12.6.2008

Update!

I'm chasing cute lambs in the photo by the way, to give them a hug but I guess they are just traumatised!

Everything is unfolding well with the training, John just discovered a new way of getting into a pose, supta kurmasana, for his beginner students just by exploring things on his mat. We did another blind practise today whilst being supported and guided by fellow students to get out of our conditioned minds, what we project on our practise, on our bodies and the people who adjust us in the practise. I found myself giggling half way into it because I was on Takako's extra long, extra wide mat thinking I would be pretty safe to move around on it, and yet half way into the blind practise my body parts were already falling out of her mat. I had John sitting by me and moving me back to the centre of the mat everytime I returned to samasthiti. So we often play around as we learn and discover new things.

David's session was pretty interesting as well. He's an anatomy teacher, a body worker and an astanga practitioner all in one. He has an amazing understanding of the body, his approach is so determined and encapsulating when he adjusts, and he's so inspiring. It was interesting to hear how teaching anatomy and practising yoga can contradict itself, because one is getting us in the body to understand how it operates and the other is getting us to see beyond the form.

We talked a lot about western people's addiction with their body, the washboard abs, tight buttocks, the muscle building...And the consumerism around it, the businesses that exploit the market and lead people more into that attachment with their body. What are those abdominal contracting belts people wear to electrocute themselves, or the sauna pyjamas they can wear to sweat more, or the tablets/drinks they have to have to lose weight!

How wonderful to be on the path of yoga! and yoga that is in many forms, many understandings...yoga that a runner does as they get into that zone, yoga that a surfer does when they become one with water, yoga that a mother does when absorbed in their baby as they breastfeed...yoga that I do as I chase the sheep on the fields wanting to embrace them?? Not sure about that one...