DAY SEVENTEEN: it's all in the detail

DAY SEVENTEEN: 100% form gives you 100% benefit.
Thursdays are my volley days. Not Yoga AND Volley days. But no, this challenge had to come around and throw my whole life around. SO - Thursday Yoga AND Volley day it was. Tough stuff coordinating the two, let me tell you!

Today I took the 4pm with Claire, and it was a rather small class. No other challengers (that I knew at least). No friends. No one I normally practice with. I felt really alone. The vibe was so different. Where was all the positive energy and smiles I had gotten used to? My mindset was instantly thrown off. Everything felt...dry...boring. Even the air felt dry - there was no JUICE in the room. Where was the JUICE? I wanted the JUICE. I wanted the sweat. My biggest pet peeve, is going into eagle pose when I have no JUICE. I hate the feeling of lifting one leg over the other and holding them crossed like pretzels when there is no JUICE. (for anyone confused, when I say JUICE, i mean SWEAT & HUMIDITY). But then, something changed, my boring mindset got focused. Instead of thinking of how alone I felt, I realized I could use this time to think of ME ME ME. I know you are supposed to be doing that anyways when in the hot room for those 90 minutes, but I guess I normally feel like I'm part of a team and my focus is not completly on me, but on the class as a whole and how we flow and balance together. Make sense? Either way, my brain was all about me today. I listened closer to the dialogue, I pushed harder, I breathed deeper. Everything was enhanced. Since it was a smaller class, Claire took the time to give us little tips along the way. And each time, the second set was always stronger. She did a demo for triangle pose and explained how we should focus on the upward stretch going down, rather than the downward stretch and collapsing into it. And sure enough, all 13 of us yogis went into second set of triangle with a stronger form. It's always helpful to have little corections throughout class, because half the time you don't realize what you are doing or not doing, until it's mentioned and then you realize "OH YA - WOW - THIS FEELS BETTER". Oh, and if you're wondering, the JUICE finally came :)

Here is a link to Bikram demonstrating his MASTER POSTURE: triangle pose (Claire has mentioned it a few times in her classes - I thought it would be nice to share)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n66mm9vog6g  the way it hurts - that's the right way ......

ps-  im getting better at staying in camel pose without thinking im going to burst into tears  :)