Category: Musings

Breathe Yogi

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“If you can breathe, you can do yoga.”

Krishnamacharya

Through yoga I learned proper breathing. I learned to breathe deep into my belly. I learned that my breath is my friend and even more, we can play. Lengthen the inhales and exhales, also pause, so called breath retention. I learned that breathing is much more than an automated process to survive.

Working with our breath in yoga is called pranayama. Built from the terms prana, which means life energy and ayama, control or extend. Through pranayama and the different breathing techniques, we control our life energy or even extend the life force.

In the Ashtanga tradition, we use Ujjayi breath during practice. We breathe through our nostrils, and when exhaling, we constrict the back of our throat, generating a sound, that reminds us on the sound of the ocean. Ujjayi breath creates the rhythm of our practice, while building and keeping the body heat inside. There are a lot of benefits, such as regulating blood pressure, increasing the amount of oxygen in the blood and many more.

I found Ujjayi breath very helpful to keep my focus. It’s my music when practicing. My rhythm. Deepening my asanas.

Bring your awareness to your breath and just observe. Start a good relationship with your breath, become friends. And eventually, extend your life force!

Yoga like a boss!

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Happy to recommend a brand new webpage, that launched some days ago: yogalikeaboss.com

No, it’s not my 3rd one 😉 However I feel very honored to be one of the authors!

Norma and Philipp, two passionate athletes and yogis, created this page. Their approach is to establish a platform, that helps searching for yoga teachers, retreats, travels, books, clothes and lifestyle.

For all my German speaking readers, check it out and let’s support them growing!

 

Reality check

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If you’re stuck in a rut, if your routine and habits lost all its ease and you’re seeing yourself singing the blues with no reason at all – it’s time for a change darling!

No matter if it’s about your practice or any other part of your life, if you want something different, you have to do something different. Instead of reinventing the wheel, start with just one piece of the puzzle of your daily routine and see what happens. Be creative! Surprise yourself! Don’t allow your laziness to take over.

From time to time we need to change. It might be just a little habit, or something larger is due for a make over or even a replacement. Your measurement is your mood. Are you happy? Smiling? Are you feeling grounded, welcoming each day with open arms? No? Change! It’s all up to you. Try something new!

You don’t know where to start? What about trying this:

Change your morning routine. Set your alarm 10 minutes earlier and instead of pushing the snooze button, start your day with some pranayama.

Give yourself an easy start, stay in bed, lying down. Do some deep belly breaths. Belly out when inhaling, expand your rips, lift your chest. When exhaling, chest first, ribs and belly in. Slowly. Deep. Count for 5 for each inhale and each exhale.

After a couple of deep breath, stretch yourself, arms over your head, get long! Bring your knees into your chest, hug yourself before you slowly lift up to sit. Either sit in your lotos variation or on the edge of your bed and practice some minutes Nadi Shodhana, alternate nostril breathing. As this is a powerful technique to settle the mind, body, and emotions, we usually practice Nadi Shodhana when we feel nervous, overwhelmed or stressed. However, balancing the right and left hemispheres of the brain also has its quality early morning, it feels like preparing the energetic channels for the day.

You’ll start clear and balanced into your day!

Relax babe

Kathrin2 Comments

I bet you know this situation: the teacher shows something, it looks easy. You give it a try — impossible. The teacher breaks it down into single steps, explains the technique and it looks, guess what, super easy. You give it another try — impossible. I mean, this kind of never-in-this-life-possible. Everything in your body is asking ‚are you kidding me?‘ Alright, it’s not your body talking to you, but your ego. Telling you, ‚you’ll never be there’, ‚you’re not good/flexible/strong (choose your word) enough‘!

Your ego is quite intelligent, if this strategy is not working, there’s the opposite: ‚go for it, work hard, push yourself, don’t give up before you can do it‘!

Babe, that’s not better at all. Both is not doing anything good to you. Relax. Make it part of your practice to turn that ego talk off. You will immediately be open to feel, trust and be easy to yourself. It allows your body to try. Allows yourself to laugh when falling, to appreciate your practice as it is. It opens you to be grateful for each baby step.

Let me give you an example: jump throughs. These wonderful transitions between asanas. They look so natural. Have you ever tried to lift your feet in a forward fold, in Uttanasana? See. My ego told me, as long as I can’t do this, I won’t be able to jump through. And even more. My ego told me, I’ll never be a proper Ashtangi without being able to jump through. I didn’t stop working on it, but frankly, without much effort, my aim was rather making the transitions more fluent, than to jump.

One day I managed to send my ego back to sleep before practice. It was like a ‚click’ in my mind, all of a sudden I knew I had to position my hands slightly different and I walked through. Ohhhh! I know, that’s not jumping, but my hands stayed flat at the mat. This was showing my body the way. This was the moment I knew, I can do it. I can jump, no need to float before.

It works. In baby steps. Get your mind on track! Relax. Do your practice and let it happen when it’s time. Allow your ego to have a break. Allow your ego to stop texting all day long. Relax, babe.

Oooooooooommm

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OM is a symbol. OM is a mantra. OM is sound. OM is the initial sound of the universe. It vibrates at the frequency of 432 Hz, the same vibrational frequency found throughout everything in nature. Meaning, by chanting OM, we are physically tuning in to that frequency. The physical effect on the body is a slowing down of the nervous system and calming the mind, which also allows our blood pressure to decrease. Next to that, chanting OM at the beginning and ending of a yoga class, sets the practice into a frame and helps us to kind of login to our practice.

Honestly, when I started practicing yoga, I was particularly looking for a class without chanting, incense sticks, Hindu gods, singing bowls or any other stuff, that I related to this ‘spiritual chichi’. Well, now I know, it was nothing but this childish behavior of ‘when I close my eyes with my hands and can’t see anything, nobody can see me’. Practicing yoga just on a physical level is simply not possible. This doesn’t mean, that all of a sudden every yogi turns into a highly spiritual being 😉 However yoga is working in and on us, on different levels, body and mind. Thank god, I wasn’t aware of it when I started!

The first class I attended with an opening OM scared me a lot. I tried to just ignore it, as I liked the rest of the class. But one day, I just did it. Ups. What an amazing vibration in my body! It felt awesome. Just that. Getting more used to it over time, I learned to love it. Not caring about the sound of my voice, we do it all together and hey, no judgment please! Hearing my own voice is sometimes embarrassing, particularly when teaching Ashtanga and doing the opening prayer as call-and-response…. However, that’s part of the game! And beautifully settling in our cells….

Due to my own experience, I was quite careful with my students, but finally started to finish my classes with an OM. I love this grounding feeling going through my body, that completes a class. As expected, my students were scared. All I could hear was a little humming somewhere in the back. Next time I told them, we will continue doing this and it’s not religious, no spiritual reason, but physical. Be bold and give it a try, the louder the more vibration you’ll feel in your body. I could hear some tender OMs….

Yes yogis, go for it!

Body talk

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This morning, when I tried to get out of my bed, I had an enthusiastic ‚good morning‘ from my gluts, hamstrings, psoas and deltoids. Oh oh…. I had a gentle (true!) come back to my Ashtanga practice yesterday and my body seems not to be over happy about this. Although I didn’t get any complains yesterday, this morning I heard my body loud and clear:

„What the f***? I thought you gave it up? I liked this lazy Yin stuff! Cmon, Ashtanga again, sure? Let’s see what you think of the nice package I’ve prepared for you: overall stiffness, sore muscles, shortened tendons.“

My dear body, please stop being difficult, stop complaining! I promise to be mindful, respecting your mood of the day and accepting any limitations. Let’s have some fun together and rock this life!

On the mat ♥

“I don’t want to see your body doing asanas. I want to see your mind doing yoga.”

Kathrin3 Comments

What drives you? Wanna reach a certain posture? Get ‘better’? Babe, honestly, that’s not what yoga is about. Who cares if you can do Garbha Pindasana? Does it change who you are, if you can bind in Marichyasana D? Is it important? Nope. It’s just your ego complaining and trying to convince you that you’re not good enough. Your ego telling you, when you can do this posture, you’ll be happy.

Yoga is not just physically. Be prepared to struggle and questioning yourself. From time to time you might think, that you’re slipping back into your old story. But this is not even possible, as you have changed, there is no back! There might be battles with your thoughts and old demons – yep, this is exactly the way to grow.

Some time ago I wrote a post about my learning that stiffness is rather in my mind than in my body – when I reached Kurmasana and Supta Kurmasana. I was not aiming to go into this posture, surprisingly I just did it, with some adjustments from my teacher. Of course it felt amazing and I was so happy I can do it (hello ego!), because it was such a surprise. But you know what? It’s not important, a natural development, just this.

Allow your mind doing yoga. Quieten your ego for a while and be happy without a reason. Allow your body to move and improve in its own pace, without forcing anything. Let it happen. Breathe through your practice without expectations. Stop the ego talk and start riding the flow. Enjoy your practice. Without any additional effort, your body will change, your flow will get more fluent and easy, your breath deeper. Allow yourself to be yourself, exactly where you are in that precious moment.

Be patient yogi

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A difficult word for me. Patience. I’m that quick type of person…. doing everything now, all at once… Injuries hit us usually the moment it hurts most, to get our full attention. Telling us to stop. Whatever we are doing.

On a physical level, it’s not just about stepping back, doing what is possible. Nope. It’s a sign to stop fully. Listen. Look. Understand. It’s about learning the tough way. There’s another level. An injury is never just physical, but also mental. Healing can’t just happen physically. And that’s the difficult part. Trying to understand, why. What’s wrong right now? What’s holding me back, what’s actually not good, not healthy in my life? What are the side effects of the injury? What movements are not possible? What about breathing? This tells us more about where to look at. What are the consequences? Do they matter? Eventually, there’s a person around mirroring? Ups. Be honest with yourself yogi. Once identified, let go. Detach. Say bye bye. What ever is required, do so. You need your health. You need your peace.

I’m back on the mat now, restarting carefully. Yin Yoga only. I miss my Ashtanga practice like hell, but even demoing in class is not good for me. I don’t stop trying to figure out what’s behind. I know there’s more, I know my body talks to me. I’m getting better in understanding. And I’m rebuilding my practice step by step, developing a practice of patience.

Next level

Kathrin4 Comments

Puh. Whatever this means! Just received my confirmation: I’m a RYT 500 now! Huuuuuuhhhhh…. And you know what? It feels amazing. Yes, surprisingly different. My knowledge in terms of anatomy and Yoga philosophy increased a lot and finally settles in my head.

Today I teached first time since I’m back from India and my students mirrored why I love teaching so much. Their faces are adorable – I’m so grateful for getting so much back 🙂

What’s next? A Yoga shala in my garden for workshops? Yeah! Teach more classes in Yoga studios? Yep, I’m ready!

Hiphip hurrahhhhh!

Mind stiff, not body.

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Kurmasana and Supta Kurmasana – I tried them long ago and wondered how this should be ever possible. It felt as if my arms were close to break! Meaning most times, I skipped them or tried half-assed, of course without any effort.

Some weeks ago, my teacher pushed my shoulders down, closed the gap between arms and legs and I could walk my feet forward. No pain at all. Ups. So simple?

Next step, Supta Kurmasana. Turn the arms, palms face up, a strap to help, walk the feet in, cross and head down on the mat. Ups. Here we go. Easy.

What? Hold on! Easy? Ok, my feet should be behind my head for full posture in Supta, but hell, I’m quite close! And babe, this is an excellent example of how my mind stopped me, while my body can do. My teacher showed my body how to go into the posture, my mind in awe-stricken silence.

Let’s allow our bodies to work and send our minds into a well deserved break while practicing!