My Favorite Moments

There are two places in my practice that I think I can call my favorites.  Maybe I experience "pratyahara" (a withdrawal of the senses), maybe I experience pure bliss, weightlessness, or just a feeling of overwhelming calm.  I'm not sure how to describe the feelings because they are so strong and pungent and rich that I can't really put my finger on exactly how to define them.  And yet, they are so simple it is silly.

The first moment is in Prasarita Padottanasana A.  I feel like I'm crawling into a 2 x 2 cave, head first.  I feel like an ostrich with my head stuck in the sand.  All I can see is the tip of my nose.  There is nothing else.  And I want to stay here forever.  Time stops, gravity stops, sound stops, thoughts stop.  I am not me, or 23, or fat, or skinny, or hungry, or smart, or rich, or poor, or in NY, or wearing black pants, or practicing.  Nothing exists.  I am just there.  And it feels very safe and calm.  It feels like I stuck my head up in the clouds to soon and I was invited to stay--but only for a few minutes--before being thrown back down to the earth.  And then I finish my fifth breath and try to hold on to the feeling, but lose it every time.

The second moment is when exiting uthplutih at the end of practice.  Yes, in theory I should lift up in lotus and swing right back into chaturanga without touching the floor.  But until then , I am swinging forward onto my knees, rolling forward onto my elbows, launching my tail into the air and stretching my legs out behind me before lowering into chaturanga.  Same feelings as described above but also like the flying dream where I am floating above oceans and cities and houses and trees and mountains and clouds and then I slowly loose altitude and crash into the sand.  

I've got a ticket to ride

I bought my ticket to Mysore this past week. Another step toward becoming official. It won't really feel real until the apartment gets emptier. Although now that I think that thought--"the apartment gets emptier"--I had the feeling of standing in this apartment when I first moved in. How completely empty it was and how quickly it can be that way again. How real everything feels in this moment, how heavy every object is around the house, and in a few months, it will all just be a memory.

But that is exactly why it has to be now. That is exactly why I have to go and uproot and begin this journey--because this life can very quickly disappear and will.

I once went to a Jivamukti class taught by my friend, Heather. There was a lot of talking at the beginning because it was after all a Jivamukti class. And as resistant as I am to sit and hear someone yap (a small price to pay for some fun and challenging sequencing), Heather always talks sense and gets me to soften up to the experience for what it is. That day in particular, she was talking about death. How every time you exhale you are dying. Absence of air, the end of breathing is death. Every time you exhale, you are jumping off a cliff. Every time you inhale, you are carried right back up to the top only to jump again. A chance to start all over again.

I'm taking the pranayama and philosophy course that my teacher, Guy, is offering. When we hold all the air out and retain, what is that? It is like dying and then floating there just because you can. Retaining the inhales and inhaling in general tends to be much more challenging to me. What is that all about? I've always considered myself a bit of an optimist. I suppose I've also been a bit manic depressant as well. Maybe I'm just like my former boss said-- "You are a sensation junkie." And she didn't even know the half of it.

Or maybe going to India will only feel real when I'm sitting on the plane watching the city get smaller below me.

If you like horror movies, I just saw "Teeth". Two words: vagina dentata.

Last day of blog break

http://mysoremusings.blogspot.com/2007/09/flying-dreams.html

On learning how to fly in Mysore.

Mysore 2007 re-run

http://mysoremusings.blogspot.com/2007/09/miracle-goop-in-all-glory-yesterdays.html

on chywanaprash and what to do the rest of the day in Mysore

Bright Eyes Playlist

(Music to clean the house to)
(Also helpful for trips to the laundry and general accomplishment of to-do lists)

if winter ends...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgMm-lF2eBE

difference in the shades
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfZnYgSfnXI

June on the west coast

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xsa2-rro1fg

Pull My Hair

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eeupiT9lyCo

More from Mysore '07

http://mysoremusings.blogspot.com/2007/08/week-3-and-12-getting-settled.html

Mysore 2007 Re-run

http://mysoremusings.blogspot.com/2007/09/no-fearing.html

Reincarnated Post

an oldie but goodie from Mysore last year.

http://mysoremusings.blogspot.com/2007/09/working-your-edge.html

Spring Break

One week off from blogging...let's see if it lasts :)

You are what you eat

So maybe I take things just a little too seriously sometimes.

Food. It all comes down to food. What you put in your body. And although I think I live a healthy lifestyle, I admit that I've been relatively reckless since Wednesday. The result, feeling like crap (but not being able to) before practice. But today I got up early with plenty of time to sit in pasasana, do nauli kriya, kundalini stimulation exercises, breathe through my left nostril, drink a cup of hot water, and sit and simply try. All to no avail. I was really pissed off when I finally rolled out my mat. I think I was mad because I felt out of control. It wasn't really the fact that I was born without a "poop now" button, so much as I suppose I wasn't being mindful yesterday or the day before. My mind turned to mush and so did my inner chef.

The one thing that this all keeps boiling down to is what are you eating? Why are you eating like a maniac? Why are you sleep walking to the kitchen and force feeding yourself? WHY!?

I don't know! And I kind of do.

Anyway, back to practice...I was really pissed off and kind of lethargic feeling. Then Christina, Guy's Sunday assistant (bless her heart), tried to assist me in pasasana and I don't know why but I just wasn't having any of it. It was probably a lot like changing the diaper of an extremely unruly toddler. I just felt like my practice was poop and didn't want anyone to touch me and tell me its alright or help me or whatever. I was being really mean. "Oh you can't do this and you can't do that because you can't even take a shit before practice." But turns out I could. I was doing all the things that bring up drama even on a good day with less effort. I even crossed and lowered in karandavasana (for one second) all by myself. Even grabbed ankles in back bending when I thought I couldn't suck more.

Funny.

Funny how thinking all about my anus probably helped keep my awareness there and made the practice very grounded and centered. I mean, I REALLY knew where my pelvis was because I was telling it what a good for nothing...it was.

Okay. Laughing time now.

Saw "Point Break" last night. Amazing. "Young, dumb, and full of cum."

Back Bending the "Right" Way

Where do you feel it after practice:  your thighs or your back?

Both.

Hmm.

I had a chance to talk shop with my favorite local Iyengar teacher, Cory Washburn.  Before everyone starts to panic, rest assured, I'm not drinking the kool-aide, just gleaning another perspective on practice.  And when I say another perspective, I don't mean Iyengar versus Ashtanga, I mean another yoga practitioner who happens to care a lot about precise alignment.  I really feel that a little insight here and there can go along way.  When there is too much info, I start to short circuit with all the many things to think about.  However, once in awhile, I'm ready to take something new in.  

My homework this week:  Think about lengthening my hamstrings away from my calves, opening the backs of the knees.  So actually, I should have sore hamstrings.  I'll need some time to figure out what this feels like.  Will certainly report back.

Took yesterday off and practiced primary today.  Felt so tired and heavy.  Maybe I'm eating too much?  I just feel off.  I think part of it is PMS.  Where does it talk about this in Yoga Mala?

Just begun reading "Enlightenment for Idiots".  Three things that bother me about this "genre".

1.  Why are only women writing? (Holy Cow; Eat, Pray, Love, Fear; and Yoga in New Jersey)

2.  Why all this emphasis on relationships? (Fear and Yoga in New Jersey; Eat, Pray, Love)

3.  Why is it that main characters as yoga teachers have to be flakes that can't get anything together? (Fear and Yoga in New Jersey; Eat, Pray, Love)

Why does this bother me?

1.  Am I a cliche?

2.  Does my life revolve around men?

3.  Am I a flake that can't get anything together?

Skinny and Sweet (There is an exception to every rule & NYC made me skinny)

There are a couple of new women practicing at the shala (doing second series).  One of them is practicing full second plus part of third.  I spied (post practice of course) her pincha and karandavasana and the woman totally had a Manju-as-a-child-pincha-photo banana back.  And she could bind her legs by herself and she could come down and almost come up (you could tell she can come up on days when she is up to it).  And her back was flat--almost even back bending--when she was resting on her arms.  *shrug*  Just goes to show that a)its not about the poses b)its about practice c)it takes patience d)every body is different.

Post-India Notes:

While getting dressed in the shala today I noticed that my big bra (the biggest size post-India) is too big.  India made me fat.  New York made me thin.  Ha ha.

Life/practice notes:

Had the WORST allergies today.  Could barely open my eyes this morning as they were so swollen.  Thought I had pink eye or something.  Yuck.  Felt so ill that I really thought I wouldn't make it to practice.  Low back is bothering too but I think its from adjusting people while I have bad posture.  In back bending I took it easy--just ankles.  (That is so ridiculous.  I am now really praying at the end of eka pada.  "Dear God, thank you for blessing me with legs, legs that work, legs that are able to do this crazy shit.  Thanks!)

Things I like/don't like:

Couldn't get through the first three pages of "Midnight's Children".  I must be a bad person.  Laughed my head off last night at "Nine-to-Five".  Absolutely infatuated with Amy Winehouse.

Spring in New York

Has it officially begun?  Not sure, but I love it!  It is on days like this that walking down the street is a pleasure.  The city is so full of people--and so is the shala.  It has been positively packed lately.  I really like it that way.  Having so many possible distractions helps me focus.  And when I get to poses like pincha mayurasana, it makes me face my fears of falling over onto someone.  (Haven't hit anyone yet, but have scared a few unsuspecting practice neighbors.)  The only drawback for me is that it gets very hot and humid.  Not unbearably so, but enough to make it more challenging for me to breathe.  I have a tendency toward exertional asthma and used to carry an inhaler as a kid.  With the high pollen count this year pre-practice and the humidity in practice, I have quite an opportunity to work on my breathing.

I find that, on days like today, it is helpful because I don't feel 100% and am less apt to get competitive with myself.  Instead, I just tell myself to breathe and focus on bandha and it all just kind of unfolds on its own.  And then I kind of fold into karandavasana!  Well, the first part anyway.  

In the short time that I've been working karandavasana, I feel like I've learned some big lessons.  To come down (for me at least) it is essential that I am able to hollow out my belly first.  This is practically impossible on days like today where I cross on my own and then lose my balance and shift too much toward my elbows (like I'm going to fall on my belly).  I think Guy took this as a cue that I was ready to come down, so I came down, flexed my belly like crazy, and then muscled back up.  I have to have my hips over my head and then inhale.  In this position, I am not gripping my belly like death and am able to hollow it out on the exhale and then fold down into the pose.  This part is tricky.  If (when I hollow and come down) my hips aren't leaning toward my hands and shoulders moving forward, then I crash down on my butt.  I am not some bulky guy that can just hover.  I have to be able to build architecture that will work.  Its coming...

Spent the afternoon with Rachel soaking up sun in Central Park, debating universal health care systems, and giving each other yoga tips.  Rachel asked to see karandavasana.  Everything is easier on the grass.

Junk drawer post

Think so you can learn how to stop thinking.  This yoga stuff is funny.  Between all the thinking about my relationships to people and things and philosophy with Guy and everything I was thinking so much about the sound of white noise that the thinking became white noise and then I wasn't thinking because I was thinking and I crossed my legs by myself in karandavasana--and I held myself there...away from the wall!  The thing is, I didn't really notice until after practice.  

This is my favorite time of year in New York.  It is just so...optimistic.  Baby birds try flying prematurely, fall to the pavement, and then get crushed under shoes.  One moment you smell blossoms on your way down the sidewalk and the next moment it is hot pee.  The weather is beautiful and flesh is exposed for the first time (its a scary white/green/grey color).  The catcalling is back and starts out sweet ("god bless you, princess") and sometimes ends up sour ("you got me so hard--come back baby").

And now the dream sequence:

I had this dream last night featuring Sherri Shephard, Oprah Winfrey, and someone else whom I can't recall at 

the moment (let's just say it was Diane Keaton).  They were drunk in the basement lounge of a Staples.  I was very disappointed with Sherri because Oprah is a bad influence on her.  She put on a bunch of weight, and all three of them were behaving ridiculously, their clothes were falling off, just melting

 off them from the drunkenness.  Then my Mom showed up and poked Sherri, asking her why she let herself get to this point.  And then of course, in come Lucy Liu in Kill Bill and she's threatening to chop heads off if anyone mentions she is part Chinese and American (not just Japanese).  

Hey Adam, how's that for a bit of self absorption and inexpensive therapy?  :)  I think you're right.  Sometimes it is hard to see it, but  "I don't know how, but some way, it always works out in the end".

PS- Congratulations on solo handstand sans wall!  Knew you could do it!

Sleep on it/creating an exit plan

I went to bed last night at 8:45pm.  That's early.  I looked at the clock and thought about how when I was a teenager, I'd still be getting ready to go out, how this was the beginning of what would be the greatest night of my life--every night.  And now I'm covering my head with a pillow, walking from room to room in our railroad apartment in my mind, thinking about what I am going to do with all this stuff.  How can I escape?  I start in the kitchen on the far end of the apartment.  

The plants.  I can give them away.

The glass jar drawer.  recycle.  

The oven mitts. They aren't mine.

The silverware/knife drawer.  Here I pause.  That's my flatware.  That was the flatware from my mom's house growing up.  I can store those.  Yes.  What about the knives?  Some of them are mine.  I can put them in a stoop sale.  No.  I pack them too.  I already have knives whey do I want to have to buy more knives?  (I think of my grandparents)  You should only have to buy knives once.

The pot and pan drawer.  That's easy.  Yard sale.  But wait, what about those two pots from college?  And the pressure cooker?  What about the salad spinner?  I love that salad spinner!

Then I get pretty upset.  How can you break up with a salad spinner?  

I have one foot here and one foot is already gone as I recall how I'll forget.  I had this journal I kept when I walked the Camino de Santiago in Spain.  I lost it sometime last year.  I was really upset, but then was able to let it go.  Now I think about how it existed but I don't panic at the fact that I can't hold it.  Will I panic over the salad spinner a year from now on a beach in Thailand?  Perhaps a little.  Will I not be able to leave?  No, that's not a problem.  I might procrastinate though.  Will I not be able to give it away.  Maybe.  No.  I have to keep the "goal" in mind.  I shouldn't really store anything.  Why?  What do I really need to save for later?

My eyes dart around the bedroom.  At all the things.  I think about the linen closet and how a tiny fraction of the contents are mine.  I feel like I signed a contract with the stuff.  I feel like I said "thank you, how generous!"  when the things arrived, and now they've buried me alive.

Where is the back door?  How can I just slip out?  I don't want to deal with any of it, I just want to leave.  I look at flights.  Can I afford to leave earlier?  Is that fair?  #$@%!

I've got a light in my chest and belly, anticipation for what's to come and a cold feeling deep in my gut--the feeling of impending doom.  And all this is happening with this other "I" smiling, laughing, compassionate, as it watches "myself" scramble around trying to figure it out.  

What the--

"Wait--something is different..."  My toothbrush stops mid-tooth, mid-lather, my mouth hangs open.  "What the--?"  My eyes look around the bathroom, they look into the living room as I rise to my feet.  It might have been exactly midnight and I was reclined on the toilet lid with my feet resting on the sink, brushing away at my teeth when I was overcome with this strong feeling that something was different, something changed, something shifted, something huge happened, that someone was thinking of me.  It was that kind of feeling you get when you feel like you should call everyone you know to see if they are okay, to turn on the TV to see if the Apocalypse had begun, to cower and hide because God took the roof off your house and is watching you at just this moment.  Or maybe that your twin on the other side of the world just found out who you were.  It was like that.  It was like that part in Donnie Darko at the end where they play "Mad World" and everyone sits up in the middle of the night feeling like something big happened but they don't know what.  

Needless to say, I had quite a hard time going to sleep, my mind racing.  It seems rare to have these feelings and to be able to sustain them for so long.  Usually you have a moment (as described in the film "Reality Bites") where you kind of just stop and realize "whoa--I'm really happy right now" and then it is gone.  But this time I felt it and then time stopped and I kept feeling it and I could walk around in it.  There has got to be a name for this.

I woke up this morning with a start, feeling like I knew exactly how things would turn out.  Feeling like I am really here in this body but also have a foot in the bigger picture.  Must of been all that LSD I ate last night.  Or was is it the moon chapati?

It is so going to rain today, which absolutely sucks because I got talked into working the donation booth at the first annual "Slacro Yoga Fest", which, of course, is outside.  What is Slacro Yoga?  Well, the "slac" part is for "slack lining".  Did you catch that Yoga Journal article on Jason Magness?  Well, he's a mountain climber/yoga practitioner who decided that he should be able to do yoga on a slackline and voila!  "Yoga Slackers" were born.  The "acro" part of "slacro" is for "acro" yoga.  That dynamic partner stuff.  So basically, it is a bunch of yoga crazies in the park falling over, trying to raise money for a good cause.  And now, they'll do it in the rain.

Mysore Musings: A "Coming of Age" Yoga Adventure

I've got this question...what brings people to yoga, specifically ashtanga practice?   Outside of the typical superficial answers like a "type-a personality", I think there is something else.  I wonder if it is  a common thread or a different facet for each person.  I wonder.  I wonder what brings me to practice?

"You know it when you see it, but then you can't explain it."  It is like that.  So then, what brings me to Mysore?  What is this pull?  Am I trying to run away, to escape?  Or, am I running toward something.  It seems that perhaps if you are running toward something, you are always running away from something, that something being the place from which you just were.  So maybe its both or all of it.  But it is something bigger than putting my leg behind my head, grabbing my ankles, and lifting up in karandavasana (although the discipline to get to those places is paving the way to that something bigger).  

"You've got to get under those emotions and figure out the cause, the source."

Fear.  I'm afraid.  I'm afraid of being alone.  I'm afraid of being poor and hungry.  I'm afraid of losing everything.  I'm afraid of falling.  I'm afraid of getting hurt. I'm afraid of dying.  I am afraid of dying without ever being fluent in french.  I am afraid that this is it and I'm not doing everything.

Is India the answer?  No.  I think the answer is me.  I am the answer.  I am the hero.  

What is this post about?  I think it is about coming of age on a yoga adventure.  I think it is about feeling my ribcage cracked open like an eggshell and my insides are gooey and raw.  Its watching myself watching myself watch myself.  Its about how it isn't about the asanas, but those are so much easier to talk about.  Its about developing a vocabulary for your soul.

Suck it in!

Today I had a focus--vacuum stomach.  I was tired and sore and mentally exhausted but figured that if I could just really focus on that one thing, then I could get through it.  Paying attention made me pay attention.  You can't rush through a serious stomach vacuum and it might make you need to pee!  When I got up to go, I was all fuzzy headed and "blissy".  

Jumping was higher and lighter.  Everything had just a little more length, just a little more space.  But it wore me out.  Pincha and karan jump back?  Forget it!  I knew that my body couldn't take it today (partly because of a moonday coming up).  That said, I felt a difference in karandavasana for sure.  I felt hollowed out and rounded like a little ball and my legs were noticeably higher on my arms.  

Wheels were a trial.  Each time I lifted up a rib ached here, a joint there, everything feeling fragile and tender.  I stood up and just breathed for a little bit, looking down, thinking how much this was going to hurt.  And then I was like, "wait a second--no more thinking!  Just breathe, just move."  So that's what I did.  Some were fast, some were slow.  But I can't remember ever grabbing ankles with feet that parallel before...

After the forward bend I was thinking about how I had to really work on lift ups, yadda, yadda, as I lifted up and jumped back without touching my feet to the floor.  Really!  I wanted to squeal with delight--and of course no one saw.  If a tree falls in the forest...

Why is this a revelation?  Because although I don't usually touch my feet to the ground when I jump back, I'll usually give it a swing and/or push off from the back of my arms.  But today, none of that.  Now I can barely make it up the stairs :)

Read Ashtanga!

We've just published the May issue of LivingMysore Magazine!

Check it out: http://www.livingmysorejournal.blogspot.com/

Karan(davasana) knows best and all those dark corners

"Don't engage, suck in!"  Huh?  Really?  Apparently, I am trying so hard to engage and "grip" in karandavasana that I am pressing my stomach out and flexing like crazy.  I'm surprised I don't pop out a poop right in mid-air like I'm pushing out to give birth.  So, stop manhandling the pose, and stop trying to be a boy muscling into everything.  (Imagine me?  The one with no muscles, muscling into poses?)  Start refining.  Start connecting with the roots of my own practice.  Start practicing like me--like a girl.  And furthermore, what girl doesn't know how to suck in her stomach?  

So I try again and again and can't for the life of me figure out how to disengage my fury of muscles and suck in like (gasp) uddiyana bandha (duh).  I've gotten a couple of extra-curricular "exercises" to help gain some intelligence in karandavasana.

Phase 1

1.  In headstand, take padmasana

2.  Practice crossing padmasana in shoulderstand without using hands

Phase 2

3.  Practice crossing legs by oneself in pincha or at wall

4.  practice lifting the lead off the floor in headstand to learn how to engage core

Phase 3

5.  Practice lowering padmasana legs in headstand and coming back up

6.  Practice taking padmasana in tripod headstand and lowering to backs of arms

Ok, cool.  I go to the back of class and commence shoulderstand and think (for a moment) of what poses relate to this that I could work on?  I'm already putting all I've got into bandhas and jumping and lifting and so what's left?  As I'm thinking this, I see the answer is literally right in front of me.  I have mulabandha, but my stomach is sticking out in shoulderstand.  It is strong, but not sucking in.  So I make this the focus.  Not so bad in shoulderstand, but nearly impossible for me in halasana and karnapidasana.  And then I realize all these things, right in front of my eyes, that I've just been brushing by, just skimming over, just letting go.  I make and extra effort in urdhva padmasana and pindasana.  It was hard!  I was really uncomfortable and remembered why I just stopped bothering.  My floating ribs are sensitive and this made them really uncomfortable.  But today I adjusted and found a way and there it was.

On to headstand.  25 breaths there, halfway 10 breaths, came back up, the whole time really focusing on the sucking in.  When I could do it, I felt taller and more stable and I could actually feel my abs working in a much different way.  Then I took padmasana and took an inhale.  Then I exhaled everything out and at the bottom of the exhale sucked my belly toward my spine and lowered down and then came up.  What the #$@!?  It worked!  I did it again and again going lower each time.  Positively giddy, I did the tripod version and same thing.

The question now is:  can I figure out how to feel stable enough in pincha that I can have enough time to relax by belly for even just one second to be able to suck in?  I think it must be possible.  I did it in the headstands...

Earlier, after back bending, my teacher reassured me that the student next to me was stuck in the pose for a few years before going on to the next.  Thanks.  

It is definitely an entry point into a whole other level of practice.  If you've managed to sneak by without making many life changes up until this point, now it comes.  Time to really think about sleep, energy, food, relationships, concentration, emotions, mental state,  trishtana, etc.  But it isn't all for the pose.  The pose is a means.  It is reflecting life changes that one should be making to be healthier and happier just because.  If there is ever a place where a student is challenged to transform, it is here.

In the meantime, other things have changed while I wasn't looking.  The jumps are jumpier. The floats are "floatier".  Krounchasana does leave me feeling electrocuted anymore.  My left heel touches the floor in bhekasana, I don't have to cross my fingers in laguvajrasana, kapotasana is consistent, arms straight in bakasana are close.  The eka padas are actually getting comfortable.  I can cross fairly deeply in dwi pada, yoganidrasana is fab, and tittibhasana is showing much improvement!  I can swing straight legs (with much effort into B).  I'm taking a deeper bind in C and I can see my belly (which is not sucked in) in D.  

I'm in the middle of "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" which makes me want to get back into learning french.  

Watched "Sisters" with Chloe Sevigny the other night.  Really weird.  But in a good way.