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External clues are better than internal clues



I read a lot of books these days in order to close a huge gap. It's the 'how' to learn something not the 'what' to learn that interests me these days.

Many sportive people have a coach, who motivate the sportswoman. What is said in such a session can be effective or less effective.

If there is no coach or teacher, there is self-talk. This can be motivating or not. It can be effective or less effective.

One found out that external clues are more helpful than internal clues. An example, please have a look at the picture. 'Open your chest' is less useful than 'bring your chest to the wall'. 

(I know, the holy practitioners among us even prefer to think: open your heart.)

This is the work one can do. What is the external clue that helps me to get deeper into an asana?

The picture here is only 3 hours old. I practiced. It was not the early morning when I stood on my mat ready for the sun salutations. Too late I woke up and even with back pain. This is no longer an excuse. Back bending feels good, It helps to eliminate the pain. Amazing, but it is so.

After back bending I stopped my practice. It was enough.

On home practices


I'd like to start with practice advice by James Brown, yoga teacher in LA, California. The quote can be found in the book 'Yoga at home':

Page 158: 
"- Regardless of the space you have available for practice, when you are on your yoga mat, you are practicing, and only doing that. When you can't bring that onto the mat, pause and find it.
- If you want to fix your attention, start by choosing something that actually gets your attention. Choose something that is uplifting to you."

Page 160:
"Shifting my habit to self-practice, done alone without external distraction, was like cleaning a pair of glasses that I didn't realize was dirty. Without the distraction of my ego dealing with the ever-shifting landscape of a group practice, I suddenly saw myself with new clarity: Once that happened, I was hooked for life. My home practice has cultivated a healthier and more accruate awareness of self than the one that I saw when practicing in public."

I like both quotes.
Almost my entire life I practiced alone at home. I had years when I could join a yoga class once a week. I wished to have the opportunity to go to a yoga class on a daily basis. And one day with the growing yoga community also in Munich Ashtanga yoga schools opened that allowed me to practice daily there even in the early morning hours. My joy was huge. I dare to say that I was one of the most regular students. A mistake. I'm injured now and this socrialiac joint is still not OK. My psoas hurt. Often I realize it after a practice. During today's practice I had to roll out the psoa muscle several times. So many poses are lost. This I have to accept.

Yoga is a concentration exercise. If anything got better during the last decades it's my ability to concentrate. I have no difficulties anymore to practice for 90 minutes. Nothing distracts me. No music is on, I want to focus on the breath. This is surely something that improved because I attended yoga classes.

My yoga week starts on Sundays with second series. Only half of the series is possible these days.

My plan for the next week:
- Strength training three times a week before the yoga practice.
- I add pranayama and meditation after the asana practice, exactly in that order.

I feel good. The body, the mind, the spirit, this unity jubilate when I practice.

Home practices - do I need a yoga room?


I practice at home these days. To find inspiration and motivation I bought a book 'Yoga at home'. Many, also well-known yogis wrote about their practices at home.

Almost all yoginis agree that a home practice is different to a yoga practice in a shala. It's good advice not to compare the two. To practice at home requires discipline. There is more energy in a classroom. Home practices are not worse, because they are mainly not so exhausting, they are different.

To practice alone allows to alter the practice to the own needs. It's easier to listen to the body.

My own experience is that it's easy to get up, jump into a train that brings me to a shala. It is/was like going to work. When I practice at home I need discipline. Being disciplined can help in many other areas in life, too. It makes independent. I learn how to learn. This helps me to find my own insights, my own stories with the practice.

Our homes are all different. Some yoginis live in countries with more room available. People who live in cities often have smaller homes.
Some yoginis use or have to use a tiny space for their practice, others have yoga rooms.

I don't have a yoga room and I think I don't need one. I also don't need an altar.
My props are in a drawer in the wardrobe. My yoga mat is in a corner, invisible. I put it away after the practice. My yoga practice always reminds me to create a simple life. I don't want to have so many things. I don't need an altar with buddhas there, flower, pictures of the Gods or whatever.....
I want to be able to practice everywhere.....

I saw it several times in yoga schools. First the rooms were empty and clean. After a few months or years more and more things were standing around. The rooms became messy. It was no more possible to use the wall as a prop because things were there. Some teacher were musicians and soon music instruments were added. It drove me crazy. Soon one had to remove all that stuff before one could start with the practice. At home with a special yoga room one can fall into the same trap. To stand space is difficult for many yoginis.

My priorities: A room must be warm and clean. I don't need a yoga room. The space should be huge enough so that I can fall out of poses safely.. Many rooms have multiple function. Whatever we live in that room all the things in it need a place. That's it. Simplicity is the goal.

I collected pictures of Indian yogis on Pinterest: What I see is my imagination of yoga. One can practice it everywhere. To have a body and a blanket perhaps is enough.

Picture is taken 7 years ago.

Primary


What will be possible?

This was the question that was in my mind when I stepped on the mat this morning. Second series feels better for me these days, so I focus on this series. Yet once a week I'd like to do primary.

Oh it was difficult to start and not to stop after the first two sun salutations. I switched on music and lowered the ambition.


Vinyasas are lost.
I practiced cat pose as a counter pose to the forward bending asanas.

I could put my leg behind the head, yes and I'm happy about it, but I had to hold it and it didn't feel as good as it used to. Yes, I see progress again. This is what I appreciate and I even thanked the Universe for the hope that was sent.

Only twice I had to use the fascia roll to get rid of the painful tension in the right psoas.
Tomorrow morning I'll be able to say if pain returned or not.

As ALWAYS, I never ever regretted to have practiced. I feel good. 

My motivation: This idea came up this morning and I think it's a good idea as I want to be up to date with all the technical stuff. When I feel ready I'll  film a session and show it on periscope.




The benefits of yoga for physical fitness


I read a lot these days about fitness. I know that I have to change my daily routines. My injured sacroiliac joint tells me this. I found a book that acknowledges my experiences with Ashtanga yoga.

Here is  a quote from the book 'Which comes first, cardio or weights?' by Alex Hutchinson, Ph. D..

Page 136 ff:

What are the benefits of yoga for physical fitness?
"..........Considered strictly as a form of exercise, yoga has many strengths and a few key weaknesses. A 2001 study at the University of California, Davis, found that an eight-week program of two 90-minute hatha yoga classes per week led to significant increases in strength, muscular endurance, and flexibility. Other studies have found improvements in balance and even bone density. This is not really surprising - yoga is, after all, a weight-bearing physical activity.

........
A more controversial question is whether yoga is vigorous enough to count as aerobic exercise that improves cardiovascular fitness. While the UC-Davis study observed a small but measurable improvement of 6 percent in aerobic fitness, other studies have failed to confirm this. In a 2001 Northern Illinois University study of 45-minute "power" (ashtanga vinyasa) yoga sessions, the participants' heart rates stayed below the recommended threshold for aerobic exercise. ........But at a certain pint, it's probably best to accept yoga's strengths and weaknesses rather than to fight them, and seek your aerobic exercise in other ways. After all, McCall points out, having a balanced approach is a writhy yogic principle - that's why he hikes, bikes, and dances in addition to doing yoga."

End of quote.

My own experience is that I got stronger during all the years of practicing Ashtanga yoga, but not strong enough to perform some of the challenging asanas of the series. This is why I add strength training now. My physio-therapist, who got to know my body even realized that I'm very flexible, but I lack strength. This I want to balance these days.

That my sweaty yoga practice is not a work-out shocked me. I few months ago I discovered fitbit and it allowed me to measure my heart rate. It stayed the same during the practice. Only during the sun salutations in the beginning it went up. This is why I take the steps, every step that comes in my way as fast as possible. Then my heart starts racing......

As mentioned in my last blog posts, I do strength training these days before my practice 3 times a week. My surprise: It prepares my body perfectly for the asana practice. I feared I would be too tired when I do exercises already before the practice, but this was not the case. Some of my readers are already curious what I do. I work with a book by Paul Wade. It's great. Pictures will come......

The right order


1. Strength training
2. Asana training (flexibility)
3. Pranayama
4. Meditation
5. Relaxation

6. Shower and breakfast

Since some time I know that strength training is important for me. The asana practice made me stronger, but not strong enough to perform certain asanas like laghu vajrasana.
The physio therapist also recommended not to forget to do strength training. She found my body very flexible. In order to stabilize my back (sacroiliac joint blocked) it would be good to have strong abdomen.

It took me some time to find out what sort of strength training I should chose, when to do it, where to do it......
Soon it became clear, that weight lifting wouldn't be good. Thanks to the advice to my vegetable and fruit dealer who has done weight lifting, I know now that it's a burden for the joints.

I discovered a strength training that works with the own body weight. It's done 3 times a week. That's it for me.

So Monday, Wednesday and Friday, before my asana practice I'll work on getting stronger. What exactly I do will come in one of my next blog posts.

Picture: This is the reward if one gets up early.

Practice: Back pain is back. Four or five times during my yoga practice I had to massage my fascia to relief the muscle. The hope that I'll be soon pain free disappears. I love to move, I love to practice, I try to practice smart. This is the only solution that I see. Strength training is important. To live on the sofa is not an alternative.

How to adjust myself?




I practice often at home these days.

Let's start with trikonasana:
1. The position of the feet are important. First the feet are in one line when stepping sidewards from standing position. I turn the right foot on my heels. Now the heels are in one line.
2. The leg muscles are engaged, not 100%, but strong. The standing poses teach a strong foundation.
3. The upper body is parallel to the wall. This is the challenge. This is why it can help to move the arm behind the back to the thigh. This allows to open the upper body. I can realize the difference when I move my arm in the classic position again, upwards to the ceiling.
4. Fingers are together, also the thumb.
5. The back of the head and the spine are in line. The head doesn't move backwards to see the thumb.
6. The bandhas are engaged. Otherwise it's easy to make a hollow back which one shall avoid.


I practice, my back complains, I stop, I get back to the mat. That's how it is these days. Disappointing. But with time I also learned how to be disciplined and I learned not to give up.

So let's dance, I mean, let's practice.




Top 100 yoga blogs on the web

Top 100 yoga blogs on the web

... And I'm on the list. This is a great joy in the morning. I'm ready for my practice now....

Here is the link.




I can sit again


Yesterday I sat hours at my desk. I was busy with Photoshop. I listened to videos. Quickly hours passed by. I stood up from my chair and after some time I thought: Wow, I had already forgotten how painful it was to sit longer than 25 min. I could even stand up without pain. It's a good idea not to sit so long without moving the body. Yet it's a difference if pain forces me to stand up or if I move from time to tome out of rationality.

I don't practice very regularily, that is every third day I'm on my mat and it's great. Perhaps my body still needs not to be challenged yet. The breaks might help to heal.

As important as yoga is to me, it's not my all and everything. It used to be my lynchpin over more than 3 decades of my life, but not more. This is enough. This is a lot. Ashtanga yoga can be so demanding that it's not only a life style, but a greedy diva. As always I think less can be more. One must use this tool 'yoga' with intelligence. One must also practice with intelligence.

My soilliac joint will heal. After about one year ! it's better, remarkably better. I'm one precious experience richer. It has been a frustrating ride.

One teaching method for everybody is never a good approach to anything. We are all different, that is the way of teaching must be flexible and consider the student. This doesn't mean that one isn't following a lineage. But with 57 years a more intelligent training is necessary. A 25 year old body is more forgiving. My body needs more variety as it takes longer to integrate new movements, just to mention one difference in comparison to a younger body.

What is the next important step for me after this injury that stayed with me for so long?
- I'm striving for a daily practice again. Just being on the mat and to practice is enough. Second series feels good. I've overdone forward bending asanas. And second series has enough forward bending asanas. By now my back got worse after a yoga practice. This is why my motivation to practice faded away. In the long run it's not a solution to be a 'couch potato'.

Ashtanga yoga and nutrition


When I started practicing yoga 37 years ago it was clear a yogi is a vegetarian. That's when I changed my meals. I became a vegetarian. That time back not so many people thought they could live without meat and sausages and fish. I was even told that I would get ill. I'm still healthy. I never liked meat or sausages neither fish so it was easy for me to make this transition. I discovered Indian dishes. It was the first time that I thought to eat is something joyful in live.

Ahimsa means living a life without hurting other creatures. Living a non-violent life is one of the few rules for yoginis.

In the meantime to eat vegetarian might not be enough anymore. When I first read about the production of milk I was shocked. It's so cruel. I don't want to get into detail here. We can survive without eating animal products. It's even healthier than the usual meat diet. Exceptions might exist.

I think the direction is clear. If it's possible to eat well without killing or exploit other creatures, this is the way.

The reasons are mainly ethical ones.

But is this enough?

I used to practice 2 and a half hour Ashtanga yoga every day for more than 2 years. So glad that I gave up this ineffective practice. In the afternoon I was so tired. I slept again. Often hours. My body needed incredible much sleep. Even though I didn't like this, but it seems as if Ashtanga yoga was the only activity I was able to perform. For anything else I had no more energy.

A few months back I used a fitbit armwrist. It measures the heart rate, counts the steps and so on. The accompanying software allows to enter the food that one has eaten during the day. That way I found out that I don't eat enough protein. This might have been a reason why I was so often so tired.

In most other sports the connection between nourishment and accomplishments are known.

With this post I want to draw the attention to this important aspect.

I practiced as mentioned already 2 and a half hours daily. Alone with this amount of time my practice was no more a hobby. Because of the injury of my sacroiliac joint I saw a physio therapist. She helped me a lot. I also appreciated the conversations with her. She said: Many amateurs practice more and longer than professionals, but they don't know that they have to relax as well. They have no treatments by physio therapists.  They don't get any advice what to eat and  so on. This is why injuries can be expected.

In order to have a healthy but also an effective practice nutrition is as important as the practice itself.

My meal planning:
1. Monday - lentils (Indian lentil soup, or a salad)
2. Tuesday - Tofu
3. Wednesday - Quinoa
4. Thursday - chickpeas
5. Friday - we usually eat out

Saturday and Sunday I'm flexible and I often try out new meals.

This is a list of ingredients with a lot of protein. How much protein does a body need? No more than your body weight. Otherwise the liver and kidneys are overloaded.

In order to build muscles the body needs protein. This is worth repeating. One of the reasons why I was not able to perform some asanas even though they were within my possibilities was because I was not strong enough. Additional strength training would have been good, but probably not enough, too. A nutrition with enough protein would have supported my endeavor to perform laghu vajrasana i.e. After 6 years of practice and not being able to come up from this pose requires for reflection: What went wrong? I guess I have to adjust my meals and I see the importance of strength training.
Life is an experiment, my yoga practice, too.


On my practice:
I practice, back pain returns, I interrupt my practice only to start again a few days later. Not to practice seems to be good, but it has disadvantages, too.  Quickly the body becomes weak and stiff. I got so weak. Incredible.
To do nothing for the rest of my life is not an alternative.

I focus on second series these days as it feels so much better. Yesterday's practice brought a highlight. I could do sun salutation B without back pain. It was such a joy.
This morning I practiced again. It was the first activity in the morning still before breakfast. I gave up rather early, but it counts as a practice. I was glad that I practiced in the morning.

I need a group of practitioners, but I don't want adjustments from people I don't know and who don't know me. M will be back in September then I'll join his morning sessions again......







"No pain, no gain." So true, so wrong.


"No pain, no gain." This is a core sentence in the Ashtanga  yoga community with fatal consequences. Sharath says this sentence sometimes. But when he speaks to a huge audience I'm sure he wants to use sentences that people remember. This sentence is often quoted out of context. It needs correct interpretation.

It's always good not to complicate things unnecessarily, but this sentence is so short that it becomes wrong.

In addition, as mentioned already it leaves too much room for interpretation. Mainly it's interpreted: Work through any pain that you feel, no matter what it is. No pain, no gain. Stick to the series and keep practicing as usual. One day you'll feel better again. Unfortunately this is not true.

I know now that this over-simplified approach to pain can have unwanted consequences till the point that one has to stop practicing at all. Not every pain stops one day from alone. Things can get worse.

Since  my sacroiliac joint was blocked about a year ago already I read a lot. I found a lot of knowledge. Of course injuries can happen also when doing other sportive activities. One can learn a lot from each other if one stays open-minded.
It was wrong to practice as usual. My back pain got so painful that I couldn't sleep anymore, I couldn't sit anymore, forget about a yoga practice. A yogini then wrote me to go to a physio therapist. This finally brought relief and a lot of understanding.

As it's so to the point in the book 'Fat loss happens on Monday: habit based diet & workout hacks' by Josh Hillis with Dan John I refer  to the chapter: Pain and other problems in the workouts: pain versus pain versus pain.

There are different sorts of pain and they require different actions. Pain is a warning from the body. Via pain we get messages that we shouldn't ignore.

1. There is muscle soreness when we work on strength. We feel when the muscles get tired. Only when we feel something the muscles get stronger.
2. Stretching discomfort: It's also wanted. If one relaxes the pain fades away. Then one can go deeper into a pose. The pain can guide us when we are attentive.

Only for these too sorts of discomfort the sentence 'no pain, no gain' might be true.

3. Pain from the joints or other pain are a warning. It's best to work around the pain and to see as fast as possible a physio therapist or a doctor (the more specialized the better) . This sort of pain becomes quickly chronic. After a few weeks of pain one speaks already from chronic pain.

It is not recommended to work through the pain. I repeat it, because it's so important.
Most Ashtanga yoga teacher cannot differentiate between the different sorts of pain, because they don't understand the sentence: no pain, no gain that Sharath says sometimes.
And what to do if someone has serious pain? A yoga teacher is not a doctor, but he/she can recommend to see a doctor........

The consequences of this lack of knowledge can be rather awful. Since almost a year I have this back issues now. I lost many asanas. My practice was so painful that I omitted the practice too often. Perhaps I could have avoided all the months of pain if I saw the physio-therapist much earlier.

Pain doesn't equal pain.

If you want to learn something from this post then it is to differentiate between 3 different sorts of pain. The one when you get stronger, the one that is felt when you stretch and the dangerous one that tells you: Stop, something went wrong. Something is seriously injured. Immediate action is required then. See a physio-therapist, reflect on your practice in general, alter your practice. Perhaps strength training is necessary and so on. To keep going as usual is not recommended.

My summer break is over and I practice again at home. Today I started at 6 am. I sweated and enjoyed my modest practice. There is a long way to go till I can practice again like 3 years ago. This I must accept.

Instead of thinking 'no pain, no gain', I recommend to think: 'Work smarter than harder'. 

I'll write in posts to come what I mean with 'smarter than harder'.

Halleluja, I practiced.



With this practice this morning the summer break is over. Friday still means that I focus on primary. I had to try out what is possible.

The first surprise came when I did the first upward facing dog during the first sun salutation. An unbearable pain was felt on my upper left foot below my big toe. It felt as if the nerves there are sore. Perhaps I was too long in my shoes last night when we flew home from LA. I interrupted my practice and stretched the feet, the toes. Then I adjusted upward facing dog, I remained on my toes and didn't stretch my feet backwards.

A very positive surprise is to report, too: I could get into sirsasana with straight legs. Back pain was so minimal that I could do this. My muscles could hold my legs. This is so WOW for me. I could jump up and down out of joy.

After an hour it was enough.

The summer break is over. 

Picture is from 2011.