Warrior 2 Position

Yoga Core Day 4

Asa and I went into this Yoga lesson absolutely exhausted from the weekend, we had a wedding on the Saturday and we were busy all of Sunday so yoga was good chance to get the mind and body back on track. gladly in this weeks lesson I really noticed an improvement in my Yoga ability! my breathing was a big improvement from previous weeks and I also had more ability to transition between different positions (finally I'm getting better) With the breathing though, it made so much of a difference when I got my breathing right, inhaling while moving into a position then exhaling while transitioning out of one kept the blood circulation pumping around the body and allowed me to hold the positions for a longer period of time.

This lesson was all about the art of balance, and it was interesting because I don't think I have had to do any type of  balancing for long periods of time since primary school but after being introduced to the basics in earlier weeks I was interested to see how I would go. With all the balancing positions the key I found to not stacking it was to get your body alignment right (Sandy was continuously correcting me) and focus looking at a particular spot on the wall and concentrate on the action. It was also interesting to see how different people in the class reacted when trying to balance on one leg (Tree pose), Sandy the instructor was definitely entertained with everybody crashing to the ground, and hearing a massive thud as someone loses their balance while you are trying to focus on hold your balance is hugely distracting ;)

Hardest position so far:

Nan making it look easy...

Aaaaaaah the Crow! wow after doing somewhat okay on the earlier balancing exercise Sandy chucked in this position for shits and giggles, and clearly it was beyond our skill level, but hey she said if mastered correctly it would help with mental focus, upper body strength and tightening of the abdominal organs? Sandy said the idea is to be in the position before trying attempting to roll on to your hands, Anyway I tried to do this 3 times, the first 2 attempts I kissed the mat pretty hard but I managed to hold the position on the 3rd attempt for about 5 seconds before gracefully crashing to the mat :) I Crashed because I was over compensating with my shoulders and arms trying to hold my weight instead of aligning myself correctly and letting the position take the weight for me :(

Boy Lotus

Yoga Core Day 3 - 04/03/2013

Thoughts:

Even though I have only been doing Yoga for a very short time I can totally see why so many people would want to incorporate the techniques into their lives. I have always played high intensity sports like rugby or soccer so it's refreshing physically and mentally to something a tad different. I mean when do you really ever take the time to focus solely on your breathing or or body alignment (well not me anyway). For the longest time I have had problem with the cartilage around my right knee and also had some related joint pains that have been bothering me in that area. Now at first I thought I was imaging this but after each class I have noticed that the stiffness and soreness has been reducing around the knee not to mention my all round flexibility and posture is on the improve. But this is only in some areas, there are still parts such as my shoulders and back which will require much muuuuch more work, baby steps.

Coolest Thing I've Learned So Far:

Like the week before at the end of the class we had to do a breathing exercise, this one was called Anuloma Viloma or alternate nostril breathing. After sitting down in the lotus position and just relaxing your breathing for a few minutes we had to close are right nostril with your thumb and then inhale deeply through left then close the left nostril and exhale through the right (then alternate). While alternating your breathing through both nostrils an just letting your heart rate drop and simply letting your mind drift away I felt super calm and really really good? I was completely relaxed but strangely felt like my mental and physical senses had heightened? Just little things like wiggling your toes or moving the muscles in your face you could feel it more, everything seemed to be activated and this was pleasantly surprising considering the weekend I just had lol. So I asked Sandy what this breathing technique was used for and she mentioned that besides the benefits of calming the mind and nervous system it can help with you with gaining optimum creativity (Hell Yeah) and also helps verbal activity (which I'm in much need of in the beginning of the week) wicked :)

Lessons learned:

• Got there a wee bit late which sucks because the warm up is crucial.
• I'm a little better off than last week but still in a bit pain.
• Bonus: Just found a malaysian food joint round the corner from the studio that is brilliant :0

So it begins....

Yoga Core Day 2 - 25/02/2013

Okay so after being introduced to Pilates the week before I was curious to see how my actual first day of Core Yoga would go. The city studio of Life & Balance is situated on Hunter St and it's good little location, as soon as I entered the studio you could just feel it was a completely different vibe than the Pilates class the week before. Immediately the instructor Sandy vibrantly introduced herself around and made a connection with everybody who was taking the class, she made an effort to learn everybody's name and build a little bit of rapport with everybody. I also noticed that since we were beginning the course during the 2nd week of it starting that she was asking everybody how they pulled up from the previous lesson before, to try and gauge the level of pain they felt for up 48 hours after the class, asking people for their individual pain and soreness level and rate it out of 10. Mostly everybody said they felt their pain level was at a 6 or 7 so I was thinking sweet I can probably  handle that but my outlook quickly changed as Sandy seemed disappointed that people weren't reaching a pain level of  9 or 10 so she wanted to up the anti for this session. (Good times ahead)

Entering the studio you could see there was a clear difference in environment from last weeks Pilates class, the Yoga studio had the oil burners firing with dimmed lights and had the ambient tunes going on in the background (sometimes sounding like a male trying to do his best impression of Orca Whale) it did help set the mood though and I did feel completely calm and relax. It was at this point that Sandy mentioned that somethings in today's class might seem funny or look and sound ridiculous but she stressed to try and stay with it and just focus on yourself.

We started with the warm up, which consisted of a lot of  wide stances and stretches that required you to hold angled positions for huge periods of time while trying to sync your breathing pattern to the exercise.  This is also where I had my first introduction to the Downward Facing Dog position... To begin with I struggled to maintain the position as I found it super hard to keep my back straight while making sure my heels were firmly placed on the mat, the good thing though was that Sandy quickly came to the rescue and helped me position myself correctly. Once I eventually got the positioning right the difficulty was then maintaining the hold for what what felt like an eternity (I could seriously feel the back of my calves and arms start to do the Harlem shake), Asa on the other hand found it easy to hold the position and seamlessly transitioned between Downward Facing Dog into Cobra.

Cobra

(On your stomach, Arching your upper body towards the ceiling by pushing off the ground with your hands)

Luckily for me there was a bit of repetition and going back and forth with familiar holds so I got a chance to cement some of the transitions between positions down.

The second part of the class was the balancing stage, which I was actually pleasantly surprised about as I thought I would be falling over myself as some people did but I managed to juuuuuust hold my balance for most part of the positions. It was interesting to note that the timing for the balance positions were triggered by breathing and Sandy was always stressing the point especially with me the breathing, as I was noticing in some positions I would strangely hold my breath???? We finished the class with this breathing exercise where we took one huge deep breath through the diaphragm and then expelled the air in short sharp bursts. The bursts last for about 20 seconds and by the end of 5 minutes of this exercise I was completely light headed. It was unusual because I have never had to focus so much on my breathing before but I did notice that my lung capacity had improved by the end of exercise which was cool :)

For my first actual Yoga class I thought I got through it somewhat okay, I really enjoyed it  much more than Pilates and even though I felt calm and relaxed I still felt like I was getting a good controlled and thorough work out. I was pretty exhausted after the class but I felt soooo much better for doing it, hopefully my body adjusts a bit for the next session and its not so much a shock to the system as the first class! loved it though!

Lessons Learned:

• Not holding my breathe at any stage as it disturbs the rhythm of the exercises.
• For whatever reason i'm better at holding positions on my right side than my left? 

Interesting Points:

• There was still only two guys in the class and I think we still struggling the most haha
• Sandy was a great instructor she knew her craft literally from back to front and communicated super clear to everybody.

Yoga Core Day 1 – 19/02/2013

The journey towards Yoga enlightenment begins as I rocked up to the Life and Balance studio located in Glebe. Got there nice and early to try and get familiar with the surrounding and sort out any admin nonsense that popped up. I was glad I did as I found out that the Yoga class we had booked didn't have enough attendees to run the class? (Would have been nice to get a head ups?)

Anyway the receptionist apologised and booked Asa and I into a Core Yoga course that starts the following week on Mondays in the city. That didn't really help me though as I was dressed and ready to roll now! So I asked what options were for now and she suggested that we do a Core Pilates class that was on in half an hour as it would be a good introduction to core yoga course. I thought that was the plan, just take baby steps as this was all foreign to me but it still keeps me on track for my 10 week project! (Best of all they didn't charge us for it due to the cancellation of the Yoga class)

The Yoga studio was super narrow and I was waaaaay at the back stuck between two veteran mothers and Asa was opposite me. The instructor seemed pretty cool and she asked before starting the class if anyone had any previous injuries and this where I would usually shout out that I have a dodgy knee (old rugby ACL injury) but how much actual stress could it possible put on my knee?

It didn't take long for the class to get into bendy mode as we lay on our backs while pushing our pelvis’s towards the roof all while trying to concentrate on breathing correctly (at this point was already starting feel it). I was surprised that even though the movements seem to be small and seemed to be low intensive, by just trying to isolate certain muscle groups I was struggling to hold and maintain the different positions. The two Mums however had their breathing down pat which I could see was making a HUGE difference in their ability to control their movement which was a stark contrast to me as I was flailing for most periods of the class and seemed to be short of breathe for some reason which disturbed the rhythm of the exercises.(Work to be done!)

The class put me through my paces for an hour and by the end of it I could feel the burn not just in my abs and through my butt and thighs but in also my ego, I have been told that Yoga Core is more difficult so if I’m struggling now then I definitely have a long way to go to be the Yoda of Yoga.

Lesson learned:

• ·         Don’t be at the back.... Struggled to see especially with no specs on.
• ·         Place yourself near veterans.… great examples.
• ·         Bring your own Yoga mat… It’s an absolute shit fight if you don’t have your own!
• ·         Bring Knee strap next time!... Some positions require you to put weight on the patella part of the knee.

Interesting Points:     

• ·         Vanessa (A&E Scheduler) was at the same class as me and is a Pilates pro!
• ·         Spoke to a Yoga instructor during the week who tried to explain some of the differences between different types Yoga, a whole new world.
• ·         Beside the initial pain the knee and body felt good and limber for the next couple of days.
• ·         There was only one other guy in the class and we were both struggling the most :)