One Thousand Posts

As I signed into Blogger today, I saw that Yoga Chickie is up to 999 posts. That would make this one number 1,000.

I guess that's a lot.

Anyway, had a delightful day today. Practice is feeling great, despite that I am forcing myself to take extra special care not to allow any hip work to spill into my knees. Janu Sirsasana C, which I find to be such an interesting pose, may have been the tweak-factor for me. I really, really like going vertical with my "stiletto-ing" foot. Well, today, on the right side, I simply wouldn't allow myself to go there because as soon as I tried to, I felt a sensation in my knee. Usually, I come into the pose by lifting my calf up to horizontal and loosening up the hip a bit. Today, I just put my foot down and concentrated on opening up my lower back by pressing my arch into the inner thigh of the other leg.

Best Supta Kurmasana ever today, I think, although it's all starting to blur together, and it's not like it's ever going to be particularly momentous for me. I think that over time, it's just going to soften and get easier. More sukkha, less stira. Today's trick: binding with my index and middle fingers hooked, rather than with clasped hands. For me, clasped hands feels tense, and I've noticed that some people bind with their fingers pretty nicely. So, today, although Sir brought my hands into the overlap position where clasping is fairly easy, I backed off, and hooked fingers instead. I think he was surprised. And then I think he was surprised again at how well it worked. Later, I was hanging around the shala because I was teaching the Led Standing Series class at noon, and Sir was there doing shala stuff, and I mentioned the finger bind and how it felt better for me. He said that the important thing was that I committed to it.

Interesting. I suppose that there is the possibility that I have been intentionally letting my clasp slip these past few weeks. I was injured in, I think it was March, after all, and ever since then, I have been somewhat fearful of Supta K. The fear has been dissipating. Perhaps it's as simple as that?

Wow, I sure have a lot of competing theories about Supta K. Every day, I have a new idea about it. One day, perhaps, I will look back and say, "what was the big deal anyway?"

That certainly seems implausible at the present time.

I felt really good about the Led Standing class I taught. I just felt very present. And my adjustments felt like they made sense, except for one, where I tried to help one of my regular students get her head down in Prasarita Pado B on the theory that she usually gets her head down in it. Learning experience. Just like MY body is different every day, everyone ELSE'S body is different every day. The only way this student was getting her head down was if she completely leaned against me, practically knocking me over. Luckily, I am strong like a bull! Next time, no one gets adjusted in that pose unless they are REALLY close.

Oh, almost forgot...after practice, but before the Led Standing class, I had the opporunity to adjust Lori in Supta K (she started her practice even later than I did, and even she can't get Sir to stay in the room after 10 a.m.!). And she was kind enough to let me do it like three times. I always feel really confident about helping people to bind, whether Mari A, C or D. I know, literally, ALL the tricks, and I use them all. So, the arms are always pretty easy for me when adjust someone into Supa K. But getting those ankles to cross is heavy lifting even on the most supple of students. Or so I thought, until today. What I came to realize in working with Lori is that by the time I get to the point where it FEELS like heavy lifting, the student is probably as far as they should go anyway. Ahhhh. It was a very comforting realization and makes me look forward to helping people in Supta K, rather than dreading it.

After the Led Standing, I realized I had several hours before I had to pick my kids up from their afternoon activities. And I also realized that I had a bathing suit with me.....lightbulb.....the Baths! I shvitzed and had Platza - which included a scary chiropractic adjustment or two (thank goodness they felt good, but I was really nervous when the dude started pressing on my back) and then schvitzed some more and then showered and went up to the roof deck and sunbathed, reading the Times Arts Section. Too many people were smoking up there though, so I got out of there and ambled over to Caravan of Dreams, where I enjoyed a Young Coconut Shake (just the meat of the coconut and the water, whirled together...yummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm) and a stir fry. I wish I could eat every meal at Caravan. I am seriously obsessed with it. It's like magic food. It never fails to make me feel nourished and happy and healthy.

Then, finally, back uptown to pick up my kids. We stopped at a CVS and took our blood pressure and heart rate at one of those little machines they have in pharmacies. My blood pressure: 102 over 60. My heart rate: 56. Who says that Ashtanga is not cardio?!

YC