Pre-practice post. I'm a few cups of coffee in and getting myself ready for the mat. I didn't pray/meditate before yesterdays practice and just sort of hit the mat. I remember my brain being a little hard to control in that my thoughts kept flipping around as I was moving through the physical practice. Again, I am not an expert on Ashtanga Yoga, but I will say that the physical poses that you/me/everyone on planet Earth associates with "yoga" is one branch of the "tree". Take a look at the 8 Limbs of Ashtanga Yoga and you'll see that the physical practice is called "Asana". Almost all poses end with the suffix of -asana (padahasthasana/utkatasana/savasana/etc.). To me, a more interesting, abstract, and difficult to grasp, component of yoga is trying to control your mind and withdraw from your senses and yourself. Pratyahara is the term for this state of being and, while I am quite certain that my skill level is inadequate to even begin to understand what this means, I will say that, during a very intense practice, if you've got your mind quiet and under control, you can "withdraw" from the pain and physical discomfort that you're feeling in your practice. The best and least abstract way I can describe this withdraw is that you see your body, you know it's there, you know the strain and discomfort of your practice is there, but you're "observing" it as an outsider. It's hard to describe and doesn't occur often for me. When it does occur, it's a little trippy.
I'm going to spend 5 minutes praying and meditating before I hit the mat this morning to see if that does anything for my mind. After that, I'll be hitting my mat.......
Saturday, December 3, 2016 (Part II)
Post practice. I'm sitting on my mat having just woken from Savasana (corpse pose). Today's practice was the same asanas, but as I said in previous posts, each day can be so different that you might as well be practicing a different style of yoga all together; today was no exception to that rule. I felt completely different today than I've felt in the past week of practices. I definitely prayed and meditated for about 5 minutes before hitting my mat and I feel like that had something to do with it. Physically, I was strong, steady, and focused. I almost always push myself physically first with concern for my breath and bandha control coming second (don't know if that's wise or not but, there we are). It was a wonderful practice. I put additional effort into stopping my mind from moving around and running while while I was practicing; it is way easier said than done. In the midst of running short on breath, being inverted, focusing on alignment and locking your bandhas, your brain has got about 10,000 going on with it and, all of the sudden, you have to turn the volume in your head down to nothing, focus on nothing, and think about nothing (I can manage that for about 5 seconds before something flits into my head).
I'll wrap up by saying that I'm going to begin posting some pictures on this blog in case anyone who might be reading it, is curious about what some of these poses look like.
I have a wonderful weekend ahead of me. Time to get to it....
Namaste
I'm going to spend 5 minutes praying and meditating before I hit the mat this morning to see if that does anything for my mind. After that, I'll be hitting my mat.......
Saturday, December 3, 2016 (Part II)
Post practice. I'm sitting on my mat having just woken from Savasana (corpse pose). Today's practice was the same asanas, but as I said in previous posts, each day can be so different that you might as well be practicing a different style of yoga all together; today was no exception to that rule. I felt completely different today than I've felt in the past week of practices. I definitely prayed and meditated for about 5 minutes before hitting my mat and I feel like that had something to do with it. Physically, I was strong, steady, and focused. I almost always push myself physically first with concern for my breath and bandha control coming second (don't know if that's wise or not but, there we are). It was a wonderful practice. I put additional effort into stopping my mind from moving around and running while while I was practicing; it is way easier said than done. In the midst of running short on breath, being inverted, focusing on alignment and locking your bandhas, your brain has got about 10,000 going on with it and, all of the sudden, you have to turn the volume in your head down to nothing, focus on nothing, and think about nothing (I can manage that for about 5 seconds before something flits into my head).
I'll wrap up by saying that I'm going to begin posting some pictures on this blog in case anyone who might be reading it, is curious about what some of these poses look like.
I have a wonderful weekend ahead of me. Time to get to it....
Namaste
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