Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Day 28: Hit a wall

I was not myself in class today. I took more water than usual, sat out some postures, and thought the time drug on forever. I was a little disappointed with myself but I know it is part of the process. I will refocus before my next class and hopefully be able to push myself further.

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

I have got to keep up with my blogging!

Day 23:

I had a nice class at 4:30. Unlike last time I pulled a double, I was not completely wimped out. I had more strength than I expected and had a great time.

Day 24:

I spent my day on an unsuccessful journey to buy an iphone. I still have no iphone and I missed Yoga. When I say missed, I mean missed.

Day 25:

I did class at 4:30. It was a solid class. I took myself to dinner at Sweet Tomatoes to reward all of my hard work.

Day 26:

Was not feeling so hot. Skipped out on a class but got some work done.

Day 27:

Woohoo! I have missed my classes with Jessica. I went at 6:30 and had a solid class despite the fact I was not feeling well. I left feeling better than I got there, so that is always a plus. I also learned to embrace any energy that is produced from an evening class and if I can't sleep, than be productive with the time...no sleeping pills! Jessica said this after one of the postures and I had a difficult time controlling my laughter. I love to laugh in class!

Challenge Tally: 24/27...looks like there are some doubles in my near future!!!

Thursday, July 10, 2008

Day 22: I actually REALLY love my camel!

Talk about a complete 180 from yesterday. I attended class at 4:30 with Jessica and it just flew by. It was a pretty solid class. I went in with a positive attitude and a clean slate and took it one breath at a time. The class went so well that I wanted more. I stayed for the 6:30 class with Sheila. I was able to keep up my strength and control my breathing for the majority of the class.

The good news:
I have been trying to get past the mental block that has been preventing me from embracing ultrasana or camel pose. Today in both sets of both classes I was finally able to let go. Just let go and breathe and go in to the posture everytime. I found that it was easier, yet still challenging, to not be afraid and embrace the feelings and emotions that this posture causes than to hold myself back afraid of what I will feel next. For those of you who are not yet Bikram practicers here is what it looks like:



This is one of the master postures in the practice. Being a new Yogi I still have far to go in mastering this, along with the 25 other postures. But today I feel that I made a great step in the right direction as I could see improvement with every new attempt.

Practice makes perfect so I will continue to embrace the feelings and practice!

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Day 21: Another week done, new lessons learned

First I must get this out of the way...I had my worst class ever. No reflection on Jessica who's voice helped me through the 90 minutes, but it was my personal worst.

I learned two very important lessons today.

1. Do not expect to have a pleasant Bickram practice five hours after having
tests/blood work done.
2. Do not psych yourself out.

This was actually a great day for me. I was pretty much cleared by my liver doctor who said I have made remarkable progress since my kidney/liver failure in May. This is news that I have been hoping for. He did however want to have one last set of labs drawn, just to be safe. I am already naturally wussy when it comes to that and did not feel good going in to class. I thought I could just let go and have a nice practice. My body was not in total agreement with that idea. I had to sit several times for fear of vomiting on my neighbor and had a huge problem with dizziness.

That brings me to the 2ND lesson of psyching myself out. As I felt worse I got irritated with myself for not being able to push through it. This led to feeling sad that it wasn't happening. Which led to being mad for being sad, and so on, you get the idea. I need to focus on not letting (in Jessica's words) the monkey chatter in my brain get the best of me in my practice.

I was able to offer up some encouragement to a fellow newbie Yogi which gave me positive energy. I left the studio not feeling defeated but with a positive attitude knowing that tomorrow is a new day. Instead of dwelling on it I am going to embrace those feelings as part of this process and hopefully handle it better if and when it happens again.

Thanks to everyone for your support!

Tuesday, July 8, 2008

My last week...

I'm really going to work on posting on time this week, but here's last week...

Thursday, July, 3:

Not much to report. I did hot golf today rather than hot yoga. I did break 66 on a side which was a personal record, so it was a good day.

Friday...Happy fourth of July!

I attended the 7:30am class with Jessica. It was a great class all in all.

Saturday and Sunday...
These were days of rest and family time for me.

Monday, July 7:

I spent a lovely evening with Sheila. I did my first back to back double, 4:30 and 6:30 classes. I was a little late for the first class but after my days of rest I felt incredibly strong. I was able to get and stay in camel three out of four times. I also got some tips on triangle from Sheila between classes and was able to work on keeping my foot from sliding in class two. I was able to control my breath in both classes.

Tuesday, July 8:

Again, nothing to report. I really needed to concentrate on work today after the holiday weekend so I did not attend class. I'm in the hole for 3 classes for my challenge but I will be able to make those up. I can't wait to go back tomorrow.

Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Day Fourteen: Two Weeks Down!

Well, my second week practicing this Yoga flew by. It went by a lot faster than the first. I am still even at 14/14 and that is okay with me. I don't think that I will do any more doubles unless I need to in order to accomplish my 60 day challenge. This week has been a little slow going for me. I have had to sit out on a few different things. With that being said, I have also been focusing more on particular postures, such as camel, and can see improvements within those. I got back into camel today and stayed there for longer. Jessica spoke this morning about being your own teacher and focusing on keeping the entire body tight for the whole 90 minutes. I am now trying to not just go through the motions but really focus on keeping my tummy and other muscles tight throughout the class. This makes it tougher but you can only get out what you put in. This will be my new challenge to myself.

Lucky Thirteen

I attended class at 4:30 PM. I was much more hydrated and mentally focused today. I still had some problems with my breath and (sorry boys) menstrual cramps but I somehow pushed through. I was able to get in the camel posture in the second set this afternoon. I didn't stay long but I was there. This is something that I have been focusing on so that made me happy.

Day Twelve: Back in the Saddle

I'm not sure how much good my day of rest did. I attended the 6:30PM class for the first time. Just being out of the room for one day, coming back in was difficult. I noticed the heat for the first time in a while and had some problems focusing on one breath at a time. It was more like trying to take ten breaths at once...I'm sure that tomorrow will be better.