practice yoga regularly

It starts Tuesday. I’m excited!

A bonus: I went in to pay the fee for the class today, and had to go into the gym building (which I haven’t done before). Turns out it’s not a scary place after all. The faint smell of chlorine and sweat is really familiar to me, and the building is a bit worn and old (a plus in my book) – on the whole it really reminds me of the old YMCA where I took my first swimming lessons at 4 years old. It’s not the polished kind of place where I feel I have to already have a six-pack to be eligible to exercise there. Bike parking is readily available. I could stand to go there often – maybe even 3x a week?

Through the university.

8:00 a.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I’m excited! I really want to practice regularly, but I needed some sort of PUSH to make it happen. I miss taking yoga classes, though I was not very good at going when I had the opportunity (partly because I had to drive a ways to get to the yoga center).

This is only a short walk away. And hopefully it will get me in the habit of also going to the gym building in the mornings, which perhaps I’ll be able to leverage into a more expanded fitness routine.

Don’t know why, but I pulled out the vinyasa cd and am now glad that I did. It wasn’t quite as hard as I remember it being, although I did skip the inversions (don’t do those yet) and modified a lot of the hamstring stretches. My wrists are a little tired (the woman who did the cd really likes downward facing dog) so I will give myself a break tomorrow, but I’d like to come back to in on Sunday. I certainly felt great afterward.

The basement, while ideal in some ways, does not give me a good feeling.

I think that I could potentially practice yoga well in the roomspace I have now – it’s a bit of a squeeze, but I think I can JUST fit all of the various asanas. I may have to experiment – for some of them (anything supine w/ outstretched arms, for instance), only one orientation will work.

So – to this end, I’m going to pick up the crap lying around my room and try to do some yoga. I’ll let you know how it goes.

I think because I don’t really have a good place/time to do it. My room is way too cramped (and the floor is really creaky – distracting). The living room would be ideal, but there is no privacy and my roommate is usually up before me and working on her music, wishing to be UNDISTURBED. :(

I’m actually considering cleaning up a corner of the cruddy basement. It’s icky and sort of cold down there, but it’s private and I wouldn’t disturb my roommate. I could probably rig up my space heater. It’s not so bad (actually doesn’t even smell that musty, for a basement) – just needs to be swept.

There might be a good opportunity for me to get moving with this again. The local community center will be offering yoga classes once a week starting Oct. 3. They are only $5 a class. If they are good classes, I might start going regularly. I wanted to take a class through school, but could not pay the fee in time for registration. Next semester, perhaps, but I’d almost rather take a weights class if I’m going to take one through school.

Just sun salutations and standing practice (kind of a misnomer, as the standing practice includes side plank and bow poses). I’m pushing myself to improve each time, though. This time, I actually worked up a sweat (briefly) from trying to extend further in bow pose.

Really need to take a few classes again soon – maybe after a few more weeks of regular (daily?) practice. I don’t want to learn any bad habits – it would be nice to have someone check my alignment for me once in awhile.

It’s getting easier.

Something cool, too – I think I’ve already noticed the benefits to my other exercise activities. Went for a short hike directly after my yoga session on Saturday, and I was fully energized. It felt easy to exert myself – I felt so good that when my roommate decided to stop and rest, I chose to time myself on the rest of the loop and see how fast I could do it. 20 min! (I ran a lot of it, which I’ve never done before).

Now I just have to get past the mental block that’s keeping me from getting up and doing it. I think that once I can get myself OUT OF BED, the rest will follow naturally.

30 min. worth. A great start to my weekend.

I think I’m going to start working on this goal with more seriousness. I just love how I feel when I take the time to do yoga.

I did part of the vinyasa cd last night. Well, it was a relatively short practice, but I got some sun salutations and hip openers in. Good stuff. I then tried to do the sitting part, but got really frustrated. Reason? My hamstrings are just too tight to do forward bends really well right now. I mean, staff pose is tough for me to do with a flat back. I think it’s a combination of weak core muscles and tight hams. I don’t want to round my back (I tried doing that last night, and I can definitely feel the strain in it this morning – not horrible, but not something I’d like to repeat), but if I don’t, I can barely bend forward.

That’s ok, though. I realized that part of what has been stopping me is that I’ve been looking for “the perfect practice guide”. Which is silly. Only I can know which asanas would be really helpful for me on any given day! I have tons of resources at my disposal – surely I can create my own sequences. So, I think for the next session, I will do the sun salutations and hip openers portions of the cd, and then devise my own practice for the hamstrings. Maybe throw in a few balancing asanas, because I really like those.

Hopefully my hams will loosen after awhile. I’m thinking I need to add some legs-up-the-wall minutes to my cardio routines as well. I really want to do sitting forward bends well – they look so comforting (for the people that can do them!).