"My legs are too long for Navasana!"

Yeah, so my friends keep reminding me that I said this not too long ago! Funny though..

But, it's been like 4 years and I still cannot do navasana comfortably. In navasana the body is like a weighing scales, it has to be balanced both sides to be able to stable right? If I raise my arms in the air in navasana I can lift my legs nice and straight into the "perfect navasana posture" (except that my hands are not in the "oar" position!). 

And if I bend my knees slightly I can hold my upper body up-right, knees at eye level and it feels comfortable, so strain. I can even lift my legs and hold abayha padangustasana, engage the relevant muscles and release the toes and then hold navasana, but I've been told because my toes are not at eye level this is not navasana. So I lower the toes to eye level and my legs become the lever which tips the balance of the scales and down they go!

So what do I do? 

Do I do the high toe navasana, which looks like the version Kino does? Or do I risk straining the back to have the toes at eye level? 

One of John Scott's philosophies is "form follows function" - what a posture looks like is not as important as the function it is supposed to have on your body. But I'm being told different by some teachers. So this brings me to the question of does form really follow function in ashtanga? 

Answers on the back of a postcard!

One of those days?

Practice today was awful. After 3 great practices along with Richard Freeman I decided to go it alone today. My right hamstring is unbelievably tight for some reason, really doesn't want to play ball.

I video'd myself doing the sun salutes to see how my jump backs are going but only wound myself up by the fact my forward bend was horrendous. I just have such a stiff, rounded upper back. It looks ugly. I look ugly.

Disappointed.

My jump backs from standing were better, i'm trying to let my head be the lowest point of the body to the ground before I shoot the legs back, it feels better, like it's getting there. The jump back from seated was awful. Maybe I've worn myself out doing such long practices this week? I couldn't lift the body, I even landed on my belly during one half, arsed attempt.

Appalling.

I gave up the jumpbacks and decided to settle for the whole seated sequence without them. I then lay in savasana for a while until I thought I'd have a go at Hanumanasana, as I'd seen a few photos of people in it this week and wanted to know whether I was anywhere near it.

I've only attempted this posture 3-4 times in my life. I did some deep lunges for a while, played around with the bandhas in them then had a go on both sides. Surprisingly...really surprisingly, I got down with both legs straight just 1 inch off the ground with the left leg forward!! Who knew!?! The other leg wasn't so good, but not terrible, especially seeing as I'm suffering with a pulled hammy. Not sure how exactly I did that. Overuse maybe.. What seemed to help me get it was confidence. A tilt of the pelvis in the right direction, pulling up on moola bandha, stillness and hollowness above the public bone, letting go of fear little by little to let gravity pull me lower, releasing my hips little by little. Felt good.

Anyway, so there it is...crap practice, looking hideous, then just giving a little time to something new made all the difference!

"Turn on the lights of the pose" (Richard Freeman)

So it turns out some of my "lights' have been off for some time!!

I love that when you finally discover them though, they can transform your practice.

Revelation 1: I haven't been properly flexing my hip joint in forward bends, the seated ones especially. I've been just lifting the kneecap of the outstretched leg and therefore only working one part of my thigh. When you engage the psoas (I think it must be the psoas, my anatomy isn't that great) it strengthens the whole thigh, fixing the leg in place and enabling a deeper forward bend.

I've been working on my jump backs. Realised that I have the arm strength, that's fine, but I'm finding it hard to pull legs through...why? Because I can't yet hold my legs into my body...why? Because my hip joint/psoas isn't yet strong enough! Something to work on. I realised this when watching Kino's video tip on jumping back where she gets you to just hold your legs into your body with your arms stretched up in front of you.

Revelation 2: Flexing the ankles in padmasana. I've been entering the posture with pointed toes as one teacher showed me. but if you then flex the ankles/feet this automatically engages the hips (and the knees closer together) deepening the posture. Then remember to with on moola bandha and voila, a comfortable padmasana!!

Have a very happy Easter :)

Moksha.. Chicago

So I recently spent a week staying with friends in Chicago. Why did not one tell me this city was a yoga paradise?! If only I'd known sooner, I could have filled every day with yoga from the minute I woke up until the minute I went to bed! And I could've gone to a weekend workshop with Ray Long... sooo gutted I missed that :(

Nonetheless I had a great time. Really my type of place. I booked in for a week of Mysore sessions at Moksha Yoga and was assisted by a couple of great teachers Noah and Alexia. Got some really great adjustments too. One involved sitting on my feet so I could drop back and come back up to stand without help. Another got my shoulders right to the floor in kurmasana as if I'd been doing it all my life.

I wish I could've packed up and moved there...really. I also found a fantastic restaurant Native Foods, a vegan restaurant which did amazing dishes, I even bought their cook book. I've even made their vegan cheese! Out of cashew nuts?! Who knew?!!

But I really overdid it with the drop backs in class. It wasn't until I got home that the pain started, just an irritation of the SI joint I think, so I've laid off them since. It might have been doing them with straight legs when I'm used to bending the knees slightly, who knows.. I've given them a rest this week anyway, to be good to myself. It seems to be working.

I've been trying to practice handstand instead. This is not going so well. I can't hop up to the wall yet, I think I'm getting my hips higher but I can't tell, there's no-one around to tell me how I'm doing. They feel higher and I can feel them tipping towards the wall with concentration of moola bandha. More than before. However, this small increase in lift is still not translating to my jump-to-stands or jump-throughs and is disappointing. Maybe one day.

My home practice has gone a bit awry recently what with the travelling and being busy at work. Haven't got over the jet lag fully either, it's been awful. Thank god I've got classes I can go to when self-practice isn't happening. Although I do need to just get back on the mat at home and spend a bit more time with the postures. Led classes are just too fast to get in there completely...

Maya (illusion) and fear

Maya (Sanskrit माया māya), in Indian religions, has multiple meanings, usually quoted as "illusion", centered on the fact that we do not experience the environment itself but rather a projection of it, created by us.


The ashtanga system never fails to impress me in its capacity to demonstrate the duality of my existence. 


The practice is a constant reminder of what I think I know to be true and what is actual. 


So I have begun to practice the second series and last night was the first practice at the Buddhist Centre with James Critchlow. I practiced up to Mari D of primary then into second and got as far as ardha matsyendrasana before my time run out, sadly. In post last post I mentioned laghu vajrasana and kapotasana, which Id tried on my own in the week and failed miserably to get into. Then I made a yoga rope and found a way to lower myself into it quite safely, although I didn't manage to get the head to the floor. Kapotasana was a completely different matter though, I couldn't find a way into it and my upper back seized up, preventing my from lifting my arms overhead and doing anything in the posture. I was very fearful of my back breaking, or my discs herniating or my thighs not holding out and me landing on my head. But most of all I was absolutely convinced that my body would not go into the posture. However....


...All my fears were proved to be pure illusion (maya) as James lowered me into laghu vajrasana with ease, still holding my thighs and then to kapotasana where it felt easy to place my hands on the floor! James then pulled each wrist in towards my feet and I held onto my toes. Once in the postures I felt an amazing release of the fear which was creating tension in my body and holding me back from attaining the posture and I managed to work a little deeper. James said he could feel the release physically. He also said that he knew what my spine could do and knew it was fear holding me back. He said the longer he teaches yoga (and he's been teaching since the 70s) the more he believes that it is therapy for the rest of your life. 


As an aside...James was telling some great stories last night about his journey of teaching. Apparently back in the day, the 90's probably, he got David Swenson over to do workshops all the time in Birmingham, before he he turned yoga superstar.  He's been teaching as long as David and knows him well. He was also telling us about when he first heard of ashtanga, he as doing Iyenga at the time and couldn't believe there was another form of yoga, then he met someone who'd been to Greece to practice this dynamic form, similar to what Iyenga students know as 'jumpings', then he met Derek and Radha and that was it. He was teaching Iyenga and then slowly his Iyenga class became an ashtanga class. He says his first proper full primary led class lasted 2.5hrs as he'd keep forgetting what was next... I guess there weren't cheat sheets back in the day! Sounds like good times.

An amazing experience in baddha konasana...

So I've been experimenting a lot with the konasanas, baddha, upavista, from the primary series and the effects of mula bandha and pelvic floor work on the hips in these postures. I've worked out that if I engage ashwini mudra (or squeeze the anus as Tim Feldman puts it!) and pull up on the perineum muscle, then something happens low in my sacrum which allows my hips to open in baddha konasana and for me to bend further forward in upavista.

However, today I was having problems in getting both engaged at the same time and my hips felt stiff. So I was wriggling about in baddha, and trying to open my feet and engage the necessary bits at the same time, then everything clicked into place I had this powerful feeling from my tailbone right up through the spine to the middle of my shoulder blades. A feeling like everything along the spine was completely in alignment and working together. I must have spent about 15 breaths in BK, just completely absorbed by this amazing feeling. I can only describe it as perfect alignment or a feeling of clarity and stillness.

I don't normally describe any of my yoga experiences in esoteric terms, but as I don't know what exactly happened this morning, I can only describe it as maybe unblocking some granthis?! It felt as if there was definitely space for energy to travel upwards to in between my shoulder blades. So maybe that was it...granthis, being unblocked. Maybe I even experienced a little bit of kundalini rising?! But it definately stopped right in between my shoulders, at the back of my heart. Maybe that's why I can't get to grips with the deeper backbends, because I have a huge blockage at my heart centre! Aaargh! Who knew?!!

Laghu Vajrasana...this is war!

Amazing what yoga props you can find at your local B&Q isn't it?! This contraption cost me 11 quid, not bad eh?! 

I've been meaning to get a yoga rope for ages, just haven't got round to it. But Sunday's brush with second series backbends and in particular my complete inability to even lean back in laghu vajrasana, pushed me to get it sorted, and quick! It has turned out to be extremely handy, now I can practice some of second at home. As well as laghu, I also tried kapotasana, an asana which I've always thought looked beautiful and have wanted to master for ages. However, turns out my upper back is as stiff as a board :( I can see now why Kino says that you may be ready for second if you can drop back... I bend a lot in the lumbar and a lot less in the thoracic spine and these second series backbends make this stand out A LOT. 

The other huge issue I have with kapo is the reaching back with the arms. I am absolutely petrified of putting my arms back, even just in prayer position up to my forehead! It's unbelievable! I thought I would have been OK, what with being able to drop back quite happily now. But no! It's crazy, I'm nearer the floor so there is less distance to fall back, yet as soon as bring my hands in line with my face my entire back stiffens up and I cannot go anywhere! 

I know people say that these deep backbends release a lot of underlying feelings, so what does not being able to put my arms up and back mean??! That I cannot open my heart? Or is it just that my bone structure will not allow me to get the movement in the shoulders necessary for the arm position? I suppose the next few weeks of practicing second series will soon answer these questions...