Practice Yoga regularly, with the wonderful, worldwide alumni of 30-in-30

...the daily encouragement of the 30 in 30 goal. I love you all. Now I need to find another daily inspiration.

I know the benefits of keeping the routine of a morning and evening yoga routines. Yet I seem to be intent on self-sabotaging. Why? I just don’t know.

I’m pretty good on my morning sun salutations but my evening practice has majorly slipped. I really need to get back to where I was.

I think joining a ‘proper’ class might help!

I’m gonna go do my evening yoga routine right now! No excuses.

To get back to my evening yoga routine. Mornings I am good on – other than very occassionally missing a day. I miss my evening routine badly. As of tomorrow I am going to get started again (I really am to tired tonight – excuses excuses).

Also I really do want to join a proper yoga class. I have wanted to do this for six months – I have the details of classes – I just need to be brave and get going!

As I have mentioned before I am still practicing daily and still tending to stick to the same few morning and evening yoga practices that I alternate. As such I generally have little to report.

Then the last few nights I have noticed a real progression in my sirsasana (headstand). At first I could barely stay up even with hubby holding my legs. Now I can get both legs up straight in a fairly controlled manner (at first I was just kicking into the air and hoping hubby didn’t get a black eye!).

Now my hubby is able to let go of my legs for a few seconds and I can hold myself. It really is only a few seconds at the moment (4 to be precise) but my plan is to keep practicing until eventually I can get into the position and stay there unaided!

The night before last I stayed in a hotel with my husband and so I had to practice my yoga without dvd guidance. I found that I knew the sequences with ease and interestingly found my breathing and flow to be much smoother and in tune with each other than I do with the dvd.

The morning practice was amazing – we were on the 9th floor and with the curtains wide open at 6:30am I was able to watch the start of a new day unfolding over London as I did salute to the sun. It felt great :D

Last night I got in late and was too tired to bother to get changed, get out my yoga mat and dvd – so I just did a short spontaneous practice letting the postures flow naturally. I did some forward bends, then cat postures, followed by camels into child and then ended with some back stretches.

It felt really good just to follow my instinct :)

Well I am still going with the daily yoga practice. I have now managed 54 consecutive days. I have to confess that I haven’t deviated wildly from my usual routine:

Am: 20 mins sun salutations and balances
Pm: 25 mins floor postures and inverted postures

I had a little disruption when my Mum decided she wanted her yoga dvd back (the evening one). I tried doing a similar 25 min practice on another dvd but I missed the ‘total body and mind’ plan sooo much that I had to go and buy my own copy. I am finding though that whilst mostly I love the comfort in knowing the practice well, at times I am getting bored and I do need to rotate my dvds for more variety.

I also had an interesting few practices when I stayed at my Mum’s for a couple of nights and she sat and watched me (and talked to me)doing my practices. I didn’t realise how much I appreciate complete peace whilst practicing – I am so focussed I can’t hold a conversation and I don’t really want to!

I do still want to find a ‘real’ yoga class to enhance my practice but the right one hasn’t come along just yet. I will still keep looking.

I hve noticed some real improvements in certain postures. I can know fairly easily manage my head to my knees in the forward bends (not quite chin to shins but I’ll get there!) I am most pleased with my headstand – I can now manage a few seconds with my legs bent and I am getting better at holding my balance when fully upright but I do still need someone to hold my legs for now!