No Home Email, No Internet, No Phone (Again, How Annoying)
Filed Under Miscellaneous (blog matters, etc) | Leave a Comment
Apparently it’s a phone company/DSL provider problem. But they won’t be sending a technician until next week. In the meantime, please expect only intermittent posts and responses to emails.
A Reason to Get Out of Bed
Filed Under Asana, Pranayama, and Yoga Practice, Meditation | Leave a Comment
Today, when I was trying to burrow more deeply under the covers when invoked to wake by the usual sounds, I thought about the way young children or pets are eager to get out of bed and to get you out of bed, even if it is for nothing more than to say good morning or eat breakfast. The moment they open their eyes, the day looks promising. At what point does bed (even if we have had enough sleep) come to seem more desirable than getting up?
I am not particularly eager to go to work today — things are rather stressful at this juncture on my project. I do know, though, that sitting for meditation is always good. I also know that on the days I practice fully in the morning, my day is more enjoyable no matter what happens. Knowing that I have the time and space to practice if I wake timely is always a good reason to get out of bed and is what drew me out of the comfort of lying under the covers this morning.
Now that I am done with my practice, I can also enjoy what spectacular weather is on offer today. An added bonus.
Green, Red, Yellow
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Calf Loop (and enhancing the integrity of the energy flow)
Filed Under Asana, Pranayama, and Yoga Practice | Leave a Comment
When I think of the Anusara principle of calf loop, I think of playing with drinking straws as a child. I’d take the straw out of the glass and bend it back and forth. The straw would end up with a horizontal crease where it was bent — not quite a break — but the place where it bulged at the bend would prevent the straw from serving the purpose of enabling liquid to be drawn up through it. When our knees (or our elbows for that matter) are hyper-extended, I think it disrupts the energy flow from the periphery to the core, weakening the pose, and breaking the integrity of the alignment.
As one whose legs started out bowed (though less after over six solid years of working “shins in/thighs out”), my natural tendency is to hyper-extend. I find that using calf loop, I do not hyper-extend. Calf loop (also called “shin loop”) has us draw energy from the base of the shin, up the back of the lower leg, and loop it through the top of the shin and then back down the front of the leg. We wouldn’t ever start a pose thinking about calf loop, but in the flow of a pose, after the major principles are activated, including muscular energy, we can enhance muscular energy and the integrity of the alignment of the knees by focusing on calf loop. When I practice calf loop, I find that it lifts the calf muscle and draws it more firmly into the top of the shin, and moves the top of the shin forward. These actions do not bend the knee, but firm the muscles behind the lower leg, including the calf and the popliteus (which is the muscle behind the knee that flexes the knee) to the bone.
What is tricky — especially for those who tend to hyper-extend, is that getting the knee in proper alignment feels like bending the knee. If we have been out of alignment, changing our stance will feel strange and perhaps “not right” at first. The sweet subtlety of practice (whether trying to expand our ability to do poses, heal and injury, or live in better alignment overall) is learning what is true integrity in a pose and what is habit, what will serve and enhance and what does not.
Let Us Have Lettuce
Filed Under Food for the Body, Gardening, Photos | 2 Comments
Night-time temperatures forecast for the low 30sF next week. I’ll be eating some big salads in the meantime.
Staying Indoors (or Not)
Filed Under Art and Culture, Food for the Body, Gardening | Leave a Comment
Of my friends on facebook, several reveled in staying inside because of the rain yesterday. Others complained about being unable to do things that would have been better on a dry day. Reporters and anchor persons seemed to think it newsworthy whether the rain will impact football or baseball games. How about telling us whether the rain we are getting is optimal for the native flora and fauna and how it is impacting the farmers? We seem as a society to have forgotten the relationship of the weather to food.
Dia de los Muertos
Filed Under Art and Culture, Community and Family, Photos | Leave a Comment
