Things in my life which have changed in the past few years:

my profession

my address

my mood

my marital status

my name

my employer

my favorite books

my favorite websites

my favorite music

my hair

my dress size

my voice

my brain chemistry

 But I am still here.

Hmmmm.   Those things must not be me, deep down. 

Created a change in energy, a little pattern break for a new perspective.  Disembarked the T a stop early.  Took a treat from Starbucks for a walk in Boston Common, along the edge of the swan pond.  The pond is drained of water right now, but there are Canada geese roaming the crater & fat fuzzy squirrels squampering around.  (That’s a contraction of squirrel & scamper.

It was enough.  It shifted my state without doing violence to it or denying how I felt.  Just a little nudge in a new direction, a beauty moment or two.  The nice things that followed — teaching a good class (if I do say so myself , taking Vanessa’s fun fabulous Hip Hop yoga afterwards — I know I wouldn’t have appreciated as much otherwise.

Ohhhh, it was one of those mornings.  It started at 0400 when I spilled my bedside water bottle all over the floor.  And made a wreck in the kitchen working the morning libation.  Then continued on with blowing the circuit breaker from various contraptions in the yoga room.  Grumped over to the neighborhood Baptiste studio. 

I have great affection for Baptiste — they have the HEAT & humidity thing just down, & a refreshingly no-yoga-snobbery attitude — but I’ve been loving my Forrest time because of the deep sophistication of the practice. But I just can’t get my room hot enough.  The heat & humidity is doing wonders for my back.  I love Back Bay because they have the bestest teachers in the whole world.  But they can’t get their rooms hot enough either.  My great wish during the workshop at New Haven & the recent teacher trainings have been to have Ana & a hot room for 2 hours every morning.  Heaven.

Goldilocks can’t find the right porridge.  Well, she knows what her favorite porridge is, but that’s just not available.  And she keeps accicentally spilling all the porridge that is available.

It’s a pretty okay problem to have, I guess.  Just means I really really have to acknowledge that whatever planning or controlling or scheduling I think I should do will always get soundly trounced & laughed at by the universe.  Just need to take practice day by day, which is how it happens anyway, so really, why have I continually tried to fight it with imaginary practice plans & schedules & goals?

Point being, today I went & did my modified Forresty practice with the Baptiste-ites, & then came home & did the first 50 minutes of Day 3 of the Forrest 5 Day Intensive.  Which worked rather nicely & therefore has me back fantasizing & scheduling & planning… OY!!

Did 2 hrs of backbending to the Heal Your Back MP3.  And an hour of goofing around with gentle stetching & the rolly ball.  Play day otherwise.  Heading back into the happy sunshine!!

Sheila Cat wanted a picture of herself posted again–  “it’s been too long since my fluffy magnificence has graced the internet!” she squeaked…   I don’t understand why the top is cut off.   She has very nice, big fluffy grey ears in the original picture & real life!

I’ve been practicing at home for the past few days this week, mostly to prevent a tweak in a hamstring that is just signaling it wants to tweak. And of course I’m a big ole fan of heated yoga. I’ve had friends ask previously how I heat the room for yoga at home, especially friends whose best available practice room might be a drafty basement, & wanted to pass on the few tricks I use.

First off, I really can’t heat the whole house just to get my yoga space nice’n'toasty. Partly because we have old radiator heat here in Cambridge that takes FOREVER to bring the temperature up or down. And mostly because Beloved Husband barely tolerates keeping the house at 70 degrees & would prefer to live in a meat locker. So I only heat the room itself.

And the big key is, I heat specifically a mat sized area. Trying to heat the whole room (& it’s not a large room, small spare bedroom size) wasn’t working as well as I’d like, so I’ve targeted down very specifically. I have two space heaters aimed right at the side & front of my mat, about a foot or two away. Plus a humidifier. Let those puppies run for an hour or so while I work in the room or do so easy warm up stuff & it’s okay for yoga. Not as hot as I would like (it rarely is , but good nuf!

Practice today was a little warm up then Day 4 from the Forrest 5 Day.   Tasty twisting.

Key thing: Do NOT be tempted to forward bend once you are warm & think it’ll be okay. Just AVOID forward bends until there is no evidence of tweak or any pain at all for several days, or even weeks if it was a serious injury. Try out these modifications to keep practicing & healing.

1) Standing forward bends: Do Chair pose instead. Hold it & skip the forward bends. You’ll get strong & get healing nutrients, blood & energy to the hamstring.

2) Seated forward bends: Bend the knee. And NOT just a little bit. Bend it entirely, fold the leg out of the way, substituting for example a cross-legged forward bend for Janu Sirsasana on the hurt side so you can stretch the back without any danger to the hamstring. OR for something like Paschimottanasana, substitute Bridge instead. Or Purvotanasana. Or Locust/Boat (boat for the Forresters). Like chair, those poses contract & heal the hamstring.

3) Splits: Avoid like the plague on that side. Do a pigeon instead. For standing splits or something like Utthita Hasta Padangustasana, do standing pigeon or get down on the mat & do a regular pigeon or Locust/Boat

4) Sun salutes/B Series: Skip the first part with the forward fold. I like to do my suns right now just from Down Dog stepping forward, & not even get near the front of the mat.

5) For Down Dog: Bend the knees, gently. A deep knee bend in Down Dog & agressive lift of the hips can actually put the upper hamstring attachment at risk. Soften here & stay aware.

Those are just some modifications. Things that are great for hammies include Horse pose, Standing poses with knee bent to a right angle, chair, boat/locust, bridge… and continually contracting at the sit bones to support that attachment.

Couldn’t figure out how that had happened, or where it came from, but worked to eliminate it & mostly have done pretty well.

Yesterday & today I’ve used the Forrest 5 Day set for very nice home practices. Even was a bit sore today! Gotta love long holds.

And the mystery has been solved.

Ana, bless her strong gorgeous self, uses “ing” on her verbs with great abandon on the 5 Day set!! These were recorded a number of years ago & she doesn’t have really any repeat words as such, or use “ing” unduly in any class of hers I’ve been in… but it does crack me up to have found the culprit, the root of how the egregious “ing” got into my teaching vocabulary!

A lesson to us all — you teach what you learn.

Had hoped to be out to take class, but was surprised yesterday by some emergent hamstring tweakiness at the upper attachment. Feels like a little strain/fraying almost right at the sitbones & is NOT a good thing. Had a strained upper attachment injury that lasted for, like, a year. Have been savoring the joy of healthy hamstrings & am completely unwilling to give that up. Hope is that if I take a day or two to heal — no forward bends! — it won’t turn from tweak to fullblown injury.

In Forrest, the basic rule for working with tweaky or injured hamstrings is 1) don’t stretch the affected hamstring AT ALL until painfree for a decent period of time 2) to help it heal, contract it. That means squeezing the area around the sitbones in my case, for example. Boats (also known as locust pose or salambhasana in other styles) are really good for hamstring injuries.

In other news, fell down the front steps bumpbumpbump like Pooh Bear yesterday morning on the way to class. Sneaky Cambridge ice at work again! Shook it off & kept heading to class, until I realized I had a long scrape on one arm. Going into a public place with an open wound is just bad form. Plus, sweat would really frickin’ hurt! So turned around for home & contented myself with a mellow home practice, rolling around on the Yamuna ball, & a nice back massage at an Aveda salon (coupon! score!) The poor masseuse had her work cut out for her — I had golf balls in my upper traps & sea urchins living under my shoulder blades.

Today I warmed up at the local studio for almost an hour, then taught, then did Vanessa’s fun Hip Hop class at Back Bay. Satisfying day!

Now, on to the sequence.

Theme: Come back to the breath relentlessly. Don’t be relentless in the pose but with the breath instead.
Props: Block, strap
Technique: Inner leg activation, arm balance, shoulder opening

Pranayama: Inhale 4, hold 4, exhale 4, hold 4
Supine figure 4 stretch
Twisted root abdominal, both stages
Bridge figure 4 (block)

Dolphin/Elbow plank/Side elbow plank/Other side/elbow plank center/dolphin
Child’s pose
Down dog/Plank/Side plank/other side/plank/down dog
Child’s pose

Rag doll

B series into:
- High lunge with chest opener & knee lowering up & down; twisting lunge
- WII; Triangle with half bind; Half Moon with half bind (block)

(always option to do side plank vinyasa covered at beginning of class instead of chat-style vinyasa)

Chair; twisting chair; step back into twisting lunge; Pyramid with back heel up; IT band Pyramid stretch

Crow pose

B series into:
- WII; Reverse; Extended warrior variation; option to full bind

Astavakrasana

Down dog into:
- Pigeon; Janu sirsasana; Shin-bound half lotus spinal twist; half lotus spinal twist (strap)

Savasana

Yesterday worked out to be a great day, though there was a little slogging cuz of a random 4 am wake up (repeated today for some reason — what is UP with that??).   Did an early yoga class, then took Beloved Husband’s spin class.  (Yep, he was teaching!  Very fab.) 

The aforementioned workshop was taught by Lynne at Back Bay from 2-5 & it was AWESOME. 

It was open to 200 hr certified teachers from any style & focused on “feel good” assists rather than corrective, alignment based adjustments.  That means assists that help a student get space in the pose.  Lynne set up an opening circle where we each gave our name, main style of teaching & favorite yoga pose.  She then took us through a few suns.  To cover assists, someone goes into the pose, Lynne would demo the assists then we’d pair up & practice on each other.  Alot of the assists were Forresty, but Lynne has a diverse background & some were new to me.  

Rather than try to describe assists (which is tough in words if you haven’t seen them before), instead here’s a few of the concepts she emphasized in each of the poses we looked at:

Child’s pose — press sacrum back & down; don’t push chest down because it compresses cervical spine if head on floor

Down dog — lengthen sacrum up & away

Seated — lengthen back, align head

Seated twist — never crank the twist; lengthen & lift

Lunging twist — it’s never about the shoulders, rather lift up ribcage & revolve

Handstands — leverage always best at hips

Backbend — create space between sacrum & ribs; make sure to press sacrum back before any movement down & ribs UP

Basic jist is to make more room rather than compression & never force anyone anywhere. 

Okay, caught up!

http://autumnlotusyoga.omblogger.com/2010/02/15/forrestizing-a-class/

But have  a few more points to offer today after observing more carefully what I do since writing that.

1)  For twists where the hands are in prayer position, Forrest yoga substitutes a stronger hand set-up.  Make the bottom hand into a fist, upper palm goes on top.  This protects the wrists & provides greater stability.

2) Forrest basic moves beyond active hands & feet & relaxed neck (mentioned in first post) are also really good to keep coming back to in any other class.  Telescoping the ribs, tucking tailbone are two.

3) Another Forrest basic move that deserves its own bullet point is the Forrest breath.  It’s similar to that from Ashtanga or Pilates in that it takes place first & foremost in the ribcage rather than the belly.  It co-exists with the idea of expanding the ribs while engaging the belly.  You can breathe like this in any class.

4)  You can also direct the breath in any class.  Either focusing on getting it to move into one special spot or putting it in different spots as appropriate to the pose.   This is a step more sophisticated than the idea above & is partly a literal physical thing  — breathing into pelvis or chest is very visible & more easily felt — & partly a bit more esoteric.

5) Another more internal thing to work on is reaching out through the bones.  Some styles of yoga focus on gathering the bones into the joint —  especially large bones at big joints, like hugging the thighbone into the hip.  In Forrest, you try to create space in the joint by reaching out through the bones & lifting the joints away.  It’s a small, sensation-based move, but it is a big difference sometimes. 

6) Exception to that: in Forrest you focus on pulling the sitbones together in some moves & for those with low-back or sacro-iliac stuff, often pulling the front hip points together. 

Okay.  That’s the download for today on that.   Had a nice 2 hours at the studio (though tight!  gotta get back to pre-practice warm baths & rolling on the Yamuna ball!) & a gentle few minutes on the ball & slow stuff at home after.

Wrote about it first from the perspective of blogging & yoga sutras here:

http://autumnlotusyoga.omblogger.com/2009/12/13/the-yoga-of-blogging/

I make no pretensions about having something profound to say each day, heaven knows!    But I do my best to say Something –  whatever shows up, with certain boundaries around my & Beloved Husband’s personal lives — even if it’s “yeah, today sucked, ready to move on to tomorrow.”

At the most basic level, it’s because life happens everyday.  Good, bad, indifferent, we wake up & go about the business of walking around in our skins (or trying to), being human.  Every.  Freaking.  Day.  It’s not something reserved for special occasions or profound revelation days.   Every day is not Christmas.

But thing is, if you don’t show up, if you don’t practice or write or get into your skin on each ordinary day, you miss most of the extraordinary ones.  To stretch the previous metaphor a little further, Christmas in July happens randomly quite often, usually when you least expect it.

Today’s practice had no likelihood of being “good.”  I had a rough day yesterday that I’m still processing & will share if & when it’s appropriate (not huge externally, more an internal thing — all is well truly in Chez Lotus .  Didn’t sleep much.  Woke up exhausted & tight & a little sore & mid-process.  By all rights I had every reason to give myself a pass, stay home, do an easy self-practice.  Went to class though, showed up on the mat for something a bit more structured.  And it brought some peace & release & a strong sense of getting a glimpse at a deeper level of healing.  Oh, & a random, rather loud & awesome hip/sacrum shift that just happened at the end of class during supine easy twists. 

It’s no coincidence I committed to a near-daily practice at about the same time I was ready to get married.  Practice, and  any chosen concurrent ceremony (including writing about practice), is like a marriage: you are there for it each day.  Gifts, challenges, breakthroughs, blahs, whatever, you are there.

But around the time of my Forrest training I stopped spinning.  Partly to focus all my energies on yoga.  Partly because my left hip flexor & right knee weren’t appreciating the spinning so much anymore.

And I had other cardio obsessions prior to spinning.  Loved running, Jane Fonda-style dancaerobics, step aerobics, and even sliding! 

General perspective for yoga folks who love other activities as their primary pursuit is that yoga will enhance anything else you want to do in life, whether it’s a triathlon or being a parent. 

If your primary focus is yoga, though, doing other activies gets trickier, I think. 

The instructor at my first yoga teacher training was VERY down on non-yoga activities, considered them detrimental to practice, tightening joints/muscles.  Only thing he approved of was swimming.

But he was a right bastard, so we don’t care anymore what he thinks.

Ana &  some Forrest teachers don’t do much outside of yoga besides walking/hiking in nature.   They do ALOT of yoga though & honestly don’t have much time outside of it.

For the rest of us, I’ve decided its a continual balancing act — yeah, like we need more of those in life!!  There are times I HAVE to focus all my time/energy on yoga.  When I was getting ready for the planned assisting venture, eg, or teacher training, I was working my ass off on yoga.  But after that went off the radar, I have turned some of that built up energy/stamina to spinning again.  It’s been great so far — just a few times a week, bonding with Beloved Husband, listening to loud music.  I know other strong Forrest teachers who are adding in some biking or running or dancing again also.

Guess we go through phases on what we need.  If I find it’s detrimental to my practice, I’ll back off.  But while I’m enjoying it, why not?

Today I slept like hell & up early.  Did about an hour of mellow Forrest (yes, it’s possible  with some pranayama, abs, dolphiny excursions.  Heading to class in a few minutes & will see Herr Doktor this afternoon!

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/23/health/23mind.html?ref=health

“A warm touch seems to set off the release of oxytocin, a hormone that helps create a sensation of trust, and to reduce levels of the stress hormone cortisol.

Still have a little more to share about thi s past Forrest weekend. 

Confession: I didn’t make Friday night.  Couldn’t resist the chance to dress up & have a date night with Beloved Husband at the Temple restaurant in the Renaissance hotel, Providence.  It’s a fascinating building — origially built as a Masonic temple but the Depression stopped construction in 1922.  It sat empty for like 70 years before coming back into use.  The hotel has a motif of Masonic devices & maps of the original structure; they even preserved & recreated some of the graffiti from the years of dereliction!

So, Saturday am workshop.  First off, went in of course a bit nervously &  tired (didn’t sleep well, despite gorgeousness of hotel).  But was hugely & pleasantly surprised to know like, half the group!  Between Boston & New Haven yoga excursions & the Mentorship program, it was akin to coming home & created a really nice vibe.

Here’s the breakthrough thought that Iwanted to share, past the prattle about hotels & yogacquaintances.  Sat down on the mat & had this bubble up as Ana directed us to focus on tracking transformation in a chosen spot: 

“No more fighting, forcing or faking.  Clear that all away & accept only healing.  Nothing less.”  

This intent cleared away alot of the flak & flotsam & crap immediately & allowed a directed focus.  4 wheels, first time in a year, baby! 

Accept nothing less than what you truly need.

Yesterday was take class, teach class, take class.  Today is mystery-activity-to-be-discussed-tomorrow, take class, then volunteer session!

My computer is dying, quite likely right as I type this.   It won’t take any power & is starving itself!

Short news is that this past weekend went great.  Theme was tracking sensation through a particular spot — by getting more skillful at tracking feeling, we can track our transformation.  And by being committed to evolving.

I did my first wheels in like a year on Saturday.  4 of them, going bridge/wheel/bridge/wheel/bridge twice through.  And felt great after.  Magic.

Here is Ana’s sequence from Saturday, best as I remember it:

Ditching computer again for the course of the worksh0p & will post upon return. 

Three sessions with Ana at Raffa for me — tonight, 6:30-9 pm.  Tomorrow & Sunday 9-12.  Plus touristing with boy! 

Enjoy your weekend!

Here’s Monday’s class sequencing, btw.  It was a fun day.  I love Monday holidays because attendance at a mid-morning class goes way up & everyone is quite happy to be playing on a school day, as it were.     It’s also fun to keep pointing out during an inversion class that any pose that brings your head below the level of your heart counts to inversion “quota” & turns the world upside down. 

Theme: Connect with what joy feels like in your body.  Use the energy generated from the poses to feed that joy & in turn, feed your spirit.

Props: Block, roll, blanket

Pranayama: inhale, hold, exhale into uddiyana, hold

Seated roll backs with a block, warming up the spine

Abs with a roll

Leg circles

Bridge over a block, adding leg circles

Rolling like a ball

Down dog, with leg lifts & circles

Rag doll

Classical suns (use blanket for back knee)

Agni sara in horse stance, 4 sets

Forward bend with neck traction

Wall: 

Down dog at wall, adding leg lift & optional circles

Chair at wall (block)

Handstand 

Forward bend at wall

Dolphin at wall

Bridge

Forearm balance or handstand, adding agni sara optional

Returning to center:

B series into

WII, Reverse warrior, extended side angle, bird of paradise or standing leg extension

Ostrich, Head to ankle variations

Seated cross-legged twist or half lotus spinal twist

Shoulderstand (blanket) or bridge at the wall (for neck tweaky)

Eagle legs spinal twist

Savasana

Led the peeps through about 45 minutes of chair/wall/floor poses.  Breathwork focused on comfortable long inhale, pause, long exhale, pause.  Ended with a lovely savasana.  Brought folks up & namaste-d.

Then, in mutual accord, everything went still.  For five-plus minutes we sat together, breathed, some held prayer mudra, some didn’t.  We just sat with ourselves and each other.

I didn’t create the moment.  It just happened.  Spontaneous meditation.  Pure beauty.

Today — 2 hrs sweaty, half hour solo chill stretching.  The rest of the day is mine to roll around in.   Ahhh.