Musings on my Yoga Practice

Gardening and Yoga

2009-04-27T13:54:00.002-04:00

Yesterday I spent 4 hours weeding and tilling a community garden plot that we recently became tenants of. Occasionally I would stop and check in with my body for back pain, any sort of repetitive motion pain, etc. I seemed to suffer no ill consequences, and was a bit surprised. In previous times in my life whenever I did something like garden for a period of time, I would have severe lower back pain and find myself needing to quit.

Even after coming home and collapsing into a deep-sleep nap from the fatigue I woke up refreshed and not feeling any physical ill consequences whatsoever.

"How does your body feel?" I asked John.

"Fine. I'm surprised that I don't have any aches or pains," He
replied. We both looked at each other....

"Do you think it's the yoga?" I mused.

"That's probably a big part of it, I'm sure." We both do yoga regularly. I do my 1-2 hours a day, and John does the Power Yoga by Rodney Yee maybe 3-4 times a week, tai chi every day, running 3-4 times a week, and then he has an Alexander session once every two weeks. The amazing thing about yoga is that it seems to be building not only my strength and flexibility, but also my endurance.

It was 10 o'clock last night before I could get my wiped-out body and mind back into the present and do my Power Yoga. I had a great, strong workout. How my body could endure 4 hours of gardening and then 60 minutes of power yoga baffles me. I think we totally underestimate the potential that is in our bodies.

Watching your breath

2009-03-31T09:21:00.001-04:00

This morning, still having sleep issues, I found myself awake at 4:00 and staring at the ceiling. We have been reorganizing the house in preparation for my mother moving in, and I moved my meditation room to a corner in a cubbyhole in the bedroom. I got up and sat on my meditation cushion to quiet my mind. As I sat there, with my mind wandering, I found myself searching for ways to focus and calm it. I thought about Rodney Yee's Ujagi (sp?) meditations, where you extend your exhales longer and longer, and breathe with ease.

I began to do that a bit, and then gradually allowed myself to stop the instruction of trying to extend the exhale, and I began to just breathe, but keep the same frame of mind where I'm concentrating on my breath. I was pleased to find myself sinking deeper and deeper, and finally reached that state of clarity that I occasionally reach when I've had a "good" meditation. I don't know how long I sat there, but eventually I got up and went back to bed. My dog was waiting for my return, and he snuggled up to me with his head on my chest. I kept that state of calm and clarity as I lie in bed, and eventually floated into a pleasant slumber with the waterfall-like sounds of a puppy snoring on my chest. It was quite a beautiful morning.

My Yoga Story

2009-03-20T12:14:00.001-04:00

In 2001, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I lost both of my breasts and spent the next year undergoing cancer treatments. Two years later I had uterine bleeding and, because of the risk of uterine cancer from the cancer treatments, I opted for a salpingo-oophorectomy (lost uterus, fallopian tubes, and cervix).

I tried to have breast reconstructions, and the pain from the expanders and the subsequent implants was so intense (felt like I was having a heart attack every time I breathed), that I went to my plastic surgeon one day and said "take them out".

So.... today I have nothing that in the past has defined me as a woman. It's been a VERY VERY long 8 years, and god knows I've suffered from every possible ailment since then, I believe because of the cancer treatments -- depression, ulcers, diverticulitis, arthritis, diabetes, terrible hot flashes, back pain that was so severe my back refused to hold my body up.... If you were to see me naked, you'd see how terribly deformed my body is. The mastectomies left my chest not just flat, but hollow, all the way through my armpits. I can put my hand over my heart and actually feel my heart through my ribs.

I'm telling you this not because I want sympathy, but because I want you to know that whatever happens to you and your body, you'll find that it's all ok. I could lose an arm or a leg today and I know that, other than the pain-in-the-butt it would cause my life, as far as my image of myself, it would not be a big deal. It would never make me feel any less about myself or embarrassed or ashamed. Anyone who makes me feel that way, it's their problem not mine. It took a LONG time for me to get to this place, so it didn't come for free.

One of the things that I've learned throughout this entire process of redefining who I am as a woman and as a human being is that the "strength" that it takes to accept yourself is there. You don't think it is, because you never had to tap into it before. And you can look at other people and think "they have what it takes, but I don't". But it's not true at all. To get what it takes to gain this acceptance of who you really are, search. Your answers will be different from my answers, the means whereby are not important. What's important is that you find your answers. Someone or some group or some web site or some book -- even a store clerk somewhere -- is there with your answers. You just need to be there paying attention and listening. And once you find someone whose message speaks to you, then you can keep investigating until you come to a deadend. Then backup, and keep searching until you find someone else. All of these things that you learn will help you build a toolkit to live by that's customized just for you.

Yoga is one of the things that I've put into my toolkit. I started doing yoga about 8 months ago. My husband John was doing Richard Hittleman's "Yoga in 28 Days" book for his back. That book has a statement to the effect that "if you do these 28 days of yoga religiously, you'll find that you can never go a day without yoga again". Getting through those 28 days was tough -- I couldn't even do a cobra pose when I started. But I found that Hittleman was right. I began to expect my yoga workouts every day. It was more than the flexibility and strengthening, it was also the amazing calm that it presented in my mind when I did my meditations.

After continuing with Hittleman's maintenance routines for a couple of months I decided to graduate to something more intermediate. I graduated to "Moving Toward Balance, 8 Weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee". Again, it was a challenge for me. 1/4 of the poses in the book I couldn't even begin to complete. The rest of them were just plain hard. After I finished "Moving Toward Balance" once or twice, I bought a DvD called "Power Yoga with Rodney Yee". At first I could only do 15 minutes of that DvD. I did my 15 minutes of the DvD in the mornings, and continued with the "Moving Toward Balance" book in the evening. I kept with the DvD, and added a pose at a time as my body learned to do the poses, until I could do the entire 65 minute routine.

Now, 8 months later, I do anywhere from 1 to 2 hours of yoga every day. I either do the DvD or I do one of the routines in "Moving Toward Balance" chapter 8 -- and occasionally, if I have time, I'll do both.

I always thought of yoga as just a stretching thing and wondered why I would want to make my workouts just stretching with no aerobics or strengthening. I never saw the need for something like yoga -- maybe a little stretching, but the full yoga seemed like overkill, and for people who had more patience for that sort of thing than me. The amazing thing that I've learned is that by some incredible miracle yoga provides me with everything. I live in a town whose streets are mainly hills, so bicycling around town requires lots of hill training. Before my yoga, if I wasn't hill trained, it would take me months before I could comfortably bicycle the hills around town. After yoga I discovered I can get on my bike with no conditioning and tackle the hills with no problems whatsoever -- standing on my pedals up the long hills even.

I recently climbed a mountain that in the past left me out of breath when I peaked. This time, before I knew it I had made the round trip, and I felt like I could easily have done it again. There's no end to the discoveries I'm making in what my body can do now.

When I scuba dive, my tank lasts forever. My yoga makes my underwater experience completely meditative and calming. The breathing that I do in my yoga seems to give me such a huge aerobic capacity that it feels like my body is optimizing every single breath and I don't need to strain at all to get oxygen.

After my cancer treatments, I was told I could never lift anything more than 5 pounds again for the rest of my life, because of the risk of lymphedema from loss of lymph nodes in my armpits. For 7 years I babied my arms with paranoia, and they became flaccid from lack of use and lost all of their strength. After 8 months of daily yoga routines, I can now do the 20 or so full pushups from the Power Yoga DvD. I can do the two 30-second handstands from my Chapter 8 routines.

At the time of my cancer diagnosis, as I was recovering from surgery, I found that I had also developed a frozen shoulder. I went through many months of fairly painful physical therapy and finally got my arm to the point where it was about 85% of its full range of motion. I recently discovered that my right side had been starting to get the same frozen shoulder issue. I don't think I ever would have noticed the problem creaping up on my right side if I hadn't been involved in the intense self-awareness that yoga gives me. I've been working on that for the past month or so, and that arm is recovering. At this point, both of my arms are at 100% range of motion (as far as I can tell).

I can go on and on about the things that work for me in my life -- The Body Ecology diet (www.bodyecology.com) which has been the foundation of the rules that I live by for nurturing my body through paying attention to the foods that I put in it; my spirituality which has allowed me to define how I will live the rest of my life so that when my time comes to die, I will know that I fulfilled my life's purpose.

So, yoga is not EVERYTHING to me, it's just one of many things in my life that has been critical to helping me lead a healthy and happy life.

I have love in me to bestow on my family and friends. I get up every morning and look forward to my day with eagerness and energy. I can catch myself the very minute I start getting overstressed and recognize "ok, that was the pizza I had for lunch", or "such-and-such a situation is stressing me out", or "I'm overworked", and instead of letting it fester out of control, I can reach into my toolkit and do something about it to nip it in the bud.

Even though I've always abhored the phrase "cancer has made me a better person", deep down inside, because my cancer has given me the challenge to step up to the plate, I have to admit that it has provided me with the motivation I needed to straighten up my life and make my life worth living. Yoga has been one of the products of that challenge. Instead of being 10 years older, yoga has made me 10 years younger. I didn't start off by wanting to be younger or wanting to be skinnier. I don't think you ever get these things by seeking youth or weight loss as a goal. I got these things by just wanting my life to have meaning and purpose and joy.

Changing my yoga routine, and learning about twists

2009-03-18T15:06:00.001-04:00

I have changed my routine slightly. Instead of doing Power Yoga every morning, I'm now doing Power Yoga on weekend mornings and cycling through the lessons in Chapter 8 of "Moving Toward Balance, 8 Weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee" on weekday evenings. Doing evening workouts fits in better with my schedule. I am weaning myself off of sleeping pills, and I can only do that by planning my schedule to accommodate just that one goal. That means allowing myself to go to bed when I'm sleepy (instead of trying to force myself to bed when I think I should), and allowing myself to waking up late, which means skipping my morning workouts.

So my daily schedule is more like, (1) wake up and do some sitting meditation if I have time (2) do morning pre-work preparations (3) go to work (4) come home and cook and eat, (5) let my food digest for an hour or so, (6) do my evening yoga. Most of the time it means starting my evening yoga at 9:30 or later and ending at 11:30 or later, and then going to bed and reading and falling asleep naturally when I'm exhausted. I'm also drinking a glass of green drink after my yoga workouts to flush toxins. I'm trying an experiment and committing myself to doing that no matter what time of day my yoga workouts occur at. That means getting up frequently during the night... which also pushes my getting out of bed time to later. It's a bit of a strange sleep schedule, but so far it seem to work better, because it removes imposing rules, which in itself I think causes me stress which makes the sleep issues worse.

One of the things that I'm liking about doing Chapter 8 routines instead of Power Yoga every day is that my body gets a lot more variation in the different workouts. For instance, last night was twisting (my arch nemesis workout). The Power Yoga with Rodney Yee DvD only has one true twisting pose, which is very short in duration. True, the triangle, side angle, pyramid, warrior I and such are forms of twisting, but for the forms that really focus on the twist, the DvD only does the cross-legged twist. Chapter 8's twist routine does about 5 or 6 different twists, which end in Lord of the Fishes, which really gets deep into my body.

Now that I'm getting more time with my arch nemesis, twisting, I'm concentrating on really understanding them. Lately I've been just starting with barely any twisting at all. Just starting with my back straight and shoulders back, and then VERY VERY slowly, with each breath, easing into the twist and feeling the space around my spine releasing at I very gradually twist more. I'm finding that this is allowing my body to have a much better understanding of what it is supposed to do. Up until now I think I've been trying too hard to get into the twist, and finding it frustrating, because then I feel my torso slumping more, which I know is not the correct posture for the twist.

As an aside... another interesting thing about my new routine of no Power Yoga every morning --- my daily back ache seems better -- as though I'm giving it time to recover. Possibly the variation in the workouts is healthier for my body.

Treating my Body as a Holy Temple

2009-02-27T15:01:00.001-05:00

The last few days back at home from travelling I've been feeing drained and ill. Last night I came home from work and collapsed in front of the TV and spent the evening watching a movie. I'd been attributing this to jet leg. But now I'm beginning to realize that these are my classic detox symptoms. Two weeks away from my normal diet has cost me. I've been gradually coming to a philosophy of "eat less and make what you eat REALLY count". That means organic, lots of fresh veggies, no candies, pastries, or other sugary foods, no red meat, no eating like a pig. I violated all of those dictates.

One of the things I'm beginning to realize is, yoga has made me really view my body as a holy temple. I used to hear that a lot when I was involved in the Christian movement, many many years ago..... but it takes education to understand how to convert that to something practical that you can implement in your own life. And I think that it's different for everyone, so what works for one person does not work for another. The trick that I haven't learned is how to treat my body as a holy temple when I'm out with others or not in my routine. This is a serious path of growth that I need to incorporate into my life somehow.

I can't go without my morning yoga!

2009-02-23T18:03:00.004-05:00

I've spent the past few weeks travelling. When I came, I packed my Power Yoga with Rodney Yee DvD, but didn't know if there was a DvD player here. I also brought my book, "Moving Toward Balance: Yoga in 8 weeks with Rodney Yee". On the first morning away from home, I couldn't find a DvD player, so I decided to try to "wing it" through the DvD by memorization. I was so happy with myself. Having done the DvD every day for the past 6 months or so, I did the entire 65 minute routine by memory.

In the meantime, I did find a DvD player, but I continued to do my morning routine by memorization. Doing the routine without the DvD takes about 1 1/2 to 2 hours, since I make use of the luxury of getting to spend more time in poses. One of the problems with the DvD is sometimes I reach the point where I think "Yes, I get it!" And my muscles juuuusssttt start to begin relaxing into a pose when Rodney says "come up, right foot back..... blah blah blah" and mentally I think "damn him!" :)

Since leaving home, I realize something new about my yoga. (There is no end to what you're learning about yoga) My morning yoga is like morning coffee is for other people. I watch the people around me racing to the local coffee shop for a coffee and pastry. They say "I can't go without my morning coffee and pastry!" Then they spend the rest of the day talking at a million miles an hour and getting stressed out. My yoga does exactly the same thing to me as coffee and donuts do to them, except I find myself doing a lot more listening throughout my day and a lot less talking, and taking more deep breaths instead of getting stressed out. I can't go without my morning yoga!

The other day I climbed a local mountain. It's a fairly short hike, about 4 miles round trip to the peak and back. I wondered how much I'd be able to do without getting winded, since I haven't been doing much climbing or walking. I found myself reaching the peak before I could even begin to be out of breath. Before I knew it I had made the round trip. If it hadn't been getting dark, I'm tempted to believe I could have done twice the distance. Is it that yoga is aerobic, or is it that yoga makes my body so strong? I haven't yet been able to answer that question.

And now I don't wonder why 1/2 of my suitcase is consumed by my yoga mat, books, DvD, strap, headband, and sweatpants.

I miss home so though.....

Downward Facing Dog and Upward Facing Dog

2009-02-09T12:33:00.001-05:00

My frozen shoulder issues seem to be getting better. I'm amazed at how it could be healing so quickly. I can only imagine that yoga has caught the problem before it has actually become a full-blown frozen shoulder, and also that yoga has allowed my body to learn quicker by being more readily agreeable to relaxing into the pain.

My yoga growth seems to never end. Lately Downward Facing Dog and Upward Facing Dog have taken on new meanings. It used to be that I'd get into Downward Facing Dog, and in my mind I'd be thinking, "ok, I'm here... so what?". That was the first stage of my DFD growth. Then, I did more reading and studying of the pose, and realized that I should be pushing into my legs so that my calves were getting stretched. So I worked on pushing into my legs and getting those calves loosened. I interspersed that with stretching my arms and back.

Now, though, I find myself being a lot more fluid in my DFD's. I get into the position, and stretch my ankles, and stretch through my right side, and then my left side... and then it becomes as though I was doing a huge yawn through my entire body. When Rodney Yee says to stay in DFD for 30 seconds or 1 minute in "Moving Toward Balance: Yoga in 8 Weeks with Rodney Yee", I used to get into position and stay there, and it would feel like forever. Now I get into position, but then stretch here, and then there, and then do a huge "yawn" through my spine, and the entire pose is like stroking myself as though I were a dog and master as the same time. I find this transformation in my perception and abilities quite nice.

The same enlightenment has come to me about Upward Facing Dog. There's something in my back that "cracks", when I'm starting to loosen my spine through doing this pose. It's most evident in the Power Yoga with Rodney Yee DvD, where you do a gazilion of them. Once I've reached this loosening stage, then the pose becomes one of stretching and tractioning my spine, and feels so exhiliarating.

I can't miss a day of yoga now. It's etched into my being. The day that I skip my workout, I can feel my body doing virtual flips all day long. "Huh? where.... what.... where's my stretching? Where's my mind grounding? What's up? What's down?" It's discombobulated.

More On My Frozen Shoulder, and "Full Moon Feast" by Jessica Prentice

2009-02-04T12:39:00.001-05:00

I've been working on my frozen shoulder for the past couple of days. Could it be due to inflammation associated with doing 3 hours of yoga a day? I cut down the yoga back to one hour. Either a Power Yoga session, or a Week 8 session. Not both.

I'm still learning how to read my body and know my limits. My inclination is to quit yoga and give my body a rest. But my intuition tells me that would be the absolute worst thing to do, and at my age, making mistakes like that would mean a sudden decrease in my well-being and good health. So..... I half my yoga committment and keep up the work on recovering my shoulder back to working order.

I've been reading the book Full Moon Feast http://www.wisefoodways.com/moons/ by Jessica Prentice. A fascinating look at food and how it has fit into man's cultural evolution. It fills me with a deep respect and sense of spiritual gratitude for the food that I eat.

Frozen Shoulders and changing the world through yoga

2009-01-30T12:40:00.001-05:00

I have been ultra-sensitive to all issues surrounding my right arm lately. It entered my consciousness the other day when trying to do a reclining backbend over a block that I'm developing a frozen shoulder on that side. Certain positions above my head cause an intense stabbing pain. This is the exact sort of pain I had in my left arm when it was frozen, at the time of my breast cancer diagnosis. In certain positions the sudden and intense pain that the arm would send coursing through my body would literally throw me to the ground screaming. It was like an electrical current zapping through me. It took many many months of dedication to my physical therapy (2-3 hours a day working on painful arm stretching exercises), but with my dedication I was able to bring my arm back to about 80% of its original range of motion. Today I have very little to no limitation due to the frozen shoulder. I do have limited motion due to the mastectomy and losing a pretty large chunk of underarm tissue through that.

Now that I'm aware that my right arm is developing the same condition, I can recall that I've been feeling this for the past couple of months. I think the yoga has been quietly helping me work through it, and that is why it is not any worse. So I am finding ways to reproduce the painful positions and then holding them for minutes at a time throughout the day.

If it weren't for my yoga, I would be ignoring all of the signs of this problem and I would be having to deal with a much more serious issue. The more I discover about what yoga does fo rme, the more I can't imagine what life is like for people who are slowly losing their strength, balance, and range of motion through their aging and who won't ever know it until it's too late.

If I had to change the world with only one thing, it wouldn't be to impose my religion on everyone, or my political views, or my moral views. It would be to give everyone yoga.

Does Truth really exist?

2009-01-28T15:02:00.001-05:00

I went cross-country skiing today, with the sleet coming down. I thought about fear and what causes it. We live on a hill, and so the top and bottom part of the circular trail are relatively flat, but going up and down on either side is a bit steep and windy, and the trail is surrounded by woods. I've never been able to ski down these downhills without imagining my body going splat against a tree, and so the fear has always kept me either inching down little by little or taking my skiis off and walking down.

Today for some reason the fear which has plagued me disappeared. I found myself zipping down the trail. I even almost hit John, but snowplowed to a controlled stop. I was very pleased at this new experience, and pleased at the thought that the world is NEVER black and white. There are NEVER absolutes. Just as my fear of doing this hill was something that I thought was permanently etched in my mind and my body, so the thoughts that so often cross my mind when I'm doing yoga that a pose can never ever be attained seem to be absolute fact. And yet my body proves over and over that these "absolute facts" are really fantasy stories that my mind has made up.

It gives me pause to wonder.... what other fantasy stories has my mind created about my life or the world I live in?

Body aching. Am I being too demanding of it?

2009-01-28T09:17:00.001-05:00

Last night I was doing day 2 of week 6. When I tried doing the reclining backbend over the block (with the strap around the arms), I had a sharp stabbing pain in my right shoulder. It was the exact same pain I felt when I had a frozen shoulder (about the time of my cancer diagnosis) on my left side. I worked with it a little, and this morning worked with it. I will keep going into that position before my workouts and trying to ease my arm through that position until I can work through the issue there. Yoga gives you such an ability to inspect your body at deep levels that you would never get otherwise. I think for that alone, it is something that is well worthwhile. It never ceases to amaze me at how many people of influence talk about how yoga can overstretch you or doesn't provide enough aerobic or strength training, or isn't a decent exercise modality for whatever other reason. Those reviews are what have kept me from pursuing it for all of these years. How different my life might have turned out if I'd been where I am today 30 years ago.

Doing the week 8 workouts in the evening and the DvD in the morning might be too much for me. My body is completely worn out. Everything is tired and aches. I'm not sure if I should back-off or keep pushing myself at this level until my body is conditioned to tolerate it. The last thing I want to do is injure myself. I do love the week 8 evening workout, though, and I love the DvD morning workout. But they're both long. Each week 8 lesson is 1 1/2-2 hours, and the Power Yoga DvD is 65 minutes.

Aching, creaking body

2009-01-27T15:57:00.002-05:00

My back is killing me today, and my entire body hurt when I did my yoga this morning. I think it's because I did day 1 of week 8 in "Moving Toward Balance: Yoga in 8 weeks with Rodney yee" last night. The last week of the book contains much more intense workouts than previous weeks. That's a good thing for me, since I think I'm ready to move past the basics of the previous 7 weeks. Still, I can't deny that my entire body aches and creaks. Even the very act of raising my arms from standing forward bend to standing backbend hurts :P

The Beef you're eating. Triangle and half moon poses

2009-01-27T12:56:00.001-05:00

Today's DelanceyPlace email was an interesting description that shows a bit about the life of the cow that you eat. Does it matter that we do this to cows? After all, they're born to be "slaves" and subservient to us, and they can't talk back, and they can't think and they have no feelings. Or do they?

http://delanceyplace.blogspot.com/2009/01/delanceyplace_27.html

My latest little bit of yoga enlightenment concerns the triangle and half moon poses, where the top arm goes straight up in the air and the bottom arm straight down to the ground. The proper positioning of the torso in these positions is to be turned in the same plane as the arms. These are the hard positions for me to do, because my body seems to be tremendously asymmetrical. On one side, I can turn my torso fairly easily. On the other side, my entire torso sort of sits there pointed at the floor, as though there's no other way to be in that position. So on that side, I find myself constantly in a dialog "lengthen and relax my waist, try rotating my hips... not rotating? ok, go back to trying to keep my waist relaxed.. etc." Lately, though, instead of that dialog, I'm thinking about the connection between my top and bottom arms. If I think about them being on a sort of pole, going right across my chest, then it seems as though that image helps to get my torso moving in the right configuration. It's especially useful in the half moon where you're just sort of dangling on one leg and losing the perspective that you have with two feet on the ground. Having that connection between my two arms gives my body a frame of reference upon which to align itself.

I so enjoy the rest of the DvD after the upward bow. It's a huge gentle hand that passes over my body after 40 minutes of drill sergeant yoga. I'm probably being a little over-dramatic, since if you watch Rodney Yee, he seems all but drill sergeant. But try doing what he's doing....

The Tao of Healthy Eating, body brushing, and neti

2009-01-26T20:06:00.001-05:00

My thighs are sore today. Since I haven't been doing much else in the realm of exercising, it must be the leg stretches in the last segment of Power Yoga with Rodney Yee DvD. I think I've been pushing the stretching. But it feels soooo good to get into the deep muscles of my legs and back. Such a release, after all these months of asking for so much from them, to be giving something enjoyable back to them.

A man at my local health food store recommended I read the book "The Tao of Healthy Eating" by Bob Flaws. He states in that book that cooking (not overcooking) vegetables is the best way to eat them. So, I am doing less vegetable juicing and more cooking over the past week. One of the benefits is that dinners are much easier, either cooked or eating left over soup. Juicing is a huge time sink, however wonderful it makes me feel. Tonight I ate a tiny bowl of left over squash soup and fermented vegetables for dinner. The book also says to eat like a king for breakfast, a merchant for lunch, and a pauper for dinner. So in the interest of not having a ton of food in my stomach for my evening yoga/tai chi practice, I am attempting to follow that very philosophy.

Two changes in the way of cleaning my body that I've done lately, thanks to yoga articles that I keep reading. One is doing the neti pot to clean out the sinuses, and another is to use a before-bath brush to loosen dead skin that has grown from the day before. I am doing those two things daily now. The neti cleaning seems to make my nose very dry in this already-dry winter weather, however, but perhaps it's keeping me from getting sick. So far no serious illnesses this flu season.

Taking off the Blinders

2009-01-26T13:59:00.001-05:00

I read this recent post by a friend this morning:

http://irishsea-mark.blogspot.com/2009/01/luck.html.

We can spend our lives thinking about the "if only"'s, or we can look at the here and now and with the tools we have, ask ourselves "how can I live my life today so that I can be the best that I can be and leave the world a better place for my having lived in it?"

As far as I've been able to tell, only the latter view of life will gain you happiness. Anything less destroys any hope of your life having any meaning.

Another friend posted a link to a dramatic video this morning: http://www.maniacworld.com/are-you-going-to-finish-strong.html . I love this video, because it so beautifully points out that life is not at all about being the "ideal" physical human being, if there ever were such a thing -- nor having all of the things laid before you that society swears are prerequisites to living a full and happy life. It's about remaining focused on doing what you need to do, in spite of what everyone else tells you you can and cannot do, to realize your dreams and goals.

Is it possible to even imagine what magic the collective human race would be able to achieve if we all were able to take off our blinders and see this incredible potential?

I thank my friends for opening my eyes today.

Moving my yoga to the next level

2009-01-25T17:32:00.001-05:00

My yoga practice is at a plateau and needs to progress to another level, I think. Last night I did lesson 2 of week 6, and I realized that lately I feel bored with my "Moving Toward Balance 8 Weeks with Rodney Yee" lessons. The props are tedious to set up and I feel like spending an entire week working on just one thing is not working for me any more. I've already been through the book a couple of times, so I think that I am ready to jump to week 8 and begin cycling through it for my daily practice. The last time I did week 8, I felt that it was too much -- each day takes at least an hour -- and some of the poses I felt I needed more practice on. But now, I believe that I might be ready to do that. If I can't do an hour every day, then I will work on trying to figure out how to whittle down the 8-week lessons into briefer sessions. That way I can get my inversions into every days practice as well.

I think the Power Yoga with Rodney Yee has done wonders in bringing me to this point. I will continue to do what I'm currently doing which is doing the Power Yoga DvD every morning and then lay aside at least 20 minutes for yoga/tai chi work in the evenings.

I do a handstand every morning before starting the Power Yoga DvD. I'm still doing about 25 seconds and not much more. Even 25 seconds of handstand makes the push ups in the DvD tough towards the end.

More on the Handstand, and Thwumping the wall in Wide Angle Forward Bend

2009-01-23T15:35:00.001-05:00

I've been studying the handstand lately. How come sometimes I just go up, gracefully and effortlessly, and sometimes, just the contrary, I kick and kick and my fight-or-flight fear response builds up to the point where the fear itself overwhelms my ability to kick? Last night I stumbled upon the thought that it had something to do with my arms being bent a bit before I begin my kick. I explored that. With my arms bent, it seems that they have more ability to somehow take part in positioning my body as my feet are rising. So, I'm not just kicking against gravity, but I'm kicking up and then getting somehow pulled up by my arms. I showed my revelation to John, and he just shook his head, not understanding it. I don't understand it myself. But I believe I'm on to something when I say that I think the key to an effortless handstand lies in the arms being bent a bit in the starting position.

Every time I do the Power Yoga with Rodney Yee (which is every morning) recently, I have to smile to myself when I get to the Wide Angle Forward Bend. Rodney says to put the back of your head to the ground. Well, the key question here is, "how the heck does one put the crown of their head to the ground when the top of their head just barely grazes it?" A couple of weeks ago I decided, what the heck, I'll just do what he says and put the crown of my head to the floor. Well, in order to do that, it means I have to lean forward and forward and forward. I managed to get it done, but within seconds found myself somersaulting into the wall in front of me, crashing into it with an explosive thwump. It was hilariously funny. I loved the laughter that yoga gave me that day :)

Observing the relationship between the shoulderblades and the sacrum

2009-01-20T14:37:00.001-05:00

Since I've been able to do the entire Power Yoga with Rodney Yee DvD things have dramatically opened up for me. The upward bow positions, which at first caused me severe pain, are becoming positions that I'm gradually learning to look forward to. More importantly, though, is that the stretches in the last 20 minutes or so provide an amazing sense of relaxation in my body and mind. I'm so grateful I didn't quit when I thought about it a couple of months ago. Quitting the DvD before learning to do the complete workout does not do it justice. It's become a ritual of welcoming, gratitude, and petitioning to my day now.

One of my latest observations has been the relationship between the shoulders and the sacrum. This is a phrase that Rodney uses over and over in different positions. "Observe the relationship between your shoulder blades and your sacrum" he loves to say. The other day I was doing week 6 day 1 in the book "Moving Towards Balance 8 weeks of yoga with Rodney Yee", and he suggested observing the relationship between the shoulder blades and the sacrum while in downward facing dog. By playing around with my positioning I can identify those muscles that tie those points together. It's quite something to be able to do that by someone who, up until now has not ever had a clue about her body other than the fact that it was a source of great pain and tremendous inconvenience.

I've been doing the handstand daily, in order to facilitate my understanding of how to gracefully enter into that position. One of the observations that John and I both have had is that, if you can't make it up on your first kick, every subsequent try weakens you more and more. It seems that you have only so-many tries and then you may as well get up and go do something else and come back later, because your body will only get more and more exhausted trying. There is still a point of fear that I feel, and I think that contributes to the sense of exhaustion with each attempt.

What makes a person search?

2009-01-16T13:22:00.001-05:00

Last night I started reading the book "The Wisdom of Yoga" by Stephen Cope. I found myself wondering... "what is the nuance in a person that makes him/her search?" I find myself never content with myself. I'm always searching... searching... searching... for the answers. The answers to life, to myself, to my higher purpose... And yet, most of the people around me seem quite content to be whoever they happen to be at the moment, and never give one thought to it. What is it in me that makes me tick differently? What is it exactly that makes life so unsettled for me?

"Impossible" doesn't exist

2009-01-15T13:10:00.001-05:00

I had two major discoveries over the past 2 days. Yesterday I was googling yoga poses, as I do periodically to read more about what others have to say about the poses I'm doing. I discovered quite by accident that my hero's pose, which I've always thought was a simple sitting on your feet pose isn't sitting on your feet at all. Your feet are actually to the side of your butt. That changes the pose dramatically for me, and now I have to learn a new post :)

The second discovery was that I could do the handstand. The handstand has always been my nemesis. I've been able to do it in the doorway with no problem whatsoever, and it feels effortless. But kicking against the wall has been an exercise in overcoming horrible fright -- the fright of my arms collapsing and my plunging body crushing my head and neck. I've been kicking and kicking and feeling like I'm getting nowhere. The wall just never seems to be there for me.

Last night I asked John to lift my legs and put it against the wall (as I do regularly) so I could feel the final position. It seemed as though my legs and my back were bending so far back, it felt very stressful to my entire body. And my arms were seriously overstressed. I was frustrated, and so decided to quit and continue to periodically work on it, and vowed to keep doing it in the doorway until I could learn it the "proper" way, kicking against the wall. This morning, after my Power Yoga workout, I did a handstand in the doorway and studied my positioning. My legs and back did not arch way back, and my legs and arms were at ease. It's been baffling to me that the doorway has felt so simple and yet against the wall so incredibly frightening and hard.

I noticed that my starting position in the doorway is with my head and back supported along the door jamb, as I walk my feet up the other jamb. I'd already decided long ago that the proper starting position when kicking to the wall was with hands about 3 inches away from the wall and back and head not supported by the wall in the initial kick. This morning I decided to support them and try the kick. I was shocked beyond belief that after about 2 kicks I found myself in a handstand. Is part of the reason I was able to do this that my arms are much stronger now? Am I better at analyzing my yoga poses? I can't explain how this exact same experiment which failed so miserably 5 months ago happened almost with no fanfare this morning.

Yoga continues to teach me that one of the great lessons in life is that there is no such thing as impossible. Life's been tough going since my breast cancer treatments in 2001. It's not the cancer itself that is the issue -- I never felt or saw that. It's the challenge of the cancer and my treatments forcing upon me all of the things I've neglected my entire life -- my physical, spiritual, and mental well-being.

For all of these years, I've thought that I would never use my arms for anything significant again in my life. This morning I did the 20 or so push-ups that the Power Yoga DvD sends you through, breezed through the triangle, side angle, and upward bow poses, and did the pyramid pose with my hands in namaste behind my back. Then I did a 20-second handstand.

Just as I do my yoga poses and every day I feel some tiny muscle that fussed yesterday giving in today, and I feel those tiny muscles every day giving in little by little, I'm also finding that little by little I'm gaining my courage and my ability to see that "impossible" just doesn't exist.

Bringing workouts into my non-workout world

2009-01-13T12:51:00.001-05:00

This morning Power Yoga Total Body with Rodney Yee workout was so great. I'm always surprised at how different my body feels from day to day. Some days I can hardly do one pushup. This morning my arms felt strong, and in the upward bow I managed to even begin to think about listening to my back. Usually it's enough just that I get through it, much less bring my mind through the pain to actually observe. Also, the ending leg stretches felt so fantastically refreshing and rejuvenating. All in all it was a good yoga morning.

John and I went cross-country skiing a couple of days ago and I noticed that when you push and are gliding forward on one leg, you are in what is very similar to a warrior 3 yoga position. And when your waist twists back and forth as your arms swing, the hip movement (and suppleness requirement) is very similar to what you do in tai chi. Rodney Yee says "breathe into your lower back" on some poses, and I find that breathing into my lower back to keep its fluidity as I ski is very helpful.

John mentioned an article, or book (I can't remember exactly) which was about how we associate "working out" with going to the gym or taking classes; but in actuality, we are missing a very important attitude we should be taking where the very act of living our lives should be viewed as a workout. For instance, when I get water from the water cooler at work, I can either lean down and press the lever, or I can squat, and by squatting mindfully and slowly up and down, both strengthen my quads and practice keeping my spine erect but relaxed.

So I love it when I find myself integrating my "work outs" into my daily life like when I'm cross country skiing (or at the water cooler :P). Lately I make a big point of putting my shoes and socks on and washing my feet in the shower with a one-legged stance, and doing them in slo-mo so that my balance, coordination, and strengthening are enhanced.

Yoga and the Gift of Thankfulness

2009-01-12T12:56:00.001-05:00

I have finally graduated to being able to do the entire Power Yoga by Rodney Yee workout. Most of the last portion is leg stretching which I'm discovering I've been sorely needing.

I have added on, at the recommendation of my dear husband, a tai chi video by Terence (Terry) Dunn. It's a magnificent video -- very simple in presentation, but precise and methodically taught. The warm-up by itself is 50 minutes long. I only dedicate 20 minutes to it, squeezing it in in the evening when I can.

I think slower is more my style than lots of information/forms/poses. I find that I need time to think over what I'm doing and practice a small thing over and over and over. Maybe this is why it's taken me 6 months of daily workouts to finally be able to get through the Power Yoga DvD. Yoga has become so much a part of my daily routine that without my morning yoga workout, I feel that I cannot begin the day with a worshipful, thankful attitude. The attitude says "now there can be no disasters in my day".

One thing interesting that I've noticed is that the Power Yoga DvD does not make one a yogi. I dedicate my evenings to juicing vegetables and puttering in the kitchen with my diet and such, and so don't always have the time for my evening workouts from the "Moving Towards Balance, Yoga in 8 weeks with Rodney Yee" book. When I do it now, I get a tremendous workout. I'm surprised, since I'm so dedicated to the Power Yoga DvD morning workouts. I discover, though, that the Power Yoga gives me a maintenance workout, but the "real" yoga comes from holding the poses longer and doing more inversions. In those ways I feel that I learn more self-perception and gain more meditative qualities to my yoga. Plus, it's just plain harder to hold, say, a side-angle bend or warrior 2 for 45 seconds. I find that in that pain of holding those poses is where my mind searches for the ease in my body and where I find the liberation.

I still continue to find over and over the life-changing benefits of my daily yoga practice. Maybe some of it comes from the fact that yoga makes one respectful of ones body. And even when I'm being bad to my body by eating badly or whatever, it's still with an overall knowledge that there's a pristine, pure, worthwhile being inside, and that's a wonderful gift that I'm grateful to have.

Yoga and walking

2008-12-09T13:11:00.000-05:00

I'm on my third time through the "Moving Toward Balance: Yoga in 8 Weeks with Rodney Yee", and for the past 5 months or so have been doing the Rodney Yee "Power Yoga" DvD every morning. That's about 1 1/2 to 2 hours of yoga every day. That much yoga can only result in profound changes in ones life. And sure enough I am finding profound changes. One of my latest revelations was the holding of my body as I'm walking.

About two years ago I had an episode where my back refused to hold my body up any longer. When I sat in a chair, I would feel as though my spine was collapsing my body so that my internal organs were getting squashed. After going to one doctor after the other, I finally became desperate for a cure, and decided that no matter how much it cost I would find my own cure. I did acupuncture, Alexander technique lessons, reiki, massage, healing, and whatever else I could find. Well, I finally pulled out of this by finding a physiatrist who put me touch with a physical therapist who gave me a weight training program. But that's an aside. The important thing I wanted to mention is the Alexander work. The Alexander technique consists of a series of lessons where the practitioner "teaches" your body to understand what the perfect alignment is. He or she basically does things to cause your body to find its own alignment, and then continually guides it. Over the course of time, theoretically, your body will "learn" by incorporating this into other parts of your day.

I never got much farther than a couple of months with Alexander, and never completely understood it. But I retained a lot of the words of what my teacher taught me. One of the things he said was to "think about your head suspended over your body, with the spine hanging from it".

Last weekend, I was walking my dog and thinking about this, and also thinking about the correlation with Rodney Yee and other yoga and tai chi instructors, who say "think about your shoulders moving down, and by moving down allowing your neck to elongate and your head to be suspended as though it's hanging from the stars (note the similarity with the Alexander teachings)".

After about the millionth Sun Salutation, I think I'm finally understanding how to walk with my head suspended and my shoulders down. When I get into this "groove", it feels as though everything from my shoulders down is one unit, separate from my head, whose purpose, it feels, is to dangle my spine. Then everything from my shoulders down moves as though a puppet on a string. This is a recent discovering, and I'm still exploring it, so I may not be on the correct path at all. Still, it's nice to have these periods of self discovery as my body begins to release itself and my mind.

Washing my hair, and Quan Yin the Buddhist goddess

2008-12-09T12:47:00.000-05:00

It's funny at how a small side note or comment can catch your ear and cause you to make big changes. I read a small note in my latest Yoga Journal about how our society over-does its processing of everything from food to even our bodies, the way we insist of putting medication into our bodies, and scrubbing our hair every night.

I've been washing my hair every night for probably my entire lifetime (because my parents did and my brothers did). I've tried not doing that, but found that my hair got so greasy and itchy it drove me crazy.

Well, I read that line in the Yoga Journal, and for the past couple of weeks I'm attempting to wash my hair every other day. If I can make this a habit, then maybe I can make it every other day. I'm pleasantly surprised that except for the first day or two, it's been quite tolerable. On off days, though, my hair sits flat on my head and it's becoming obvious that it's thinning as I age. But that's the vanity part of me speaking, and I need to get over that.

I was in a new age bookstore recently, and the sales person told me that she saw the Buddhist goddess Quan Yin standing behind me, and on the other side behind was a Buddhist monk. Even though I have no idea who this person was, it still inspired me to research Quan Yin. She represents a very strong diety of the female persuasion. She's actually a female version of the male Buddhist diety Avalokitesvara, who is supposed to be the embodiment of all compassionate Buddhas. I find myself praying to her when I meditate, try to get to sleep, feel stressed, or stand in namaste during my practice. I like the thought of having someONE to pray to instead of just the heavens. And I'm holding the image of her being physically present with me at all times. I find that very comforting and grounding. In one of my yoga magazines, I read about petitioning when you pray. I've not petitioned for myself when I pray, and I realize it's a big thing that I miss in my life -- petitioning for myself. So now I petition Quan Yin, morning, day, and evening.

Second Thoughts about Continuing with Rodney Yee (and first experience with Kundalini)

2008-11-24T14:26:00.001-05:00

I had a heart to heart with myself over the weekend, pondering whether I should quit the Rodney Yee yoga program I've been doing (morning Power Yoga DvD and evening "Moving Towards Balance: 8 weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee"). Part of me is concerned about whether concentrating on just Rodney Yee is compromising the balance in my body's strengthening -- making me strong and flexible in certain ways, and leaving other areas week. The reason I worry is because of the soreness I feel in my legs, back, and neck, and I found that if I twist my foot inward (instead of outward, which is how it is inclined a large number of the poses), it seems tight. Still, these are vague issues, not really enough to actually KNOW that bad things are happening. They could be related to improving and my body's scar tissues breaking up. After all, I've not been flexible nor had strong core muscles for many many years, I'm guessing as much as 30 years.

I bought a Kundalini Yoga DvD (Kundalini Yoga with Gurmukh) and did it on Sunday morning as a change. "Shake out the anger!" I heard her saying that as I desperately threw my body left and right in a frenzy, trying not to collapse from the pain and motion sickness of it all. If that's what Kundalini Yoga is, it's.... well, different, that's for sure.

So.... not being in the mood to shake out my anger for 40 minutes this morning, I went back to my old standby, Power Yoga with Rodney Yee. I was pleased to feel completely refreshed and rejuvenated and totally rewarded by doing it.

I wonder if the second thoughts I had all weekend were just a signal that I'm progressing to the next level in my practice. hm.

I'm grateful for me

2008-11-19T13:43:00.002-05:00

I woke up late this morning and decided to skip my morning power yoga practice. I think I've done it every day for the past 5 weeks. It was probably time for a break. My legs were beginning to feel sore. So as not to lose the peace and calm of my morning I kept my date with my meditation room and did 13 minutes of meditating.

I'm filled with gratitude today. Gratitude for being given another chance at life after my breast cancer, gratitude for my life and my job, my husband, my dogs, and maybe most importantly gratitude to myself for being who I am. I spend so much time feeling guilty for appreciating who I am, as though it was somehow making me a selfish, self-indulgent person. This morning I thought about who I am and what I've done in my life, and the work and persistence I've invested in becoming the person that I am today -- breastless, uterus, ovaries, and fallopian tubeless, childless -- yet my life is incredible, and so fantastically much richer than I could ever imagine. From a childhood with a dictatorial perfectionist for a father through to my cancer, through to everything that's happened since my cancer that has caused my health to slowly decline to the point where, two years ago, I was suffering chronic depression and dysfunction from just about every spot in my body -- I've overcome all those things which wanted so desperately to see me wither away into an insignificant ball of nothing and die.

I'm nothing short of an amazing person, and I'm grateful today for me.

Pulling my Yoga Practice into my Day

2008-11-18T12:28:00.001-05:00

The other day, after our bicycle ride, I leaned on the car to take off my shoes.

"Stand on one foot and take off your shoe, you shouldn't lean on anything," John said. I realized John was right. There are so many opportunities for us to do our "yoga practice" throughout the day that we miss. This morning in the shower as I leaned against the wall to wash my feet, I realized that it never once dawned on me until now that I could do this on one foot.

One of the beauties of a daily yoga practice (twice daily for me) is you do find it spilling into the rest of your day in so many physical and mental ways. If I'm not completely focused when I practice, then I find that I'm not doing my poses correctly. In the morning I do 40 minutes of Rodney Yee's "Power Yoga" DvD. If I'm not 100% engaged, I miss poses or find myself doing the wrong poses, or find that I lose my timing and then have to rush to catch up. In the evening when I do my practice from my "Moving Towards Balance: 28 days of Yoga with Rodney Yee", if I'm not 100% focused on what I'm doing, I do the poses incorrectly. I find myself tensing up my muscles in the wrong places, lifting my shoulders out of their sockets, or tightening my waist instead of letting it elongate and be loose and elastic. Each pose requires me to check in on my body, scanning for anything out of place or ignored.

The need to be 100% engaged means that for those couple of hours a day that I'm doing my yoga practice I'm not thinking about the problems of the day or any of the other things in my life that would so love to be the most important thing for me to fixate on.

I think the impact of all this is that instead of my external stresses encroaching upon my yoga practice, my yoga practice is encroaching on the rest of my day. And that's a good thing. How wonderful it would be if, when my boss says "how are you doing on your schedule?" instead of everything in my body tightening up and my teeth clenching, my mind automatically says "take a deep breath, shoulders down, chest and back wide, forehead smooth, smile." :)

Mike's Blog: "... the world needs people who have come alive."

2008-11-17T12:11:00.000-05:00

Mike's Blog: "... the world needs people who have come alive." This is such a nice quote: "Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and then go do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive." -- Howard Thurman

Quote of the day

2008-11-11T08:43:00.001-05:00

"Do not believe in what you have heard; do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations; do not believe anything because it is rumored and spoken of my many; do not believe merely because the written statement of some old sage is produced; do not believe in conjectures; do not believe merely in the authority of your teachers and elders. After observation and analysis, when it agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it."

-- Buddha --

Living in a world of true understanding, and how it defines "beauty"

2008-11-10T12:08:00.002-05:00

Today I thought about the word "beauty". What would the world be like if we all had this supernatural gift of understanding each other, similar to the way you begin to understand a character in a movie as the character develops and you see, for instance, how a seemingly common person behaves under an extraordinary circumstance. What if we all were able to "see" each other for those underlying capacities: the eloquence that comes out of a person who on the exterior looks to be completely uneloquent; the poise and control that might come out of someone under a situation of intense pressure; perhaps the lack-of such eloquence or poise that might come out of someone who on the outside is extraordinarily beautiful.

How would a world like that be different from todays world? Would we still have a world that worshipped external beauty and fancy clothes and possessions?

Finishing "Moving Toward Balance: 8 Weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee"

2008-11-10T08:51:00.004-05:00

I finally finished my very last lesson of the "Moving Toward Balance: 8 weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee". It was refreshing, (first half of) the meditation practice was to take a walk. Even though I walk all the time I used it as an excuse to go take another one. I wondered whether I should let the dogs out to go walking with me -- I usually spend most of my time being paranoid that I will hear the screeching of wheels as a car careens into one of my dogs, so I'm constantly hyperaware of where they are.

As is usually the case, I gave in to my reservations and let them out with me. My little one, Sid, who usually walks with me came down a couple of houses with me and then disappeared, and Mac the Lab as usual hung out near the house. So for most of my walk I was alone, which allowed me to think about the lesson -- walking with my chest open and my arms and legs swinging freely. I love the "listening" that yoga requests me to do to my body. As a software engineer, my body is usually the last thing on my mind, which is why I think that after 30 years of this abuse my body has taken such a downward spiral.

My mastectomies and radiation treatments have wreaked havoc with my upper chest area, from scar tissue damage around my heart, lungs, and arms right up through my neck where my port-a-cath was inserted. So I find that my shoulder and upper arm really work hard when my chest is open. Every couple of seconds I need to check in with them and make sure that they are moved down, and not tensed up as I am naturally inclined to do. I liked the concept of timing my breathing to my steps, because it did add a breath-awareness to my walking, which converted my focus from outward and daydreaming to inward and attentive.

I walked for about 20 minutes. My street is in a very dark rural neighborhood. With all of the autumn leaves covering the street and lawns, the world seems abounding with clutter, and with my flashlight and listening for the clink clink of Sid's tags, I still could not see where he was or hear him. When I got back to the house, I walked up the driveway and there were Mac and Sid, sitting on the back lawn by the deck stairs, commisserating and watching me. "'Bout time you got back to let us in!".

Two years ago, John and I went on a meditation retreat for Thanksgiving. Even though I was very sick during the retreat and spent most of my time walking the halls trying to get through the weekend, I loved the sense of thankfulness and love that I felt. I'm hoping that we can do a similar retreat this Thanksgiving-- maybe a yoga retreat this time.

More on Yoga and Religion

2008-10-30T15:41:00.001-04:00

http://www.nst.com.my/Current_News/NST/Thursday/NewsBreak/20081030151705/Article/index_html

Oftentimes, I think religions see themselves as changing a person from without. People who are lucky will take that change and begin seeing a change from within. Yoga changes people from within. Maybe that is one explanation why some religions feel threatened versus their members practicing yoga.

John has female friends and I have male friends. Our abilites to grow as individuals strengthen our marriage. I think that goes for everything in this world. Anything that stifles me or tries to compartmentalize me brings my growth as a person to a halt, and although those things might help me feel better shortterm, they have never lasted longterm. The most ideal religion for me would be one where my individuality is respected and indeed celebrated.

Is Mindfulness Good for your Brain?

2008-10-30T15:31:00.001-04:00

As I was showering this morning I thought about the towel. I had the towel hung behind the shower door, and my bicycling clothes from last week hung on the towel rack to dry. When I moved the bicycling clothes from the towel rack into my bureau, I didn't realize that I could move my towel from the door back over to the towel rack. As I stood looking at the scene, I could feel the gears in my brain reorganizing things so that the towel was on the towel rack again.

This is a minor thing in the grand scheme of my day. But the reason I mention it is because I could stop and observe myself as I worked this infinitessimally trivial thing out. If I could be conscious of doing this, then I could expand it to being conscious of the rest of my world and the way I interact with it.

One of the books I listen to at night is a book about the Buddhist precepts. One of the things that he says is that we can view our bodies as physical manifestations that we're temporarily being given control over. That struck me as an interesting concept. If I view my body as a thing outside of who "I" am, then I can separate the "me" from the "it", which also separates the "me" from the thoughts in "its" brain. How does that help me? I guess mainly that I can project a loving relationship onto this body as I care for it -- feed it, exercise it, do the things I need to do to keep it healthy -- and I can remember that when "it" is sick and unhealthy that there is an "I" underneath that is a constant. The concept is fuzzy, and for all I know, I completely misinterpreted what he said, but still, it got me to thinking.....

Yoga and the Child Within Me

2008-10-29T13:48:00.001-04:00

I've been doing 30 minutes of the "Power Yoga" Rodney Yee DvD in the mornings. I always follow it up with a sitting meditation. The more familiar and proficient I get at doing the 30 minutes of this DvD, the more intense the workout is getting for me. This morning, in my follow-on meditation, I found myself sinking effortlessly into a state of perfect calm and contentment. It felt like brilliant sunshine, and I celebrated it by dedicated my practice to my mother, mother-in-law, a dying uncle, and my boss at work. I accepted the suffering that each is going through at the moment, and gave each a silent offering of the peace that I was feeling. It was a very nice meditation.

Afterwards, I went into the bathroom to take my morning shower and noticed that I had a bottle of a new type of shampoo, and I felt the child inside of me jump with glee "wheeee, a new shampoo, how fun!".

Yoga is bringing back the child in me :)

The Question of Yoga and Religion

2008-10-28T16:50:00.001-04:00

I've been thinking about the question "Is Yoga a Religion" since I read the article about the school that had issues with yoga being taught because they didn't want some "cult" religion to be taught to the kids. It took me by surprise.

I can't deny, though, that I do feel very spiritual when I do tai chi, or yoga, or even go to holistic practitioners or natural foods stores. Why? Because those things make me feel better. When I feel physically healthy and alive, then my mental outlook changes, and I can't help but have a sense of deep spirituality. I feel that spirituality in the muscles of my body when I do my yoga stretches, or when I am thinking about my yoga body as I move about my day and check my breathing.

I can't tell whether this means that yoga is a religion for me. Is it the end result that defines a religion or the path towards that end?

Bicycling, dog training, Extended Side Angle, and Building Post-Mastectomy Arm Strength

2008-10-27T14:23:00.001-04:00

Last week a friend at work told me about his son. His son is 7 years old, and an avid mountain biker. My friend was telling me how much he's learned from this little 7 year-older, who has an intuitive sense about how to shift his weight and maneuver his bike through difficult trails.

I've thought about this over the past week. I spend a good portion of every single day studying my body and muscles. "Am I standing correctly? Is my back relaxed and wide when I'm walking? Am I breathing? Is my neck tense?" I seem to have lost my ability to handle my body "intuitively". How is it that I need to relearn the very seemlingly basic forms of standing upright and walking? In that same vein, how is it that my body doesn't intuitively understand what it needs in order for me to maintain good health?

Yesterday John and I had a gorgeous bike ride around our neighborhood. The weather was warm, and the road was covered with leaves. We laughed at a small poodle sitting in his yard. The first time we passed her, she barked at us. Second time we passed, she barked, but after we passed her. Third time we passed, she didn't bat an eyelash. How easy it is to train a dog :)

I bought a Rodney Yee DvD called "Power Yoga", and I've been doing the first 1/2 hour every morning. Thankfully it's not as hard as I anticipated. It's not easy either. I like that you are thrown directly into the workout without long, tedious explanations. I feel like that 1/2 hour is well-spent, doing one move after another. It's a perfect complement to the "Moving Towards Balance: 8 weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee" book. The DvD starts off gradually with the Mountain, Standing Backbend, Forward Bend, Lunge, Downward Facing Dog, Upward Facing Dog, etc, and then works up to Warrior 2, and then Extended Side Angle, and then Triangle, and then sends you through different combinations of doing one after the other. It's very nice.

I smiled last night as I was doing my nightly "Moving Towards Balance: 8 weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee" lesson. The Triangle and Extended Side Angle poses in the lesson are so easy now that I'm doing them with the DvD in the mornings. I still find the Extended Side Angle to be one of the most challenging because of the arm limitations from my cancer surgery and my back pain.

Speaking of which.... one of the new things I've been adding lately is handstand. I've been doing that twice a day for the past couple of weeks. Just in the doorway for now, though, and only for 5-10 seconds at a time. I have a long ways to go to build up my arm strength. After breast cancer surgery I was told to never lift anything more than 5 pounds for the rest of my life or I would get lymphedema in my arm. So, for the past 7 years, I've done nothing at all with my arm -- babying it obssessively. Yoga is teaching me that I never had to do that. The medical establishment still hasn't figured out how to heal people in the true sense of the word. 99% of the population will never study yoga or any of the holistic practices, so 99% of all breast cancer survivors will go the rest of their lives never picking up more than 5 pounds.

Looking to Where the Teacher is Pointing, and not to the Teacher

2008-10-24T15:10:00.001-04:00

I've been thinking the past few days about spiritual leaders and their responsibilities. The reason is that I googled "Rodney Yee" and discovered an article about his extramarital affair. I found myself filled with disappointment that this had to happen to me yet again. It seems that this has happened to me over and over in my life. I become engrossed following someone who is resonsibile for a life transformation in me, and they turn out to be human. Then I become disenchanted with the person/group, get a bad attitude and leave.

In thinking about this, I've realized something. If I can't forgive my "spiritual leaders" for being human, then who am I to forgive myself for being human. After all, they are not saying that they're gods (and therefore perfect, by whoever's standards) by any means. Now that I've been through this exact conundrum a handful of times and am older and wiser, I'm beginning to realize that this has nothing at all to do with them, it has to do with me, and my ability to look at the world through mature eyes.

In my own always-trying-to-find-a-spiritual-answer-to-everything way, I am seeing this as Rodney Yee's lesson to me. It's an opportunity for me to learn. I can walk away from my yoga book and never buy or look at another lesson by him, or I can continue with what I'm doing and continue to grow spiritually and physically and keep my eyes focused on the real goal, which is the thing that is at the end of the path that Rodney Yee and the rest of us are all on together -- the path to a place of peace and harmony and a world of tolerance and love for each other.

Goal for today: breathe

2008-10-20T12:22:00.001-04:00

Yesterday my back killed me. It was one of the very few days that I skipped my yoga. I suppose it was from increased activity. I was so busy, that at the end of the day I found myself collapsed in front of the TV, hardly able to keep my eyes open, my body was so tired and my back so achy.

As I was puttering around washing dishes and doing my various pre-bed preparations, I realized that I spend a lot of my time holding my breath. It's most obvious when I'm washing the dishes. The thought of my breath came to mind from watching a new DvD I bought called "Yoga Burn" by Rodney Yee. He makes a point of using the word "breath" in almost every single one of the 3 billion or so poses that he demonstrates on that DvD.

I woke up this morning and thought about breathing, making a conscious effort to breathe into my lower back as I hiked the dogs, did my sun salutations, and got ready for work. I noticed that thinking about breathing into my lower back affects my Downward Facing Dog pose quite a bit, in a subtle way.

My goal for today is to breathe.

There But for the Grace of God Go I

2008-10-16T13:15:00.003-04:00

This morning I thought about my yoga practice and how it seems that yoga is so much more than placement of body and breathing and stretching. Once you get past the point where you're just trying to get somewhere even slightly close to what you're supposed to be doing, things relax, and then it becomes a process of listening to your body. As the weeks and months pass, I find myself reading the instructions in my "Finding Balance: Yoga in 8 weeks with Rodney Yee" book and getting into my pose, but after that, Rodney Yee seems to fade away and the dialog is between me and my body. And even more profoundly, most of the dialog is about my body talking to me.

The more I continue my yoga practice, the more I'm drawn towards the reality of how lacking most of our society is in finding empowerment to heal themselves. I find myself associating myself more and more with "fringe" groups -- the "touchy feely, spiritual, tree-hugging-mouse-saving" types who, like me, are in their middle age and continue to search for meaning, purpose, and explanations in their lives. The reason I'm drawn towards these groups is that I find that most everyone else is just plain stressed out and not doing a thing about it.

Having been there for most of my life, and seeing myself where I am today, I know that "that" part of myself that can become chronically stressed out can overwhelm the real person underneath. So the world never gets to see that person underneath when I'm in that state. My dialog, actions, activities, diet, addictions become a web of protective covering and escape and deception both to myself and to everyone around me. Seeing that in the people around me, I can say to myself "there but for the grace of God go I....". May I never lose my true self again

Sleeping with the Dalai Lama

2008-10-07T09:26:00.001-04:00

I have lots of issues with sleep. I find myself needing sleeping pills a lot more than I should because I have so many issues with hot flashes, which will often wake me up 4 or 5 times a night in panic. I've been trying to figure out how to wean the sleeping pills from my life and how to learn to live with the hot flashes and still be able to function during the day after sleepless nights.

Last night I decided to play an audio book that I have called "How to Practice" by the Dalai Lama.

I haven't decided whether I consider myself deeply religious or not. I think of deeply religous people as being people who have some sort of religious tenet that they follow. One of the things that helped me get through my cancer treatments in 2001 was the meditation classes that I took from a Tibetan group called Rigpa. I like the Buddhist view of the world where, instead of changing the world, they believe that first and foremost the person needs to change. I guess in that respect, I would consider myself a Buddhist. Tibet is a wonderful icon of what all of the world should be, I believe. And I also believe that if there would be any hope at all of my helping to create that world, I would need to find a solid ground within myself first, so that I would have a firm foundation upon which to stand as I hold my hand out to the next person.

So, in that vein, I thought that playing a Dalai Lama audiobook might be something that could help get me through the night and hopefully instead of waking up agitated and unable to meditate and/or get back to sleep, having the Dalai Lama speaking to me and helping me to focus on that image of world of peace and simplicity, and finding it all within myself.

I woke up at 6:00 this morning, feeling completely rested. I was amazed.

Finding a balance between what I can do and challenging myself to go one step further

2008-10-06T10:19:00.001-04:00

I took 4 days off from my yoga to deal with a colonoscopy and recovery from its associated complications. The last day before I took off, I did the first day of week 5: Twisting of "Moving Toward Balance: 8 Weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee". I remembered while I was doing this lesson that the last time that I did this weeks lessons, I really hated it. The pretzel-like twists in his variation 3 of most of the new poses are completely out of the scope of my abilities, and if I try to do them, I find that I struggle with just getting my arms to go the right way. And if I can finally manage to grab my toe (arm, waist, etc), my body is so contorted out of proper position, I find it frustrating and I begin resenting the lesson and secretly accusing Rodney of being unnecessarily difficult and tedious.

So... after taking four days off, I had a hard time motivating myself to come back to week 5 of the book. I played with whether I should begin at week 1 again, or take a break from Rodney Yee and do my Richard Hittleman "Yoga: 28 Day Exercise Plan" routines.

A part of me didn't really think that quitting at a time that I hate the lessons was a good time, so I negotiated with myself. I told myself to just do the ones that I can do, and not even attempt to do the version 3 twists. And maybe not even try to twist far, but instead of making it a tedious lesson, try to make it more meditative and gentle.

That's what I did last night. I re-did lesson 1 of week 5 on Twisting, but I did the twists in a very gentle, contemplative way, concentrating on listening to my body and the things that Rodney says we should be thinking about: Inhaling into the bottom of the twist, exhaling as I'm twisting and feeling my body rising, and then inhaling as I untwist slightly.

It turned out to be perfect for me to approach the lesson that way. I felt very positive afterwards, and felt good that I could come up with a way to modify the lesson so that I could feel good about it. I'm sure if I went back over the instructions in the book I'd find that somewhere along the line Rodney says to do that. It's hard to find a balance between doing what I can do and challenging myself to go just one step further.

It felt wonderful to do the meditations after last nights lesson. My "chi" was full of positive, relaxing energy, and I found myself at peace, even during the sitting-against-the-wall part of the meditation which I find to be hard. Maybe the pillow in the small of the back helped. This is the first sitting-against-the-wall instruction where Rodney has you using a pillow at the small of your back. Or maybe it was just that my practice was so wonderful.

Yoga room and meditations

2008-09-29T14:52:00.001-04:00

I spent yesterday completely clearing out our "yoga room". It's a big bedroom with a walk-in closet, and now it has one platform bed and one floor lamp and the rest is completely empty except for yoga mats, props, and CD player with relaxation CD's. The walkin closet is my meditation room. It has two zafu mats and a couple of meditation cushions, and a dog bed for my dog, Sid, who sees it as a space that he can go when he's really exhausted and doesn't want to be bothered.

The "yoga room" was originally my office, so now my new office is in a small cubbyhole in one corner of our master bedroom. My life seems to be a constant, neverending shuffling of my stuff. I change hobbies, interests, friends, etc. etc. etc. Sometimes I think it stems from a childhood of being a military brat and never having developed the skill of bonding with anything or anyone. At other times I wonder whether it's something that's unsettled in my innate being. Luckily for me, this characteristics hasn't extended to my husband, family, or dogs.

Anyhow.... now we have a beautiful yoga room that is free of any outside junk save one bed, and a space for both John and I to do our practices at one time. In the meantime, I work on our family room downstairs, which will be a REAL yoga room some day. Right now it's in the middle of wallpaper stripping. What exactly would "yoga room" wallpaper look like, I wonder as I wade through downy-soaked wallpaper and puddles. I have not been able to find an answer to that, so we have yet to see where this activity will end up.

I didn't begin my practice until 10:30 last night, and I'm on the first day of week 4 of Moving Toward Balance: 8 Weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee. I know that the first day of the week has a fairly long and intense practice, so I opted for doing day 2 of "Richard Hittleman's Yoga: 28 Day Exercise"'s revolving daily exercises. Hittleman's yoga is different from Yee's. Whereas Rodney Yee will have you do one pose for 30 seconds, Hittleman will have you do a sequence for 10-15 seconds apiece. The poses are slightly different as well. Rodney Yee's poses have made Hittleman much easier, although Hittleman poses still hit upon areas that are quite tender in my body, so I know that they are a valuable cross-yoga-training practice.

Another thing that's interesting is, Rodney Yee is much more formal in his meditation instruction. Hittleman has some breathing or imaging exercise, and then the rest of the meditation is lying quietly. I have very good meditations with Hittleman. Last night I was pleasantly surprised to find myself sinking into a state of complete relaxation and mental calm.

Yoga practice with your spouse

2008-09-26T13:06:00.001-04:00

I'm going to discover what it's like to share my yoga practice with my spouse. At want for a place for him to begin his work with the book "Moving Toward Balance: 8 Weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee", I cleared out the other half of my office, and now he shares my space with me. I gave him instructions to be quiet unless absolutely necessary, since my yoga practice is somewhat sacred to me.

Within about 10 second he said "I don't know how to set up my mats. Do I really need two mats? This one is curled up, I should turn it over."

"Work it out with yourself please, John. You don't need to get me involved in this discussion." I grumbled as I faced the wall in my mountain pose, trying to concentrate on relaxing my face and body (and a positive attitude).

I still have a long ways to go in being a generous person. Sharing my sacred space is definitely an act of love. We'll see how long I can last :P

Wide upper back

2008-09-26T12:58:00.001-04:00

Today as I walked the halls at work, I thought more about my posture and the proper way for me to hold it. In "Moving Toward Balance: 8 Weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee", Rodney talks about keeping your back and hips wide. And I can feel that as I relax my back, my hips and back widen. I can especially feel it in my chair, where I have a lumbar support. If I relax my back so that it feels widened, the I can feel a greater ability to curve my back over the lumbar support.

It feels as though if I relax my back when I'm walking, where I can feel my back widening, it brings my spine back (or up from the slouched position, if you want to word it more properly). And then, it feels as though everything else begins to fall into place.

I'm still experimenting, though. I'm the first person to say that when I'm in a touchy-feely class and the teacher asks "what are you feeling"? I inevitably am the person that makes a comment that's totally the opposite of what I'm supposed to be feeling. Throughout my years and years of built-up stress, I find that I'm completely out of touch with perceptions about my body.

John made a wise statement the other day. "You reach and age where you have to do these [stretching/exercising] things because they're serious business". That is so true. I've reached an age where my yoga and meditating and such are very serious pursuits, and I know that if I stop them, my body and my emotional health will slide downhill.

Graceful Sun Salutations and the Perfect Posture

2008-09-25T16:24:00.003-04:00

I watched an online video on the Sun Salutation on the http://www.jogajournal.com/ site (http://www.yogajournal.com/video/learnposes/?bctid=1483914421 by Natasha Rizopoulos) the other day, and it showed ma a bit about how to do the transitions from pose to pose. I've read that the sun salutation should be done in such a way that the transitions themselves become part of the pose. I didn't quite understand that, and have been studying online videos of people doing it.

In the Natasha Rizopoulos video, I can see a couple of things which are interesting:

She spends a quiet moment initially in mountain pose before beginning the routine.
She brings her arms around when going from upright to down, and from down back to upright
When she moves to and from the lunges, she hovers her leg in the air before actually placing it in the new position
She begins her Downward Facing Dog on her toes (thereby keeping them in the exact same position as they are in the post just preceding) for a brief moment before lowering her heels into the full Downward Facing Dog

I've been attempting to mimic her style, and I'm feeling a lot more of the graceful flow that I think I should be feeling.

Yesterday when walking to my car after work I thought about what I wrote about curving my upper back when walking or standing, and that's not exactly correct. I don't actually curve it. I think the right term may be that I reposition it.

The finding of one's perfect posture seems to be such a complicated and introspective task. I'm constantly studying different holistic methods of posture and coming up with revelations. Hopefully with each new revelation, I edge closer to something that will hopefully become my perfect posture.

Reaching Nirvana through reading ebooks

2008-09-24T14:25:00.004-04:00

In last nights "Moving Toward Balance: 8 Weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee" lesson (week 3, lesson 2), I did alternate Cobra and Downward Facing Dog poses. It was interesting because as I repeated this sequence throughout the lesson, I found myself thinking about the entire curvature of my backbend, especially the upper part of my back, which has a tendency to be very rigid. I could feel that thinking about the rounding of my entire back and trying to keep my legs active took the edge off of my lower back receiving most of the workload.

As I walked up and down the hall today at work, I found myself thinking about this, and as I walked, I had the sensation that my lower back even in the walking position seems to get more than its fair share of the workload. I concentrated on trying to give my upper back more of a backbend -- which to people with good posture it would seem more like my moving from a tendency to be hunched over, to a more upright position -- and felt that it helped to bring my spine upright into a more holistically balanced position.

I've had a funny revelation lately. I have had chronic sleep issues since my cancer treatments in 2001, due to all of the myriad of subsequent side effects and health issues that followed. I keep thinking that I need to resolve them the "spiritual" way, and use the awake time to put myself into a meditative state and clear my mind. The other night, I lay awake for about 3 or 4 hours. Finally I gave in, opened my ebook, read a page of it, and promptly fell asleep. When I told John about it in the morning, he said "if the ebook puts you to sleep immediately, why don't you just read it instead of laying there trying to meditate?" Now, I read my ebook to put me to sleep. If I wake up in the night, I read another page of it and then fall asleep within minutes. Another example of how I'm learning to live my life, not in the way that I try to put pressure on myself to (or feel pressure from the outside world to), but in the way that makes it work.

My question is, if I do not use this sleepless time to meditate, and instead us it to read ebooks, will it take more time for me and my subsequent lives to reach nirvana? A somewhat puzzling conundrum to me.

This morning I did a full headstand, legs in the air. I didn't feel at all uneasy about doing it, and found a nice balance where I was able to relax the muscles in my neck. Afterwards I got up and started for the bathroom to brush my teeth, and then it occurred to me that coming out of a pose as demanding as a headstand should have a more gentle transition, so I went back into my office and did a child's pose for a minute. As I walked out of the office, I wondered whether getting the blood to my head would help me think better at work today.

Yoga and headstands and back pain

2008-09-23T11:12:00.002-04:00

This morning I successfully took my headstand another step and raised my legs into the air. For just a second or two. It feels good to see myself making progress in my poses.

I'm starting week 3 of "Moving Toward Balance: 8 Weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee". I loved how the last time I did this first lesson of week 3 I was amazed at how I was able to accomplish that backbend lifting my head off of the floor. Before Rodney Yee, I was doing Richard Hittleman's "Yoga: 28 Day Exercise Plan", and I could never lift my head off of the floor in the backbend. There is something very thoughtful in the lesson plan laid out in "Moving Toward Balance: 8 Weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee". The poses seem to build upon each other, and somehow, subconsciously, the mind develops an understanding of the body, so that by the time he asks you to do something challenging, the mind has already done 80% of the work needed to accomplish the pose.

I find that the yoga is not helping my back pain -- some of which I attibute to old age arthritis, and some due to scar tissue from breast cancer radiation treatments. This is guesswork on my part, since the source of my back pain has never been diagnosed despite repeated visits to many doctors, a host of tests, and a ton of physical therapists and holistic practitioners. The yoga in fact seems to make the pain worse. I think the reason is because, I imagine, the mobility of muscles that haven't been mobilized in 30 years and the breaking down of scar tissue mean that things around my spine are getting repositioned and resorted.

I may have to live with my back pain forever. At this point it's irrelevant to me, because I go about my life in spite of it. Even when I'm not doing the yoga now, I spend more time being aware of my body and what parts are tensing up throughout parts of my day. When I walk down the hallway at work, I feel when I'm slouching, because the Mountain Pose has taught me about finding that spot where my head and spine are balanced and the parts of my body that don't need to be working are relaxing. In that way, I can feel my body gliding with more ease. Part of what yoga is teaching me is that I can live with back pain AND ease of movement. It's a constant lesson, but that's what helps me see that motion (and my life) need not come to an end because of my various aches and pains.

Finding Enlightenment

2008-09-23T09:16:00.002-04:00

I constantly struggle with the concept of enlightenment and the concept of "finding" it. One of the biggest roadblocks for me in a group of spiritual types is seeing everyone else as more enlightened than myself. It's especially vivid with zen buddhism where people work with koans. I can feel the whoosh as it all flies above my head.

On the other hand, sometimes I get into modes where I've been doing a lot of meditating and feeling myself becoming more grounded, and then it feels as though the entire rest of the world is so messed up emotionally.

I wonder if this means I'm normal?

More on headstands, as well as the relationship between scuba diving and meditating

2008-09-18T14:43:00.003-04:00

In the past couple of days, I've started to do three full sun salutations (ala Rodney Yee) in the morning, and one headstand a couple of breaths long.

I love timing my poses through my breath instead of counting. It makes me mindful of my breathing, and helps me focus on my body.

I've noticed that yoga hasn't helped my back pain at all, which I believe is caused by scar tissue from radiation caused by my breast cancer treatments. The worst of the back pain is just behind the lung on my cancer side. But somehow the yoga makes the back pain less of a concern to me. My body feels like it's getting some understanding and acceptance of itself, and that's a very calming feeling.

The really nice thing about the Rodney Yee yoga is that he emphasizes mediation. The last 15 minutes or so of the practice are dedicated to relaxation poses, and if my body can't take a particular pose for too long, I'm able to do my meditating with the next pose. I feel that I'm learning alternative meditation positions. It's nice because I find that in my life my ability to meditate is directly connected with my spirituality as well as my entire attitude about life in general.

This morning when doing my headstand, I discovered that I can get my body into one particular position where maintaining the headstand is effortless. On either side of that position I either fall back against the wall, or fall forward onto my arms. So my goal will be to keep praticing so that I can reproduce that position reliably every time. I will stick to doing one headstand of 2-4 breaths duration each practice session so as not to strain my neck. I truly believe that learning to do this will do wonderful things for my overall well-being. This is one of the aspects of scuba diving that I believe causes such a calming effect. The other aspect of scuba diving is the pressurization, which I think must have huge positive effects on the body. I just don't know an easy way to simulate that on-land though.

Musings on comments (and why none)

2008-09-18T09:04:00.002-04:00

I thought about commenting as I drove in to work today, and decided to turn off commenting in this blog. There's something about allowing comments in ones blog that I've noticed. A blog with commenting allowed implicitly invites others to be a part of your blog. Which is a really good thing in most cases, because it invites collaboration, which is a wonderful aspect of blogging.

But comments in blogs also change the blog. They guide the direction of the blog development, and also affect the writer -- and reader -- in a positive or negative way. I find that I tend to feel a certain degree of social etiquette in acknowledging people for their comments. If someone takes the time out to write something, then they deserve to get some sort of recognition for being an active reader. I also find that I tend to be driven by affirmation from my audience, and I'm wondering what will happen if I have no "audience" per se, but stand on my own, without any of that feedback.

I'm going to do something different with this blog and turn off commenting. I want my time and writing to be directed by what is within me to say, and not by comment maintenance.

So.... this is the groundwork that I am laying for this blog. I have neither traffic stats nor comments turned on. This will be all about my sharing a very profound part of my life with the world in words, and about my trust that there will be a connection to the world, without any need for proof.

Head stands

2008-09-16T13:18:00.002-04:00

Since I'm gradually realizing the profound impact that yoga is having on my life, I decided to create a blog and see where this takes me. For the past 5 months or so, I've done the yoga every night. I began with Richard Hittleman's "28 Day Exercise Plan", and after doing that for a couple of month, I realized that I was beginning to reap both mental and physical benefits from my practice.

One day, at Barnes and Noble, I discovered a book by Rodney Yee called "Moving Toward Balance: 8 Weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee". I discovered what a truly amazing teacher he is, and have been inspired in my practice by the care and mindfulness that he shows in his books and workouts.

Last night I did a yoga headstand for the first time. When I first began attempting the headstand, 5 months ago, I never ever thought I'd get to the point where I could do such a difficult (for a 50-something post-cancer woman) pose. I discovered that the yoga headstand doesn't come from the development of external muscles, it comes from an internal sense of balance and relaxation, and from a deep sensitivity to my body that is slowly beginning to come to me from doing 1 1/2 to 2 hours of yoga every night.