The Crane Has Landed

I practiced a little later than usual today and shortly after I entered the shala JB had actually begun his own practice and his mat was set up to my left and slightly behind me. No I didn't feel any pressure at all. I did take it easy during the vinyasas of primary series because I have two slightly tweaked hands and my problematic right ribs were feeling a little twingey as well. Other than that practice felt pretty good.

I managed to bind both sides of pashasana on my own and stay upright. It's funny because JB assisted me in pashasana yesterday and  his assist is pretty intense to say the least and when I do the pose on my own it feels like a completely different pose. What I do probably shouldn't even be called pashasana. Perhaps I should just start calling it "pash" but I digress. I did kapo 2.5 times on my own and it's coming along. I'm now able to hang back into the pose to get a nice opening and breathe at the same time. A few weeks ago this was a challenge to say the least. I'm also able to ever so slightly walk my hands further up my feet than before. After JB's supta vajrasana assist I commented to him that there's gotta be a better way to do that pose because when I do it, it mostly feels like my elbow is going to pierce my spine. He in turn told me what I already knew which is that I need to work on getting the elbows to cross over each other and once that happens I'll experience a lot more opening in the pose but until then I"ll have to endure the ancient elbow torture techniques.

After our little supta vajrasana discussion I did bakasana a two or three times in an attempt to lift both feet off the floor at the same time. During my last attempt I sort of had an epiphany regarding how to straighten my arms more in the pose. What I did, and I don't think I was consciously aware of it, was to rotate my arms so that my inner arms were facing forward. I did that as opposed to just straightening my arms and having my inner arms face each other. This is something that I definitely intend to experiment with tomorrow. I then got two blankets and attempted the dreaded bakasana b pose. Attempt one; fail. Attempt two; fail. Attempt three; landed the legs on my, held it for half a breath and then rolled on to my head. I looked over to my right to catch eye contact with my shalamate/assistant who was practicing next to me and instead of getting a sympathetic look he proceeded to snicker at me. Attempt four; abandoned. Attempt five; I landed the crane and held on for dear life for the full five breaths. Surprisingly JB saw the whole thing go down and said something along the lines of "good job" and proceeded to give me the next two poses.

The thing is I feel like a complete fraud because a) I don't know if or when I'll ever be able to land bakasana b again and b) I haven't even attempted it yet without blankets in front of me to buffer my fall.  So now not only do I have to worry about trying to land bakasana again I get to start stressing out about the impossibility of jamming my legs behind my head. The good news is that JB is taking off for three weeks at the end of the month so I won't have to cross that bridge until next year. 

And Now You're Ready for the Prom

Those were JB's words to me after we finished assisted back bending and he brought my hands to my heels for the first time. Needless to say the feeling was intense and I wanted out nearly as soon as my hands touched as was evidenced by my instinct to lift my head after he placed my second hand. After all was said and don't a shalamate practicing to my right says "that was great, you sounded bit like you were having an asthma attack but overall it was great" and we both got a nice chuckle out of it.

The rest of practice felt very good which I attribute to a lazy home primary on Friday and a nice castor oil bath on Saturday. The only thing that wasn't so pleasant was the length of my practice because I did full primary and second up to bakasana b.

Speaking of bakasana b that pose is not even within the realm of possibilities for me yet. I made about 30 unsuccessful attempts at the pose before calling it quits. Practice and all is coming right?


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Nausea, Not Pining and New Poses

I felt nauseated during practice again today. I stepped out of the room before parsvottanasana and spoke to JB when I came back in. The nausea was so bad today I was almost on the verge of tears while I was outside the room. So after disclosing that I wasn't in fact pregnant to JB he suggested that the nausea could be from all of the nerve cleansing going on thanks to the deep back bends of second series. He also said there there might be some anxiety on my part as I face the more challenging poses of second. I'm not generally a nervous person as it is so that hypothesis didn't seem to hold much water with me at the time.

Today I actually did primary up to baddha konasana and then went on to second. Ustrasana felt great as I was able to move my hips far forward while I was in the pose and laghu is continuing to improve as well. As I set up for kapo a huge wave of nausea swept over me, perhaps I was anxious after all. I closed my eyes and took a few moments to focus on my breath and after doing that I was able to face kapotasana. I did it once by myself and was able to grab my toes I then waited for an assist from JB. I asked him to place my left hand first which he did and I think that made a huge difference as I was able to surrender and breath as I held on to both heels. I've been having some tightness in my erector spinae on the left side and when I'm adjusted into kapotasana with my right hand first it causes a lot of discomfort and cramping on the left side. So hopefully we can do it this way going forward to make it more bearable.

Supta vajrasana is still pretty sucky and I think it will continue to be that way until I can cross my elbows correctly behind me thus enabling me to keep hold of my feet as I arc back. By having my hands and feet bound I don't even know how I manage to arch back to get my head to the floor because I literally feel stuck like there's no way to go. After supta vajrasana JB had me vinyasana and assume pashasana position. I shook my  head furiously as if to say that I didn't want a new pose but he didn't get the memo and proceeded to ignore me so off to bakasana it was. Mind you, I've never been able to do that pose during any of the vinyasa classes that I attended during my previous lifetime. It was always a dreaded pose for me along with almost all forward bends. Something about the ashtanaga practice over the past year and learning to bear weight on my arms while leaning forward has taken a lot of fear out of the pose and I was surprised by my ability to do it. Thankfully we only did the A version as I'm sure I would have been completely humbled by any attempt at the B version.

As I prepared for my back bends it was as though my nausea had miraculously disappeared and I was feeling well. Dare I even say good? You know that good feeling that you get after practice sometimes and all feels right in the world? Well that's how I felt.

Am really looking forward to led class tomorrow for some reason.