Playin’ The Edge

This article talks about a study that was done on “deliberation without attention”. Basically, thinking hard about a straight-forward decision works fine. But if it’s a complex decision - take a gigantic chill pill. Let your unconscious chew on it while you do something more productive to your wellbeing. Like sleep… or yoga.

So let me just step into the confessional here and say - I’m a closet bluegrass fan. My first formative Bluegrass moment happened on a sunny Sunday a.m. at the Vancouver Folk Festival where buddy from Kentucky drawled “We’re not havin’ church, we’ve havin’ bluegrass”. It made no logical sense, but I was with him in spirit.

And then there was the time drinking beer in the funky Adams Morgan area of DC where i looked up, and realized I was listening to dudes play things like the mandolin. It was Bluegrass and I was really liking it. But taking the step to purchase that sweet genre of music was another thing entirely. Where do you start? What if a friend sees you at the till?

But then I heard good things about a trio of Vancouver homegirls called the Be Good Tanyas . I got their Chinatown album and wore it out. There’s nothing better than bittersweet tunes about neighbourhoods you’ve lived in. And then a fave of mine, Sarah Harmer, came out with her bluegrass album, The Mountain and it rocks (figuratively of course).

I’ve used “In Spite of All The Damage” from the Chinatown album to wind down at the end of the yoga class. I wasn’t sure about it, because I always try to find positive music for yoga, and this song is all about relationship trouble. When someone in class said they really liked the song I confessed I’d had doubts about using it for yoga.

But the class decided that it’s ok, it’s not sad, it’s Bluegrass.

I’ve done a couple of downloads from Eoin Finn (I believe it’s pronounced Ian and all I have to say is that in the game of Baby Name Scrabble somebody’s parents had too many vowels wouldn’t you say?). It’s good stuff. I did the hip class a while back and it really loosened the ol’ cementy hips up.

This a.m. I did the Honey Standing Poses and they’re great. It’s a nice straight ahead flow in under 40 minutes. After the initial Sun Salutations you just do poses, so you don’t have to keep up with alot of transitions.

What I appreciate about Eoin is that he does a real solid Savasana. Sometimes I cheat (I’m sure we all do) when we’re doing yoga at home. You think you really need to *do* yoga and that means packing in as many poses as possible and then lying in Savasana until you think of the next thing you need to do (which is about 10 seconds for me). But Eoin talks you through and it reminded me I need to take that time more often to really enjoy the yummy effects of all the poses I packed in.

Good article in Slate called “The Medical Tourist Returns: Yoga Treatment in India” about the writer’s experience doing lots of yoga classes in India. It sounds great, but like her I’d be sneaking off for the chicken and flat beer after 5 days too. You have to keep things in balance, even in India

Someone lent me Tuesdays With Morrie a long time ago and I never picked it up. Then I kept hearing about it and finally picked it up again. It’s a great little book, here’s a quote:

‘Everybody knows they’re going to die, but nobody believes it. If we did, we would do things differently,’ Morrie said.

Learn how to die, and you learn how to live.’”

Now how on earth can I justify talking about lip stuff on a yoga blog? Excellent question. Lesse - it’s February, Carmex makes me happy when it’s -15 (that’s celsius kids), and hey, yogis need soft kissable lips too. Besides I’m an expert on this, I’m Canadian. Here’s the scoop.

Lots of products like Kiehls are fine for summer. But if you’re in need of a more medicated experience to keep those lips in line, Carmex is a pot of gold. If you’re in Canada you can find it at Shoppers.

Carmix is just medicated enough, compared to say, the Blistex one which may cause second degree burns with its effective ingredients. But it’s also got just the right creaminess - not too thin, and not too thick. Ever noticed how the cheapie drugstore lip balms are like rubbing a candle on your kisser?

Once you’re rubbing your lips together in glee, check out the urban myth about Carmex. Let’s face it, a product hasn’t really made it until it’s been accused of being full of deadly ingredients and listed on Snopes. Oh, one more piece of advice, the squeezey version of Carmex is not squeezable when it’s been left in the car overnight in the winter.

Hey, let’s stay kissable out there yogis.

I wrote about JivaDiva and how her podcasts are great for at-home yoga. Sometimes though, Jivamukti yoga, which is the style she does, is pretty speedy. It can be tough to keep up to audio-only instructions. Alanna, that’s her name, commented back with a tip that she’s now offering video podcasts! My iTunes is set up to automatically download her podcasts, so I found one and I tried one out this a.m.. It was a 30 minute Twisting session and it was great. Nice to be able to peek up and see what the next move is.

She did a wicked sequence (I won’t give it all away ) where she went from a Revolved Prayer Lunge to a Revolved 1/2 Moon Pose. So if you’re lunging with your right leg forward, your hands come into prayer and you twist right. Then to transition, your left hand comes onto the fl0or a foot ahead of your right foot and you open up to the right stretching your left leg straight/back and your right hand up to the ceiling. Yummy! This is one you should try at home. If you’re not an iTunes person, no problem, you can also find them on her website. Thanks for your comment Alanna!

I can’t remember how I heard about this book - The Translucent Revolution - but I read something interesting in it the other night. The writer, Ardagh, says that we take our thoughts to be Facts and The Truth, and of course they’re not. Thoughts are impermanent. Thoughts change and pass and morph and disappear just like water heading down a stream.

He also says that our thoughts promote action in our lives OR block action. And of course they don’t deserve to have that kind of power, they’re just thoughts. We think they’re real but when we try to poke at them we realize they’re just shadows. A little light of awareness and their power disappears.

This came back to me last night when we did a Back Bending class in Power Yoga. I didn’t tell everyone what the class was working up to, but after lots of juicy back bending poses and warm ups, we did the Wheel Pose in partners. I just love springing that on a class that’s ready to do it. I grab a couple people and we demonstrate (one helper lifting the person’s torso, and the other lifting the tops of their legs). You can feel the hush of everyone else in the room who hasn’t done the pose thinking “I dunno man. I just don’t know if I can do that”.

But then they try and it goes better than they thought it would and the look on their face is just priceless. And you want to say - now why did you trust those thoughts? They’re just thoughts. Try and see for yourself.

Next week’s Back Bending class will end with drop-backs into Wheel Pose. I can’t wait.

Now some people like to really jump on the bandwagon, go whole-hog, go for the whole shootin’ match and whatever other cliche works here, when they decide to ‘get healthy’. But the problem with the bandwagon is that when you fall off the wagon it’s a long way down. And that’s a huge downer that makes you feel like a loser and usually kills your resolve right there. As I’ve said before sometimes major change just freaks you out.

I think a better strategy is to sneak up on things, make mini-goals and keep it simple. It’s like balancing doing and non-doing in a yoga pose, you need to find a way to ease your way into the change. You need to find methods that will allow you to be a bit of a slacker too. Now that may not be the case for seriously motivated Type A folks but they’re reading something else, right? The key is to assert just a little control over your life so you don’t get lost and freaked out.

I tripped over this website and just love the simplicity of the No S Diet. Now I think diets are evil, because only we can know what kind of food our body is happiest with - but check out the rules:

No Sweets
No Snacks
No Seconds

On any day that doesn’t start with an S. And holidays are included in days that start with S.

I love that - it’s real and management and might actually be something I could adhere to.

When I did my teacher training we were asked to buy “Anatomy of Hatha Yoga” and it looked like such a serious book that I was afraid I wouldn’t be up to it. And some of the writing is a little funny - like could you cram any more ‘anatomical’ words into a sentence? But I dipped into it on the weekend when I was playing around on the mat and there were some nice tips and tricks in it that I hadn’t noticed before.

Here’s one that I used in classes this week.

1. First stretch out your right leg and do Head to Knee Pose (I never call it that in class because I’m trying to get my students to *not* slump over the their leg trying to get their head to their knee - how about we start a movement to call it Navel to Thigh pose? ). Hold it for a few breaths.

2. Then put your left elbow on your left knee, make sure your sit bones stay down as you stretch your right arm forward *inside* your right leg. In other words, you’re not stretching *over* your right leg, you’re 6 inches or so inside that leg. Hold this.

3. Then go back to Head to Knee/Navel to Thigh pose and hold it again.

You’ll generally find that you can stretch farther the second time around. The book explains why this is, but since I’m no anatomical expert I suggest you just try it yourself. I’ve been running outside more, and boy did this stretch help loosen up all those tucked away tight muscles! Enjoy.