At the very end of each yoga class we finish by having a bit of a lie down. To a beginner this is a very odd thing to do- to lie down in the middle of the room with a bunch of strangers for a few minutes. The reasoning is that after having created all those wonderful shapes and moved the body, breath and energy in all directions, we let it all go. We lie down into corpse pose (Savasana), finally stopping and returning to stillness. In this stillness the body has a moment to absorb and assimilate, on all levels, the changes that have happened, before we spring back to life and it gets very busy again.
There are those who come to yoga so they get 40 winks or 5 minutes of 'peace and quiet'. And those who love the practice, but sprint out the room as soon as I say 'find a comfortable lying down position'. They either don't see the point of wasting time on the floor for 3 - 5 minutes or they can't cope with 3-5 minutes of doing nothing. To be fair it's not easy.
Read moreYesterday a friend told me he was contemplating moving because he had a panic attack in his car on his way to work. He thought it might be better to move house so he’d have to drive less. This really upset me and I made me want to learn more. Here are some of my findings and thoughts.
Read moreAt the end of most of my yoga classes, I close by asking us to take a moment to "thank our bodies for the hard work they have just done and have gratitude for the hard work they do for us every day, all the time, without us even knowing it", or words to that effect.
I don't know about you, but I'm miffed when I can't do a yoga pose. It bugs me when my leg won't neatly slide behind my head and I can't then balance on my index finger. When in reality, the fact that I can even lift a leg is an amazing feat of engineering and yet here I am complaining that it's not high enough.
Read moreYoga teachers say some odd things during class. I completely include myself in this. I've named various body parts different marine life forms: I often refer to the pelvic floor as a giant jelly fish. I've moved internal organs around the body, asking you to 'breath with your toes' or twist and 'pop the heart out and float it to the ceiling'. I have certainly said things like 'be in the moment', 'be present', 'be in the here and now'. But what do these phrases really mean?
Read more'I am off to my yoga class' = I am going to a place where I will roll out a mat and do some weird shapes.
But technically speaking if we are talking about the postures we perform in a yoga class, we should be calling it Asana class rather than Yoga class. But that's like pointing out that a hoover should be called a vacuum cleaner and ping pong is the name of the brand of a table for table tennis...pointing that out would be pedantic, wouldn't it?
Read moreI have been painting the Grand Hall of my house, which incidentally is 1m2. My other half says it looks much better than before. I think the paint now highlights all the imperfections in the walls and the old radiator, the cracked door frame and scuffed skirting board. These imperfections invisible prior to my contribution, now really annoy me.
Meanwhile, my other half is tiling in the West Wing, aka the bathroom. I think it looks fabulous, so much better than before. Yet all he can see is the gap between the centre tile is 2mm narrower than the tile above it. Had he not pointed this out, I would never have noticed. This imperfection really annoys him.
In both cases it's not perfect, but better than it was before and in actual fact - it is fine, it does the job more than adequately.
And yet it niggles...
We want perfection
Read moreAs controversial as this notion of 'yoga not being exercise' is, especially when we do it in gyms, it is worth considering… The whole point of yoga is to reach enlightenment. This is a bit of a tricky place to find. We first have to stop all our 'mind chatter'. Then, discover our true self and perhaps, after that we might be good to go.
Read moreYoga is so much easier in the bath. All those poses where I have to lift my entire body weight just using my hands - piece of cake. The poses where I have to put a leg behind my head- easy. (Well... perhaps 'close' to my head.) Forward folds - easy peasy- you can't go too far or you'll drown.
Read moreClose your eyes. Relax your body.
(Make a mental note of how hot you are on a scale of 1 to 10)
Have a millimetre gap between your teeth
Keep your tongue flat against upper palate
Separate the lips, gently exposing as many teeth as you can
Inhale slowly and deeply through the teeth
At end of inhale, close mouth and exhale slowly through nose
This is 1 round. Repeat 5 more rounds.
(Make a mental note of how hot you are on scale of 1 to 10)
You can't read on until you've tried it. It's only 30 seconds of your time.
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