But I don't want to complain, I brought this upon myself and I'm continuing to love the yoga training and how it's making me think about things out of the ordinary. We also have very inspiring people in our class - one just wrote her first book - a guide to immigration in the US which I'm reading right now and everyone just seems to have so much energy. For me, the past few days have been tough as I'm trying to find out what I really want in life and yoga is causing me to ask myself some of these difficult questions but I think that's all part of the journey.
The eight limbs of yoga include not just the physical activity, called asanas, but also yamas and the niyamas, the discipline, the self control that basically lead to a more mindful way of living, considering others and yourself, the pranayama, the flow of life energy through breathing which is impressively powerful as I just learned in Kundalini class, the pratyahara, the withdrawl of the senses, attesting to this is the fairly blend food served in ashrams, the dharana, the focus and the dyhana, the meditation - so yes, even apart from the physical aspects yoga is hard work and why do all this? In order to reach smadhi- the state of bliss.
And I don't want to sound like I am becoming part of a cult or something, it's just that a lot of things are starting to make more sense to me and I remember I blogged about the New York style of yoga a few months ago where people are just rushing from one class to another and it's all about who' wearing the most expensive lulelemon outfit - I am starting to realize that that has nothing to do with real yoga for which you don't even need a class to practice. One of our teachers mentioned this week that we should encourage our students to start their own practice and own it which is so important for instance if someone loses their job and cannot pay for class anymore - that should not mean that he or she couldn't continue to do yoga anymore (especially since in that case, it may be all the more important for him/her to do it to keep in balance). I think that's very empowering - no matter what, you own your yoga.
I loved my Kundalini class yesterday - I had taken a slow seated kundalini practice before but clearly it didn't affect me as much as the class yesterday. It was amazing and I'm starting to think that I should have enrolled in a Kundalini teacher training but who knows maybe I will at some point. So what's so different? It doesn't seem to be common to do complex asanas in Kundalini - he only made us to fairly simple exercises such as bringing your arms to the sides and rotating your wrists or bringing one leg straight up and then switching but man, he made us hold them for quite some time. So afterwards you can feel your legs and your arms burning anyway. But the biggest relevation for me was that the breath is just such an amazing tool. He taught us some pranayama that was out of this world - I was light headed and could't stop smiling afterwards. The teacher was also the kindest, most friendly person I have seen - I guess Kundalini gives you that quality. I'm definitely going back to his class and I also want to see how I can incorporate his elements into my classes - no wonder Shiva Rea (the lady who inspired all of the teachers at my teacher training), includes so much Kundalini in her teachings...
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