Monday, December 28, 2009

Weekend Warrior

143 classes in 139 days.

I did classes Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday since my last blog. On Christmas the studio was closed, so that was my first day without class since the beginning of October! Yes, it felt weird. It was funny, one of my teachers told me it was good to take a day off and she's glad that the studio being closed forced me to take a day off!

But something very good happened after Christmas, which is that I think I've finally solved my weekend problem. For months, I've had a hard time with the weekend classes. I've taken afternoon classes on Saturday and Sunday, and by my standards, they were generally awful. I have no clear explanation for this. I do classes during the week at 5 PM, and they're great. I almost never have a rough class during the week, but for some reason, those afternoon classes on the weekend were like getting hit by a truck. I felt exhausted at the end of class, which is the exact opposite of how I should feel.

I went over this a bit with Sheri, my favorite teacher, and she suggested I come earlier in the day. This is something Juliana (fellow blogger DancingJ) suggested to me too. So this weekend I took 11 AM classes on Saturday and Sunday and it was great! They felt just like my normal weekday classes. My muscles were a little tighter at the beginning of class, but that went away quickly.

I've been given many possible reasons why this works out better for me, but I really have no idea what the reason is, nor do I care. I just know that the 11 AM works for me, and I'm going to stick with it. I should have taken Juliana's advice earlier...:)

Greg

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Holidays

139 classes in 134 days.

Tonight will be my last nighttime class until next Monday! Thursday there are only morning classes, then no classes Friday (Christmas), then my usual afternoon Saturday and Sunday classes.

The last few classes were fun. Stacey, the studio owner taught on Monday and then Jen, a recently graduated teacher, taught last night. Last night, right before classes, Stacey said to me, "You've gotten really good!", at which point another teacher nearby said, "That's what happens with a daily practice." Made me feel good, of course. Then Stacey set up next to me in the front row last night. I was between her and Nita. Lots of energy there for sure!

No blogs for the next few days. Everyone have a great holiday!

Greg

Monday, December 21, 2009

Wall Walking!

137 classes in 132 days.

Ok, so a few days ago I was introduced to something that has already produced a lot of fun and helped my practice a lot. It's called "wall walking" (at least here). Nita showed me how to do it and a few people do it here. She told me it wasn't broadly known about it, and she even showed different people at teacher training about it. There are probably about 5 people at my studio that I see do this on a regular basis.

It's basically a back bend into the wall and then you continue to back bend and "walk" down the wall with your hands until you get your hands on the floor. Then you "walk" back up the wall. It's a fantastic back bend and really helps with other back bends in your normal practice. It's also great for opening up the shoulders. I wouldn't necessarily recommend this without someone showing you how to do it. I'm curious how many of you know this already.

It's a lot of fun, and I'm doing it before class now. I also do it at home and other places, including a restaurant Saturday!

Greg

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Knowledge

133 classes in 128 days.

I've had a lot happening yoga-wise over the past few days, so I'll spread things out over a few blogs. I haven't missed any classes, so don't worry about that:)

This past weekend, I had various friends come from out of town. One of them has actually done a few Bikram classes in L.A. She was pretty excited to hear I had become a Bikram fanatic. She started asking me lots of questions about, the postures, etc. And I had no problems answering her questions, and I realized along the way how much I actually know about the subject so far. Obviously the teachers talk a lot everyday, but I never considered how much of the knowledge has now become a part of me. It's second nature now, and of course I keep learning more all the time. It was a lot of fun to rattle off data about the postures, their internal and external benefits, etc. I guess I've been paying attention in class!

Sunday, December 13, 2009

Spreading the Word

130 classes in 125 days.

Had a very fun weekend with some friends from out of town. Of course, that doesn't mean I missed any Bikram classes. The rest of my life just gets re-arranged around my classes:)

As far as Bikram goes, my favorite thing from the weekend was that a girl I was talking to about it showed up for class on Saturday. She bought the week intro. She had done 3 or 4 classes at some other studios, but it had been a while and I wanted her to come check out Green Valley. She did really well, and got lots of attention from the teacher that day. It makes me soooooo happy to get people on board with Bikram. She was very happy and thanked me for getting her there. Let's see how she does in her intro week. I want to make another fanatic!

As as my own practice, I'm kind of in a stuck place again. That's ok, I've been through this before. I go everyday, so I'm not worried about being stuck for too long!

Greg

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Tightness is Rightness

127 classes in 122 days.

Overall very good tonight. But weirdly enough, my muscles were tighter tonight. This is very unusual for a weekday night, as that's when my muscles are usually at their loosest. I'm blaming it on the cold weather we've had this week. That's as good an excuse as any:)

Dancing J's continuous tips on Standing Bow Pulling (i.e. telling me the dialogue over and over) are definitely helping. Tonight, the teacher complimented me on the posture. But trust me, it's still very much a work in progress.

Greg

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Michelle and Mei

126 classes in 121 days.

Michelle dropped by my studio today to do the 5 PM class. Recent teacher graduate (and fellow blogger) Mei taught a 3 PM class, and then took the 5 PM class. They were both great. Michelle was her usual determined self. She definitely works on each posture and doesn't take a vacation on any of them. Believe me, I see plenty of people take it easy on a few postures each class, even if they don't totally sit them out. But not Michelle, she rocks it the whole time!

Working on some tips from the Dancing J about my Standing Bow Pulling tonight. This is still a major work in progress. I can get my body parallel to the floor, but sadly, it doesn't last long. Every class is a new adventure...

Greg

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Motivation

125 classes in 120 days.

Tonight the person who introduced me to Bikram Yoga practiced with me. I talk to her and see her all the time, but we haven't practiced together in a while. Plus Sheri was teaching, so I was highly motivated tonight, and I had a great class. I pushed like crazy, didn't feel the heat, and went deep into a lot of postures.

Having her in class with me just reminded me again how grateful I am to her for introducing me to this yoga. She factually saved my life. I'm sure everyone has an interesting story about how they found this yoga, but I will never forget my dear friend who opened this door for me.

Greg

Monday, December 7, 2009

Rain Rain Rain!

124 classes in 119 days.

For the first time in, I don't know, almost a year, we've had significant rainfall in Vegas. It's been going since this afternoon. The power went off at my business today and we just closed up and went home early! Traffic was a mess, because no one seems to know how to drive when it's wet here. Good thing I learned to drive in Cleveland.

Tonight we had a visiting teacher from New York, Jason. Didn't catch his last name. I did introduce myself before class so I wouldn't get totally ignored during class:) It went well. The room was stuffed with regulars plus about six teachers, so that's always good for my motivation. A few of the teacher graduates were back in class to resume their normal practice, so that was cool. Lots of energy in the room.

This 101 thing is catching on by the way. Yesterday, I was talking to Nita about it (she'll probably do 101 classes in 50 days, but anyways), and another student who I didn't even know told me she heard about the 101 challenge. This thing is spreading like wildfire. I love it!

Greg

Sunday, December 6, 2009

Some of my Favorite People

123 classes in 118 days. Did the Friday 5 PM, Saturday 1 PM and Sunday 3 PM.

I'm not going to talk about my recent classes, other than to say my right leg is almost feeling normal again, and is now more flexible. Yay!

I want to talk about the yoga community in this blog. Last night, we had a holiday party at the Palms and a bunch of different yogis from different studios came. It was a lot of fun, as you can imagine. Pictures should be appearing soon on Bikramyogachick's blog. I know lots of different people in different walks of life, different groups, etc, but there's just something wonderful about people that practice this yoga. For one thing, they all have some high level of motivation. Who else would put themselves through a 90 minute torture chamber on a regular basis? They're kind, friendly and we generally all get along. How often do you see a big argument at a studio? It's probably pretty rare.

There's a certain confidence and calmness too. I'd love to see some demographic research about people who practice Bikram sometime, because I swear they're just smarter then your average group of people.

On a related note, the teachers from the Fall Teacher Training graduated on Saturday! So that's about 300 more teachers unleashed on the world. Awesome.

Greg

Thursday, December 3, 2009

The Way Out is the Way Through

120 classes in 115 days!

Do you know what's significant about 120 classes in 115 days?! It's four consecutive 30 day challenges! Happily, class went well today. I would have been annoyed if class # 120 was a rough one. Roberta taught, and sure enough, she whipped out the yardstick again! She only used it a little bit to correct postures tonight, but I avoided it. Also, my leg felt a lot better today, which leads to the topic of this blog (and the title).

Yoga is about the only thing I know which can cause you pain, soreness, etc, but also heals anything negative it might cause. Think about that for a minute. What else in this world can do that? If you get hurt playing basketball, it's going to make things worse if you just play more basketball. Drinking more alcohol doesn't solve any problems from drinking in the first place. More drugs don't solve a drug problem. More food doesn't help someone lose weight. More war doesn't solve war. See where I'm going with this?

This yoga is so amazing because even if it temporarily causes you some discomfort, it always gives back tenfold.

Greg

Blah

119 classes in 114 days.

What an annoying day yesterday. I ended up getting off work a little late and was rushing to get to my 5 PM class when I ran into horrible traffic on the freeway. There was an accident and so traffic was stopped up for a few miles. So I ended up not making it to the 5 o'clock class. I suppose I could have gone in about 5 minutes late, but I've never done that and didn't want to.

So I took the 7 PM class. The only times before I've taken a 7 PM class were my very first class ever and then later as the second class of a doubles. I might as well have taken a double, because the class felt like a double. This is one of those classes where I really had to pay attention to the teacher, because I kept forgetting which posture I just did! I just wasn't totally in the room today. My leg still hurts, my teeth (?) were hurting, etc.

Hopefully I can make the 5 PM today...

Greg

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Lock Your Standing Knee - Maybe

118 classes in 113 days.

Yes, I'm still in pain. My right leg was continuing to cause trouble in class tonight. Very sore on my quads and quite painful at times. But I persisted and the teacher Sheri told me not to be too concerned.

However, tonight during class, Sheri shared some very interesting information with us. Teacher training is going on here in Vegas (it's the last week this week), so Bikram himself has been teaching a lot of classes. Anyways, Sheri was at one of the classes he taught recently and he made a point that everyone should try to kick out on Standing Head to Knee, whether their standing leg is locked or not. He said that kicking out can actually help the person lock their standing knee. Now, I already lock my standing knee, so it's not a big deal for me, but it's definitely a major change from what the teachers have been telling us everyday. I kind of like the point about kicking out can help locking the knee. Interesting.

Now of course, the point isn't to slack off and not try and lock the standing knee:) And for sure, you have to lock both knees before bending your elbows. If you have any questions about that last part, go ahead and try to bend your elbows down without locking the knees. Go ahead, I dare you.

Greg