Age and Balance

January 12, 2013 at 12:28 am (Connecting to self, Thoughts, Yoga, Zen)
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Lord of the dance poseHello Beautiful Souls,  today during my morning practice, I made a mental note that my balance was off.  During the short meditation that followed I had a chance to ponder where I am in my life and what is in and out of balance.  I noticed that as I have aged, my physical balance has decided that it no longer wants to be taken for granted.  It will show up when it wants, just to say hello and remind me that while I’m no longer 20 my balance is still in there hiding.  There are days when I am steady and strong in my poses and there are days like today where props were not only needed but required.  So how do I fix that??  ahhh yes practice.

Let’s see there’s quite a few asanas (poses) that could help convince my balance that I am no longer taking it for granted, that I am paying attention.  There’s Virabhadrasana  III, Chaturanga Dandasana, Bakasana, Ardha Chandrasana and who could forget Garudasana (or what I fondly refer to as my I’m a pretzel pose) just to name a few.  Age is just a number, so practice I will, practice I must.

My time on the mat this morning also left me reflecting on the non-physical things that are out of balance in my life.  My diet is out of balance, my thought process is out of balance, my schedule is out of balance and even some of my relationships are out of balance.  So how do I fix it?  What came to mind is something that I learned while becoming an instructor.   A simple quote by Ashtanga Yoga  Guru Pattabhi Joi which says “Practice and all is coming”.  I want to thank my brain for allowing that one quote to show up this morning right when I needed to hear it most.

Namaste

Yogini Kp

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Our Little people

August 31, 2011 at 4:47 pm (Connecting to self, Journey, Thoughts, Yoga, Zen)
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Namaste beautiful ones.  Recently I was called upon to step up and take care of a “little people” who just happens to be my great niece.  She’s all of 5 years old, a breath of fresh air and has come to live with me for a while.  Her small frame is packed with energy and flexibility that I long to regain in my life.  Oh I do OK for 56.  I still work out regularly and of course I practice Yoga almost daily but when I look at the unbridled energy that this rambunctious little 5 year old possesses, I feel a since of urgency to make much more of an effort to get back to a place in my life where I could be described as energetic and rambunctious….the thought of that almost makes me giggle.

During my practice earlier today I took stock of where the resistance has chosen to take up residency and I again resolved to focus on those trouble spots. Instead of going through a familiar flow such as my Sun salutations, pay much more attention to the asanas that I have avoided because it has just been easier to skip them.   For example there is virasana (hero pose) that my thighs and knee’s have repeatedly told me that I should avoid and Ardha Chandrasana (half moon pose) that challenges my balance or the lack there of.  To date I’ve been able to do most asanas with assistance from props but I always wonder how long it will take until I reach a place where the props will be left in the corner and no longer needed.  Perhaps my approach in the beginning was a a little over zealous and I didn’t give myself enough credit for the Asanas that I was able to perfect.  Maybe in the beginning I did too much too soon and when it caused me pain, I backed off of that asana and gave up on some of them all together.

Perhaps I should listen to my great niece when she says to me “it’s OK Aunt Karen, you can try it again”  “it’s Ok to make mistakes, right Aunt Karen?”  This evening she showed me her bridge pose which was really the wheel pose and I smiled and asked her where she had learned it.  She told me she learned it last time in her gymnastic class.  I smiled at her little face when she told me, she would teach me how to do it.  I love Little people…they are so very very wise.   I invited her to join me tomorrow evening for some time on the mat and she is so excited to do so as long as we can hula hoop afterwards too.  Of course we can, I’m pretty good at that.

Namaste

Yogini KP

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