Practice yoga 30 times in 30 days

gonna do this one day. i actually did it in january….

it seriously is life changing.

but now.. i am focussing on taking things slowly and practising santosha (contentment) with where i am.

that works for now.

I apologize for not having posted the follow-up. Life has been busy, tough and I kind of forgot. But I wrote this wrap-up report at VF, my favorite fitness forum and I am copying and pasting it from there. I posted it there on 2/23/2008.

This is my second Sadhana. I officially finished it on 17th, but the “musing” took this long. This is one of the tougher periods in my life. Surprisingly, I had no emotional meltdowns during any practice in contrast to last year when I had cried for some silly reason.. hurt by some insensitivity of a friend. In the grand scheme of things, it was no big deal. But I am surprised at how relatively calm I am this year..perhaps I am finally “growed” up.

Focus: Just doing Yoga everyday.

I was doing Yoga fairly regularly before the Sadhana due to ongoing low back issues.

I started Sadhana on 12/21/07. Had a break in between when I traveled to India. I completed 40 days, but I did miss 5 days… so basically I reached 40 days 45 days after starting my Sadhana (not including my India trip). Well, this is the best I can realistically ever do.

Improvements over last year: I am able to easily do Yoga practices longer than 45 minutes. Last year I was just managing 30 minutes. I don’t mean that poses got easier, I am not fidgeting after 30 mins wanting to stop.

What did I learn: I figured out I am inflexible to varying degrees almost everywhere. And that is OK with me. More than learning, I should say I ‘unlearned’. My big thing is not to push myself and get into poses the wrong way… eg, rounding of back in forward bends. I noticed that I was doing that in cradle stretch when I was doing Backyard as well as Tilak’s Altar. The other big thing is trying to breathe through the practice. I did well for the most part, paying attention to my breath, somehow towards the last few practices, it was hard for me to keep that focus on breath.

My experience so far:

I started doing Yoga as a stretching component when I started running with Cardiocoach. I am thankful to Yoga cross-trainers (these are people I check-in with at VF every week to talk about our fitness activities. They have encyclopedic knowledge when it comes to Yoga). It was their chatter that hugely influenced me and guided me towards Yoga.

The first year, I was eager to do poses, effortlessly did Ardha Chandrasana in my first class and was always eager to try hard poses.

Where I am now:
I cannot do Ardha Chandrasana easily, sometimes I can, sometimes I cannot.
I am not in a hurry to do the poses wrong anymore. I enjoy slower, gentle Yoga, poses with longer holds ( even when I cannot hold it long). Fast Vinyasa just does not work for me. I need to figure out how to best optimize a pose for me and this takes several tries, several minutes in poses for me. Now, that is the big reason why Barbara Benagh clicked with me. It was not love at first try. I started with YFSR and repeatedly did the low back and hip and sacrum segments… but initially I felt it was slow, I was impatient and my hamstring inflexibility made it unbearable to do these sections day after day. But I had great faith in all of you ( I am referring to the friends at videofitness who extolled its virtues). I was using YFSR before I started the Sadhana and I was bit tired of the reclining sections by that point. So, I tried a variety of different DVDs during the Sadhana. This is how my final breakdown looks:

Barbara Benagh: 18 (all YFSR)
Erich Schiffmann 5 ( 4 BB + 1 Gentle Yoga mp3)
Gary Kraftsow: 6 (low back viniyoga)
Lillah Schwartz: 2 (Freedom from back pain)
Darlene Bink: 2 (From the ground up)
Tilak Pyle 1
Mary Pappas: 1 (Y for weight loss)
Raji Thron: 2 (Gentle series)
Rodney Yee 1 Conditioning for athletes)
Peggy Cappy: 2
Sudhakar Kem McRAe 1
Danica McKellar 1
Yoga radiance 2
ETA
Hips and hamstrings 1

( Total no. of practices > 40 as I did two practices on some days )

Realistically, I don’t think I will be able to do Yoga everyday, but I hope to incorporate more and more into my routine.

I thank my Yogini friends at VF, they have been wonderful in terms of their input. I certainly would not have been this committed but for them.

In closing, all I can say is Robert Frost’s famous words: “Miles to go before I get good at Yoga”, but the journey is fun.

Since, it has been a few months, I can also update I actually do Yoga regularly (at least 4 out of the 7 days). It is usually short 30 minute practices.

So, I am happy to cross of this goal from my list as I know I will practice regularly now. I will try to add hyperlinks to some DVD I mentioned. I am currently into Barbara Benagh. I must warn that it might not work for everyone as she is slow and deliberate, but if you really listen to her and follow the instructions, you will find the pose so much more enhanced than what you were doing before, at least that is my personal experience.

NAMASTE!

and I’m inspired to keep it up at least once or twice a week.

It had very positive (and unexpected!) effects on other part of my life as well:

-I don’t smoke anymore
-I feel more centered and less anxious
-I feel more in the present rather than spinning away with crazy thoughts all the time
-I sleep better
-I take better care of my looks
-my posture is fantastic, I feel more confident when I walk in a room
-I feel more fluid when I move and this makes me feel more attractive
-I feel less of a need for things like alcohol and sugar – in fact, lately I’ve been passing on them altogether
-I crave really healthy things and eat a lot of them

Good luck to everyone on this goal. My suggestion would be to mix up your practice with different styles to make sure you hit everything and don’t become bored!

I find the PM yoga on this tape to be so much more strenuous.

hopefully will so some pm yoga as well tonight.

it’s funny the subtlties that your body starts to pick up on as your practice develops. It starts to feel more natural and flowing.

7 more workouts to go!

my shoulders are tight – ugh!

Looks like I’ll be doubling up from here on out…that’s definitely ending with a bang

After a 3 or 4 year period of inactivity, I am back as a daily practitioner.

Feels good. I look and feel so much better. Everyone I see tells me so!!!

Why did I ever stop?