Flexibility

Nice ’strap wall’ yoga class today with my favorite “bat pose”.

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 04/04/2008
• Time: 06:30:00
• Total Time: 1:15:00.00

Really strong Pilates class today despite SI joint tightness.

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 04/03/2008
• Time: 18:00:00
• Total Time: 1:00:00.00

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 03/31/2008
• Time: 06:30:00
• Total Time: 1:15:00.00

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 03/28/2008
• Total Time: 1:15:00.00

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 03/26/2008
• Time: 06:30:00
• Total Time: 1:15:00.00

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 03/14/2008
• Time: 06:30:00
• Total Time: 1:15:00.00

I’ve talked to you before, internet, about my challenges  in the areas of ‘letting go’ and/ or relaxing into things and letting them come, being too hard on myself and not being able to quiet my mind to be in the present. Today I’m happy to tell you that I’m rounding the bend and am feeling *quite* a bit different/better. I think it’s down to lots of small things starting with the incredible trip to the desert, yoga practice, studying the Yoga sutras, bringing more quiet opportunities for mindfulness into my life and most importantly just, well, being nicer to myself.

I mention this today in particular because this morning has been particularly lovely. At the end of Yoga this morning our instructor suggested that in the coming out of  Savasana  to find our seats that we “disturb ourselves as little as possible”. I did so and carried on with the ‘as little as possible’ all the way through putting away my gear and into the locker room where I normally take a long hot shower (I love the shower at the gym so much I rarely shower at home – maybe once a week). Once arriving in the locker room this morning, though, I realized that the sensation of showering was going to be more than I wanted to process –the millions of drops of water hitting my skin - all the cold, wet, hot, soap, shampoo, washing, drying - it was just going to interrupt my peace and force my brain and nerves to process it all rather than just remaining temperature neutral and relaxing through my morning. So I chose to wash up a bit in the bathroom then dressed and travelled mindfully to the office.

Clearly I’ll want to bathe at some point J but for now I’m really grooving the peace and quiet in my mind and body.

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 02/06/2008
• Time: 06:30:00
• Total Time: 1:15:00.00

Last week was PURE madness – VP business reviews on two of my 3 businesses and enough other urgent deliverables that I was ‘dreaming’ (and NOT in a good way) about editing web copy at 3am! UGH! By Thursday night it was clear my body was gearing up to really shut down - I slept poorly – had a sore throat, painful sinuses, un-killable massive headache, and when I ‘awoke’ after a terrible night it was clear that I was getting “the cold” that everyone around me has/is/had or is getting. On Saturday I was late for a meeting (totally out of character for me) and I likely made a big mistake getting hopped up on enough cold meds that I could attend a friend’s birthday party on Saturday night ‘cause once I got home early Sunday morning I didn’t leave the house or venture farther than from my bed to the couch and back again until Tuesday morning. Well, Ok, it helped that after I woke up and got dressed for yoga class at 5am (!) on Monday morning I noticed several inches of snow on the ground and immediately decided it was a sign that I was meant to go straight back to bed!

Now it’s Thursday and I’ve made my way mostly through the week feeling quite out of it but also interestingly calm. Yoga class on Weds was, well, surreal – I sort of ‘wormed’ my way through – moving slowly and somewhat delicately and frankly that’s how I’ve been at the office, too. We’re prepping for a big launch, my team is down a few key roles that I’m partially covering for, and things are just as crazy as they should be/always are in those circumstances. The thing about being so sick during it is that nothing is making me particularly frantic and this is GREAT and AWESOME because it’s an area I really want to work on - this not getting frantic. Me? Frantic? Ummmmm, not possible – my body is totally booked just now spending ALL available energy processing bazillions of nasty cold germs and trying just for a second to keep the snot IN my nose. A lesson in doing MORE of what’s important (getting well) and less of what’s not (getting all wound up and stressed about things that will get done just as well if not better if I slow down and take some concentrated time to do them).

So THANK YOU universe for this terrible cold! I’m loving the lesson/opportunity to practice prioritizing wellness yet still getting what really needs to get done accomplished.

AND I’m very sorry to everyone who has been stuck in a contained space with me at any point during the last few days .

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 01/30/2008
• Time: 06:30:00
• Total Time: 1:15:00.00

Hrumph. Second week in a row I missed my Tuesday night tennis clinic. Last week was due to snow and this week, well, being buried at work. Bummer, but it’s all about choices, right? I chose to stay at work rather than go to tennis so that I could get crank through a couple of things, and get home to bed to TRY to get some sleep. I’ve been having terrible sleeping patterns lately with lots of middle the of the night waking - sometimes having nightmares about launch content. silly. shakes head. nightmares about work. Didn’t you just come back from the desert all blissed out, girl? Gotta get that back and more regularly.

Either way made it to 6:30am yoga and was delighted to engage in a ‘wintery’ rooting practice today with lots of rolling about on the floor and ab work. THEN I kicked myself up to a forearm stand thingie against the wall for the FIRST TIME EVER! I really didn’t believe that I could haul my rear upward but today it happened - twice! So wonderful. I got little mat burns on my elbows, though, maybe I need a different kind of mat? Still - yay!

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 01/23/2008
• Time: 06:30:00
• Total Time: 1:15:00.00

OMG - Bat pose today! Best thing ever!

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 01/16/2008
• Time: 06:30:00
• Total Time: 1:15:00.00

Full set of many many photos here, and will write of my adventure in the desert when I have a little more time. For now suffice to say that second to losing weight/taking up fitness seriously this trip to the desert is the best thing I’ve ever done for myself. It was an amazing (though too short) and life changing journey from which it was excrutiatingly painful to return. I’m planning my trip back already so I can take more time, more space, and find more truth.

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 01/14/2008
• Time: 06:30:00
• Total Time: 1:15:00.00

Question for you fine folks: When or how do you integrate yoga with cardio, strength, or other forms of exercise, before or after? I’m planning for 3days/week yoga but am not sure how to fit it in with swimming, spinning, stair climbing, and/or running. I feel like if I do those things before yoga I won’t have the strength to really work on my yoga practice - my quads or hamstrings or whatever works on warrior will barely hold when I’m fresh -can’t imagine how it would go after a half hour of stair climber. On the flip side, I feel like if I do cardio after yoga I will lose the peaceful mindful buzz that I leave class with. Perhaps I would then do cardio more mindfully? Or shall I treat it more like two-a-days and do yoga in the morning and move cardio to evening?

So help me out - tell me what’s worked for you?!

I’m thrilled to be adding a few days a week of yoga to my routine and am AMAZED at how unbalanced my body has become from years of more sport-specific training. I mean I’m psyhced at the opportunity to work on and correct it, not that I’m focused on my limitations - but I’m noticing that all the little muscles really struggle to function compared to the giant bully bits like my quads. Generally I feel like I’m pretty strong but in class it’s the most easy seeming thing that finds my body quaking and nearly tumbling when the little balancing guys are trying hard to hold up my giant quads It really seems like this imbalance might be the source of injury and discomfort for me and I’m really hoping that rounding things out will deliver improvement all the way around.

I’m finding it to be so enjoyable and challenging that I’m wondering if there’s some cool yoga retreat/intensive thing to go do this spring that they let beginners come to.

Oh, and ‘lion’s breath’? my favorite thing in the world. ‘Course I’m a Leo, so my mind visualizes some awesome stuff when I’m doing it but GAWD does it feel good. Also today we worked on the little sounds for chakras focusing on the one for the heart - “Yam” - and we were just chanting it inside to ourselves focusing on our heartbeat. I imagined (for some crazy reason) these little impish and playful panda bears (tiny baby ones) banging this great gong and yelling “Yam” to celebrate my heartbeat with the sound extending and echoing off the nearby mountains, then after they did that for a while they began to really party and were singing/yelling “Yam, yam yam” in little musical patterns and dancing. It was the most AWESOME morning I’ve had, maybe EVER. Pretty sure I was giggling to myself in class while visualizing my gong-ringing heartbeat panda bears.

Still giggling, in fact.

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 01/09/2008
• Time: 06:30:00
• Total Time: 1:15:00.00

Another awesome yoga class. So excited to be adding this to the ever-growing list of activities. This whole working thing is really getting in the way of all the exercising I’d like to be doing!  Back to weekly tennis lessons tonight - should be plenty rusty after not hitting for a few weeks!

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 01/07/2008
• Time: 06:30:00
• Total Time: 1:15:00.00

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 01/02/2008
• Time: 06:30:00
• Total Time: 1:15:00.00

Logbook Activity

• Type: Flexibility
• Date: 07/05/2007
• Time: 08:15:00
• Total Time: 00:45:00.00

45 Mins strength, 15 flex.

FreeMotion (FM) Triceps 3×12

FM Biceps 2×10

FM Shoulder Press 2×10

FM Twist 2×10

Chest Press (bench) 3×12 15lb

Tricep Pullovers/Skull Crushers 2×10 8lb

Hip Ups 2×25

Stretch.

Logbook Activity

• Type: Strength Training
• Date: 06/18/2007
• Time: 07:00:00
• Total Time: 1:00:00.00