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Wednesday, September 11, 2002
Oakland, CA PRACTICE:
Fluid Yoga: 30 minutes Journal
I woke early. Took a shower to warm my sinews. Listening to Krishna Das I did what ever I could. It was working in whatever way my body would allow. I am stiff first thing in the day but more internally settled. It is important to do this movement process first thing in terms of being set in the best possible way for the rest to the day. To remember my inner self. To expand the dream space still hanging in my psyche from night time. To smooth into the physical space setting my bones in line. Letting the blood move. Stirring the organs, opening space in them before they become loaded with food and the processing of the day's conflicts. I work on parallel alignment of femur head while elongating the sacrum and lifting the front of the pubic bone towards the sternum. This theme follows me into many asanas and movements. Also working on isometrics in short range of motion. Have been feeling the need of strength in something other than full kinesphere movement. Thursday, September 12, 2002
Oakland, CA PRACTICE: Fluid Yoga; the Image of Taffy; 90 minutes Journal Flow and Pausing in Poses Today I feel stiff from hiking and dancing too rigorously yesterday. I say 'too' because I have an optimal feel within myself these days - long and strong but not overly muscled. I like the feeling of freedom in my joints when I haven’t shortened them too much. I like being able to sink down and rise up from the floor effortlessly because my tissues are released and in balanced tone - that is, every group assisting the other group in fluid succession. This balance is what I've been honing these past two years, particularly the past year. The Fluid Yoga produces this condition in me. This practice is neither held poses nor is it continuous motion. There is an oscillation of actions. For instance, I'll do a combination of poses, one flowing into the other and out again. I repeat the combination a number of times. This is a dance idea more than a yoga idea. But the yogic sensibility emerges when there is a fermata in the full extension, a lingering in that extreme extension, filling it with awareness so the body can deepen the stretch. Afterwards there is a flowing away - an oceanic receding of the wave from the shoreline - and the next part of the sequence comes into play. The ebb and flow of the combination has a rhythm that allows for elongation of the endpoints in time, a drawing out, a sensitive unfurling mediated by the sensual feel of the stretch. I know how to negotiate this timing by feeling the body let go, feeling the muscle fibers almost sigh gently in relief as they ease themselves out of holding and into expansion. In the process of repeating a combination, attention can shift to the in-between spaces - that long period of transition between full extensions comprised of the successive passing of effort from one muscle group to the next. In this passageway we gather deep strengthening and integration. It is also the arena where lapses in concentration are best addressed. It is easier to pay attention in the full extension because we work at our threshold of intense sensation. It lends itself to being noticed. By contrast the sensation of movement transition is subtle and can sink into a shadow of attention. Maintaining present-ness and awareness in transitions is the key to developing center, power and intimacy with oneself. Intention I wound myself into spinal twist today with my hands bound behind the back. Keeping the hands clasped around my leg I slid this arm loop along the leg allowing it to draw and release the fascia and muscles along my shoulder blade and down into my sacrum. The slow lean with ease-ful breathing acted like a taffy pull. I felt my body respond to the textural intention of my movement by softening and letting go. When I am anxious and in a rush my body like-wise responds by tightening against my intentions. It defends itself against being pulled too hard, too fast. Some days I have noticed, however, that a strong martial relationship to myself works - as if my body is raring to go and wanting strong impulses. But today it was weary. Fatigue is no impediment to full range of motion or to full practice. It requires the adjustment in approach and intention. The tissues are fed by understanding oneself to be a pliable substance, by moving elastically with a surety of timelessness. The lactic acid is ushered out and endorphins invited in, but all we know is that we feel fresh and free. October 2, 2002
Oakland, CA PRACTICE: Large Ball Movement; Fluid Yoga; Released Motion Journal
My spine is so tight it wants to pop. Might released motion help? I found that I could do released motion but I had to guard against the tendency to "show" that it is released (as if there is an imaginary witness that needs to see I am released). Being released requires settling down into my body and into a deeply felt place; when I am tight this hard to do since there is restriction and pain. When I quieted the restrictions relented some. I have been pushing my body hard from the outside and spending less time in a compassionate condition. Re-acquainting with softness, gentleness took some attention. I was unable to sustain it for very long but I know that the short period was needed and salubrious. Ball Work entwined with Fluid Yoga: here the efforts to release were more efforted - a stretching quality that was satisfying though did not penetrate my essence as deeply. In this period of duress the capacity to not overwork is something I welcome in myself. As if I am finally growing up enough neither to punish nor neglect myself. I am growing up enough to be present, unafraid of this moment.
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