musings on my process...

Since my car accident 5 years ago I have taken a very gentle approach to practicing yoga. It has served me very well. I have managed my pain with out medications, I have become stronger and healthier, I have mindfully looked into the emotional losses for me caused by my injuries and become happy.

Now that I am stronger again and have a better understanding about my physical condition and limitations I am exploring going deeper( although sometimes in my gentle practice I went so deep into my joints by softening that I would injure myself-both gentle and vigorous can be deep and powerful.) I don't mean to push through pain and into a deeper stretch. I mean deeper breath, deeper focus, and balancing the strength and flexibility in my body for optimum alignment in each moment. I have started to explore the benefits of a more vigorous practice. Also I have been using a flow to build up heat and lightness of movement, warm up my body, and deepen my breath.

It came to my attention that I need a little more yang in my life. I think rather I noticed that I avoided yang, and thought maybe to explore what I want to avoid would be a good idea. I also realize I rarely get my heart rate up. I also miss the athlete I used to be.

I took a class recommended to me by a friend. I was teaching more and more and didnt have a regular class that I could attend. I feel teachers need to be students. I allowed myself to go more slowly than others and drop into childs pose as I needed and watched my tendency to compete and achieve. I found that on some days I was very strong and other days I was very achey. On the strong days I could follow the flow and on days of bad weather I would spend more time warming up and a lot more time in childs pose. Soon my students were asking for more flow and I started to incorporate it into one of my classes leaving the others for those that needed a place to learn alignment, mindfulness, and breathwork, or work on healing from injuries as I had.

I know that more vigorous is often more popular, in gyms especially, but I feel strongly that vigorous needs to be balanced with proper alignment breathwork and mindfulness to prevent injury as well as to be yoga instead of exercise. I feel that to progress in yoga takes more than being physically able to do the postures and series. Yoga is more than asana. It is breath, it is community service, it is meditation and mindfulness, it is right speech and action, it is spiritual growth. Although some may not agree. To guide students to check in with their breath and become more mindful can be spiritual. I separate spiritual from religious.

Yin and Yang need to be in balance for health and well being. If you find yourself only working out vigorously, examine whether or not you have relaxation meditation a slow stretch or a mindful walk somewhere in your life as well. I was the opposite-avoiding movement from fear and trauma. And now I feel I have the potential for both again... in balance... even more so than before my accident.

Just a word or so on Spirit. Spiritual. Spirituality. To me this is not religion and does not require a set of beliefs in gods or afterlives(which to me are fine as long as they do not prevent personal growth.) We all have an essence soul or spirit that grows and changes throughout our lifetime. The miracle of life on this planet is a mystery, but we are here and have choice. I chose to continue to grow and learn and enjoy it.

Serenity is not a plastic face, or even a porcelain one...

I was inspired by an article in the Yoga Journal(November 2009) about Sri T Krishnamacharya as I practiced on my own mat. I tried to apply a steadfast focus in each posture and to my entire practice. The title phrase above came to me..."serenity is not a plastic face..." I started to think about my students. I ask them to enjoy moments of difficulty all the time. I put them into a posture and say as my teacher said to me, "Please enjoy this moment." I see tense jaws and intense expressions from trying to get it right. It is true that although we try to control it, we have little control over the world outside. We can change ourselves only, so we try so hard to do it right, or cheat because we can't. Bad things happen and good things happen. Serenity is the steadfast place inside. In this place we are not shaken by the good and the bad. Our physical bodies are effected by life and time, but in this place we chose how to respond to life experiences. When we connect with that place on our mat it is practice for the rest of our days.