Practice Yoga with at least 4 different Podcast episodes in Feb 2007

I finally did the 4th session last week. It was was Adi Amar’s Ashtanga session (the first of a 3 part Ashtanga Series) from Yoga Today.

I wrote to Yoga Today and learned they are looking for sponsors for the next series. Until then they plan to rerun the series they shot in Arizona. I hope they get their sponsorhip.

When they do, they also plan to relaunch their website with a searchable database from which all past episodes can be downloaded.

For any Yogis and Yoginis who like variety in their practice, Yoga Today is well worth checking out.

For each session, they provide level guidelines (Beginner, Intermediate, All Levels). I find the Intermediate and All Levels programs are suitable for anyone who has learned yoga from a live class for about three months. I have not tried the beginner classes.

Free Yoga podcasts can be as good as $$$ yoga DVDs.

I practised with Yoga today’s Core Strengthening session with Adi Amar.

She began the session with Sun Salutations into which she worked side planks and warrior poses. This worked up quite a sweat. Next, she did a core session that I found quite tough. She did Navasana and Table top circuit style (5 sets!) with Kapalapathi or Breath of fire while in the poses. She did a pose from supine, reaching the torso through with hands outstretched legs parted and raised off the ground that really works the lower abs. To end the core work, she did some leg raise variations that I could not manage to keep up with because my abs were fried. I quite like her teaching technique.

In ancient India, Yoga was created and practised by spiritual seekers. When Yoga was exported in the modern world, it was marketed with the “mind and body” tag.

A Yoga guru who has truly invested in learning both the mind and body aspects and has the gift of good communication can be really inspiring, I imagine. I find reading the original texts is hard and boring work. On the rare occasions when I plough through and distill the essence from the long-winded, repetitive passages, I am rewarded. Even if a Yoga guru were to communicate his own interpretation of yoga as a tool for spiritual growth and well-being, as long as there is depth behind the thoughts, I would listen with an open mind.

There are different kinds of Yoga DVD instructors. Some approach it like exercise. They do not talk spirituality or philosophy. I like this approach. I dont make any conclusions about whether they “get” the mind connection. I appreciate that they simply choose not to talk about it. Shiva Rea and Rodney Yee are examples.

Some instructors seem to feel compelled to talk about the mind connection. Is it possible to say “Most of them sound shallow and silly” without being rude?

Venkat and I practised with Neesha Zollinger’s “Return to Center Hip Opening” from the Yoga Today series yesterday.

Some of her “physical” techniques are effective for those who need help easing into hip opening. If only she did not digress into little “centering” speeches every so often!

Venkat put is perfectly. He said it is a good thing she is very pretty. He could tune out the words and just look.

Feb 2007 has long since past. I finally got around to practising with a podcast today.

I had downloaded a few Yoga Today podcasts. I never got around to using them because … who does yoga in front of a PC? A few weekends ago I converted the downloads to DVD.

With that I lost my last excuse.

I practised today with “16 poses to change your life”, a class taught by Sarah Kline.

Now I wish I had started earlier with Yoga Today. I enjoyed the session much more than I expected to. This particular class has very attainable poses (one participant shows modifications for beginners). It is neither strenuous nor too easy.

Sarah started the class with what she called Bellows Breath. I have not learned Bellows Breath from Venkat, but what she demonstrated was very different from what I have read as descriptions of Bellows Breath (my impression was that each exhale and inhale are done in a series of forced expulsions or inhalations, but Sarah just breathes slowly and deeply). She does it standing, tilting her head back at the top of the inhale. I must remember to ask Venkat to show me Bellows Breath.

The first of the 16 poses, she calls Ardha Chandrasana. It is not the standing balance pose to the side with one leg raised and one hand resting on the floor. Instead she raises her hands over her head in prayer (but with index fingers pointed) and arcs her body in a side bend so that it literally looks like a half moon. She also does this as a back bend.

For each pose she announces a mantra. For her version of Ardha Chandrasana for instance it was something about smiling with your whole body. For Garudasana it was – No matter how twisted I feel, I am centered on the inside. Most were corny and yet quite cute. They made me smile.

I dont suppose I can remember all 16 poses. It is midnight and I did them in the morning. Let me try -

1. Sarah’s version of Half Moon Pose (Ive seen this pose on the cover of a Bryan Kest DVD, I wonder what the real name for it is)
2. Utkatasana or Awkward Chair (she does a few variations – I liked this part a lot)
3. Garudasana or Eagle pose
4. Extended Head to Knee Pose (New to me. I liked this pose. She balances on one leg, puts the other foot in a “stirrup” that she makes with her hands by interlacing her fingers, then she extends the raised foot in front of the body, still in the stirrup, and tries to get her forehead to her knee)
5. Natrajasana or Dancer pose
6. Veerabhadrasana – 3 (which she says is also called Tulabandasana)
7. Standing forward bend with feet wide apart
8. Veerabhdrasana 2 and Triangle
9. Tree. Then forward bend from tree. Also a squat while still in tree that she calls a toe stand which was the best pose of the day for me.
10. Bhujangasana or Cobra
11. Shalabasana or Locust
12. Dhanurasana or Bow
13. Supta Virasana or Reclining hero

Chris, I’ve felt these twinges of guilt off and on for inviting you to this Goal and never getting around to doing anything more than the download part. I hope you agree with my title. I am going to practise with way more than 4 podcasts this month. I liked my first Yoga Today Podcast enough to want to try many, many more.

Since the goal was to do this in February, I’m not going to make it. I have to get back into my daily yoga routine as well. Simpler and easier is better for me than a diverse range of different yoga routines.

Sanjeev Kapoor is India’s celebrity chef.

On March 14, he is releasing his new Non-Fat Cookbook in my city. The event is being hosted by a women’s club called Duchess at the hotel where my gym is located and the sponsor is my gym.

Q: What does this have to do with Yoga?

A: Read on.

The gym decided to spin an event around healthy living around this event, to which about 200 people are expected. The agenda is the book release, followed by a healthy-can-be-tasty buffet lunch. In between the two is a short Fitness Show on the gym’s fitness programs. It starts with Yoga, then Aerobics, Weight training, Physiotherapy for sports training and rehab, and finally Dance. Except for the dance finale (to be performed by a professional troupe) the rest of the shows, the gym decided, will have to be performed by gym staff and members.

Venkat, who is our gym’s only Yoga instructor, is responsible for creating the Yoga show.

Venkat, as you may have seen from the pics I post, is fabulous at Yoga and could have put on an entralling solo show.

However, the entire point is to get students to perform because the message is “Hey, isnt this gym more fun than where you go now?”

This is where we get to what Sanjeev Kapoor is doing in the title of a post about practising Yoga.

On Saturday, Venkat came home to devise the routine. He wanted me to give him feedback while he choreographed the Yoga show.
He had picked 4 women students to perform.

Q1 – What routine would look like a peformance and yet accomodate the abilities of this heterogenous bunch?

A1 – Venkat’s group of Yogini participants is:
J, a yoga teacher doing a refresher with Venkat: The most skilled but with limited time to rehearse
N, the gym owner: Very fit but got into Yoga just about a month ago
S, another student: Supremely flexible but recovering from injuries that limit the asanas she can peform
Vee(me) the AY: Semi-skilled and enthusiastic

Venkat decided he and I would peform a Vinyasa as mirror images of each other, while the other three would perform a routine of static asanas behind us. J would do advanced poses in the center with the other two peforming easier asanas that are visually complementary, on either side.

Me: Let us pick the Vinyasa routine off one of my DVDs.
Venkat: But that is not original.
Me: Sure, but most people here do not use these DVDs, who would know? We will be done with choreography in ten minutes.
Venkat: (silent – but looked displeased)

Venkat choreograped an “original” Vinyasa flow. He had to work with poses that I can do well (zero forward bends for instance) that could still look impressive. Quite a challenge. It took us an entire hour of working together before Venkat could pick reasonably elegant poses that I could perform with reasonable elegance. The routine is less than five minutes.

I am glad we did not plagiarize from a DVD. He has devised such a pretty routine.

My Yoga practice since Saturday has been repeating this 5 minute sequence over and over and over and over…..

Q2 – What music?

A2 – I wanted Prem Joshua’s “Himalayan Trance”. It starts dramatically, and then builds tempo over time like the word Trance would imply. Venkat liked the beginning and the middle, but felt the song was not suitable because we finish the routine before the song picks up fully.

Jeff (who teaches aerobics and dance at the gym and is perfroming the grand finale with his troupe) gave us Deva Premal’s “Tumhare Darshan” from her first album “The Essence.”

We have been rehearsing to the latter. It is hauntingly beautiful. Venkat has been very unhappy though. We cannot understand a few words of Deva’s German-accented Hindi. Venkat says “How can we perform to lyrics that we do not understand?” I think very easily. The song and our sequence go so well together. But Venkat is still scouting around for a substitute. It has to sound good, match the pace of our routine, and mean something to Venkat. We have to find it between now and tomorrow morning (which is when we “perform”).

Q3 – (Was the most challenging) What to wear?

A3 – Jeff suggested we should all wear white for Yoga. Everyone agreed, so it seemed at the outset this was going to be a very easy decision.

J said she would only wear Indian clothing (salwar kameez or something like a long Indian skirt) since she dresses traditionally.

Venkat and I are doing inversions and back bends – skirt-like or tunic-like clothing will invert with us! Venkat suggested the two of us should wear white Yoga pants with a white tank top, while the rest would wear white salwar kameez.

J was happy with this decision.

Then N said she does not wear salwar kameez. She offered to buy identical Yoga pants and tank as mine. Venkat felt, we could make this work. Since J would be in the center, with S and N to either side, J could carry off salwar kameez and look distinctive. The rest of us would all wear pants and tank.

We asked S to dress in pants and tank. S has no problems wearing Yoga pants but will not wear a tank. She does not like exposing her arms.

Finally, this question will be settled with Wear what you want as long as it is white!

The risks

The Vinyasa routine looks best when Venkat and I perform side by side facing the audience. But this requires plenty of rehearsing to move in absolute coordination. We don’t have the time for this. I position myself therefore, beside Venkat but just a trifle behind him. I am in sync when we do poses facing forward and inwards because I can match the movement by looking at him. But when the pose faces outwards, I cannot see Venkat since we are back-to-back. I have figured out how to look at him from the corner of my eye (hopefully not too perceptibly) on these poses where we face outwards. Except Half Moon and Warrior 3 in which I lose my balance if I try to peek at him. We devised a little trick. Venkat snaps his fingers to cue that he is moving from these poses.

Venkat and I have rehearsed together many times.

J worked with Venkat yesterday to plan the asanas for the other trio. She has not rehearsed ever, apart from planning the asana sequence, but is so proficient it may not matter.

Venkat, N and I have rehearsed together twice.

Venkat has rehearsed with S.

Today will be the first (and last!) time we rehearse as a complete group.

On Sunday, Balaji Venkat and I ran outdoors. Venkat has banned any runs until the show is over on Wednesday, since I will be risking muscle tightness.

Tomorrow is the show. I feel like an excited little girl. Even if we are totally out of sync when we do our little Yoga show, I will not mind. This has been so much fun.

I tried a second Yoga Today podcast tonight, and it was another one with Sarah Kline. While I don’t suffer from migraines I did think that it would be good to try a practise that focused on my neck and shoulders. It was good and I found that it did help release some tension in my upper body. Each of the podcasts is an hour, so it’s a good, balanced workout. I think that I will keep trying them out every now and then as it’s a good workout and a nice change from my regular routine.

I practiced my first yoga podcast today with the Yoga Today video podcast with Sarah Kline. The winter warmup definitely warmed me up and it was quite challenging and I had to rest several times as I couldn’t keep up. But it was a very good workout and now I’m tired, but I feel as if I’ve accomplished something. I want to check out some of the other podcasts in the series (there is a new 1 hour one each day!) to see if there are some that are a bit easier. But it was fun to change my routine and be challenged.

I will be traveling from tomorrow until February 16th (business travel on conferences and business meetings within India). I may not be able to log in regularly.

I will miss you and 43T.

I will exercise, practise Yoga as often as I can besides doing all the networking and work stuff I am supposed to do, and try to eat as clean as possible. The last goal is where I need the most will power. Conferences in India mean an abundance of sinful, delicious food and very few healthy options.

I just downloaded my first video podcast from www.Yogatoday.com. So I am fully equipped for this goal (3 podcasts out of 4 downloaded and plenty of opportunity to use them while I am traveling).

Ooty was just another person at the videofitness forum.

She raved about something called cardio coach guided audio workouts

I tried it. It blew my mind. I went from Cardio Fit to Cardio Fitter Than Ever Before and had a blast all through the journey. The common interest initiated an online correspondence with Ooty. You have read her posts here? Imagine feeling connected to this person overlowing with affection, fun!, zest for life and a very unique and special kindness. I just realized recently that Ooty is the best thing Cardio Coach did for me. When I feel blue, thinking of one of her endearing posts brings a smile to my face.

She referred to vancouver yoga. in one of her comments here at 43T.

So instead of heading to iTunes for my first free podcast. I went there. After all, Ooty recommended.

A Yogi named Eoin has a few free mp3 Yoga downloads available here. Eoin is a name to reckon with, with the Yoginis at videofitness (and they are a very knowledgeable and enlightened set), but I have never tried his DVDs so far.

I did not practice Yoga yesterday. It was a combination of being pressed for time and too tired (mentally, not physically) to make up my own Yoga routine, or bother with TV and DVD. If I had a quick Yoga routine on my iPod I would have squeezed it in after my workout at the gym. The mat was right there, the iPod was strapped on my arm, and I am always in the mood after a workout.

With Eoin’s Yoga Quickie, a 25 minute practice, I can, if I ever feel this way again. Plus, I cannot resist double entendre.

It has Sun Salutations A&B > Warrior 1 > Warrior 2 > Triangle > Revolved Prayer Twist > Seated Forward Bend > Table > Boat > Butterfly > Wide Leg Forward Bend > Pigeon > Corpse Nice!

I am listening to the download now as I type. It has inoffensive background music, while Eoin instructs. Eoin’s voice and style of instruction seem nice.

Next in line for download is tragically hips a 55 minute practice. This Routine is designed as both a great way to get fit and tone in less than an hour and also as a mother’s milk for those tight and sticky western hips. I hope this routine turns tragic hips into magic hips. I do not remember exactly, but am willing to bet this is the specific mp3 download Ooty recommended.

Western hips is so right! In India we sit cross legged on the floor, quite often. Women adopt a full squat position during many household chores like chopping veggies with traditional kitchen implements. A person who is stiff from a sitting-on-chair lifestyle is teased, “White hips.”

Chris and I are experimenting with free Yoga Podcasts (audio and video) in February. Folks rave about them. We wanted to figure out if we were missing something really good. If you want to join us, please drop a comment here asking for an invitation.

Off to download tragically hips now.