Hands up, I surrender

I am beginning to surrender, yes I know, some would say about time, but there just seem to be so many things in practice as in life that are out of my control and however much I want to influence their outcome I can’t . But they do say things happen for a reason.

When I came back from Sri Lanka at the beginning of the year my practice seemed to be really moving on, binding Pasasana at AshtangaLanka, standing up from the bolster in backbends, I really thought it was starting to happen. I had worked hard and I suppose to a point I thought I deserved all the little successes. I had the year planned out, Mysore in June, after the company moved, going there with a decent practice.

Then suddenly 20th January, life hit the pause button. There followed the horrible 10 days in Hospital, followed by nearly 4 months of trying to recover my strength and energy. I never thought it would take so long, in the mean time the company move date got put back again and I discovered that the Shala in Mysore wasn’t going to be open for my originally planned dates. Practice  was doing what I could, accepting where it was, trying not to force it along, however frustrating it was.One of my Teachers made the comment that she thought my illness was in part caused by my working so hard at my practice, I had depleted my body of what it needed to fight off what really should have been a routine infection.

Finally the move date was confirmed for July, but Mysore wasn’t open again until October. I decided rather than leave to stick it out, keep doing my practice until I could confirm everything. Practice seemed to be happening again, then the Garbha incident, oh shit my knee is still all this time later not able to do Mari D on the first side, I havn’t tried Garbha since. Instead of striving once again I had to just surrender to what my body could do, not what I wanted it to do.

Since the lurgy of 2 weeks ago my body is still recovering, since January any cough or IBS or anything else seems to have taken far longer to heal than in the past, practice over the last couple of weeks has been sporadic, a few times Surya Namaskar has been it, at the Shala I have done it all, put paid for it in the days after.

I suppose this proves I’m learning, finding awareness, finding acceptance, holding my hands up to practice and to life, giving up on being able to influence outcomes.

At least this Friday it didn’t take 2 hours to get home. I have struggled with my backbends lately, mainly because I’m so tired when I get to them, so tonight I decided to get off the Ashtanga wheel and play for an hour. This turned into 2 hours of standing with added Eileen vinyasa poses for fun and some forbidden second  series to open my back up, then the full range of UD against the wall, on the mat, walking in, rocking etc, nice to be able to do backbends without feeling like I was going to collapse.

 I won’t say I don’t care about standing up, but it’s got to the point that I don’t think it will ever happen,maybe next lifetime as Kino is want to say. I do all the things to try and make it happen, even though I know it won’t. But was it precisely because  I wasn’t striving or pushing that I managed to drop back on to my bolster on top of just one block, rock a couple of times and stand up, does giving up make the seemingly impossible, possible?

Coming Back

After Sunday’s good Shala practice, then hanging out with good company in the fresh air and sunshine for hours, feeling like I was getting better, well the lurgy and IBS finally abating at least, I thought things were improving. That was until I got back to the office on Monday with its sub zero air conditioning making my chest wheeze, my head split, the muscles in the sides of my back ache and realising just how sore my stomach had become. The whole place is moaning about the aircon, on one of the hottest days of the year people were wandering around with Fleeces on! People took warm up breaks, going outside into the sun to defrost.

So after a day of feeling worse as the day went by I got home and tried to practice, despite the warmth it just didn’t happen, I felt awful and abandoned the project after the Surya’s, ending up curled up in the foetal position on my mat. Tuesday night I tried again, I did get as far as Bhujapidasana this time, but my back and stomach were aching so much that I crashed down trying to do Urdva Dhanurasana, once back on my back I ended up having a 30 minute Savasana, it would have been longer but the phone rang, for Savasana read snooze zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…..

I am finding it really difficult lately to get any consistency in my practice, it keeps feeling like I am starting over, then when I do get a couple in a row and feel a bit more open, something comes along and screws it up. Maybe my body is surreptitiously trying to save its consistency for Kino and Sharath in the coming weeks.

Last night I finally managed a full practice, I had hoped to get to at least Navasana and do some backbends, Navasana came and I thought Ok I will do Bhuja and of course Bhuja is followed by Supta K and on a warm humid night it was easy to bind the hands and cross the feet. After Supta Kurmasana it suddenly doesn’t seem so far to the end, Garbha is a crappy faff thanks to the left knee, I do hope it recovers before I head to India. maybe I should have watched THIS before the garbha Experiment. More proof that hardly eating since last Friday has made Pasasana sooo much easier, maybe they should rename it anorexicasana. Followed by some surprisingly good backbends, but again nowhere near where they can be, I really need to do backbends every day for the strength in the arms and the intensity in the upper back.

I just hope I can get another satisfying practice tonight, I think it’s partly mentally grading my practice, I have expectations, knowing what I am capable of and being disappointed when it doesn’t happen.

Back at the Labour Camp more new rules and regulations, after the no food and drink at your desk policy, new stealth time and attendance system, now they banned Radio’s in the workshop. Those jobs are mind numblingly tedious, and all because they wont pay for the broadcast licence, the guys and girls in there look even more like Battery Hens.