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VISION_QUEST2's Recent Blog Entries
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Wednesday, November 03, 2010
Well, it did take a yoga practice done under conditions of extreme exhaustion yesterday to get me to this point.
Not that he had been (morally) in the right (and he did have an agenda, possibly primarily mercenary in nature), but perhaps The Master Teacher, by forcing me (painfully and traumatically) from dolphin pose into a headstand back in February may have been trying to achieve this noetic state in me which there is nothing left to feel angry about ... I hadn't gotten into headstand in my home practice yesterday, of course (some of the half moon variations are much more important to me) but the net effect was the same.
Note that the yoga practice did necessitate the wearing of one (1) arch support on the foot that has plantar fasciitis. Despite its being self-sequenced and not to Cyndi Lee's DVD, which is the only other instance of a home practice EVER needing one or more arch supports. (As opposed to yoga taken at Tree of Life, OM, or The Nameless Studio I Used to Go To)
[I live in New York City and plan to continue to take a handful of classes at Cyndi Lee's own world-class OM studio.]
Note that I am usually exhausted on practically every Tuesday evening (from upstairs neighbor noise and the attendant spillover vibrations of moving furniture at all hours of the night, and then a lengthy commute, a full day's work and errands), and I usually substitute the "Fast Break" goal of going for a long walk instead. Which usually clears my head, but nothing like THIS ...
Please also note that I am three pounds north of MY goal weight.
Not the Fashion Capital of the World's proscription of a goal weight. Not Maura Kelly's/Marie Claire magazine's proscription of a goal weight. Not Hollywood's proscription of a goal weight. Not The Master Teacher's proscription of a goal weight. MY goal weight.
Where THEY read "plus size" (which could be as low as an American size 8, btw) I read MY goal size! Which is a size down from what I'm wearing now ...
Anyway, on with the show ...
Tina
Note to Community Team: I don't always talk about my progress, but this blog should suffice.
Friday, October 29, 2010
#1 It is obvious she's a suck-up to her boss(es)
#2 Consumerism and self-loathing are the two cornerstones of the women's rag trade today, and she toes to the party line
#3 She has a sweetheart agreement with at least one or two style houses
#4 She plans to write a book
#5 She provided free publicity to "Mike and Molly" which drew twice as many advertisers than the ones that left. blogs.babble.com/famecrawler/2010/10
/27/maura-kelly-of-marie-claire-5-reas
ons-she-shouldnt-be-fired/
I was an economics major in college.
Sunday, October 24, 2010
The Cool Yogini's signature teaching style is the most energetic - and the least mellow - at the entire Tree of Life Yoga Studio. It is nearly vinyasa in its intensity. The class, as presented without upward modification on the part of the student, is an advanced beginner class that would challenge many advanced beginners. It is one of the few classes she teaches. This yoga studio does not offer many yoga classes, being as it has branched out into a half dozen other things ... related to things other than yoga ...
So, I took her aside, last week - she'd had a few moments right after class ... just before I was to travel directly from the studio to see my Aunt who had been in the hospital ... and I'd told her that I might have gotten the wrong first impression, that she'd taught the advanced class (which due to scheduling conflicts, she can't teach anymore). And the advanced class isn't really very advanced; but as far as I'm concerned, it's about as advanced as I would like it to be ...
I mentioned about what I called my "mangled headstands" against corner walls in the past few weeks, alone, at home, during my home practice. I mentioned going into full wheel many, many times. And I wanted to reintroduce reclined hero, as well. So, I'd asked her, "... without skewing the energy in the [yoga] room, could I add these poses? I'm not talking about doing my own sequencing ...."
I did not know that with some yoga classes in the past few years (since my experience at New York Sports Club) a teacher of a mild(ish) style could work with you. If you ask, particularly.
Be it known (and this is not meant as a criticism) that The Tree of Life does not have consistent (i.e., mass-produced) offerings in their yoga classes across instructors--even at the same class levels in their descriptions--although they are nearly all presented (with direct interpretation by the student) as pretty mellow. This is the diametric opposite to the consistent, mass-produced, endurance-bending offerings at The Nameless Studio, which I left [possibly forever] ... Opposite also to the offerings at OM yoga, which is all of the above, but milder--more awake, aware and mindful; more humble and humane--than at The Nameless Studio - and presented with no takeaway feeling of being exhorted at with: "I am the Master Teacher ... and fitter, healthier, and more spiritual than you could be ..."
I have a serious slow flow practice at home that is of a respectable intensity given my age, physical condition, and that I'm NO yoga teacher trainee. And it shows ... even in the most peculiar places... The Nameless Studio, whose young founders and early instructors specialized in an extremely challenging style, earlier this year, acknowledged that I had "returned to class" after a long while with "amazing energy to bring to the practice". Even they acknowledged the power of the home yoga practice for "those who must" (in their opinion ... let's just say it's a financial necessity on my part. I figured out how to do it; and followed that with the commitment to doing it ...)
Besides pranayama (yogic breathing) -- and particularly the locks (isometric holds of core muscle groups - I have a bit of female bladder trouble, so this is for self healing purposes), my home practice (what I call my Soft 2 be Strong Slow Flow) is pretty energetic and it has no Kundalini kriyas in it. I'd been tempted to add them. Might yet at a later time.
So, anyway, she'd said OK. That it was something all to be worked on; that I was taking a chance at home with the headstands against the corner walls. That I should be observed by someone at this point.
Anyway, in class, I was standing on my head again. I graduated from the corner today to the side wall (actually mirror). It was not touch-and-go; she did not have to strain to hoist me into the pose, just to slow down and redirect what she feared was my momentum-driven ascent to same. I held the pose for 5 slow breaths, which is a world record for me.
Note to Community Team: I practiced yoga nearly seven (7) hours last week; three long-class-length home practices and last week's class. I may have fallen down on my Fast Break walking tracking, but with my pained feet, would it make that much of a difference?
Be it known that my home practice has gotten intense enough for me to require one arch support to be worn on one of my bare pained feet. I don't know if that's good or bad, but suffice it to say, my standing one-legged balance postures got to that level of seriousness!
Note Two to Community Team: I am visiting my Aunt after work tomorrow night. She is more homebound than the other aunt I help out regularly. I am glad I am still strong enough to do all this at my age ...
So, if I don't blog much ... you'll know why ...
Saturday, October 16, 2010
You know, let's say a family is up in New York and they have an infirm elderly parent or other relative in Florida, Arizona or some other retirement haven. And the less common instance of local or regional aging-in-place. But that family is aging. Like I am .. 56 and unattached. And I have several nagging mid-life health issues of my own. I can't go running all the time to check up on and jump through hoops to maintain red-tape laden living standards for my homebound widowed 96 year old aunt, who had been in a position to, but hardly helped my family when I was young ... soon the family would be broken,anyway (she being on my father's side of the family).
Anyway, some families have money (and by definition do not depend on government subsidies for care and shelter for their elderly ... so, also less red tape) and they can pay their elder care consultants to find a home or in-home care, check up on their remote family member daily; and they wash their hands of the whole hassle of having to remember to check up on the family member except on their birthday (maybe!)
So, what happened is that my aunt had been in the hospital for a week and NOBODY IN THE FAMILY KNEW. Being that I am relatively local, and considered next-of-kin--it's a manner of speaking, because I have a full time job with a bear of a commute every day--and because I am willing to visit, I also serve as a PROXY FOR A FAMILY THAT DOES NOT CARE.
THIS PROXY IS ONE THING THAT I AM TIRED OF BEING.
We both left repeated phone messages for a Geriatric Care Manager in the area. No telephone call was returned.
My aunt will get a visit from me tomorrow. I can't guarantee next week.
I think her luck is running out, but since I can't pay for a Geriatric Care Manager, and I refuse to tell a family that does not care about her about this hospital stay and my concerns - FOR her. Because they do not like her.
She is the sister of my father. My father had problems and he'd never financially supported the family after a short while. So, beyond my immediate family, almost all "professionals and living elsewhere", she survives a son who'd died young, and has nobody else.
Monday, October 11, 2010
My previous blog generated a lot of comments (given my general track record here)!
So, I feel empowered to go really off the wall this time.
First, my Buddha Nature:
Yes, I do have a Buddha nature. No, I am no stranger to Buddhism. But have not practiced (Japanese) Buddhism since my mid-twenties ... I am also interested in spiritual self-study from the Hindu and Jain texts, as I will never afford any yoga teacher training (usually packaged as "further study in yoga" for those students who go to a yoga studio regularly for more than a month, who either want to teach yoga OR even to advance it yoga - if they have marginal interest or ability to teach).
Yes, I went to OM Studio for two of my recent classes. This school of yoga was founded by a Tibetan Buddhist disciple, Cyndi Lee, who is well known. I did speak to her via the internet - you don't have to be practicing - or even familiar with - Buddhism to go to OM yoga school. So that makes me probably very much appreciative of the attentiveness and awareness cultivated by this particular yoga practice, more so than other casual studio practitioners.
[This is not to say that my home practice has to follow suit, totally ... but the practices DO harmonize with and influence each other ... ]
Having been a former meditation addict actually also stands in my favor. Many students of most vinyasa styles are naturally HYPERACTIVE (as I have alluded to in a blog comment at The Daily Spark.com) ... I mean, for a glaring example, they gravitate towards Nameless studio-where-I-used-to-go, irrespective of the hyper-Hindu-Jainist-spirituality practiced there (when I know them--mind-bogglingly so--to be very much into Judeo-Christian forms of worship) ...
Just yesterday, I asked an avid yoga student there, (actually also a yoga teacher as well) if she ever considered where I go to now ...my (and hers too) cultural upbringing in the mindfulness of its mystical offshoots, is very in line with that of the current studio I go to.
She said emphatically, no.
In contrast, I am nowhere NEAR hyperactive. Knowing and admitting to my kind of movement orientation (NOT hyperactive) doesn't take too much horse sense ..
What I didn't know was that it seems to win out over spiritual orientation (in the case of this lady and others) ...
Nirvana is actually getting the two to coincide with one's NATURAL movement and spiritual orientatIons.
Like I say, different strokes ..
I am happy to share my blog.
No Baptist preacher need worry too much ...
I think the spirituality is usually unbundled from the religion ... a lot of practitioners are in it "for the burn" ...
It is the more easygoing styles (slightly slower paced vinyasa and hatha) that will fuse religion and religious mysticism onto the yoga ...
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