and I've never tried to rearrange a ticket. For me, I start cooking a meal, I cook the meal, and then I eat it. But this time I was surprised to find how easy it was to just stop cooking. A friend recently told me about this San Fran mouse that can jump like 12 feet and mid air, turn 90 degrees. That's me. Born the year of the rat.

So this rat turned 90 degrees away from the USA. This rat jumped back into India.

Expected

I sat in the car going to the airport. I was amazed to find that I was at the exact limit of permit luggage weight (25 kilos). The plane took off and I was in a daze. I landed in Mumbai. The plane took off and I was in a daze. I landed in New York. I had no keys to my apartment. I had 25 kilos of luggage. I had jet lag. So, I went to practice.

I didn't know exactly where Eddie's was, but somehow, managed to navigate my way to the unmarked, second floor studio. My body buzzed from lack of sleep, airport funnyk, 24 hours of unused muscles, and the adrenaline of the "fight or flight" instinct surging through my veins as my body shifted from one side of the world to another, from one culture to another, from one teacher to another. And in that torrent of energy, I practiced. My body carved the air and I could feel the boundary where New York met the cloud of Mysore surrounding me.

Cop-out

As the car drove further and further from the place I've called home for the past few months, I thought of all the people I've met, all the things I've seen, all the things I've learned. I saw the landscape outside the car as if it were the first day again. I tried to pick out the things I was fascinated with on that first ride. As my eyes jumped from one thing to the next, I slowly drifted to sleep.

My eyes began to flutter open. I could see someone rolling out their mat to the right of me, and someone else beginning to walk away on my left. I arched my neck and moved to see the clock on the wall behind my head. I struggled to read what it said. "No, really?" I asked myself. I had been asleep for an hour. I sat up on my mat. There was one last person finishing up in the front of the Shala in New York.

I was so excited about my upcoming trip to Mysore that I had dreamt about it during what was supposed to be post-practice rest (savasana).

What is real? Maybe a little of all of them, maybe none of them. I have to keep a little of this magic to myself...

:)

yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

Keeping good company, an important part of yoga

It is not easy to follow a spiritual path in an age of materialism. You may be trying to improve yourself with yoga and meditation, but your neighbors, friends and even family members may be moving in a different direction.
One of the ways you can gain the strength needed to stick to your path is [...] yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

An Animated Childbirth Video

Childbirth is scary to most people. Movies depicting childbirth show women screaming in pain, shocking the senses of young and sensitive children. My girls have asked me in the past about this and I have always tried to be as candid with them about my experience giving birth to them while trying to explain it [...] yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

Meet Hillary - new yogini friend, great inspiration!

I met Hillary (Rubin) virtually through Elsie’s blog links. She and Elsie are both yoga instructors and podcasters. Elsie is based in California; Hillary is in Philadelphia. Philadelphia happens to be close to my heart as I lived there for 2 years while taking graduate studies.
Hillary, in particular, is a personal inspiration to many of [...] yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

Freedom from Braces — Not Yet!

Yesterday, I got the news from my ortho which I did not want to hear but expected. The long-awaited freedom from braces before the end of this year won’t happen.
Yes, these metal contraptions will still see the New Year!
In a previous post, I said I was so looking forward to having these come off [...] yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

They have some nerve.

My pecs, I mean. I lost track of where the comments were that i wanted to answer on the topic of backbends, so i hereby start a new thread to answer, in brief:

Julie is right - the surgery screws things up. But not irreversibly, i am convinced, or rather hypothesizing. I hope i am right. Unlike julie, my surgery happened before i discovered ashtanga, so i have no direct comparison regarding before versus after. I will say that i have never experienced any nerve dullness or sudden nerve re-awakening. On the other hand, under normal circumstances, my pain awareness threshhold is high. Perhaps that makes it hard for me to connect with the necessary feelings in my pecs.

Unlike julie, also, ustrasana is easy for me, as is lagu vaj and bhekasana. They don't add much to my mix for me because the problem is not my chest so much as my armpits. So, i guess it is about the insertion between pecs and...something else? Also, my delts are relatively overdeveloped, and so they seem to block my pits from opening up. Ustras does not address that.

I totally agree with julie though that we, she and i, that is, need to compensate with extra contraction of the spine, itself. I anticipate that this will be a long road, longer than if i were merely trying to soften tight muscles.

The ball is a huge help. HUGE!!! It forces me to shape my back in the way it needs to be shaped and molded. It gives me a template for reaching my arms up and back while in a back arch.

My bottom line: if i could learn supta k, i can do this too. Supta k seemed imposisible. At one time so did mari c. Now i can put myself in supta k and i clasp wrist in mari c and find pasasana logical and doable next step. Thus, the impossible can be possible.

Yc yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

I have a blog war hangover

I misbehaved. I am not the only one, but I can only apologize for my own words. I feel yucky.

I let myself get annoyed by Linda. Then I let my feelings turn into actions - writing things intended toward taking her down a peg. Someone else might have gotten hurt in all of this. The fact that I don't know whether or not he did makes it all the more regrettable. If I didn't know the effect of my words, then I should have been more mindful and just not said them.

You'd think that after 41 years on earth, including four spent in high school, and a decade on the park benches of the Upper East Side (a veritable hornet's nest of gossip), I would learn to shut my mouth when in doubt, or even to know when I'm in doubt.

Remorsefully,

YC yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

“Awakenings” At Bora — MOVED!

I blogged earlier about “Awakenings” at Boracay, the 1st Philippine Mind-Body Camp at the Boracay Tropics.
Nap Quesada, its organizer, texted me earlier that the event has been moved to coincide with the Bonifacio Day celebration on November 30-Dec. 2. This was in consideration of those visiting their loved ones on All Souls’ Day.
Deadline for registering [...] yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

OK, so, here I am at the wall. It's really sad.

My armpits are stuck in New York, while the wall is over there in Cuba. And you can't get to Cuba from New York.

This is my backbend after dropping back. Please ignore the sweat. It's really kind of gross, I know:

I want to do the work. I do. I really am not avoiding it. Anymore. I just suck at backbends. But maybe I don't always have to suck at backbends. I will try to take all the advice given. But to me, so much of it doesn't even feel possible. Straighten the legs? How? Push my chest toward the wall? HOW?

YC yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

I'm not talking about out-laws

So, let's say you live an hour from the theater district. And let's say you never saw much theater even when you lived and worked within walking distance. And let's say that your kids would rather have a fish hook stuck in their eyes than sit through a broadway show.

Now, let's say that a certain member of your family says to you, "I want to take your boys to see [insert broadway show here]. What do you think?". And let's say that you decide to be polite and say, "Oh, that might be nice. I will have to ask them if they want to go."

And then let's say said family member says: "I wonder how i will get the kids to the show, since you live in westchester now."

What would you do? Would you offer to drive an hour into the city to bring the kids to a show that they don't even care to see, and which you couldn't care less if they ever see? Or would you say, "Yeah, no, I guess it won't work out after all"?

Personally, I do not react well to indirectness, to manipulativeness or to gifts with strings attached. It reminds me of those time-share scammers who offer to comp your dinner if you just promise to show up at some sales presentation the next day, smack in the middle of your vacation. I would just as soon skip the free meal. Ya know?

I am sooooo annoyed. Not because i can't let the offense go, but because a certain other family member is more than happy to jump to the task of driving the kids into the city, despite that he can't be bothered/doesn't have the time to do any of the household chores that I have now taken upon myself to do. And if you catch my drift, this certain other family member is pretty hard to avoid at home. Hence my inability to "let it go", and my need to vent here.

Grrrrrrr.

Yc yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

For Vanessa, not my sister, the other one...

It's not pretty, but here it is. This is an example of my non-vanity. Note the pastey skin, the non-cute yoga attire, the unfinished family room background.

Yes, it's true. My backbend doesn't look one iota different from the way it looked a year ago. Or at least not in this photo. It is entirely possible that it looks somewhat better today, after Intro to Second class at the CT Shala, in which I managed every backbending pose except Kapotasana A, which, even with Val's assistance, saw me unable to touch fingertips to toes. THAT said, Kapo B was okay (the one with straight arms, hands on the floor), and I was pretty pleased with my Bhekasana. I've always had flexy knees. So flexy that they make up for non-flexy hip flexors and a chest that is just beginning to poke out from behind its armor.

I will try to swallow my pride and post some more backbending photos as I continue to plug away at backbending with more assistance than I had in the past. Maybe it will make the difference. Theoretically, it should.

Oh, and Posh-asana in class after NO marichi's and no standing poses after Parsvotanasana? NOT happening. Humbling. The girl next to me caught her wrists. I kept falling over, and I wasn't even binding. Val wasn't giving adjustments at this point - she was practicing with us, a la her teacher, Tim Miller. She began to walk around and give assists at Laghu Vajrasana, which is also quite easy for me. Hey, something should be, right?

Oni helped me stand up from backends too, an unexpected gift at the end of class. One thing I can say about the Yoga Shala CT, it is a giving place. And completely accessible. The teachers are entirely unmysterious. And that is, I cannot tell you how lovely. A teacher who speaks in full sentences, imagine! A teacher who doesn't just nod and smirk and answer questions with questions. I mean no disprespect to Sir - he is an amazing teacher. But it is a pleasant novelty to learn Ashtanga from someone who seems so very much on the same wavelength as myself.

YC

yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

My last class, my last day

I woke up this morning in the middle of a dream, interrupted. Was that really my alarm? Did I really have to get up? Just as I was convinced that ignoring the blaring sound and journeying back into dreamland was a viable option, something inside said, "Wake up! This is your last class!" I'm not sure, but I can probably say that as I turned to roll out of bed and switched off the alarm, I was making the grouchiest, most pained expression I was capable of. Sometimes I wish I had a hidden camera. I'm such a clown. I'd see myself and think, "Oh no, really?"

I did all my morning rituals, just the same as before. I trotted to class, avoiding eye contact, eyes burning to stay open, just the same as before. I fidgeted on my mat until Saraswati walked in to start class, just the same as before. And when she started the chant, I could hear and feel the vibration of the room, just the same as before, but this time, I realized that it wasn't forever. That, tomorrow, I wouldn't be here standing in this spot, listening to this chanting, feeling the breeze from that window. I realized that even when I wasn't here, someone else would be in this spot, and the chanting would still go on, just the same as before. For a brief moment, I could feel the presence of all the people in the room, and then all the people that had been in that room since I arrived in July, and then all the people who had ever been in that room, and then all the people who ever practiced with Guruji, and then Guruji practicing with Krishnamacharya...I know that there is no question, I have to come back, and me and Mysore, well, we'll be waiting for each other.

As for my last practice, it felt like my first day in that I was hyper aware that something was special, and different, and deserved really being paid attention to. I noticed how at once, my body was so tired and also so ready for anything. I noticed how my body has changed. I'm much stronger than before, and my body shape has developed accordingly. Some poses are a little harder than before, such as hands down in prasarita c, because of all the new muscles in my upper body. In the last three months, my strength has really developed, but my flexibility hasn't changed dramatically. I think that part of this is because I don't really get any adjustments, and that extra push is often going to take you deeper into something that you might otherwise just stay comfortable in.

I've learned so much practicing with the family and living in Mysore about myself, people, and the world. I feel like I was in a life rehab program and I'm about to step out the front door to see if anything really changed, or if the developments of the past few months will fall away from me like post-it notes when the sticky wears off.

I feel happy. I feel content. I feel like I have direction, and love, and friends, and family, and good health. I feel like the astrologer was right. That all the cards are there, we just have to be brave enough to play them. And I think that I can and I will and I think that I'm so glad that I made it out here at all. I think that if you have that spark somewhere inside you, that little voice that says, "I wonder...", you should listen. I think you should go for it, because it will change your world.

I'm taking a car from Ganesh at Anu's at 1pm this afternoon to the Bangalore Airport. From there, I fly to Mumbai/Bombay where I catch my overnighter to New York City!

"Life is uncertain. Eat dessert first." --As spoken by Tina on Friday at our cooking class.

yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

Revamping...but for what?

The yoga here in this neck of the woods is so good that I find it hard to imagine what I could add to the mix. On the other hand, not many people I know are willing to drive 30 plus minutes and cross state lines (especially when it involves Connecticut and their unnecessarily mean highway troopers) just to practice yoga, when they haven't even been tempted by the kewlaid, let alone dipped from the vat.

But the ladies around here all seem to have something going on besides the mothering. Even if they don't travel into an office, per se. They all seem to be doing something. Making jewelry, selling jeans and handbags, putting logos on workout clothes and selling them under some cute name. So, I figured, if I could gin up a card, maybe I could inspire myself into some sort of identity, which might lead to my actually teaching yoga up here in the great green and horsey north.

So, here it is. "Sweat, sculpt, smile" as a tagline, with an arm balance design to make it clear that this is the yoga for those who want more than a stretch class (unfortunately, that is the misperception of many, that yoga is a stretch class and not for those seeking a workout).

Downtown/uptown yoga is dead. Long live...whatever.

YC

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Vinyasa Yoga Class - New Video At MyYogaOnline

This advanced Power Yoga class explores long standing sequences and arm balancing postures. Build strength and steadiness while expanding your awareness to inner connection. To experience the full video go to VINYASA YOGA CLASS
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Free Burma

I first got wind of this through Noemi’s post.
This picture of monks walking down the streets of Burma, protesting its military junta, and joining the civilian protesters, gave me the shivers.
I recalled the Philippines’ EDSA I Revolution (People Power) in the 80s when, in protest of the Marcos dictatorship and in support for the rebels, [...] yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

The smell of Mysore

Today was my last Mysore class. I wondered what I would remember from this trip. How the morning smelled like burning sugar. How a cockroach walked toward the kitchen, stopped when it noticed me, and then continued on its way. How my shoulder felt in ankle grabbing--like the whole world was tied in a knot next to my left ear. The way I feel like I'm walking on air when I step out of the shala, and then get a little nervous of falling down the stairs. The ugly dog that hangs outside of the shala, and how I avoid it as I walk up the hill toward my house. How lying in my bed after practice, I drift off to a half-sleep where the sounds of birds become like voices and I wake up feeling like I should know the words. Or even if I could put the feeling of getting used to a new pose into a jar: the wave of sensation that lingers over the body as it adjusts to the new challenge.

I am not sure if I'm getting a little sick or if I caught some back bend fever. Yes, this really happens. After intense back bends you get sick for about 24 hours with flu-like symptoms and then you're good as new. I've gone through it a few times in my life as an ashtangi. I feel like maybe it is happening again. I feel super tired and drowsy, my back is sore, everything is achy, my throat scratches. A friend told me that she actually went to the doctor for this and he told her that this was as very real diagnosis and that it happens because the muscles in the back have a huge spasm. Sometimes this spasm around the spine is so big, that it affects the nerves and this could effect the immune system.

We said goodbye to Pete yesterday, who had been here for about a year. He was the last person who has really been here the whole time that I have. Its easy to get very close to people here. It is like dog years or summer camp. Its this violent explosion of relationships that last for a week or a month or sometimes just one special day. It seems strange to paint the picture of this place in my mind without the people that I have met in it. I can understand how it is very hard for the people who really live here long term. All the time it is like the ghosts of the people you were close with are always floating in the air, just beyond your reach. Their house hovers in the direction you remember, but the weight of knowing the emptiness weighs on your heart. It is so amazing to me how you can come here knowing no one, and leave with a network of friends smiling as they wave goodbye.

I still have four days here in Mysore and two more led classes with Saraswati. I'm slowly crossing things of my Mysore to-do list, and also deciding that some of the things aren't really important to do. Mostly I'm just being here and totally in awe of this crazy life as I look down to my feet, through the earth, and imagine myself and everyone I know standing on the other side.

yoga therapy; Self Improvement;

Yeah, well, i think I'ma gone smoke mahself a doobie and then go do some yoga

Cause who needs to be present when you're really just doing gymnastics? Not that there's anything wrong with that.

I used to do gymnastics when I was a kid. Gymnastics are cool. I could do back handsprings and front handsprings and walk on my hands and front limbers and back limbers (these are what are known as tick tocks, ya'all), and when i was a high school cheerleader, I could jump in the air and touch my toes to the top of my head. I rocked. I also was the top of the cheerleader pyramid. That was funny. It would have been more funny if i first smoked some pot, put on a bikini and went horseback riding, saddle sores be damned.

I was and am a force of nature. I am literally vibrating with sexual magnetism, and no one can resisit or reject me, ever, ever, ever, because I have dissolving hips, unlike all youze fattie fatties, and I can eat all the things you've only ever dreamed of eating because I am magic. Magic....shazayay-ah-am. Shadoobadoo-shaddddddddd-ahhhed. I. Am. Or, in that other language "Sat Nam" and all that, cause I do my gymnastics in a yoga school.

But what I'm trying to say (maybe I should draw it because I am such an amazing and awesome artist! And brilliant too! A MENSA member!!! I was the smartest kid in school always,while everyone else was getting C's I was pulling straight A's, which is why I went to art school, I mean, because I could have gone to Harvard, Yale, Duke, Tufts, UCLA, you name it, I rejected all of them when they asked me to go on a fully paid scholarship because I heart art!).

Hmmm...what was I saying? I got distracted when I had to go screaming at some people who didn't agree with me.....

Oh yeah....FUCK YOU if you don't smoke pot. And fuck you and double fuck fuck fuckity fuck you if you don't smoke pot AND you take prozac. Because big pharma is bad, and if you're depressed or anxious, you should smoke pot rather than lining the wallets of those big bad pharma executives. Pot should be legalized for the treatment of depression, anxiety, and manic disorders, like mine.

And if you don't agree, it must be because you are not as gorgeous, skinny, talented, brilliant and Carrie-like (not Carrie from Sex and the City...rather, Carrie from Stephen King's novel, you know, the one who could make shit happen with her MIND!!!). You must be jealous of me. If you don't like what I am saying, it must be because you are a jealous and insecure wanker. Aren't British words cool? I'm so hot for using them.

Because i say so, that'as why, bitches. yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

My Yoga Online New Videos - Padma Yoga and Meditation

We are pleased to announce two new videos available on My Yoga Online featuring Padma of Padma Yoga and Meditation:
Mountain - Classical Yoga postures and breathing to develop a gentle foundation.
Ocean - Classical Hatha Yoga flows creating fluid movement and rejuvenation. Padma integrates the body and mind, awakens inner joy, and refines awareness of inner stillness. [...] yoga; Yoga Poses; Health and Wellness;

Win or Lose, It’s the School We Choose!

It was not the BLUE school’s day. There were too many shots that went astray, free throws that did not connect, spills, turnovers, steals….
But I still found myself shouting as C2 and I watched the games from our bedroom TV. And in the midst of trying to follow the Eagles on the court, my fingers [...] yoga therapy; Self Improvement;