I M Perfect lady

Tag: Yoga

  • Me.

    “Greatness is not in where we stand, but in what direction we are moving. We must sail sometimes with the wind and sometimes against it — but sail we must and not drift, nor lie at anchor.”  Oliver Wendell Holmes 

     

    I am surprising myself that I have continued to sail, although I haven’t met really strong head winds, just a few strong breezes in the past 50 days.

     

    I have 50 more to go and I don’t know what each new day brings, what winds will blow into my day, but so far I get my sailing done first thing in the morning, I make that leg of the journey perhaps before the winds begin to blow in the calm waters of the dawn.

     

    This is so not like me, I used to be the martyr and nibble on the leftovers of the day, the few crumbs of time and the bottom of energy tank, and those I chose for mine.

     

    Usually there wasn’t much there to do anything with, but sleep.  I slept to be a martyr again.

     

    As I now take from the top of the tank, I feel that I am stronger within myself and that is what I now bring to each situation that arises.

    I used to have a shame muscle that would operate if I were to focus so much on my self, to take the time off the top for me, to use my time and my energy for me.  How dare you, it would say!

     

    How dare I not.  My body is so much better, my disposition feels calmer, and my whole life feels more in control when I am in control of me in my life.

     

    It has taken me 51 years to realize the only one who can take care of me is me and if I drain my tank without first filling me up, we all suffer.

     

    My tank is full, the day has begun, I now have something to give to my day, Me!

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  • I have just begun.

    Just two weeks to go in completing the 60-day challenge, and I am quite sure I am changing it to the 100-day challenge.

     

    Mary Jarvis says, “Day 60 -90, your body shape seems to suddenly change at an exponential rate, though you may not notice.  These are the days when you start to hear all the “Wow, you look great!  What are you doing?” comments.  These 30 days are usually your best 30 days.” 

     

    So I am thinking if I stop at 60, I will miss the best days of all, like walking out without dessert. 

     

    I will go along as far as I can, but my sights are now on 100.  In two weeks I will begin the best 30 days, I have just two weeks left to unravel and unknot emotional twists and things that have held me hostage.  And then my body should adjust and open and change quickly now that there isn’t anything inside holding it back.  I can’t wait to see what 100 days will do.  I will then take pictures again. 

     

    It will be interesting to see how much my body changes in 100 days of Bikram!

     

    Inside I am happy I am not done, or almost done, for I don’t look done or act done or feel done, I feel like I have just begun!

     

     

  • You Be You

    “I don't know what is best for me, or you, or the world. I don't try to impose my will on you or anyone else.  I don't want to change you or improve you or convert you or help you or heal you. I just welcome things as they come and go. That's true love. The best way of leading people is to let them find their own way."

               Byron Katie

    An old friend surfaced and I felt myself not being seen or validated, and what instead was happening, is that I wasn’t validating her. 

    The stress inside of me was that I wanted her to be where she wasn’t, to speak and think in a way that was impossible for her to do so.

    I wanted her to have my relationship with God, my experiences of life, and my views and to feel what it is like to be in my shoes.  Insane?  How unkind of me to not understand that she simply can’t, for she is in her own life doing her own thing. 

    How awesome we each get our own life, our own business and our own pathway to God.

    There is an article “Seana Corn’s First Lesson in Yoga, (on Oprah.com click on Spirit) which again expresses that all people are on their own path, which is what I needed to read today, it cemented in me, that her and I are both right in our own way.

    I no longer feel the need for her approval or validation, I allow her to be on her own pathway, but without resentment towards her.

    So quickly I get lost in the community approval thing, where I seek another’s validation, like that will make my life better, easier or more than it already is.

    I truly honor her path, wherever IT leads her, and I am sooo grateful that I am not a ‘leader’ for her, for I have no clue what is best for her, like not even a little.

    It is amazing the way the resentment dies as soon as I accepted her as herself.

    You be you…

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  • Full Power

    I heard yesterday that after you say No, and the other person tries to get you to change your answer, they are trying to gain control over you.

     

    Imagine that?  I just hadn’t thought of looking at that as a power struggle or as one person looking to control the other.

     

    Byron Katie has said, that if you can’t say no, I don’t trust your yes.  Now this has a new dept to it for me. 

     

    You are as strong as your no.

     

    I am seeing this in my challenge that I am saying no to laziness, tiredness, sloth like behavior, and instead of settling back in and laying there, I get up and move.

     

    Each day that I say no to my old behaviors, I am gaining control.  Certainly the old behaviors are like an old unhealthy friend, urging me to change my mind.

     

    Today that feeling was almost overwhelming to just stay in bed and quit.  It took effort to get up, to get moving and to begin.

     

    That same zapping energy seemed to be present in the hardest postures, where I needed full power to power through, like Balancing Stick.

     

    It is up to me to stick with the no and not change and follow the old behavior, capitulating under its power.

     

    Imagine the power of no!

     

    Saying no can change your life and bring you back to full power.

     

  • It Appears And Then Goes

    This 60-day Bikram Yoga Challenge is just one of many challenges we are doing each day, little ones, difficult ones, and ones that bring us more in alignment of who we truly are and ones separating us from who we are not.

     

    Being a Mom challenge started roughly 22 years ago and will continue on now until I die, an endless challenge.  It is a combined experience with both sides leaning on the other or challenging the other to become their best. I have seen how I can affect this challenge; how I am the change I want to see in them. 

     

    A marriage challenge has been going on now for 23 years, during which time I have grown up and then fell apart.  What we learned most is that who we are and how we feel directly affects the relationship of us.  Our truths and our selves highly influence the way this flows.   We have rode the rough waters and sailed the smooth seas, learning along the way, our willingness to try repeatedly is amazing. 

     

    The individual challenge of just being me has been going on for 51 years, and in that time I have witnessed myself in many different roles and tasks, some more challenging than others.

     

    And all we can do in each of these challenges is to do what is being asked of us right now.

     

    As a day moves along, I am in the yoga challenge, then I flip into the mom challenge, then a mail lady challenge, then back to a wife for a while, then a mom, maybe an Artist, and on it goes.

     

    How cool is that we have a multitude of things going on at one time.  The challenge is to do each challenge fully and with presence, and not to get ahead of the challenges, or sit in one challenge dreaming of another, but to concentrate right here right now. 

    We add little pieces, fun color or dimension to all these challenges each day, building on them a little at a time.

     

    We become like a juggler juggling the many aspects of ourselves, catching and releasing each challenge as it appears and then goes.

     

    “Do little, but right, that is how you change your personality, your life.”  Bikram

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  • Tired Lost This One.

    Today was the day I dreaded, the day that I knew it would be touch and go with yoga, for I had such a full day and late night the day before.

     

    So, the alarm goes off, it is 4:20, and I am heavy and not enthused, at all. 

     

    The dog wanted to go out, so I stepped outside with him.  It is clear, crisp, starlit, moonlit, quiet and surreal.  I breathe in deeply inhaling this wonder, and know that I just may do yoga, now.

     

    My night was the most awful since we began this challenge, restless, sleepless, waking, sleeping for short periods to wake wide awake, and dreams that seemed so real back then, that I awoke more tired then I fell asleep.

     

    And now yoga…

     

    It was uneventful and nothing stood out except the fact that I was doing yoga with a tired body and no rest.

     

    I kept hoping I was ‘gaining energy’ in the yoga class, recouping my nighttime loss. 

     

    The headache I woke with dissipated sometime during the standing poses, and I was simply amazed at myself when the last breath was blown out and I lay down to Bikram’s song.

     

    I had faced the challenge this morning and won.

    Tired lost this one…day 33 won!

     

  • A Strong Body Will Be Revealed.

    It is Monday morning a workday for me, and I have my 32nd completed.  I feel that the rest of the day will flow better now.

     

    What I noticed today that under the extra seat cushion I have, there are muscles coming alive, and they are becoming really helpful in the floor exercises where I have to lift my legs off the ground.

     

    Before my back tried to do this job alone, and now there is a connection between leg and back, called butt, and they are actually helping in the lift.

     

    It was shocking to actually feel them working.  I am thinking I have never had them, ever.

     

    I wonder what is under my inner tube in front?!

     

    This added bulk that I am carrying around really doesn’t help at all; instead it is actually in the way on lots of postures, folds and cushions of me squished or hanging out as I attempt to finesse this yoga.

     

    It tickles me to know that muscles are being born underneath, like I am wearing a bulky jacket, but once I lose the jacket of extra flesh, a strong body will be revealed.

     

     

  • We Begin Again.

    "I exist in perpetual creative response to whatever is present."  Martha Beck

     

    In yoga today, I was watching how I felt in each posture, where my attention was or my attitude, was I accepting or enduring or somewhere in the future.

     

    Today I wasn’t fighting Bikram and the length of time he wanted me to stay with the posture, nor was I expecting me to do beyond what I did.

     

    If I went in very mindful and controlled and had a good breathing sequence going, I was amazed at how much more I could do.

     

    In fact I did so well on the Balancing Stick, I was eager to tell you all, but the next two were horrible, for I was ahead of the pose, expecting a perfect one before I even began, based on the prior one.

     

    Well, the prior one was gone, it was a whole new game, and I didn’t focus, breathe or concentrate.  I wasn’t in that pose, I fell out and had to chuckle at the difference between the two.

     

    I caught the feeling of how quickly moments go by, how we have to grab and drink of each one, and not worry about the flavor of the next, or indulge to long in a past one.  We have this moment, right here.  

     

    Right here, right now, we begin again. 

  • One Posture at a time.

    It is here, I am half way done with the 60-day challenge, which means I got up 30 days in a row and did yoga, which to me is amazing.

     

    I felt good today doing the yoga, I was stronger in some places, less wobbly, and was able to hold the postures longer.

     

    I watched for resistance, and found some in weird places, just odd little muscles holding back.

     

    My shoulder muscles for sure seem always to be zapping up energy in postures where they are not required. 

     

    Also, my jaw muscles want to get involved, and they are in the way in Rabbit and actually when relaxed make my breathing easier and fuller.

     

    My shoulders, neck and jaw are the three places where I stored all my resentment and stress.

     

    It is odd, that my upper body was bracing and feels stiff, and my lower body is slack and yielding and weak.

     

    I am thinking as my legs walk my truth as I lock my knees against things that are not good for me, this will balance out.  And then my shoulders can relax and as long as I speak my truth, my jaw doesn’t have to clench in frustration.

     

    I told those muscles to relax now, that I had a better grasp on life, and that they no longer had to stand guard against things I didn’t pay attention to.

     

    It is like my body has been bracing itself for the next assault; knowing that I would go against the body to help/be/do for the others good, not mine.

     

    Like any broken relationship it takes time to mend and build trust, but we can one posture at a time.

     

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  • Seeds For A Better Tomorrow.

    Bikram writes in his book, Bikram Yoga about the ‘Intangibles’ of yoga.

     

    “These are some of the most important ways that yoga acts on the body to create perfect health.  Keep in mind, though, that yoga is not reducible to a quantified number of medical benefits.  Even as yoga makes measurable changes in your muscles, organs, bones and spine, it also is working on what we call the ‘subtle anatomy,’ renewing and reviving you at the cellular level, invisibly taking care of every atom and molecule. There’s an emotional and psychological aspect to the healing process as well – the mind/body connection.  As much as I like describing things in terms of cars, yoga doesn’t just give you a mechanical tune-up.  This is soul-stretching we’re doing, mind-restoring and Spirit-building.  The unquantifiable improvements in your quality of life and your attitude toward life make themselves felt in every cell as well.  When you’re well, they’re well.

     

    One of the yoga’s most miraculous effects is the way it actually increases your energy, rather than depletes it.  After practicing 90 minutes of postures, you’re not dragging and exhausted – you’re raring to go.  Your feet barely touch the ground!  How can this be?  First, you are in tune, so you operate and process fuel more efficiently. You can go further on less gas.  We also believe that through the breathing exercises, you are generating vastly greater amounts of prana, life energy, so naturally you feel more energized.  On a medical level, you are taking in more air, oxygenating all your cells and charging them with energy.

     

    My guru quantified this effect; he taught that one complete Hatha Yoga session infuses the body with enough energy for up to 16 days of health and increased longevity.  Practice again the next day and you gain another 16 days, while using only one.  It’s like putting money in the bank for future use. Put that money in the bank every day, and watch it add up, with interest.”     Bikram Choudhury

     

    That sounds rather impressive and it seems about right, for what it requires of us in those 90 minutes.

     

    This is serious yoga with serious quantifiable results; just learning to grasp the beginning of each pose will result in huge payoffs.  Maybe just arriving on the mat each day is a victory against long held past routines.

     

    It seems like it can go either way, until I am standing ready to take my first yoga breath, I then know I am on the next day’s session.

     

    It is not guaranteed that I will arrive each morning, but I don’t worry or stress about it in between. 

     

    I have intentions of continuing, but you just never know.

     

    My lack of self-trust is showing, my past behaviors out number the good ones.  My endurance to continue being kind to myself has not been a steady pattern in my life.

     

    It seems ‘something’ always comes in and knocks me out of my good intentions.

     

    Each day that I do one more yoga, I am building a history of successes.

     

    Dr. Phil says the biggest predictor of future behavior is past.  I am planting seeds for a better tomorrow. (21 days)