What a Difference a Day Makes

Wow yesterday's practice was light, flowing and fun. Today's practice on the other hand was cold, difficult and ended up with me hiding my tears while in paschimottanasana. There was no real reason for at all whatsoever but with each failed attempt at bakasana b (12 in total) I grew ever more frustrated at myself, my practice and any and everything else. I stood up for drop backs and was able to do one. I stood at the front of my mat for a moment contemplating a few more and started to get teary eyed. I turned around took a few deep breathes and then assumed the position for assisted. I couldn't look JB in the eyes because I didn't want my emotional state to become a "thing". So I just turned my head and did assisted back bends as best as I could. I sat down to do paschimottanasana and that's when I lost it.

At that point I grabbed a towel and walked out of the room and on my way to the locker room I ran into a shalamate who embraced me with open arms. She encouraged me to cry and to get it all out of my system and she was really nice about it and eventually even had me giggling at the absurdity of the situation.

I tend to think of myself as tough as nails and that's the impression that most people have of me. However, there is the rare occassion when I do have complete and utter meltdowns. The thing about today's meltdown is that it wasn't at all about the asana, yeah it sucks that I can't do a pose and I admit I sometimes get green with envy when I see shalamates flawlessly execute a pose that they were just given. But it's ladies holiday and I'm dealing with some work frustrations (the normal stuff that comes with starting a new job) and I just think that coupled with my practice frustrations led to my meltdown.

Interestingly enough I do think that there was something in the air today at the shala because quite a few of the practitioners called  it quits early because of one ailment or another. Perhaps we can blame it on the lack of moon days in December. 

Is This What Nerve Cleansing Feels Like?

Today's practice was interesting to say the least. I was excited to get on my mat this morning to give my shortened practice a try but it didn't seem that much shorter. Well that's sort of a lie. It did feel a little bit shorter and less physically taxing but I managed to somehow let my practice take up the whole two hours that I allotted myself. Something else for me to work on I suppose.

What I'm finding is that the back bends of second series aren't so physically taxing per se but after kapo and supta vajrasana I feel completely wrung out and I curled up into a ball on the front of my mat feeling nauseated after each pose. Supta vajrasana was especially fun today because I was on the verge of tears after I came out of that one. Oh and it took about 12 minutes for me to regain any feeling and sensation in my hands. I also felt like a complete failure doing that pose because I was unable to hold on to my feet at all during that pose. It seems like every muscle in my back is getting worked these days and it's reminiscent of how my hamstrings would feel when I was learning primary. Each day would be successively worse in terms of soreness in my hamstrings and my ability to fully execute most of the forward bends. I guess my back is the new hamstrings. The saddest thing about this whole situation is that my hamstrings still get pretty sore after each practice so it's not like the back soreness has replaced the hamstring soreness. I'm just sore all over these days.

One positive development today was that I only did laghu vajrasana once today. I got my head pretty close to the floor (it may have even touched at one point) and I hoisted myself back up fairly gracefully. I didn't give it another go in an effort to conserve some energy.

During assisted drop backs with JB today "we" walked my hands pretty close to my feet. I touched my hands down on the forth exhale and he had me stay there for a few breathes while he straightened out my feet. He then instructed me to walk my hands in some more and THEN he started to count from one. I used to enjoy assisted back bending with JB because it would give me a great buzz that lasted throughout the day however, today I just wanted to puke after all was said and done.

If there's one thing that this practice has taught me is that I know that in a few weeks time my body will adjust to these new asanas and things won't be so terribly bad but from where I stand now I'm in a dark dark place and I don't see the light yet.