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November 29, 2008
Yoga Dreams
Ever have them?
I was in Mysore last night during my dream. Sharath was there, talking to the students round breakfast at Tina's (old place). He stood up and announced 'Students', as is his way, and told us all there'd be a class on that morning. This seemed a bit strange as we were all sat there having just tucked into breakfast. Hmnn.
Then I realised I hadn't paid my shala fees so had to go back to my digs, fish out the piles of rupees to go back and pay. I struggled to get the 10-speed racer bike I had (how'd that get there?) out of the apartment and onto the road first of all stopping to fetch my leather jacket, yup, in bright green.
Go figure.
Anyways, it put me in a good mood that my sub conscious seemed to be working through Mysore images, perhaps getting ready for the trip ahead. Who knows. It's all just a bunch of randomness that you try to make head or tail of with your conscious mind. I tried to let it go but the warm fuzzy glow's been with me all morning. Nice.
So I phoned up to change my flights this morning which thankfully didn't cost anything to change. I knew the flights are cheaper now than when I booked but knew I'd lose everything bar the taxes if I cancelled my flights completely and booked a fresh set. Still, the booking agent was kind enough to wave the fact that I was supposed to be able to change my departure date to after 10th December, so it all worked out in the end.
The good thing is I'll be in Mysore for Xmas Eve now. I sent a quick email to Joseph and discovered he's planning on visiting the orphanages again this year on Xmas day so getting out the day earlier means I'll be able to go along and help out again, something I'm super happy about as it was such a blast when I was there 2 years ago.
Posted by graeme at 3:10 PM | Comments (1)
November 28, 2008
Mysore
The project that I've been working on for the last 9 months is running late so it came as no surprise when earlier on in the month my project manager asked me if there was anything that I could do to get us back on track.
Well, I could delay my trip to India.
So yesterday they finally asked if I could do that and go later on in the month. I'd prefer to be out of here before Xmas hits full swing but the cost and availability of flights out to Bangalore, let alone anything that comes out of the events in Mumbai, might make that a little prohibitive, so it probably means going either xmas eve or anytime afterwards. Hmnnn.
Well, it might be nice to arrive in Mysore on Xmas day.
Posted by graeme at 9:25 AM | Comments (0)
November 27, 2008
Happy Thanksgiving
To my friends in America, who I know drop in to this blog from time to time, I'd like to extend my warmest wishes on Thanksgiving.
Y'all know who you are !!
I've had a blast with you all over the times that I've spent with you during your festivities and I'm sad not to be with you again this year. In any case, hopefully it won't be long before I see you soon.
Have a great day!
G
Posted by graeme at 9:06 AM | Comments (0)
November 26, 2008
Ping pong
One of my friends mentioned to me the other day that I was up and down between Glasgow and London it was like ping-pong trying to keep tabs on me. It's certainly felt that way over the last couple of months too, and after a good couple of days of practice with H down in the big smoke it was back to business as usual up here in Scotland this morning. Not that there's anything wrong with the shala, the teacher or the people here, it's just different, and I guess to some degree that's one of the things of the practice I'm finding out just now is how these sorts of things impact upon my practice, or, at the least how it's affecting my judgement of it.
Ok, for sure, it's real easy to say that any down turn in how I perceive my practice is down to a specific change on what's going on around me, that's like saying that a hammer is more effective at bashing nails into a piece of wood just because it's a Tuesday and the room's slightly warmer on those days. I guess it's kinda pointless, other than, of course, that it's interesting that my wee mind choses to make theses sorts of comparisons in the first place.
At the teacher training this past weekend the guest lecturer was talking about the Yoga Sutras and in the afternoon there was a visit from a Tantric yoga practitioner, both of which were there to talk to the students about our minds, one from the perspective of what we can learn from Patanjali and one from their chosen yoga discipline and what they've learned from their own teacher and teachings. It's interesting to watch the students nod their heads when the teacher makes a specific point, the 'Yup, I've done that too', kinda nod, and you almost hear their minds turning over the new ideas as they are presented. It's all fascinating stuff.
Earlier in the day they students had to present a posture from primary series, one each. It makes me smile to remember how I felt when I came to that part in the course and had to do the same exercise within the group I was in. My, how time flies. They all did really well, and I'm particularly pleased that the 2 students I've been helping along with their practice had little difficulty in getting their instructions across nice and clear.
Posted by graeme at 2:13 PM | Comments (0)
November 24, 2008
Back under a watchful eye and some helping hands
Today I went back to H's shala. Man, it seems such a lonnnnnnng time since I've been here. It was great to see H there chalking up announcements on the board as I walked in. I wanted to get in nice and early so I could take my time and soak up some of the atmosphere of the place again, and hopefully settle in to a peaceful practice as quickly as possible. It was nice to have a quick few words with H before finding a spot and getting down to practice. It was really nice to finally break into a sweat in Surya B for the first time in about 6 weeks as well... I'd forgotten how much warmer the smaller shala is here, and, with the extra bodies generating more heat than they do up North, I've come to appreciate it as by far a much nicer place to practice. And that's before H had started the opening mantra or placed any hands on me to adjust.
It was nice to see the assistants too, of course. I'd really missed having my shoulders worked as far across as S can take them. I sometimes feel they might just pop out their sockets - I know they won't - and it's a such a nice "awwwwww' feeling when she lets go and I get to come back up to standing. I'm gonna be a bit stiffer there tomorrow for sure.
I'd been helping out at the teacher training course this weekend and had to demo some of the poses yesterday as part of an asana workshop. I'd done pretty much my normal practice at lunchtime as a warm up instead of eating - the workshop was in the afternoon - so I was nice a loose when I got started in to practice this morning. It was a really nice feeling.
I've noticed that things have moved on again. I managed to get my feet to the floor in Purvattanasana for the first time in a long time. It felt nice and open too. I guess the hot yoga's helped me out there a fair bit.
It was nice to see the familiar faces in the shala too, though I only got a chance to say hi or smile at a few. Hopefully I'll be able to see the others tomorrow before heading back up North again tomorrow.
Posted by graeme at 10:49 AM | Comments (0)
November 19, 2008
Visa
I had a quick check on the India consulate site this morning and it says that my Visa's arrived back at their building ready for me to pick up. Yippeeee!!!! One step closer to getting to Mysore.
Posted by graeme at 1:08 PM | Comments (0)
November 17, 2008
Stuck
Ever been stuck in a lift? Yeah, me neither, atleast that was the case until last night when I tried to go up to my room on the sixth floor of the hotel. I'd asked to move room as the one I'd been given had a dodgy heater. I find it hard to sleep if I get too cold for some reason. But as I got into the lift on the 3rd floor and pressed the 6 button it dropped about half a foot and everything went off. After pressing all the buttons and even trying to get the inside door open (the outside one firmly refused to move) I thought I was in for a long wait. Even pressing the alarm "you'll be connected to an emergency line where someone will help you" didn't seem to do anything other than fill the compartment with a ear shattering squeal. That's a nice touch. As if people might not be scared enough of being trapped in a lift in the first place, let the emergency alarm scare the s*&t out of them if all else fails.
Thankfully it wasn't long before I heard a voice on the other side of the closed door.
'Is someone in there?'
Err, yeah.
'I'll have to restart the lift'. Visions of the lift program sitting at a Windows blue-screen-of-death immediately came to mind. But it wasn't as bad as I thought. The floor counter filled with life, counted the 6 floor from ground upwards then the lift descended to the ground floor, though I had to press the 6 button again before the doors would open.
Interesting experience all the same.
Posted by graeme at 8:44 AM | Comments (0)
November 12, 2008
First taste of India
It's quite exciting to be going back to Mysore as this time around I'm going to try and pay attention to all the little nuances that I may have missed the first two times I was there. Like applying for the visa. Here's a brief summary (this whole episode took about 5 hours).
Printed out the application form from the website
Filled it in
Went to the Visa Centre in Edinburgh
Was told I'd come to the wrong building (where I went the last 2 times) and had to walk over town to the new place.
Walked over town.
Got stopped at the door. I hadn't filled the application out online, which I needed to do.
Directed to the nearest Internet cafe to fill the same form out online.
Paid for the visa online.
Went back to the visa centre to be told I'd filled one bit out wrong (took the wrong option). Was given a third application form to fill out manually.
Filled that out (again).
Stood in line to have my form checked and handover my passport.
Was told it would take 2-3 working days.
There was a few couples who had done the same as me and had turned up at the original building with the non-internet form and they were taking it kinda badly that they had to fill the form out again online (they did have 4 passports with them). I felt like telling them what it's like to try and queue for a train ticket in India, or to send a package home from the post office where there's a 1000 more steps to go through and more waiting and more frustration than you get at the Visa centre (I kept my mouth shut).
I wondered how they'll cope with things like traffic in India. All that driving on the 'wrong' side of the road. Huh. I guess it was a bit of a shock to me the first time around. It can be unbelievably frustrating to try and get something accomplished there when you live in a pretty much instant world in the West, and all you're faced with in the East is 'tomorrow, you come'.
This time, though, when the guy said 'You need to fill out another form' I nearly did that side-ways head-bobble they do and just accepted it.
Posted by graeme at 12:47 PM | Comments (0)
November 10, 2008
Injury Free, almost
A strange thing happened during the led primary yesterday. 8 month ago I'd come to the end of my practice and was working through some hip openers before going in to savasana when I took my left knee in to half lotus and began fiddling about with my calve and the top of my hand. I must done this a hundred times before but when I gently pushed down on the outer edge of my quad me knee gave up this loudish grinding noise, like you'd maybe hear from inside your head if your jaw's been stuck tight together for some time and you're freeing it up. It wasn't good. Ever since then the outside edge of my knee's been a tad painful, not in the ouch way though I could certainly feel it going that way if I had to bend the knee in any way.
I'd had something similar on the other side in the early days of my practice when I'd just began to manage to get into full padmasana and had held the posture for too long and strained the other knee. It took about 10-12 weeks to clear up so I knew I was in for a similar sort of a wait for any signs of improvement. Yesterday was the first time I'd practiced without any pain or without any extra tightness in the knee. It felt really nice. I'd been holding back in ardha badha postures on that side, often just standing upright instead of folding over, so it was good to find that I could get clean to the foor with my unbound hand and for it feel as comfortable as the other side. A nice sense of relief.
It's a reminder, though, to be wary of the slightest thing. It only takes a second for your practice to change for the worse and even after a full practice I should've been more aware of what I was doing to my knee. A senior teacher said at a workshop once that doing incorrect action is a bit like a car crash happening over 25 years. Every day you get a little bit closer, and a little bit deeper into the wrong area until one day, when you least expect it, boom, the whole thing blows up in your face. I've been lucky. I've heard of people having knee problems that take years to clear up.
I'd taken a few days off practice during the week as I'd been feeling a bit of a shooting pain in my left buttock, the sciatic nerve I think, so wanted to give it a bit of a rest. It seems to have helped.
So with less than a month before I head to India I think I'm going to be injury free for the trip. If I can manage not to crash the scooter on the first day, which I did on the very first trip to Mysore, I'll be well happy.
Posted by graeme at 9:15 AM | Comments (0)
November 6, 2008
Doing something different
The hot yoga class the other day was very good in the sense that it seemed to help move on the slight niggle I have with my right leg. I'd been standing pretty much all weekend at the show so getting part to some form of yoga had a nice feel to it, a bit like coming home. Hot yoga kinda grates on me, all the neck bending you do right from the word go doesn't sit well with me, nor the 'sit ups' that take place as a kind of vinyasa between sets of postures. Still, I think it's good for me to be doing something different, if not for my but for my head.
Still, when I left class I had a bit of a niggle in my right shoulder to add to my right knee but thankfully both seemed to have improved before the Mysore class yesterday morning. So much so that I had quite a fantastic practice. Everything felt nice and loose and I had a blast with most of the postures. A really, really nice time. I'm also getting more comfortable with my jump throughs and feeling a lot lighter in my practice too. The weekend at the show where I was mostly just drinking fruit juice during the day seems to have helped me refocus my eating habits in the more healthy section of the store.
I've got to think about getting my Visa to India sorted out pronto as I'm hearing a few people have had a bit difficulty getting a hold of theirs.
Posted by graeme at 2:37 PM | Comments (0)
November 3, 2008
Yoga Show
Finally 5 minutes to myself...
It's been all go this past weekend. Having left about 3 hours later than expected, and arriving in London way too late to dump any of the stuff for the stand, let alone contemplate putting any of it together, it was left to a bit of a mad dash before the show proper opened in the morning to pull it all together. A few minutes before everyone was let into the show we were just about ready to go.
The show for the teachers I had come with was a great success. There's lots of energy around the place and some people were nice enough to comment on how helpful and vibrant the people on our stand were, probably due to the vast amounts of fruit juice from the juice bar we were all drinking. Oh, yeah, that and the 16 bars of 'Conscious Chocolate' - that stuff's just fab!
The book was well received and we just about sold out on the last day which was nice. The teachers made a lot of really good contacts and the T'ai Chi teacher was particularly pleased as she was approached by a company to do some work for them, something she'd secretly wanted to do for a long time.
Personally, I had a great time. Met a bunch of people from the previous teacher training courses I'd helped on and had a good chance to have a rummage around the show. I even managed an Inversion Therapy session, something I can only liken to being 'spun dried' when I was surfing. A sensation of falling yet being totally supported and totally at ease. I.T's where the therapist takes your hips by his feet as he lies on his back, cradling your head and shoulders on their chest and hands. Felt amazing.
Anyways, here's some snaps....
Teaching on the opening day
View from the balcony
Ready to go....
Posted by graeme at 2:00 PM | Comments (0)