yoga pose | Paper Clay Nature

During my “day of rest” in the 8-week series designed by Rodney Yee yesterday I not only took the opportunity to do a home practice that I really wanted to do, I also looked over my blog entries from the first week of the series. What was painfully obvious is that I don’t want to be doing this practice.

A home practice is not about self-punishment, it should feel really good. It should be about commitment, dedication and making choices that reflect a very personal and intimate evaluation about state of mind, breath and body. I really enjoy my home practice, but doing the series as designed by Rodney Yee felt a little bit like punishment—–I was really forcing myself, albeit unsucessfully, to do his program even when I didn’t feel like it.

This is precisely what makes a home practice different from a group practice. If I go to a group class and the instructor has us do six tree poses, then I am going to do those six tree poses to the best of my ability and depending on how I feel, the energy of the instructor and the energy of the group on the class, I’m either going to feel like I enjoyed the class or not or that I learned something new or not, but you can’t choose your own adventure when you go to a group class. When I practice at home, I always start out with some warm-up poses and seated grounding poses and then I organically move in a way that supports exactly where I am. Tight in the hips, I throw in pigeon pose. Tense through my spine? I’ll start with some twists. Basically, I start with a few poses that allow me to self-diagnose and then I do what feels best after that. It just doesn’t feel right to be by myself, all alone, doing what doesn’t feel right.

This is not, in any way, a judgement on the book or the series or sequences as designed by Rodney Yee. As a matter of fact, I think that, for someone who is relatively new to yoga and who wants to explore what it means to have a home practice, this is still a truly valuable reference. But, for someone who has been doing yoga for almost 20-years and already has an established home practice, this series feels like I am being asked to deny the wisdom of my practice, a practice that has served me well for quite some time now.

So, my 8-weeks of yoga with Rodney Yee ended after a week. In the end, I have learned many valuable things from this experience of just one week:

Moving Toward Balance: 8 Weeks of Yoga with Rodney Yee is an excellent reference book for yogis of all levels (including teachers) who want to learn how to sequence a yoga practice, to explore alignment and desire very clear written instructions that are complemented by instructive photographs. Regardless of whether you do the sequences as described, there is a lot of valuable information in this reference.
A home practice should never feel forced or like a punishment. While you shouldn’t shy away from poses or only do the same exact poses, yoga isn’t poses and pose practice isn’t yoga. If you take group classes regularly and want to try to do yoga at home, make sure that your home practice is something you look forward to. Even if you just roll out the mat and enjoy an extended savasana, that is just as valid of a home practice as anything else. Love it, enjoy it, benefit from it—–may your home practice be peace.
My current advice to students who want to start a home practice is actually the most helpful thing I can offer (I’m patting myself on the back here……). I suggest that you roll out your mat. Sit on your mat and breathe and see what happens. If you feel inspired to practice a particular asana or move in a particular way, then do that. If not, then do 5-10 cat/cow movements and see if you feel inspired. If no inspiration comes to you, move into child’s pose and do a few sun salutations. As you move through sun salutations, see what you feel inspired to—-perhaps a warrior pose or two, or maybe an eagle pose or maybe a tree pose or half-moon pose or…..you get the idea. Not inspired, come on down and do a bridge pose and then wind relieving posture and hug your knees into your chest. End with a 10-minute savasana. Whatever you do, end in a 10-minute savasana. I repeated that twice on purpose. Even if you just sit, breathe and then end with savasana, that’s a lovely practice. It might just be all you needed to start your day in peace or energize yourself in the middle of the day or close the day for a great night’s sleep. Whatever it is, it’s yours and yours alone.

I’ll keep writing my blog and practicing and hope you’ll keep reading. And, we’ll all sleep better tonight knowing that I’m no longer forcing myself to practice in a way that doesn’t bring peace to my life. Oh home practice, I missed you last week! Welcome back! Welcome home!

I was recently supervising my preschooler in the tub and, while he engaged in an imaginary battle between a Thomas the Tank Engine bath squirter and a Fisher Price fisherman, decided to pick up my shampoo bottle and read the text. This text informed me that, by using this particular product, I would obtain results that would give me the hair that I both desired and deserved.

The desired part, I could identify with. Of course, I desire healthy, shiny, full, fresh smelling and bouncy hair with appropriate fullness. I certainly desire to protect my hair from anything that might cause damage. This may be a whole lot of hope to place in dead skin cells, but I could not deny as I read the back of that bottle that, yes, I desired these things. Admittedly, I also made my purchase with some hope that using this particular product would, in fact, help me obtain a head of hair that had just this list of delicious qualities. For those of you who know me, I currently have a head of hair to rival Elvira—-it’s super long, grey at the temples and generally swept up in a casual way with a clip. So, if I have desires for my hair, it’s both a whole lot of desire and a whole lot of hair to desire it with.

The deserved part, well, this seems problematic (at best!). Exactly what kind of hair do I deserve and what have I done to deserve hair with these qualities? I was immediately brought back to a Bill Crosby sketch where he made fun of folks who got drunk to the point of being physically ill at happy hours on Fridays because they had worked so hard that week that they deserved to get drunk. [Curious? Need a good laugh? Check it out here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYsko_tc3a0 ] After an immediate chuckle at this remembering, I started to think about the relationship between our yoga practice and what we desire and deserve.

In general, although we may not be honest with ourselves about the nature of our desire, we start taking yoga classes or start any specific class or practice with a certain goal or want or need that we would like to have satisfied. We want to relieve stress, feel better, have more energy, look younger, be more fit, lose weight, make friends, be able to say that we too do yoga and fit in, lower our chances of heart disease, get pregnant or find some kind of blissful state. These desires can be helpful in our practice when we acknowledge them with honesty (satya) and a certain level of willingness to release the desire long enough to focus on our breath and the practice at hand. Perhaps our practice will show us that we have passions and desires that we were not aware of or not able to name. In this sense, our practice can help illuminate certain truths about ourselves that may have been hidden. This type of self-awareness is priceless and our practice, as it evolves, will reveal a revolving set of desires as well.

Thinking about the concept of deserve is at once very non-yogic and what yoga is all about. It’s at the heart of so many philosophical debates about why bad things happen to good people. Exactly what does anyone deserve and what role do we play in facilitating our own receipt of that just reward or just punishment. In some ways, this is part of our exploration of satya (honesty) and ahimsa (non-violence). When we are honest during our practices and create a flow of movement and breath that is steady and rhythmic that, in turn, steadies the mind, then we are also honoring our limits. We are, one might say, getting the practice we deserve. What happens when we fail to honor our limits? The breath is short and our muscles are shaky and our footing is un-centered. We feel weak, overwhelmed and our minds jump from one instruction to the next, one pose to the next, one shaky and aching shoulder/neck/thigh to the next. In this case, one might also say that we are getting the practice we deserve. On the other hand, we may just be re-enforcing the beliefs that we have about what we deserve that we carry with us on and off the mat.

I would like to suggest that you deserve a calm breath, ease through body and mind and a relationship with spirit that is both an inspiration and guide to act according to your highest ideals. I desire this for you. While you may desire a toned and lighter body, less stress, greater sex appeal or a sweaty romp through a familiar and anonymous flow—-you might get what you don’t deserve! Injury, headaches, a racing heart, exhaustion, shallow breath and negative thoughts racing through your mind about how you would have been able to keep up if you were just a little younger, thinner, or more fabulous. Desire is an intention that we can guide to a variety of opportunities and possibilities. This week, in your practice, notice what you desire and see if you get what you deserve.

If all seems a great failure, I assure you that, apparently, bliss is available from an easily obtained bottle of shampoo straight off the shelf at Rite Aid—-for less than $4.00. So, with a guarantee so close by and so economically obtained, what do you have to lose if you expand these concepts and take them onto your mat with you this week? Before coming into a pose, honestly ask what it is that you desire from it. When you come out of the pose, experience what it is that you deserve. Exhale. You are beautiful!

Posted by Sharon Fennimore Rudyk
Owner and Director of Yoga Matrika in Pittsburgh, PA
https://www.yogamatrika.com/
http://www.sharonrudykyoga.info
http://www.prenatalyogapittsburgh.com

Tag: yoga pose

Week 2: Day 1: The End

Desire & Deserve