Monday's Mysore

Not so much of a Mysore style but a led class today, essentially to "remind us of the sequence".  My teacher had also been to the Richard Freeman workshop in Oxford at the weekend so I think he wanted to pass on some new tips, which I think I found useful. It's always nice when a teacher brings something new to the table - sometimes in a led class they can sound a bit bored and repetative and it can be a bit sad :o(  Anyway, Mysore or not, I had a bloody great practice. I think I must've sweated out loads of toxins too and now I feel great. (Albeit it ready for bed...)

There was a minute when bringing my legs up and over (straight) to get into sarvangasana when I felt a serious pull on my buttocks and lower back which wasn't good; I've had that before, generally when going from matsyasana into uttana padasana, but I normally give myself a little hug between the two postures to free up whatever is going on in the lower back, and that seems to work. Will be careful of raising legs straight in the future, I really don't need any more lower back problems...

One of the 'tips' from RF was in Mari C - apparently he says that it is OK to have your hips diagonal in this posture, so you start almost looking to the side, then to breath out 3 times whilst wrapping your arm around your leg to exhale as much air as possible from the belly. I did this and found that it worked (see last post about having to physically 'tuck' my belly in to get round!) This way I did not have to, yay!

My sarvangasana was a bit wonky today though...I didn't feel straight at all, like my bum was sticking out, nothing I did seemed to shift me any straighter, which is very strange for me, as I normally love this posture and do it well (ie. close to being able to balance on shoulders alone, being that straight).

Oh, and my standing balancing was so sketchy today, but I put that down to the moon cycle, which I fully expect to put me off balance.

Tomorrow I'm going to go into work early again, finish early, do practice then go to my class to teach. (I say this now and it might not happen exactly this way but at least I've got positive thoughts going on , ha! :o)

I just thought... I didn't get the burning pain in the back of my right knee today either, great!