Tuesday Morning

Well, I had a pretty fun Labor Day. I actually did labor most of the day but in general, I enjoy my work a lot so it's not in any way a bad thing. I spent a lot of the morning answering email and working on the Teacher Training curriculum for the upcoming Teacher Trainings in Tucson. (And it's not too late to sign up- you can do a level 1 and level 2 Teacher Training with me and Darren back to back. Good times for sure!) Then I did my asana practice and taught a special yoga class at 5:30 for Free Day of Yoga.

I am not really sure how long Free Day of Yoga has been happening here in Austin but its a pretty cool thing. All over town, all day long, almost all of the yoga is free. So people new to the practice or seasoned practitioners and everything in between can make a day of it and spend their Labor Day on the mat, practicing yoga in community. For instance, Venus came to my class last night and said it was her 7th class of the day! So, Free Day of yoga is kind of like a yoga buffet-people eat a lot whether or not they are still hungry just because, well, its free and they can. But seriously, it's a really wonderful community event and it is no small thing to organize, I am sure but it certainly one thing that makes Austin Yoga great.

Anyway- my Free Day of Yoga class was scheduled to be in the Chakras room at Castle Hill but we had already reached the room's capacity at 5:20 and people were being turned away. (Which I hate and do my best to never have happen. In fact, I have gotten quite frustrated with more than one front desk person over the years for deciding for me what capacity on a room is because my idea of a full room is usually very different than most people's idea of a full room. But I digress...) Anyway, I intervened and convinced the management to open up The Annex so we could fit everyone who came in the class. The Annex is really an amazing studio space- we had Anne and Jeff's wedding practice there and we are going to have the workshop with me and Noah there. (Sign up for that! Its going to be great.) There is tons of natural light, lots of wall space and we easily fit the 50-something people that came to class in there.

I worked with the theme of karma and lila, of work and of play and kept the evening's class more on the side of play. The idea is that work, in general, for most people, is often done with a result or a reward in mind. It has a karma to it, in that way- we work to get something. But play, well, play is done for no reason other than delight in the doing. So the teaching goes that while some things happen in life that are a result of our actions (karma) there are also things that happen simply because of lila, or God's Play. Obviously, these are big ideas to grapple with and more is involved than simply the notion of work and play, but that was the springboard for my class theme last night. I worked with the heart quality of delight and we moved through some fun arm balancing work, and some back bend variations that were just down right silly at times. All in all, it was a great class and I had a really good time teaching.

Here is a link to some footage from the class.

I suppose that's about it right now. Hope your day is delightful.

Thursday Morning

Last week I posted this picture here and I also posted it on Facebook, wondering how to get closer to the classic form for this pose with the arms straight. And then I got a message from Desiree Rumbaugh who was in Israel and she said the only way she can ever get her arms straight is to take her arm bones back more than seems humanly possible. (my words, but she did say, there is a fair amount of grunting groaning and grimacing involved many times!) So, on Tuesday I wrote a sequence to head into the pose again and when Gioconda and I practiced I was in a pose a lot like the pose above and then I buckled down, sucked my arm bones back as hard as I could and kicked my feet as hard as I could into my hands and lo and behold, I got my arms straight by the third try.
So that was a very exciting thing on Tuesday afternoon. After that I came home, made dinner and then The Other Desirae came over. (Sometimes we call her "Little D" as opposed to "Big D" but that is another story.) So we sat outside and ate roasted veggies and had a lovely talk about life, yoga, business, and such.

She and her mom and Omar and his wife are all in the Kombucha making business now. Their product Kosmic Kombucha is really fantastic. It has great flavor, awesome effervescence and a very low sugar content. Seriously it is very good AND it is available for sale even as we speak! Call Desirae at 512-917-2234 or stop by Breath and Body Yoga for yours.

Yesterday was Focus on Form day in the morning. We worked on back bends and twists which went well. We spent a lot of time on the belly down back bends and getting all the different parts f the pose to come together in unity. (I started telling a story about how, as a community, we need all parts to work together, etc. and it is much easier said than done once you add in the business element of teaching yoga and so on.)

I met a friend for lunch and then met up with Gioconda again for a practice. We did lots of hipwork and twists (to work out some of the residual soreness from Tuesdays back bends!) and that resulted in a nice foray into padmasana, simhasana, and parsva kukkutasana, which is big pose for me. Lotus does not come naturally for me, twists are not my strong suit and with a long torso getting my leg high up on my arm is a major undertaking. Anyway, after several attempts I did it on both sides and Gia, bless her I-phone once again, captured it on film.

So after a short break, I taught the 6:00 Level 2-4 class which was a really fun time. Last week, Miranda requested some help into how to get her leg behind her head and so we worked on that last night in class and celebrated Jeremiah's 26th Birthday! Yippee.

Here's our sequence:

AMV

AMS

uttanasana

surya namkasar variation lunges and with no long holds- 5 minutes

malasana -2X

pasasana -2X

maricyasana 1- 2X

maricyasana 3- 2X

Virabhadrasana 1

parivritta parsvakonasana- 2X

deep lunge with forearms down

lunge with shoulder under front knee

parighasana variation

visvamitrasana prep with back knee down

visvamitrasana- 2 X

omega pose

eka pada raja kapotasana prep- moving back and back until the front leg looks like omega pose

laying on back with one knee down to floor by arm pit

supine babay cradle

eka pada sirsasana- 2X

setu bandhasana

windshield wipers

setu bandhasana

savasana

Once again, we had a really great turn out for class, with lots of folks working really hard. (And I was happy to see I didn't totally freak everyone out last week with my empowerment rant! Or if I did freak them out, they did at least come back for the most part.) I will be out of the Wednesday classes for the next 3 Wednesdays but Hannah will be holding down the fort for me so please support her, please support the class, please support the other students and please stay connected to your practice on Wednesdays. I will be back teaching Wednesdays on May 26.

I am planning a practice for May 15 before I head out of town to the Certified Teacher's Gathering. I am just deciding on a place. I am very tempted to have it down in San Marcos with swim in the river afterwards just like old times. The space is revamped, it would be a nice way way to initiate the space and so stay tuned for details.

So, that's the update for today. I have an appointment and then some work to do all morning and then I am subbing the Group Practice for Mandy-ji this afternoon and The Love Yoga Coop. We have requests for headstand and variations, twists and back bends, a specific request for standing up from urdhva danurasana and so it should be a pretty fun time. Come ready to work and to play.

All right then- onward with the day.