Catching Up (again)...

I have been a bit remiss in posting some of my YTT class reviews on the blog per our homework so this morning I decided to go through my notes and post some of the interesting things I have learned in the last couple of weeks.

"Energy flows where the attention goes."
We had a very nice class about Ayurveda, the so-called "sister" of yoga. It is one of the ways to balance our life, in foods, herbs & spices, scents, actions.  Key phrase: "Prana trumps all". Again, the breath! It is a complicated topic that I will be looking into more.

We have learned a lot more about pranayama (breathing) techniques. I think for me the best thing is that I am now a lot more aware of my breath in other situations too. The other day I was in a jam on the freeway and I just sat there, breathing in and out slowly, calmly and that lessened my annoyance. And I think it helps my sleep more to focus on breathing and relaxation before I sleep.

There has been a lot of teaching practice and scurying around about the teaching and I had a revelation about WHY I am in the teacher training and what it means to me. AND... the realization that really I do not want to be a yoga teacher. Yes, I know... then why am I taking this long expensive training? Well.. for me. I started out wanting to take it to deepen my own practice and learn more about yoga and myself. Then I got caught up in the buzz around teaching for a few weeks and thought yeah sure, I can teach this. Then as I was sort of panicking about the "final" and finding students and all the talk about the business of teaching I stopped. And took a breath. And told myself... this is not what you wanted. And took another breath, it was getting lighter... and thought again about why I had signed up for this in the first place. And came through the other side with the INTENSE realization that I no longer wanted to teach, I just wanted to BE. To be with yoga, as a practice, in my life. And I realized how much more there had been to this course than just to prepare us for teaching. It had really been an exploration of ourselves and our own journeys. And for me, that was good enough. More than good.

Part of my thoughts above also hinged on the fact that I really enjoy GOING to yoga class/practice.I have found a few classes that I enjoy, that bring me peace and comfort, and then there are also workshops I sign up for that introduce me to new things. Next month I am trying the handstands workshop -- not so much to do a handstand, but to maybe face my fears of not being strong enough, not being good enough, thin enough, limber enough... and to learn how to make it work for me.

We also had classes on prenatal yoga (Wenke), the buz of yoga (Tami) and Bhakti (bringing devotion to your practice) with Alicia. Of these the bhaki one resonated most with me possibly because of it's musical side. We did some chanting and then movement, with chanting which I loved. I found it almost folk-dance like in its simplicity and joy, and it also made me really want to go folk dancing again. I know, a leap from yoga, but not really. Yoga is not just a class you go to and then it is over. Anything can be a meditative yogic practice if done with that intention, even folding towels or doing dishes. Ok, yes I would rather be doing downward facing dog than doing dishes but just sayin'...

Reviewing...

I started writing this in my "other" blog and realized there was a lot of crossover to this one, so I decided to post it here too. I see I have fallen behind on blogging our yoga teacher training work so I will let this one start the ball rolling again for me...


The other day Tami was giving a workshop in our yoga teacher training session and through what she said reminded me of my Word of the year and the CDF's (core desired feelings based on the Danielle LaPorte book, The Desire Map). I realized it had been MONTHS since I had thought of those and decided to review them and see just where I stood with them...

My Word for the year in 2015 was OPEN. HERE is where I wrote about that.
My CDF's for 2015 were unencumbered, aligned, vibrant, connected, and mindful. HERE is where I list them but I see now I never really wrote more about them.

Now it is the week of Thanksgiving and many people are doing Gratitude challenges and such on Facebook and other social media. Or maybe preparing what they will say on Thanksgiving, the one day it seems we all have approval to feel gratitude. This has always been a hard thing for me. Not being grateful but expressing it. Lately there are a lot more articles online about how developing a gratitude practice is helpful in our lives and after so many years of cynicism I decided to tone my negative voice down and actually give it a try. So I joined the 40 day Gratitude challenge on Facebook and decided to take a look at thoughts and ideas I had set forth for my life and how this year played out.

Ok ok I am so grateful it is satsuma season (photo above)!! But seriously...

Starting with the Word for the year. OPEN. I think I have been more open to things happening this year. Where I think I have fallen down is being more open to accepting people as they are. Still needs work.

For the CDFs, I think I have had only bits and pieces of advancements with them:
Unencumbered: may need to use this one again next year. My house is still messy and I still have way too much stuff.
Aligned: I did better with this one and have a very positive feeling about bringing more yoga into my life. I am feeling more aligned physically but also mentally/spiritually. I have never been a religious person but I still feel there is some spiritual awareness that runs through my core. The yoga teacher training also helped me reawaken some of this curiosity.
Vibrant: I had hoped to do more art this year. Perhaps that is something again for next year. I have been feeling the loss of artistic mojo extremely powerfully these last few months.
Connected: Both good and bad on this one. I have been in touch with some people and relatives I had not been for a while, and some of that has brought sadness as well. Two of my cousins (one on my dad's side and one on my mom's) both passed away within a couple of weeks of each other last month. It makes me sad that I did not make more of an effort to stay connected. But also I have noticed the last few months I have been more introverted and have not gotten together much with people or made efforts to be more connected.
Mindful:  This one sort of laid dormant for a while then lately I am being much more mindful in several ways. Part of this is from an expanded awareness of mindfulness through the yoga training program and some of it is taking hold of my food issues and being more mindful of what and how much I am eating again.

So now I am thinking forward to next year and wondering if maybe I just need to give my words and ideas another year to percolate or is it time to choose a new word and cdfs? No hurry, no worries... just a thought that is taking hold this morning.

Cooling down...

“Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?"

"That depends a good deal on where you want to get to."

"I don't much care where –"

"Then it doesn't matter which way you go.” 

― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

I had all the best intentions in the world last TT session -- I would get the HW packet, get an early start on it, get things done! I was turning over a new leaf.

Well I did get started on the reading quickly and did a little yoga and breathing... and now it is 2 weeks later and the next session is about to start tomorrow and I am not really sure where the time went.

It's not like I really lead a busy life.  Mostly I am searching for where all my mojos went: yoga, quilting, writing, painting, gardening... I feel like they are all hiding somewhere and any time I get close to finding them, even seeing a peek of them enough to grab hold a speck, they scurry off to another hiding place.  Squirrel. 

“Mad Hatter: “Why is a raven like a writing-desk?”
“Have you guessed the riddle yet?” the Hatter said, turning to Alice again.
“No, I give it up,” Alice replied: “What’s the answer?”
“I haven’t the slightest idea,” said the Hatter”
― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

Which leads me to this week's reading about tapas. Yeah yeah, no not the Spanish plates, but the yogic niyama of heat, self-study, or will-power, discipline to put it in western terms.

 "Tapas is an aspect of the inner wisdom that encourages us to practice even when we don’t feel like it, even though we know how good it makes us feel! It’s that fiery passion that makes us get up and do our practice for the love of it, and by committing to this, the impurities are ‘burned’ away. Making the decision to go to bed a little earlier so you can wake up early to practice is Tapas; not drinking too much or eating unhealthy foods because you want to feel good in your practice is Tapas; and the way you feel after an intense yoga class, a blissful Savasana and deep meditation That’s Tapas too - ‘burning’ away the negative thought patterns and habits we often fall in to."   From: http://www.ekhartyoga.com/blog/understanding-the-niyamas-tapas

Forming new habits, or confirming old ones that I haven't been following lately. Not all of the habits have fallen by the wayside. I do still (in general) eat in a more healthy way now even though I find myself pulled again back into the carbs-sugar cycle every Autumn brings for me. 

From our reading by Mary Paffard this week on tapas:

"Plateaus occur and they need to be honored.   Especially if you have had a super firey beginning to the practice and then it’s a bit ho-hum.  The willingness to be present to each and every moment without conclusion will allow you to see this time as valuable also and at some point some new spark will alight."

That is something I am still struggling with: to be present each and every moment. Maybe then it will be easier to accept that I am not moving as quickly as I had hoped on this or that project or path in my life. I am still not very accepting of my own failures, or at the least, the slowness in which I am getting things done. I am not so sure how to get there but at least I feel I am aware of it more now. Maybe that is a start.