Friday, June 26, 2009

Good Morning Friday

So- yesterday was productive and enjoyable. I spent the morning catching up on all kinds of things in my office. I had the joy of telling a certification candidate that their second video passed (always fun), I did some work on the edits for my book, I transferred my calendar from Outlook to Google which helped me catch a huge scheduling conflict I had missed, I schemed with Milagro Retreats about a February 2010 trip to Mexico (anybody game?) and peeked ahead to the fall with my public class teaching schedule in mind. I made lunch for me and Kelly and did some chores and so on.

I went to Castle Hill to give a private yoga lesson and then taught my class there at 4:30 and then went up to Breath and Body for the 6:30 practice. We worked with a variation of the back bend sequence I have been teaching all week. I really had a nice practice and from what I could tell other folks did too. (We got to witness Dale standing up from urdhva danurasana for the first time by himself!) The sequence thoroughly prepared me for the back bends with no fanfare just good intelligent work. Many people remarked they felt really good (and even Casey admitted to the back bends feeling "less bad" than usual!)and interestingly enough while we were all prepared for deep work there were no big puddles of sweat. hmmmmm.... very interesting.....

Here is the sequence if you want to try at home:
  • Surya Namaskar A
  • Surya Namaskar B 5 x
  • Supta Virasana 5 minutes
  • Headstand- 5 minutes
  • Vira One, Parsvottanasana, parivritta trikonasana- 1 minute each, same side with back heel at wall
  • Handstand- 5 minutes
  • Parsvakonasana (clasped),anjaneyasana, parivritta parsvakonasana (clasped)- 1 minute each, same side back foot at wall
  • pinca mayurasana- different variations but back bended pushing feet into the wall.
  • quad stretches with back knee/shin/foot on wall and torso up against wall, ekapada rajakapotasana with back leg at wall and forward bended to stretch spine
  • paryankasana with knees at wall and block in upper back
  • urdhva danurasana keeping knees at wall and walking hands in - stay in legs- 5 X
  • urdhva danurasana- ustrasana to urdhva danurasana- stay in legs
  • drop backs- stay in legs
  • AMS
  • uttanasana
  • parsvottanasana, back foot turned in
  • urdva prasarita eka padasana at wall 2 x
  • uttanasana
  • sarvangasana
  • savasana

Another thing that was cool about the practice was that Krisha was there who I have not seen in like year since she had a baby, Ari was there who has been MIA ( not a criticism, just saying...), Mark and Hannah have been coming more often, as has Ed. And so I say this- not because I wasn't happy to see all the regular attendees who have been there since the beginning, but because I had recently been looking through my photos and saw pics from old group practices and I kept thinking- now where is that person? and where is that person? and so forth.

Teaching is interesting because groups seem to stay constant but really they change quite a bit- but in many cases its changing just one person a time. The time of a class changes, people's schedules changes, what any given student wants and needs changes, what a teacher is providing changes and these different changes mean that one by one, someone is no longer coming to class and another person finds their way and in a few years you realize it has become a different group. I had just been contemplating that phenomena this week when lo and behold several people who I hadn't seen in a long time were there again. (Of course Ari told me it was summer and to draw no conclusions about attendance until the fall. Ah, Ari.... always the voice of reason...)

Today I am going on a yoga field trip with Gioconda. We are going to Scott's class at Yoga Vida and Sanieh's class at Dharma with perhaps a shopping trip or coffee break in between. I am really looking forward to it. First it's a great girl date and second I love seeing what other teachers are up to.

Okay tea, finsished, green drink ingested, and now... onward...

No comments: