Remember, remember

I started my class this week by asking if anyone could remember what we'd been chanting the week before, a simple sutra, familiar enough to me now that it readily springs to mind or lips in particular situations. It can be something of an anchor when I feel drowning in a sea of new (half)... Continue Reading →

July 5, 2017 6

Validation and witness

"I give you permission NOT to do full Chaturaṇga each time". I wondered at this comment from my teacher in class today. Do people really need this permission? Do they feel some necessity for this action in every vinyasa? If they do, would the validation of the teacher make a difference? I wonder... I don't do... Continue Reading →

December 18, 2016 6

First practice (again)

I've just done my first home practice after the initial teacher training weekend. A practice I've been looking forward to and dreading in equal measure. Of course it all feels weirdly different and I'm as self-conscious as a beginner! Now I have part of a teaching script running in my head, and the first part... Continue Reading →

July 6, 2016 0

2 days in

Ok super-quick post -- just because friends have been asking... I'm two days into teacher training. I am already Tired (note the capital T). But also Exhilarated (also a capital!). It's been amazing to start in baby steps (increasingly quick ones today) to teaching one other person some simple stuff. So many small difficulties, so many... Continue Reading →

July 2, 2016 5

Stick to the script?

It's been a day of scripts. Several hours in the office toiling at my day job that this afternoon meant sorting out a script for regression testing a website. It's super-boring work, I have to say. When I test I prefer to do it more intuitively starting with the most important functionality and then working my way... Continue Reading →

June 30, 2016 3

Greeting the sun

Morning practice: a single slow sun salute. A breath in each āsana. That is all. So this will never turn me into an āsana champion, but it generated a spontaneous giggle from me and that's all I need. A giggle at how stiff and sore and tired my body is after just a couple of days... Continue Reading →

February 25, 2016 2

Darkness in surya namaskar

I know the yogic drill. I'm supposed to be present. I'm supposed to let my body move through the sequences, breathing through any intensity, avoiding nothing. Today the choreography of movement was some exquisite torture. Each surya namaskar was a physical confrontation to my desire to retreat, to curl up and make myself small. Instead... Continue Reading →