Where have I been?

It's almost 9 months since I wrote on this blog, and I've had plenty of time to think about why I stopped and why I've come back to it again today.

I really enjoyed writing about yoga and the inner journey.
When I read the posts, I know the writing is good. Honest. Relevant. To me, and potentially to others. It feels authentic, integrated. So why have I not gone mad with it??

It's a puzzle, and I'm working on it. It's something about voice. About expression. About making a noise and being heard. Being enthusiastic, being willling, being even able to accept that writing down my experience and publishing it may have some value. Yikes. That was hard to write.

Today is day 20 of the 40-day yoga practice focussed on the throat chakra. This is the second time I've done this practice. Last year it was a physical torture. This year the torture is mental. Communication (which is my career), creativity (which is my constant  not-quite-comfortable companion), truth (which I don't yet understand). The homework is excruciating. Singing in public, teaching people breathing techniques, going to different yoga studios...

This is the paradox.

I really want to sing. Out loud, in public. To belt it out with a choir. Hell, even belt it out with a great band backing me. I love singing. Singing makes me cry. This feels like a pretty strange thing to write too, but the most actual fun I remember having in the last ten years was playing Sing Star at my sister's place, doing a duet with my brother-in-law. It was Don't Go Breaking my Heart, by someone and Kiki Dee... I was the girl bit. It was awesome.

So why does singing make me cry now? There's a part of my voice that is choked up. Really choked up. Working on the fifth chakra isn't really making it any easier. Except that I have a homework assignment that involves singing in public.

I am going to go to the Wesley church community choir on Wednesday night and sing like the bejesus. I have to. It's time to get over this block. Maybe if I can sing out loud again I'll be able to write out loud again too.

Day 5 Folding Inwards, and Outwards

I filled in the application form for the teacher training course in Mexico, Jan 10 2012. Folding outwards and inwards.

This practice involves a lot of work with the spine. I'm not feeling it yet. Looking forward to spine awareness equaling shoulder awareness. High. My shoulders are now firmly planted on my back and reaching resolutely down to the waist. One day during this practice I will feel my spine undulating. It is dull at the moment. Moving, sure, but not with precision yet.

Today I lay on my back on the mat, legs in the air, and I thought, "Wow, look at those legs! I can't believe they are mine."

Day 3 and 4 Folding Inwards

There is something decidedly uncompetitive about this sadhana practice. Slowly, gently folding in. I feel competitive though, being me, being one of the oldest in the class. I'm working on giving myself permission to be slower, more bent. It's quite difficult to be one with an uncompetitive activity. Gently does it, second by second. If the knees are bent, they need to be bent.

Day Two Folding Inward

I am stronger, more balanced and more flexible than I think.

Day One Folding Inward

Energy. I have heaps of it. Even after an early start, a demanding day at the office, a brisk walk home and cooking dinner--I'm lively, wired even. I remember this from earlier sadhana practices; feeling bulletproof from fatigue.

I also managed three pretty intense and potentially volatile meetings with ease and humour.

And my inner thighs ache like you wouldn't believe. There will be arnica rub tonight.

The Next Forty Days

Today marks the last day of a two week break from yoga practice. My body did feel like it needed a rest after four x 40-day practices since January. But strangely, over the two weeks of sleeping in and resting physically, some of my old aches and pains have come back. It will be interesting to see if they flee when I get back on the mat tomorrow.

Maybe more importantly, someone at work asked me last week, "Are you still doing yoga every morning?" I said no, we've got a break for two weeks. He said, "I thought so!" In the kindest possible way. I know what he means. 

This writing practice has been a bit of a non-event, but there's a piece of me that knows I want to do this, can do this... write about more than what's going on out there in the garden, in the kitchen. Write about what's going on inside. So during this sadhana practice I will write something every day. It may just be a sentence. (I don't always need to write an essay.) I just commit to it being honest and aware. The focus is folding inward.

Transformers

My shoulders are giving up, very slowly by the millimetre, the crampiness, scrunching, and gripping that they've become accustomed to over the years. Sounds good, but I'm discovering that they weren't just scrunching for the hell of it. They were working hard to compensate for injuries, provide balance, and generally try to restore normalcy in an otherwise messed up body... sounds a bit like me and life at large.

Anyway.  About 20 years ago, I had a pretty spectacular fall while I was skiing down a steep off-road trail in my long, slick track skis... not the gear for the job. My right arm got wrenched out of its socket and it wouldn't lift up of its own accord for ages. Eventually it "healed" and got back to "normal". Not. Now I realise that the shoulder adjusted to help the injured wing flap again, and in the process, got itself all out of sorts.

This journey into the body is amazing. This week the right shoulder finally gave up its grip on the injured arm. Consequently the arm couldn't lift, not without a lot of pain; right back to square one on the icy trail under Crown Peak. Wow.

So twenty days into the arm practice, I'm rehabilitating a 20 year old injury on the yoga mat. I do feel like a doll or a transformer, moving piece by piece, millimetre by millimetre, joint by joint, into a new body.