Amazing what you can do when you are given completely new hips. (Only kidding.)
I’ve always thought that yoga poses are inherently funny. Sometimes I look around a class of students who have voluntarily submitted to being put into Kurmasana or Yoginidrasana or Simhasana and think we are raving mad. Or, how about the studios where ropes dangle from walls or the beams with students hanging upside-down like flying foxes in Sirsasna. […]
Here’s a photo of me in Padmasana, Lotus Pose. It was taken when I could still do a pretty great one. If I do say so.
Today I surprised myself. First, I did Bharadavajasana II Twist, with one leg in Virasana and the other in half- lotus, not knowing if it was a direction that my prosthesis was willing to go. No worries. I did the other side. It was fine. So, I thought, what the heck, we’re going pretty good here…and voila, full lotus.
Really, I’m not goal-minded. […]
The scrutineer knocked off early and went fishing, hoping to catch some fish which would eventually become bloaters once cured with careful smoking. Unfortunately, not long after the fisherman dropped his killick, his little dinghy was scuppered by a passing ocean liner.*
Can you pick out the words from today’s Herald crossword puzzle?
Do you believe solving crosswords is aerobics for your brain? Can you merely grapple with the clues, even when you are ultimately defeated by them, and still ward off dementia? I know that my brain sure hurts when I wrestle unsuccessfully with cryptic cross word puzzles. […]
A yoga teacher trainee whom I was working with asked a smart question: What should I practice when?
If you do the same sequence of poses every single day, as in Astanga Vinyasa Yoga, it’s not a problem. However, what do you do if your practices are more flexible?
Well, it depends on quite a lot of factors – season, age, menstruation, pregnancy, menopause (male or female), time of day, day of the week, etc.
To help my trainee, I sat down and worked out the attached scheme. […]
I know I’ve referred to Sirsasana (headstand) as a happy pose before. It is an individual thing, I realise. But I’m one of those individuals who loves being upside-down on my cranium. If you observed me in Sirsasana, you would hear me sighing profusely as the floor massages my scalp and the underlying plates of my skull. Such an overload of sunny sensations! Oh my!
I’ve heard that the eminent yoga teacher B.K.S. Iyengar doesn’t approve of sensual impressions being the goal of yoga, but sometimes they just come to you unbidden. A gift. […]
For me, the really ugly thing about being in pain isn’t the pain itself but the way it takes me out of relationship with people and the environment. I just want to go to ground and isolate myself, like an animal crawling down its lair. This is not the way I usually express myself in the everyday world; I’m not reclusive in the least.
The pain I experience intermittently is the result of advanced osteoarthritis in my hips which I have decided not to battle anymore. […]
One of Leonard Cohen’s most loved songs, “Anthem”, has the refrain:
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.
I’m of the opinion that the song’s sentiment is so popular because we humans would like not to have try to be so perfect. A good idea. It looks good on paper. Sounds good when sexy old Leonard sings it. […]
A couple of years ago, I enjoyed viewing a calendar that had been put together by a group at a yoga retreat in New Zealand. It was designed to spoof the “cover girl” approach to yoga magazines and calendars. You know what I mean? Images like this:
Or even like this:
And, how about this:
The retreaters’ calendar was quite hilarious and included pics of yoga students doing lots of versions of savasana (the yoga relaxation pose). […]