A New Week

A new week means new possibilities.  I spent today reading the Yoga Sutras and reconnecting to my intention.  I feel ready to tackle the week and all the challenges it holds.  First and foremost; another trip to the studio.  Monday night offers a great Flow class followed by a Yin class.  I refuse to let my mind tell me that "I don't have time" to do all that when in fact my time couldn't be better spent.

I plan to take a different path this week and see where it leads me.

Namaste'

The Gunas

I've done some serious soul searching since my last post regarding my lack of motivation.  I decided that my best course of action was to get to a class. It's obvious that just practicing at home isn't cutting it.  So I got up early this morning and hit a Vinyasa class to get things moving and grooving.  I think I'm on the right path to  getting that spark back!

The Gunas - this is in my reading for my next class.  I find that looking at my attitude over the past few weeks in terms of these states of mind is very enlightening.  For those new to this term The Gunas can be defined as the movement of the three parts of the mind:  Rajas - Tamas - Sattva.  Rajas is the active, fiery state; the one that induces us to act.  Tamas is the opposite of Rajas and is the fixed, immobile, heavy state of mind.  And finally Sattva is the quality of insight that is white, clear and transparent.  Since my last training weekend I would say that Tamas has controlled my life.  I had zero interest in doing anything even remotely associated with yoga.  Hence the Vinyasa class this morning.  I was hoping to activate my Rajas and get back in line with my goal.  The goal of course is Sattva.

Some say that knowing is half the battle.  I hope that by knowing where my struggle lies, in my mind, I can push past that and get my body moving again.

Namaste!

Motivation

I have to be honest; I've lost my motivation to practice.  I don't know exactly what happened.  Is it possible that I had too much yoga with the back-to-back weekends of training?  And is it even feasible that someone could get burned out on yoga?  At any rate I'm struggling.  So I've started to read my homework assignments with more diligence and I have hope that this will reignite the spark that I know is still deep inside of me!  I have been getting on the mat and for that I am proud of myself.  But my mind has been fighting me every step of the way.

Namaste

Surya Namaskar

Surya Namaskar - Sun Salutation.  These twelve poses were the focus of last weekend's teacher training.  And the topic of all my reading assignments and written homework for my third session.  WOW!  I have my work cut out for me.  My first order of business is to work on my Chaturanga.  My belly drops and my back isn't straight. So I will be spending a lot of time with my stomach on a block to teach myself to lift up!  It's going to take all of the four weeks to undue the last 10 years of bad practice.

Wish me luck!
Peace~

Samskara

Samskara - loosely translated as "deep impression".  I learned about this in terms of my yoga practice this weekend during teacher training.  It seems that for the past decade I have been doing certain yoga poses incorrectly.  This was a tough fact to learn while doing these poses in front of the whole class!!  These movements have been so deeply ingrained in my mind and body that the adjustments my instructor made actually felt uncomfortable.  But after a few moments of being in the posture I realized that my feeling of discomfort was mainly mental because physically the pose actually felt better.  Of course now the real work begins.  I need to undo all my samskaras and get out of the vicious cycle I've created.

I don't go back to training until the 3rd weekend in November.  Between now and then I will need to work with props to try and teach my body a new way of moving.  I'll keep you posted!

Namaste'

Anatomy Weekend

Happy 10-10-10!  This weekend was my Anatomy Intensive for my teacher training.  That translates into 12 hours of learning about bones - muscles - movement and such.  My poor brain is full.  I actually think I dreamed about lateral flexion last night! It was great to see everyone again and to spend so much time with like-minded people.  We learned so much; information I can't wait to utilize in my practice.

This week I will finish up some reading, write out my teaching script for Prasarita Padottanasana, read my last two Sutras and practice my alignment.  I'm a little nervous about the "quiz" this coming Friday, but I'm trying not to stress.  I need to remind myself that this is YOGA and there's no stressing in YOGA!

Have a great week.
Peace~