Blog
August 2008
Yesterday I had the opportunity to take a workshop on "assists" with Andrea Boyd, from Jivamukti in Charleston. I'll write more later on this but for now, here are some photos from the workshop which show some of what she taught us. Unfortunately my camera battery died before we got to some of the great asissts for the warrior poses and side angle pose! I'm excited about incorporating some the new ones I learned into my classes.
I still haven't taken the time to write anything up about our amazing visit to Yogaville, DC, or the Qigong conference, but hope to get to that soon. For now, though a few words about an amazing teacher.
While we were at the Qigong conference and trying to decide where to visit next, I revisited a listing for an Ashtanga workshop at Yoga Squared in Philadelphia, which was starting the day after we were scheduled to leave Maryland. When I had read about David Keil's workshop months earlier I had decided that taking 5 days out of our trip to stay in Philly was not a good idea. I was torn, though, because is an expert in anatomy and a certified Ashtanga teacher, so I knew I might be missing out on a chance to get some really detailed instruction on some of the poses that are the most challenging for me. Lucky for me, Brad thought it was a good idea and we decided to make an extended detour through the city of brotherly love.
The "workshop" was really five days of Mysore practice - which is basically what I had done in India - you show up at your allotted time and do your practice and the teacher adjusts/helps as needed. The difference between this experience and India was that I got to ask lots of questions and have a dialog with David about my struggle in some of the poses. In India, practice, self-observation, and a few adjustments from the teacher in your terminal pose are the mode of learning. While I learned a lot from that method, and my practice would not be the same without having that experience, I have been struggling of late with finding ease in some of the poses. And doing them 100's of times had not yet revealed the "secrets" of these poses to me.
While I can't say David revealed any "secrets," he did take the time to identify and explain the limitations in my hips and shoulders and show me how to work on opening them up in each of the poses so that the most challenging poses for me (like backbends) might one day come more easily. I also bought and watched his amazing Yoganatomy DVD. While I knew some of the information from my teacher training, it was a great refresher and went into more depth on some issues than I had learned before. I highly recommend it if you are interested in understanding how the human musculo-skeletal system works in relation to your yoga practice.
I can't say enoough good things about David as a teacher - he is extremely knowledgable, patient, good humored, and he knows how to push you to your limits and when to back off. He will be coming to Savannah in March and I am looking forward to learning even more from this gifted teacher.
I haven’t been writing for a few days in part because of laziness but also because I have been spending my “computing time” each day working on something else really exciting. I am now coordinating the Savannah Area Teachers of Yoga Association (SATYA) and I am on the committee for this year’s Global Mala Yoga for Peace Event. In past years we have worked to raise awareness about peace by bringing folks together to practice a series of 108 sun salutations in Forsyth Park. This year we are planning an event that will include 108 minutes of yoga (not all sun salutations), as well as some chanting (kirtan). As part of this year’s event we are also making an effort to engage in Yoga Seva (selfless service) and are raising money for one local and one global charity.cambodian children's fund
We have selected Park Place Outreach in Savannah and the Cambodian Children’s Fund as the beneficiaries of our fund-raising efforts.
We are planning the event for Sunday, September 21st in Johnson Square in downtown Savannah. We will begin the event with some led chanting. Following that, Mark White, owner of M Body Yoga in Jacksonville, will lead us in 108 minutes of invigorating Baptiste Power Yoga on the square. For more information or to register for the event, check out the SATYA website. If you would like to make a donation to either of the charities through SATYA, you can also do so through the SATYA website.
in the next day or so I'll gather my thoughts on our visit to Yogaville and the Qigong conference and get a new post up. In the meantime, new pics are being posted to the photos tab regularly.
We finally kicked off our road trip on Monday afternoon, beginning what we hope will be several weeks of exploration from Savannah to North Dakota. We have two known destinations – Reiserstown, Maryland for a Qigong conference and then on to Towner, North Dakota, where we need to pick our pups up from “doggie summer camp.” I need to be back in Savannah by August 27th so I can catch a plane out to Redlands for Labor Day weekend, but other than that, we don’t have many constraints.
Since we ended up leaving 4 days later than planned, we decided to bee-line it up to the Durham/Chapel Hill area the first day. About 150 miles into the trip, we heard a thunk and the car lost all its get-up-and-go. After experimenting with the acceleration a bit, Brad decided that the Turbo on our beloved Volvo had given out. Our trusty iPhone allowed me to Google for Volvo dealers in the area and we figured out there was one in Chapel Hill. Bingo. We crossed our fingers and kept on driving, arriving in time for dinner, but having missed my first planned yoga class at Ride the Breath.
We had a great meal at The Lantern in downtown Chapel Hill, and then headed over to our “Hotwired” hotel room for some sleep. We decided that getting the car fixed was our first priority so I decided to do my practice in our hotel room and then head up to the dealer by 8:00 am. We drove up the highway a few times looking for the dealer and kept wondering why we couldn’t find it. Then I noticed what looked like a lot “formerly known as” the Crown Volvo dealership – and indeed it was – the dealership had closed less than a month earlier.
We ended up driving over to Cary and dropped the car off at the dealer there and walked over to a place the service manager recommended for breakfast. After about an hour the car was fixed (under warranty!) and we were back on the road, with Turbo. Next destination: Satchidananda Ashram in Buckingham, VA, a.k.a. Yogaville.
