Ouch

117 classes in 112 days.

The title of my blog says it all. Solid class tonight, but my right leg, from the waist all the way to the toes is in pain. It started on Sunday and got much worse tonight. I couldn't straighten it at all for a few minutes on the floor series. It hurt to walk after class, it hurt driving home, it hurts now. I'm assuming (hoping) it's my body getting deeper and deeper into things. It's funny, because tonight I feel like I did after my first few classes. Not only is my leg sore, but other parts of my body are sore.

I'm starting to understand this yoga is cyclic. What goes around comes around. Soreness, adversity, struggle, then bliss, a new plateau, then it starts all over again:) I will tell you something that's really cool. Despite the pain, I had a solid class. If you were watching me, you probably wouldn't have noticed. I try to keep my focus even through pain, although I've had my moments of yoga drama too.

So I'm assuming this new wave of pain will equal some major progress in the near future. Let's hope so...

Greg

Time Off for Yoga

116 classes in 111 days.

No blog for the past few days. Hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving. Despite not blogging for a few days, I've been busy with Bikram. I'll recap each day.

Thursday, 11 AM: I wasn't sure if this class would have a lot of people in it, considering it was Thanksgiving, but boy was I wrong. It was stuffed with people. My studio only offered a 7 AM, 9 and 11 that day. So I guess a lot of people wanted to get in their yoga before they stuffed themselves with food! Pretty solid class, although it was really hot, as it often is when the room is filled with people.

Friday, 9 AM: Ok, so check this out. Technically, my work is open on the Friday after Thanksgiving, but for what I do specifically, there's not a lot for me to do, when lots of other people are off work. I deal with clients and various companies, so if they're not available, it's a little dumb for me to come to work. Anyways, I decided to take a half a day off work on Friday. And do you know why? So I could sleep in? Do some shopping? Nope. It's so I could do a double on Friday! Hehe.

I did the 9 AM, and it sucked for a couple of reasons. One, my muscles were unusually tight, even for a morning class. Maybe it was the turkey the day before. Who knows? The other reason it sucked was the teacher. I rarely have complaints about teachers, but this was a visiting teacher, and frankly he just wasn't very good. He basically just said the dialogue and sounded bored doing it. I understand if you are visiting and don't know the names of students, but there were a number of really obvious major errors I saw people making on postures, and this guy didn't correct any of it. Disappointing. But anyways...

Friday, 5 PM: This was my second class of the day, and the normal time slot I do. It was much better than the 9 AM. Partially because of the time of day, and partially because one of my usual and favorite teachers was there. I didn't really feel the effects of doing the double, which was nice. Believe it or not, all the other doubles I've done are back to back. This is the first time I've split up a double in different parts of the day. Gives me an idea for doing this on Saturdays every now and then...

Also, later that night I met a girl who has done a few Bikram classes in other studios. I talked to her about Green Valley and she said she'll drop by this week. I have a few free passes I could give to her. Maybe I can make another Bikram fanatic! :)

Saturday 1 PM: Ok, I felt the double here. I basically did 3 classes in a 28 hour period, so something was bound to give. Not that I sat out postures or anything, but it wasn't exactly smooth sailing. Marie taught, and now that she's learned my name, she doesn't hesitate to use it! I love corrections, but sometimes I'd rather be invisible. No such luck on Saturday.

Sunday, 3 PM: Probably my best Sunday class ever. J gave me some very good advice about my weekend classes and it paid off today. Not the advice about the time, J, but the other stuff:) It certainly helped that I had a new person behind me and to my left, and teacher Sheri to my right. Sheri threatened to kick me again like last week if I slacked off. But, she didn't have to kick me. It felt like a normal weekday class and I was happy. I even held Camel longer than usual. A few of our teachers like to hold Camel for a minute in the second set. It's a nice challenge.

Overall, my holiday weekend was stuffed with yoga, and I couldn't be happier:)

Taste the Pain

111 classes in 107 days.

"What would rather have? 10 seconds of pain or 10 years? 90 minutes of pain or 90 years? - Bikram

The above is something Bikram said when I took a class from him. Our teachers have repeated it many times. Today my lower back was in pain in class, and it's still quite sore. And you know what? I love it, absolutely love it. I've been making good progress on various postures, especially ones related to the lower back, and it hurts. I've pushing further in postures and my back is feeling it. But it makes me feel like I'm progressing, like I'm alive. The real pain is just in class when doing the postures. Afterwards, I'm just sore. Soreness is a lot better than pain in life, believe me. I've had real back pain before, 24 hours a day. It makes live unlivable. So the fact that I'm sore makes me happy. I'm making good progress.

Here's another quote from Bikram. It's paraphrased, except for the last sentence:)

"You know I get all kinds of people coming to me with problems. Different body problems, things hurt, can't walk, emotional problems, whatever. And I have the solution. You know what that solution is? Lock the fucking knee!"

Greg

Crossing the Line

110 classes in 106 days.

Class with Sheri = bliss. Just like last week with her, I had another awesome day in the hot room. Sometimes I like to go into details about postures, how the class went, etc. But sometimes it's just irrelevant. All that matters to me is how I feel during class and afterwards. Floating, flying, utterly unconcerned with anything else in my life. Those are the best classes, never mind how the postures looked that day.

Somewhere along the way since I started practicing, I crossed the line from working out my body to...something better, something higher. It's a fun place to me. Don't worry, I loooove to go into details about postures and improving my form and depth. But it's just the means to an end.

Greg

Smooth Sailing

109 classes in 105 days.

Very smooth class tonight. I was able to do pretty well in the floor series, which is always a goal of mine for every class. Bikram says the real yoga is done on the floor, so I'm happy when I can reach good depth in the floor series. The measuring stick for a good class for me or a not so good one is the floor series. It could probably be 125 degrees in the room, and I'll get through the floor series Ok. Not that it's easy, but for me, a lot of the floor poses are trickier, and when I get too hot, some of them become nearly impossible. It's funny, because near the end of standing series, the teachers often say that "we're almost on the floor", as if that's something really exciting. But if I'm really hot, I don't get excited about laying down. When I do, my body just thinks, "Oh good, we can go to sleep!"

Oh, one more quote I forgot to put in yesterday: (Teacher, in Locust pose): "Put your face on the towel, kiss the towel, tongue optional."

Greg

Amusing Comments

Been away from the blog for a few days, but that doesn't mean I missed any classes. I'm up to 108 classes in 104 days now.

Before I get to the rest of the blog for today, I have to tell you about a funny thing that happened in class today. As I've mentioned before, the Sunday 3 PM class is filled with REALLY good yogis. So I usually set up in the second row, not the front row like usual. Today, Sheri (the teacher) set up in front of me. On the second set of Camel, I continued to lay in Savasana and wasn't planning to do the posture. For reasons still unexplained, my heat tolerance seems to go on vacation on the weekends, so I was really hot today. Anyways, I was planning to sit out the second set, when Sheri kicked me in the head to get me up and doing the posture! I thought it was so funny, I forgot I was hot, and got up and did the posture. After class I told her how funny it was and she said "Well, it was effective!" I love having teachers that care that much, even when they're not teaching.

So here's the rest of the blog. I'm going to list some funny and interesting things I've heard in some recent classes. This is inspired by J, who did a similar blog at one point. I'm leaving out names on purpose (except me), but Michelle might figure out some of them.

Teacher: "You came out of the posture early!"
Student: "I like to get out of the gate fast."
Teacher: "Maybe that's why you don't have a girlfriend."

Teacher: "Keep your eyes open during the posture."
Student: "They are open. I'm just Asian!"

Teacher: "Greg, you just threw that one." - After I fell out of a posture.

Teacher: "Yoga is like a kiss. If you do it too fast, it's sloppy and gross."

Teacher (During Balancing Stick): "Greg, go ahead and touch (the girl in front of me). She's not doing anything anyways."

Teacher (During Balancing Stick): "Make a perfect Mr. T. I pity the fool."

Teacher (During third part awkward): "Pretend you have something really valuable between your knees, like Michael Bolton tickets."

Teacher, near the end of class: "Now you guys can go out and do whatever you want. Drink beer, whatever."

Teacher (to new student): "Just take it easy today. You'll see me kill other guys, like Greg. But you take it easy."

Teacher: "You guys are adults, you can do whatever you want. Except her (and points to her kid, who was in class)."

Teacher: "No sex for you tonight." She said this to a guy who was leaving the room, and his girlfriend was still in the class.

Teacher: "Yoga starts out as a workout, but becomes so much more."

Teacher: "Look into the mirror and into the eyes of your one and only true teacher."

Greg

Digging in the Dirt

105 classes in 101 days.

Not everyday is exciting in class. I thought of an analogy that fits what happened today, but I'll get to that shortly. I had all kinds of weird things going on with my body today. First, a few days ago I managed to get a nasty bump on my head during Savasana. A woman was very close behind me and kept hitting my feet with her hands when doing the sit ups. So I was moving further back on my mat and on one of the Savasanas I laid down and hit my head on the floor, instead of my mat. Ouch. So my head was hurting all class, and still does. Then I was just sore in general throughout class, with all kinds of strange parts of my body hurting. On top of that, I actually thought it was too hot tonight. It happens. The humidity was over 70%, which makes me sluggish more than anything else. I didn't have to sit out anything, but I felt kinda blah the whole class.

So here's my analogy. It's kind of like digging in the ground for something. You'll dig dirt for a while and it goes smoothly, but once in a while you'll hit some rocks. Now it doesn't mean you've gone backwards, but you do have to handle the rocks to keep digging. These rougher days are like hitting the rocks. You just have to blast though them, but it's not a "bad" day when you hit them. You're just digging deeper. Not the most exciting description, but it works for me :)

Greg

The Yardstick

104 classes in 100 days.

Well after my big high yesterday, I managed not to come crashing down tonight. A lot of the gains I had on the postures last night stuck with me, which was great. Still going deeper in a lot of things. Tonight was class with Roberta. I haven't had her in a few months, and my practice is obviously a lot better since then. Still, I was a little worried, as I just remember her class being really hot.

It turns out I didn't feel too hot at all in her class. My heat tolerance is certainly higher now than two months ago. That didn't stop some other people from feeling it was hot. Two of them left the room, and only one returned! The funniest part of the class is that Roberta would often walk around the room with a yardstick (!) and poke and push people with it to improve their postures! I managed to avoid this for a while, but then she got me - twice. Once on Full Locust and then on Stretching. I've had teachers physically move me around a bit in postures before, but never with a prop.

Anyone have water suggestions for me? I've heard all kinds of suggestions, and I've tried various kinds of water, with electrolytes, etc. But I swear I can't tell the difference between any of them.

Greg

Wow

103 classes in 99 days.

Maybe this is karma at work. After my last blog complaining about being "stuck" at a certain level, I never would have expected my class today. One of the best ever.

It started early on, in the first backbend. During the backbend, an amazing feeling came over me. I'm not exactly sure how to describe it, but it was an incredible calm and clarity. Everything slowed down. I didn't even feel anything in the room or on my body. It wasn't numb, because that's not good, but it was more like me just telling my body what to do, like controlling a puppet.

After this epiphany, if you will, I then proceeded to go deeper than EVER before in about the next six postures. In Standing Bow Pulling, I refused to come out the posture when the teacher (Sheri) said "change." The whole class just stood there and waited for a few seconds until I felt like coming out of the posture. I told Sheri after class I was just having too much fun and didn't want to come out of the posture! In Standing Head to Knee, I got my elbows below my calf muscles for the first time ever, and again I didn't want to come out of that posture either.

This is one of those classes where I think to myself, "Bikram is so right. This stuff is magic." Of course, I'll probably be chasing this feeling again for the next 100 days, but I know it's there, and if that's not motivation enough to continue, I don't know what is.

Greg

Foggy

102 classes in 98 days.

Monday was one of those odd days, in and out of the hot room. I was kind of in a daze most of the day, and it just continued over into class.

For whatever reason, I couldn't really bring myself into the room totally. The good news is the class went pretty well, no bumps in the road and doing well on the postures. It just felt weird mentally the whole time. The class went by really fast and I was surprised when class was over. By the end of class, my fog was gone, so that was nice.

I've been a little frustrated recently due to being kind of "stuck" in my practice. I've done this long enough now to know that this will happen, and then eventually I'll make some more good forward progress. But it gets annoying when day after day it feels like I'm not going deeper in ANY of the postures. Just the same old same old. Of course every class is different, but I want to get better all the time.

Sheri's teaching class tonight, so maybe I'll complain to her about this.

Greg

The Yogi All-Stars

101 classes in 97 days.

I've already discussed my difficulties with weekend classes, as it's a break from my Monday-Friday routine. So I won't go over that again right now. It was the usual difficult Sunday class for me, but overall it went Ok. It was nice and hot with close to 60% humidity. But I thought I'd write about something I love about Sunday classes.

For a variety of reasons, the Sunday 3 PM class is stuffed with experienced and great yogis. One of the reasons is that Advanced Class is at 5 PM, so a lot of those guys do the 3 PM as their "warm up." Then recently we have some visiting teachers, as well as some of the people on teacher training. The trainees have Sundays off, but a few of them come in and do class on their day off! That's some serious dedication.

Needless to say, I don't go in the front row on Sundays. Not because I'm worried about a rough class, but honestly I'd rather be behind these super great yogis so I can watch them for any subtle things about the postures. It's awesome. So I set up in the second row and got to watch all of these incredible yogis do their thing. Very inspiring.

Greg

100!

100 classes in 96 days!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Did 99 last night and 100 this morning! I'll be celebrating by doing 101 tomorrow.

I think the above is all I need to say today. Thanks to everyone at Green Valley, all my teachers and my fellow bloggers. Namaste!

Greg

Dray's New Studio, Bikramyogachick and Rain(!)

98 classes in 94 days!

All kinds of fun things happened today. First, I went to Dray's new studio. Dray was the teacher of the first two classes I ever took and he's a large reason I kept coming back. He really cares about each of his students and I think it's awesome he opened up his own studio. There are now four in Vegas. As far as I'm concerned, there could be 100 here!

Second, I got to meet Michelle (Bikramyogachick), who's blog inspired me to write my own! We practiced together up front. You can tell she's been practicing for a few years. She's very focused and doesn't mess around. Just the type of person I like to practice next to. I've practiced next to all kinds of people, including people that fidget a lot, loud breathing, etc. I can deal with it (I've even had people fall into me), but it's much more fun to be next to a dedicated and focused person. Yay Michelle!

Class itself was fine. They're still trying to work out the heat in the room, but it warmed up Ok as the class went on. Not sure it will ever get up to the (slightly insane) level that I like it:)

Finally, apparently it rained while class was going on! I came outside and it had definitely rained. For non-Vegas people, trust me, this is a big deal. It literally only rains a few days a year here, and even then it's usually only for a few minutes. And it even rained for about a minute while I was driving home. This probably sounds silly to Boston people:)

Anyways, back to Green Valley, my usual studio tomorrow. Although I'm sure Michelle and I will practice together again in the near future...

Greg

A Day Off?

97 classes in 93 days!

No, I didn't take a day off today, but you'll see why I put that as the title of my post today. Last night, Joseph Encinia, 2009 National Asana Champion, taught our 5 PM class. He's touring around the world with Courtney Mace, the 2009 International Champion. He did a few demonstrations for us, including Scorpion, a crazy looking advanced posture. If you're not familiar, it's basically a handstand and then bending your legs down forward and resting your feet on your head! And he did it effortlessly.

Throughout class, he demonstrated a few of the "normal" postures for us as well, including a fantastic locust pose, with his legs 90 degrees straight up! He gave great suggestions and tips as well.

After class I was talking to him about different postures and I mentioned I've done 97 classes in 93 days and he laughed and said I should take a day off! Not until December...

Today I'll be checking out Dray's new studio in Red Rock and seeing Michelle. Should be fun!

Greg

Return of the Queen

96 classes in 92 days!

Sheri's back! One of my favorite teachers returned after being out of town for the past two weeks, and she didn't disappoint. Of course, she managed to start off the class by putting me under some pressure. There was a new guy behind me and Sheri told him to watch me in the front row! Obviously I wasn't going to be slacking off today after that! Also, in the middle of the standing series she asked me if I thought it was hot yet. I told her it was Ok. She then proceeded to tell the class that if I had thought it was hot, she would have actually been concerned it was too hot. But since I said it was Ok, she wasn't worried. This produced moans and groans from a few people :)

Future teachers take note: The reason I like Sheri so much is her ability to note the little things in postures to correct. Her observation is simply spectacular. In tonight's class, she pointed out about 4 little things in some of my postures that made a huge difference. It's always the little things that make the biggest impact, and it takes a very good teacher to notice the little things, and correct the student.

Oh by the way, the humidity was over 60% by the end of class, and yes I thought it was hot at that point. :)

Greg

A Relative Day at the Beach

95 classes in 91 days!

Ah, Mondays. I used to hate Mondays, but now I look forward to them! Why? Because it's back to my usual 5 PM classes instead of the odd weekend schedule I do. Plenty of time all day to let my body loosen up, drink lots of water, etc. So I looked forward to my class all day, and I was not disappointed.

The room felt cold when I walked in. Of course it wasn't really cold, but that's how it usually feels to me Monday-Friday. Like I'm in Santa Monica or something. Today was one of those days when it's not a series of 26 postures, but one long and flowing class. Just the way I like it. Lots of new faces in there tonight, which I always like to see, and everything went smooth.

This is one of these classes where afterwards I have to remind myself not to get too arrogant or complacent because of how well things went. But I don't have to worry about that, because tomorrow Sheri is teaching. She's back from a trip the past few weeks and it most definitely won't be a day at the beach for me tomorrow. She knows my skill level backwards and forward and she pushes me hard. I'll have more about this tomorrow for sure...

Greg

Conservation of Energy

94 classes in 90 days!

After last Sunday's nightmarish class, I was determined to make this week's Sunday class better. Right at the beginning of class, I could tell it was going to be a rough one. The room was absolutely stuffed with people wall to wall. It's the biggest number of people I've seen at this studio thus far. This is great for energy, but it definitely increases the humidity when there are tons of people. I was dripping with sweat right from the beginning.

So early on, I decided to conserve my energy a bit. Through most of the standing series, I did the postures to about 80% of my capability. Proper set up and form, but not going as deep as I usually do. I wasn't thrilled to do it as I love to push myself really hard, but I figured it would enable me to make it through the whole class. It was already hot, and I knew it was just going to get worse as the class went on.

The class was filled with veteran yogis, including a bunch of teachers and some people that competed last month. A lot of those guys were taking postures off and you could tell the heat was affecting them. Anyways, my strategy worked great. I got through the class with minimal trouble. My postures certainly weren't my best, but I know that if I do the correct form, I'm still getting benefits.

Looking forward to Monday, so I can get back to my "normal" practice! :)

Greg

Inspiration

Two classes since my last blog, Friday at 5 and Saturday (today) 9 AM. So that's 93 classes in 89 days since I started.

This morning in class I was struck by a man behind me. He was older, probably in his 60's, and was struggling very hard with the postures, and couldn't even get into the set up in all of them. But you know what? He was working hard and didn't sit out anything. It was great to see actually.

I'm often more inspired by people like this, than people that have been practicing for years. It just shows me how anyone really can do this yoga and benefit from it, regardless of their age, shape, etc. I could care less what the people in the room look like or how well they can do the postures. I admire and respect everyone who does this. They all inspire me.

Greg

Thoughts in Class Today

91 classes in 87 days.

Everyday in class various random thoughts come into my head. I thought I'd try to share some of these. I'll try to keep these in some sort of order. Obviously I don't remember everything. It's not like I can take notes during class!

(Beginning of class): "Good temperature today. Pretty full class."

(During Eagle Pose): "Am I ever going to get my left foot to wrap around!?"

"I wonder if I'll get home in time to watch the end of the Cavs-Bulls game?"

"Who's this girl next to me? I've never seen her before, but she's really good."

(During Standing Bow): "Hey, that point Dray mentioned yesterday in class works really well. I'm getting my leg up faster!"

(During Balancing Stick): "Why are so many people around me coming out of the posture early?"

"I'm the only man in the room wearing yoga shorts."

"What's wrong with my hamstrings!?"

"Is it possible for steam to actually bounce off a mirror?"

(During Triangle): "I'm doing the posture correctly, but for some reason my hands appear to be 20 feet away from my toes. Why is this?"

(After standing series): "Michelle (the teacher) just opened the door, and it smells like peppermint."

"I think I want some Jamba Juice."

"I wonder how the first-timer in the back is doing?"

(During Locust, first part): "The guy behind me is like 60 years old, and he's getting his leg up higher than me!"

(After someone loudly said something to the teacher): "Who is this guy and why is he yelling?"

(During Full Locust): "I don't want to do Bow pose next."

(During Bow pose): "This is going better than I thought it would."

(For the next 15 minutes, a rap song from about 7 years ago is going through my head)

(During Camel): "I can't believe the girl behind me came out early. She's normally much better than me."

(During Rabbit): "My head hurts."

(During Stretching): "Ok, I'm hot now. Where are the fans!?"

(End of Class): Nothing, clear head. Serenity :)

Greg

Change in the Weather

90 classes in 86 days!

Remember my posting last week about the room being too cold? Well, it seems my studio has taken measures to correct that. The past four days there has been a noticeable increase in the temperature and humidity. One of the obvious changes is the teachers hardly open the doors during class now, if at all, plus the fans hardly come on anymore. None of this is a big deal for me (except the awful last Sunday class), but it's definitely taking a toll on a few of the students. No one left the room today, but there were plenty of moans and groans during and after class.

As for me, I'm enjoying the higher (and probably correct) temperatures. My muscles can sure feel the difference. I've been able to go deeper in a few postures, especially Camel. Camel has never been one of my better postures, and I'm constantly working to improve it. I can't tell you how many times I've gotten with teachers about it, had them look at me doing it before class, etc. When I first started, I couldn't even do the set up correctly. I was so happy when I was finally able to get my hands on my heels. Now I get killed by practically every teacher for not pushing my hips forward enough. I'm working on it!

As a side note, anyone else ever notice energy differences in the room from day to day, or even in different parts of the room? I'll explore this topic more in detail, but it's fascinating to me.

Greg

Fire Walker

89 classes, 85 days. Today I had my first class with the actual studio owner. She normally teaches mornings, so it was fun to finally get to take one of her classes. It was quite an experience. It looked like a war zone in there today. People dropping left and right, and I'm talking about the front row! Four people left the room at different points, including another teacher (!). First time I've ever seen that.

But you know what? I didn't miss a beat. Didn't sit out anything, just keep on rolling. And yes, I thought it was hot, real hot, but it didn't stop me today. After class I found out we topped off at 109 degrees with 65% humidity(!), plus she didn't open the doors once like most teachers. Just the fans a few times. I'll say this much, I sure was more flexible thanks to all that humidity :)

Greg

Top 10 Favorite Albums of the Decade

Ok, here they are. My favorite albums of the past decade. I'm not claiming these are the "best" albums (always a question of taste), and they certainly aren't the best selling. Just my personal favorites, with a little explanation for each one. They are in no particular order.

1. Coldplay - X&Y. I could have picked any of their albums really, but this one captures their sound and feeling better than any other.

2. Linkin Park - Meteora. I've always maintained Linkin Park is one of the only few original sounding rock bands in the past decade, and this album shows why. It's actually their least successful in terms of sales, but it's my favorite.

3. Kanye West - Graduation. One of the only artists to write original and unique hip hop/rap music. This was his third album and a tour de force which expanded the genres of hip hop, pop and rap.

4. Jay Z - The Blueprint. Arguably the greatest pure rapper in history.

5. U2 - All That You Can't Leave Behind. U2 has reinvented their sound three times in their career. First on The Joshua Tree, then on Actung Baby and then again on All That You Can't Leave Behind. There's a reason why they're the most popular band in the world.

6. Nine Inch Nails - Year Zero. Brilliant musically and lyrically. Nothing sounds like Nine Inch Nails before or since.

7. Guns N' Roses - Chinese Democracy. An odd choice, perhaps. This album had a lot of hype, considering how long it took to make (over a decade), and received mixed reviews. Some people just can't get past the fact that it's not the original line-up. But Axl Rose is a genius and each song is well written, performed and produced.

8. Black Eyed Peas - Elephunk. If not for this band and Kayne West (see # 3), hip hop might have fallen off the map forever.

9. Paul Oakenfold - Bunkka. The artist who put Trance music on the map in the 1990's continued his groundbreaking writing/mixing/producing with this album that shakes up typical "dance" music.

10. Eminem - The Eminem Show. Say what you want about this guy, he took the rap community and flipped it upside down. In between his intentionally over the top lyrics, you'll find some of the most emotional and honest songs since Kurt Cobain and Nirvana.

Have fun with this list. I always like feedback!

Greg

Redemption

88 classes in 84 days, and today was MUCH better than yesterday's disaster. It started off rough, and I swear it was actually hotter today than yesterday. But I found my groove and had a very good class. I went deeper than ever in Camel (not one of my better postures), so I was very surprised and happy about that! Yesterday in class I couldn't even do Camel.

All is good in the world tonight. It's amazing how much a poor class will stick my attention. I thought about it all day, but we're all good now. Maybe I'll do a double tomorrow :)

Greg

Something Happened on the Way to Heaven

Well, it was bound to happen. Class # 87 in 83 days today, and I got flattened. Big time. The best thing I can say about today is that at least I stayed in the room the whole time. Sat out the last four postures, and I couldn't even lay in Savasana correctly. I was laying on my side part of the time. It felt like 300 degrees and I got a nasty stomach cramp. At least my cramp is gone now, but it's four hours since class ended and I still feel weird.

Generally when I have a rough class, the next day is great. So let's hope that trend continues. I just have to remember that I run the body, the body doesn't run me.

Greg