Follow Directions

As far as I am concerned, the most important skill a yogi can learn is to:

FOLLOW DIRECTIONS

No joke. And let me tell you why. And I will use myself as the silly example.

There is a point to staying with the teacher, things are in a specific order and specific timing. I don't know why but I get royally annoyed when yogis bring the hand up to the center of their chest too early during Tree Pose. I just say in my head "Yes, everyone can see that you know how the posture goes."

And I will admit that I have done that. You get excited that you know what's next and that you are starting to "get it."

This is a rabbit trail but let me finish it out... ;) And I am working hard on focusing on my own practice, but there are some habits you lose when you don't practice for even a small amount of time. Like staring at yourself in the mirror. I consider yoga my "me time" and somehow I look at everyone but myself. I hear teachers say all the time that Savasana is often the hardest thing to do in yoga because we feel the need to constantly be busy.

I disagree. I think the hardest thing to do for a yogi or yogini is to concentrate on yourself. It is your time to fix yourself and deal with all the issues in your life and body. It feels so uncomfortable to look at just yourself, to see yourself for what you really are. Most people feel such negative emotions when looking at themselves. And the challenge is to look in the mirror, see yourself in an honest light, and love yourself. A very difficult feat.

Back to my story. So, here I am. I've been practicing for over a year now and we were prepping for Awkward.  Arms up, arms parallel to the floor, fingers together, triceps tight... and.... Boom. I sit into the chair too early. And not only that, I brought 3 other people down with me.

Now, I felt silly. I stood back up and waited to sit until my hips touch the chair with the rest of the class.

I realized my mistake and corrected it. But there are the people who don't. And they are usually the ones who have been practicing for just a couple of months. They are starting to lock their knee more and learning to breathe only through the nose, and feel stoked that they can anticipate what comes next in the class.

Now that I think about it, my main topic and rabbit trail do tie in together!

As I am learning to pay attention only to my own practice, I am not as affected by the girl who starts kicking out too early in bow pose. Or the other girl who goes into Balancing Stick too early, and her earliness ALWAYS causes her to fall, which sometimes causes me to fall if I am not focusing on my own practice.

It is a realization that staying with the teacher causes the group momentum and energy to stay high. And it is not realized because they have never truly felt what the momentum feels like. To feel so many bodies moving at the same moment. Such power and it's tangible.

We are perfect

This is what I want to find.

Right now, Handsome and I are extremely busy. We got an offer on the house, it was accepted and now the whole home inspection thing is going to happen. And when Handsome gets busy, I never hear from him. Which is hard as I am a spending time person.

Since I can remember, I have dealt with a number of insecurities. Some got better with time, but pretty much any kind of self-esteem I had was torn down with the divorce. And anyone who really knows me, knows I am extremely emotional. And sometimes I hate that about myself, which I know I shouldn't hate anything about myself. But I cry all the damn time. Growing up, my dad would tell me all the time that I was too emotional (which would usually make me more emotional. But seriously, why would you tell your hormonal daughter who is sensitive that she is TOO sensitive?! It is likely to make her more so.) But I can't help it! It is the way I am. I don't know how to control it other than trying to be happy and stay happy and do yoga, which seems to regulate those feelings.

When the divorce happened, I spent many many days crying it out on the mat. Yoga really helped me sort through how I was feeling and how I felt about myself. And I got much happier and much more confident. I lost weight etc and started perfecting myself on the outside as I was working on the inside. I love being active and I love exercise. But have realized, just today, that I took it to an extreme.
It seems that one MORE thing that I love about yoga is how it is telling you that where you are today is perfect. A new teacher that I LOVE, Katie, is always saying that what you can do today is perfect.

And where I have been has been perfect and there is nothing to do but let go of control and just smile. Although I tend to go through periods where I freak out and really try to control things by controlling my body. When I feel that I can't control anything, my body is the one thing I feel in control of, which I can see is almost a disorder. But yoga makes me feel perfect the way I am, that I don't have to strive to be better. That if I want fries, there is nothing wrong with that. And what I can do in yoga, is perfect for what I need mentally and emotionally.

However today, I think I made actual progress emotionally and with my practice.
In Yoga, I noticed more and more that my legs are really stretching out. Seriously. In all of the postures where the goal is truly to LOCK THE KNEE I do it. In all postures, the standing leg is able to stay seriously "locked, solid, concrete, lamp post, unbroken, I have no knee" (btw, that was totally from memory... I haven't even gotten to studying dialogue... It was probably wrong though! ;) haha). However, when you go through the postures I have found my goals are increasingly not worrying about those parts so much which is an absolute relief!
-Hands to Feet: Legs are truly almost locked and is becoming a back stretch down... My head is literally only a couple inches from the tops of my feet!
-Standing Head to Knee: Legs are both kicking out and elbows are almost below the calf (damn muscular calves lol)
-Standing Separate Leg Stretching: This has become more of a back stretch now, head is almost between the feet on the floor!
-Standing Separate Leg Head to Knee: I can now focus more on the compression of the throat as opposed to locking both legs.
-Sit Ups: Both knees are locked and it is EASIER to really perform the sit up correctly to focus on the abs.
-Head to Knee with Stretching: Legs are seriously locked and the chest is truly reaching the shins... My toes are only about 2 inches from my forehead.

Seeing all the progress and realizing that where I am at today is perfect. When I can surrender myself to the yoga and let go of all my negative emotions, look at myself in the mirror, and like what I see- That is perfect.

Yoga Brain

Yoga Brain. [yoh-guh  breyn]
-adjective. A term used to describe the state the brain after yoga which is usually indicated by a number of astounding symptoms like, but not limited to: lacking in the ordinary ability to function properly in simple tasks like walking or using a yo-yo, the desire to drown ones stomach in coconut water, and the incapacity to articulate simple words or really remember anything at all.
-noun. A term used when one has Yoga Brain and explaining ones intellectual incapacitation. (i.e. "Forgive me, I can't really remember what my last name is right now... I have Yoga Brain.")


Btw, I still have Yoga Brain from last night. And feel a little like this:

A child dancing on the beach. No wonder I can't think! :)

Last night was my first practice in about a month. And it was lovely. Sometimes we all need a break from the thing we love in order to regain our perspective as well as our deep love for the thing. My issue is that I love too many things... Like weight lifting, which I had been out of practice of that for months.

It is amazing how my weight lifting has really affected my practice in a positive way. I didn't expect that. I honestly expected to come back and have my muscles be tight, my back stiff and struggle a ton. But I felt very strong during my practice. The first back bend during Half Moon I was able to go to my deepest point immediately and my sit ups were 10 times stronger. Apparently, taking a month off and lift weights has a different affect than just taking a month off period. And, surprisingly enough, I felt like I could handle any amount of difficulty associated with my practice. Like I really could give 110%.
So, in regards to Yoga Brain, I thought of a beautiful moment during my practice last night that I really wanted to blog about... but it's gone now. :)

Side information you probably didn't want to know:
I geeked out last night when I had a self-realization moment. I was eating dinner in the kitchen as I was cooking my lunch for today and checking out my muscles in the window (I was kind of practicing some postures as well as practicing some figure competition moves) and wondered if anyone ever caught me...? Also wondering what they would see... Would they see a blonde in her underwear snacking on chocolate pudding sticking out her ass? Or would they see an athletic chick in no makeup in her underwear snacking on protein pudding and practicing a yoga posture? Funny stuff. Especially with Yoga Brain.



Interruptions.

My hugest pet-peeve ever... Being interrupted.

What that says to someone is "what I have to say is more important than what you have to say." I feel that I used to have a major problem interrupting people and I took a long period of time to just... listen.
Now, I find that I notice when people interrupt me and it is HUGELY irritating.

But as I think about life and working out and my yoga practice, life is just one long string of interruptions in the nice & neat row of plans that we make.

Within the topic of weight loss, we are encouraged to switch up our routines so: 1) we don't get bored and 2) our bodies don't get bored. It is true that our bodies are adaptable animals. Certain workouts will only work for so long doing the same thing over and over. After a while our bodies really decide to just... fake it. So we interrupt it. We interrupt our bodies from doing the same thing. We force our bodies to make a change by interrupting routines.

And until this moment, the idea of diet interruption never occurred to me. Why on some weeks do we lose more? Or why do we suddenly plateau? Maybe because my body gets bored with what I eat and how much.

Speaking of interruptions. Since I had my body fat taken I have changed up my diet to be getting in more protein and changed my workout to be spending more time lifting. A LOT more time. My ass is pretty much killing me right now... but that's how you shape a nice ass, people! ;) Also, I am incorporating more vitamins as I bought some Vitamin E & Fish Oil (to help with my knees as I'm lifting) and some glutamine (for recovery). Although I have lost a good amount of muscle, I feel very strong right now.

This made me giggle this morning. Oatmeal, eggs, supplements, protein shake, water, tea and my workout journal. I must seem like a FANATIC. Haha!

Measurements..

Wow. Dilemmas. So, as I like to do I have posted my measurements below. As you can see my body fat content has gone up. I'm not even worried about my weight number so much as I am my body fat content... Again, this is more about reaching my goals than it really is about the numbers.

Date:       1/26             2/16            3/9           4/8         8/11        9/26      
Weight:      150.5        146             141         138          125           121            
(Circumference In inches):
Bicep:          13        12.5          12          11.75            11                11
Chest:          37        37             36.5          35              34                32
Waist:          36.5     35.5          34.5          32              31               31
Hips:           41.5      40.5         39.5         38.75       37.5            34
Thigh:         25          24.5         24             23           22                  22
Calf:           16          16            15.25        15          14.75              14

BMI:          35.2%   33.4%     32.3%      29.3%      26%        28%              

As I met with a trainer yesterday, the only logical explanation of my weight decreasing and my body fat content going up is... I'm burning Lean Muscle. Suck. Body, that was NOT the deal. The deal was I'd work out and you'd burn fat.

Plans? Hmm. This is a toughie. Plan is to decrease cardio to just 30-40 minutes a day and heart rate LOW. Lift more, no interval training (meaning high cardio between sets), with real rests between sets of higher weight and 8-12 reps at a time. This is serious business.

I've been told that it would be a good idea to increase both my protein and carbs. I've been eating like a fat girl who is trying to lose weight. Which is now over. Its time to eat like a girl who is trying to cut fat & gain muscle. Right? I think I'm way too afraid of eating too much and getting big again.

Also, I've been thinking of hiring this trainer again. This guy is HUGE and seems to understand the basics of reallllly getting someone to trim fat and build muscle. I guess its something to consider even though trainers can be rather expensive, plus the cost of the gym, plus the cost of protein & supplements. Plus the cost of my real love, yoga. Why does being healthy cost so much?!

Anyway, I'm gonna get started on a new eating plan and workout schedule. Hope it works!

Smiling happy.. Punch someone in the face..

Weight 121.8 lbs... And as 121 was my original goal, I'm feeling pretty good. However, my body doesn't feel like I expected it to at 121... So I am going to try to gain a little muscle and take off a little more fat. I want to look... AMAZING in my dress in November. ;) And buy boots. Boots are the big one.

But mostly I feel like punching someone in the face.

 

I feel annoyed that everywhere I turn I just can't get a break on eating. I want this to be easy dammit! ESPECIALLY with the people around me who are "trying to lose weight." They keep coming up with excuses and celebrations. Boss just asked if we could all go out to lunch sometime soon... NO! I don't want to go to the Davenport and be seduced by prime rib and fatty sandwiches. I just want to sit at work and hate my banana, almonds and carrots for lunch. Leave me alone! (not you guys, but the peeps that try to tear this down).

 

 

 

This was my meal last week. Seriously, I eat a lot of chicken, always a veggie and sweet potatoes (sometimes mashed)... but it seriously is awesome!

 

And I feel pretty bummed about this... My studio owner is herself a Bikram Certified Teacher. But her studio is not, as there are no Bikram studios in the little city of Spokane, WA. However, the style she teaches is pure Bikram and she's very strict on the dialogue. So, the plan was to apply for the scholarship to Spring teacher training... But I can't. Turns out, that since she doesn't own a Bikram studio, she can't endorse me.

 

Boss, I love your yoga but you really piss me off. I am trying to be respectful but this whole deal just sounds like you're trying to make money out of all of this... NOT help people. Grrr! What the hell did people do when Bikram was JUST starting out! Its just lame. I have the utmost respect for Boss but I am not happy with him right now... Because honestly, I can't afford the THOUSANDS of dollars to go through training as well as afford to be off work. My Handsome thinks we can, but I feel rather depressed about it.

 

I think I need to blog about the random things that make me happy... So many things feel so overwhelming right now.

Throat Choked..

There was a period of time I felt very strong. And not only strong, but in control.

Lately, I find myself feeling very very weak. And sick and feeling like I can't control myself for food. And also for exercise because I don't have the proper nutrition.

My most difficult posture, Standing Separate Leg Head to Knee

Takes so much self-control to hold the forehead to knee..

However, there was a period of time I found myself thinking about what I need to do day to day. Thinking, "this will get me to my goal." By doing or not doing a thing would get me one ounce closer, one centimeter closer to what I want for myself. But I don't just measure pounds and inches, I measure self-control and I measure the feeling of pride and strength in myself.

It is strange because the reasoning behind it started about losing weight. I started hitting my goals. But over time, the reason of losing weight became less important. Being healthy became only a by product. I don't view skinny people as what is beautiful by any means or a measure of worth of a woman. My goals evolved into hitting that goal. Slapping that goal on the face and slapping my insecurity on the back of the head.

This is for a commitment to myself. I set a goal. But a goal can mean nothing. Unless you reach it. Then it is everything. 

Everything comes in and tries to take my will. And I just let it. The point is not what tries to come in and steal my prize from me, it is whether or not I let it.

Focus is just a word, if you don't have it.

It is about having what I want. And the path that got me there. I want to endure and I want to hold on until I've reached the end.