Experimenting, rearranging...

So, it was good 10 days subbing for P. Until June, he takes over the Mysore classes again. Then, I will be teaching again for a month when he is in Mysore… It is very exciting that he is going for Sharath’s TT, and the second level!!!

Looking back to two weeks ago, I was so nervous the first day of teaching, and now I am much relieved to see that most of his students received me well. It was also nice to see that I did integrate some of the things I learned in Boulder from Richard and Mary. I can now do more studying of course… continue listening to recordings and reading the notes… and then experience, experiment… listen to the breath my body…

My own practice has been fine. Well, uhhh… I have to admit I went back to adding half of the primary to my practice as Richard suggested while I was in Boulder as an alternative to doing the whole primary and half of second. The reason that I do not go on with only second is that I do not want to get weaker since the strength part do not come very easily to me. If I were in Mysore and practicing with Sharath, I would be less concerned because he would move me on slowly, so the practice would be building up… However, now it will be where it is until September … Well, I added Yoga Nidrasana and (which is such a reliever) and Tittibhasana A , B, C, since I was given them by Rolf. Tittibhasanas were the last ones which were given by Rolf before I left Goa. I did them for the first time today since I left Goa. They are killer still, my legs get on fire ☺. I think now that if I did not upset Sharath by doing the right leg first in Dwi Pada Sirsasana when he asked me to show him that one time (I got that from M who kept wanting us to switch sides) (and of course also my head hanging down depressively did not help either) maybe he would have given me Yoga Nidrasana… Anyway, it is not important, I have enough to work on until I see him next time… and I will work on Dwi Pada and Tittibhasana, so when I am with him, it would be less of a challenge; yes Yoga Nidarasana sandwiched between those two is really a nice break, and I also need to work on the exist in Eka Pada… On the other hand, I have to admit that there is a difference between doing only second and combining it with primary! The intensity of doing only second is really strong, and I am not talking only about the physical intensity. One of these mornings as my mind was wandering while I was doing the first half of primary, I realized that when I do only second, also the focus of the mind is much greater! Therefore, I decided to practice twice a week only second, and there is only primary on Fridays and then the other three days are first or second half of primary with the intermediate… that sound ok, no? I asked Peter’s opinion about this and his response was “you are lucky that you can experiment, I did not have this choice…” I guess he had to go along with what he was told at the time…

Well, I am in a good place. I have plans to plan and not alone… and then things to look forward, especially August!!!

Rolling...

So, teaching is fun as always… of course this time will not last so long, Peter is back next week. In June I will be teaching the Mysore classes again, then for a month. I have to say that couple of them are just seeing me as this one who is filling in for Peter (which is the case) and they dismiss my suggestions… that is all right, I know when to make it clear that I am now teaching in that room and when to let go… On the other hand, I really like that some of my old students are there, it is nice to have familiar faces around, so I am not the total stranger and already I am getting to know others… Over all, it is a good environment and it is a nice reminder of how much I enjoy teaching... Though I will need to make some effort to teach some privates or something during the month of May.

Practice is okay. Yesterday I was feeling super tired, weak and stiff! I don’t usually feel stiff so that was surprising… Still I made it through fine. This morning it was better. I had more power, even though waking up part was still difficult. I guess waking up part is never so easy for me unless I am in Mysore and it is so hot that I cannot sleep and I just get antsy and hiper so the best thing to do is to practice… But then this time I am in much better situation because I don’t have a super long practice; therefore, I wake up at the same time I used to last year but I can take my time to actually wake up. I can do some hip openers, I can sit idly and try to open my eyes ☺ Then I am ready to do my practice. I even do some mini salutations as we used to do with Richard. Those are nice because they get you slowly into the movement, and the legs begin waking up…

Then… I am already making plans for August! I know August is far but I am very tempted about this one workshop. I feel similar to the time when I wanted to go for Nancy Gilgoff workshop, which I ended up going to and which had been very healing for me at the time… and now again I am feeling that this teacher will be helpful for me, so I will do it… really excited already!

Also…. I could not help smiling to myself today. I kept saying that I don’t want to travel in India again, that it is too difficult, too tiring, etc, etc… but then I found myself today looking for Gokarna and then I wanted to google “how to get from Mysore to Gokarna” thinking about my next trip already :p… dreaming is nice. I will see how the visa think will work out, what kind of visa they will give, how much time they will give to be in India and if that would leave sometime to explore…

Uhh my sister is stuck in London. She was suppose to be back yesterday from her trip but the ashes, the volcano, you all know… I hope it will not last too long. She left before I could spend sometime with her… and also it might be getting too costly for her.

Being back home...

Been back home since last Thursday. It was a long trip to get home. I took the taxi (well, that was a luxury…) from Mysore to Bangalore, about a 4-hour drive. The new Bangalore airport is really nice so I was happy to get there and I even did a last minute shopping :p… Then I flew to Bombay which felt longer than hour and a half, I donnu if it was longer… Then the flight to London from Bombay. That felt pretty quick and I was in London early morning. I was really happy to be at Terminal 5 in Heathrow. I got good coffee, I got some breakfast food (ok, I don’t think rabbits eat yogurt and granola so no rabbit food) then I went to Kiehl’s booth and got the dry argan oil they have and some more stuff. (dear Linda that was my retail therapy!) Kiehl’s is not cheap but I really like their products; I feel that the money I spent is well worth. After three hours I had to run to my flight to Istanbul, yes I was a bit late, himm I got into the plane 8 minutes before the flight, but then we had to wait around a bit, so I did not have to feel guilty... What torturous was that we had to wait in the air for a while after we arrived to Istanbul, I was very much over being in the plane, flying… After we landed it was pretty quick to get out of the airport, but then there was Istanbul afternoon traffic waiting for me… I thought my head was going to explode as I sat in the traffic. When I arrived home, it was nice though. My friend who subletted my apartment took good care of my place… and it just felt good to be home!

The first morning I practiced the primary series since it was a Friday, I did a very mellow primary and it was good. I was thinking I might practice Saturday since I skipped Thursday due to traveling but then I was just tired… lazy… Instead I slept and then met with my sister and went to see an art exhibition of a friend which was really funny… Sunday I went to Peter’s class and also today and also Tuesday. Sunday felt a bit intense, doing only second here for the first time after travelling… well it is not hot here yet and after coming from Mysore where it was super hot and had been practicing in the shala which was full of 70 people, it feels a bit different… still lucky that I had the chance to practice with others rather than alone my first few days. During the moon day, Wednesday, I practiced the standing sequence to one of the led classes by Richard from the Teacher Intensive, which was recorded by dear Sascha.

And today… I began teaching, covering for P who will be away for 10 days. I was a bit nervous last night because it has been 6 months since I stopped teaching… but it was all right. I guess now it is a natural environment for me… and then there are few more things to share since the intensive with Richard and Mary which makes it exciting... to my chance there were also two ladies who were newbies… that was fun…

A bit of Mysore afterthoughts...

Another trip to India came to an end. Each time the India experience is different and each time what is waiting at home is different. But first of all, I want to reflect on Mysore… Initially it was difficult for me because of the relationship stuff I was going through… It was too much drama; I was too tense, too anxious, to nervous… Even during the practice I was thinking of all this stuff that was going on between me and A… And at one point I got fed up and asked the rhetorical question “ Why am I here?” well, of course to practice at the shala with Sharath. So, then I realized that I have to get myself out of the situation I got myself into… and I did… after that, I begin to breath more freely, with less guilt… Then practice began to get more interesting, more inspiring… Moreover, after so long, I felt that someone was paying attention to my practice! Even though the shala was fully packed and there was a stream of students coming in and out, he was paying attention to me as well as he was to others. Then him moving me to intermediate led class and splitting my epic practice restored my confidence in my practice.. I have been beating up myself for so long, not feeling good enough for my teachers, for them to pay attention to my practice… So, it has been powerful, and transformative in some way, just like it has been with Richard… and actually reaffirming the same thing, that my practice is okay… just work hard but not get gloomy about it. Again realizing that practice should not make us gloomy, it is just a tool, one of the tools, to learn more about ourselves but not a place to begin another fight with ourselves… rite? And when Sharath says “be a student, be patient, you need to be a student many years, 10-15 years, you need to do one asana maybe ten thousand times to perfect it, be patient, be patient… and study yoga but no more physical practice after the morning practice, this is enough or it gets crazy… read yoga texts…“ and then one goes uhhh it is just a practice we do which is part of a whole practice and so don’t neglect the other parts of the whole…

Rabbit like

This week is uber hot in the shala. Yesterday was a very sweaty practice but today it was even more! I could feel the sweat dripping from my shoulders and arms already during Parsvakonasana. And today I did not have much power... and this is because I think my not eating much at all... With this heat, I think my Vata has been rising and rising (yes there is a Vata heat also) and I cannot eat much. Lunch has been very poor for the last few days and since Peter and Selin left, I do not go out to eat once in a while which would compensate for the other days. Therefore, at home it is carrots, cucumber, beetroot, raddish, one does not get more rabitty than this I guess :) Of course, I eat lots of nuts but being a Vata I don't digest them, after a certain amount, they just go out, otherwise I would be a size of an elephant. Well, I eat fruits but it says in The Hatha Yoga Pradipika that eating fruits only is not enough for a yogi... (Not that I claim to be a yogi, I am not sure if it will be possible this life time...) And this morning was an indicator that I actually need to eat some more. The good thing is that I am going home where it is not super hot so I will eat more. But the downside of this is I am already nervous about being home... Need to stay away from any kind of drama when I am there, from family dramas, from yoga scene dramas, from dramas in my mind...

Bakasana B come please....

This week passed to quickly practice wise. It was just not enough because still I cannot do Bakasana B, I jump forward but the top of the feet first touch the floor and then I pull them up. At least Sharath does not punish me about it as I have been punished before... However, in every led intermediate, he comes behind me during Bakasanas (!). Today I attempted two jumps and no good, so he said "Bad". Huhhh, I guess he expects me to do it and I feel that I should be able to do it at this point but something, something, it is not coming... what is it? is it really my mind as Rolf has been telling me? I feel like I have gotten stronger and something in me is restless, telling me THAT i CAN DO IT BUT IT IS NOT COMINNGGGG! yeah kind of obsessed about this but then I think that I should just let it go, yes I should try but not obsess about it, it is just an asana... I don't know, I am funny like that, for a while, I was making joke about myself, whenever something went funny in my daily life, I would say it is because I cannot do Bakasana B... well, maybe at some point it will suddenly happen.. . but any tips would be appreciated even though have read many of them which are out there...

Yeah, the led intermediate classes are really intense, he makes us really work hard, I feel my heart racing as we go through the postures and each time as I come to my last pose (now it is Dwi) I am thankful that I have lasted fine... This morning I really tried hard to keep the head up in Dwi pada and it was better than the previous days but I know he will keep me there because of Bakasana B :P.

Well, Sunday is cleaning day in our house but the cleaning lady did not show up this morning and then we asked the landlord if he knew anyone. He sent a man. I had to guide him a little and he did clean the floors. Just half hour after he left, the lady came and I had to tell her that we called someone else because she did not show up... She told me a reason why she came late but I did not understand, and we are leaving soon I said no more. But also last week we were not at home when she cleaned and I think she skipped some steps like mopping the floors and then she asked me for more money... well, what to do , I gave her the money...

So my last three days in the shala this week. Wednesday I will take off from Mysore... there is lots to say about how it has been practicing in the shala this time but I will wait until the end...