Day 284: Back to teaching Yin Yoga

Tags

connective tissue, fascia, joints, Yin Yoga, yoga, yoga and aging, yoga and flexibility

When I started my yoga teacher training I was sure I would come out and teach Yin Yoga. I did a little.. and I subbed Yin classes here and there but either the timing never worked out for me to have a Yin spot or someone else was hired to teach it. It seems Victoria has an abundant number of Yin Yoga teachers.

For those of you who don’t know Yin Yoga is a style of yoga that involves long holds, usually while being seated or lying on the floor. Sometimes props are used, sometimes not. There are lots of hip openers helping prepare the body for long periods of seated meditation. The energy in a Yin class is quiet, calm and the focus inward.

Yin Yoga is a practice that technically doesn’t target the muscles at all despite it’s ability to make practitioners incredibly flexible. Yin Yoga targets connective tissues, including ligaments, joints, fascia, and even bones to a certain extent. During the postures muscles are encouraged to relax so that the deeper tissues can be stimulated instead. The stimulation/stress is believed to cause a “healing response” in the tissues improving strength and a slight lengthening. The areas targeted tend to be where we feel “stiffness“, especially as we age, even though we usually attribute the feeling of stiffness to our muscles.  In Yin Yoga practitioners get incredibly deep into the body and this can prove to be very intense and challenging sometimes despite Yin being thought of as a beginner class.

So I am back to a regular spot now teaching Yin.. ironically at the first studio where I fell in love with Yoga and was introduced to Yin. Life really is a big funny circle isn’t it? I don’t have many regular yet. I am still building the class and getting to know the studio from the “other side” but so far I am enjoying myself and getting the feel once more for this incredible practice that changed my life.

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Day 225: Restorative class

Tags

restorative yoga, stillness, Yin Yoga, yoga, yoga meditation

I often incorporate restorative postures into my classes but I don’t often get a chance to teach a full restorative class. I have had an opportunity to sub a few ninety minute restorative classes the last few weeks which has been interesting. In many ways it is similar to Yin Yoga (which I teach often)  but in other ways it is quite different. The long held postures set a mood but energetically the purpose feels completely different. Yin seems to be more about riding an edge of sensation where restorative is more about rest. Both styles encourage gentle release but somehow it happens in a very different way. I notice after Yin Yoga students tend to more “spaced out”. For some reason this doesn’t seem to be the case after restorative yoga. I personally attract more to Yin Yoga, probably because I have more experience with the energetic feeling of it from my past experience with martial arts. I am enjoying teaching the restorative yoga but it is still a little new feeling and I find myself a bit at loss about what to say. Thankfully long periods of not saying anything are common in this type of yoga so I suspect my silence doesn’t seem too out of place.  I do feel a lack knowledge about this kind of yoga though. I would like to take a few more restorative classes myself.. and read the book Relax and Renew by Judtih Lasater.

Day 187: I love teaching Yin Yoga

Tags

being in the present moment, Meditation, mindfulness, monkey mind, Yin Yoga

I am really enjoying teaching Yin Yoga. At first I thought it was because the pace was slow so I had lots of time to think about what to say. What I am realizing now however is that I love teaching Yin because I get to tell myself over and over what I need to hear. Slow down, focus on the breath, come into the present moment… be still, quiet…  See how it feels to just “stay”.

Yin Yoga is kind of like giving yourself a holiday from yourself. Or at least from the chattering mind we carry along with ourselves most of the time. The beautiful thing about Yin Yoga is how the practice of becoming aware of the present moment starts to seep out into the rest of our lives after a while. During practice we are reminded again and again to be present. We face our sensations with bravery, staying with them rather than shifting or avoiding what is there. Once this feeling is recognized it starts to become apparent how often we aren’t present in the rest of our lives. We live in the past… worrying or fretting about what we did or said. Or we jump to the future.. wondering or worrying about what will happen. We are constantly escaping. Yin Yoga encourages us to be present. It is almost like being a child again (minus the “Omigod I feel like I am 80!” sensations we might get when coming out of Yin postures). I almost always get this deep sense of relief after doing Yin Yoga. I really hope this is something I can pass onto students.

Day 165: A long Yin Yoga practice for me!

Tags

Meditation, slowing down, stillness, Yin Yoga, yoga meditation

The baby had a good long nap.. which meant I had a good long yoga practice. Lately a lot of my yoga practices have involved going through the classes I am teaching so I can see how they feel in my body. There is a lot of “in and out” of postures. I take notes. I run to look something up on the internet to make sure I am doing it correctly. I see how things “flow” together and if it feels natural. I really enjoy looking at my yoga practice this way but it does change it. There is less of a meditative quality. My practice becomes more about teaching and less about me. I suspect preparing for classes will take less time once I have more teaching experience so I am trying not to worry about this change of pace. It is really important that I keep developing and deepening my own practice though. I want to focus on making sure that I take the time for myself, not just for my classes.

With this in mind I had a LONG yin yoga practice today just for me. And you know what? It was REALLY HARD to stay in the postures for five minutes. I used to find it pretty easy but the way I have been practicing lately is so different. I actually had the body aches again coming out the yin postures. I found myself wondering when the hell my meditation bell would go off so I could get out of the damn postures. It was sort of funny. I have some time set aside tomorrow for a yin yoga session and I am curious to see if day two feels the same. It certainly helped me feel compassion for anyone who I might be teaching yin yoga to that struggles with the long holds.

Day 151: Oh yummy yin yoga how I love thee

Tags

quiet yoga, slowing down, yin yoga. meditation

I often incorporate a few Yin Yoga postures into my yoga classes. I can’t help it. It is one of my favorite types of yoga. At the end of a yoga class slowing down and becoming quiet is so powerful. I think when I was introduced to Yin Yoga I really needed to meditate but I was completely unattracted  to the idea of sitting still. Yin Yoga fooled me. I believed I was doing  a physical yoga practice. I was “doing” something… but really what I need to do was “not do”. Yin Yoga provides a nice balance between “doing” and “not doing“. There is just enough movement to keep me alert while still having enough stillness to allow me to reach a meditative type state.

I taught my first full Yin class last night and I loved it. It feels very natural to be teaching Yin  Yoga. The slow pace as a new teacher is quite easy to work with too. I am just filling in for a teacher with this class but I think I will start trying to teach more Yin classes throughout Victoria. Energetically it just feels really good to me.

Day 132: Skimping on the important stuff..

Tags

Buddhism, Meditation, yoga

When I teach yoga I always do a short settling in period at the beginning of class. We usually lie down and focus on the breath. I try to really hit home the point of coming into the room.. focusing on leaving the rest of our day behind us. I often talk about the inhale bringing us into the present moment and the exhale being an opportunity to let go of anything we don’t need. At the end of class I always get the students to do a longish Savasanah. I often combine a bit of meditation in with these two parts of the class. I utterly and totally believe sitting quietly in meditation is perhaps the most important part of yoga…..but you know what?? I often skimp on this at home when I am doing my own practice.

I think it is funny that I drop these out of my own personal practice. I suppose I justify it somehow by thinking I don’t have much time for yoga so I should cram as much of the physical stuff in there as I can. I often do slow yin style which is sort of a meditation of its own.. but really formally settling in and out of a yoga practice makes such a difference. I have decided to make sure I include these things in my home practice from now on. My last yoga practice? It was BEAUTIFUL. Yup.Todays lesson for myself? Don’t skimp on the quiet parts.. it is what makes yoga different from your average work out in the gym.

Day 114: Centering exercises and meditations

Tags

centering visualizations, meditation techniques

We had a guest teacher come in to share some centering visualizations and meditation techniques with us. I always LOVE this sort of thing and slip into very strong visualizations easily. Not everyone does though. I wondered if a few of my fellow yoga teacher training students were bored out their skulls during this class. I know my husband would have been. I have done workshops like this with him before. Him dying of boredom.. me all excited because the fiery flame of some Buddhist sacred dog from a castle in heaven just came down and blessed me. It is funny how my husband and I have such similar ideas about spirituality despite taking such different paths to get to those conclusions.

Although I had never done the exercises we covered they all felt very familiar to me. They had elements of Chi Kung, Tonglen and even Western Magick in them. A lot of the focus was on clearing out unwanted energies and waking up to our pure spiritual self. I felt all cleaned out and shiny on my “insides” after.

Day 98: Well if I can’t do physical yoga at least I can sing right?

Tags

knee injury, mantra, Shintaido, yoga

My body seems to be falling apart.. Okay, so maybe I am being a little over-dramatic but I am REALLY having some challenges physically right now. First my right knee got hurt, then I hurt my right hand using a hatchet, then some mystery red swelling showed up in my left foot making it sore, now my LEFT knee is hurting. What the hell is going on?????

I don’t think this has as much to do with all the yoga I have been doing as it would seem. The yoga we have been doing is pretty gentle compared to what I am used to. I have done LOTS more yoga in the past with no issues. Lots of really active intense deep insane stretching yoga. The only really difference is that we are “refining our postures” a lot more. I have had to come out of some comfortable old habits with my body but I haven’t been going anywhere new that is particularly deep.

Pain is an interesting thing. It really gets in the way. I can feel myself getting a bit snappy. My temper is a little shorter than usual. I can see this happening. I can control it to some extent but it is a little wearing. I really don’t do “delicate” well. I sure hope I can sort out how to deal with this sort of thing before I am elderly.

Thankfully last night’s teacher training was about MANTRA. Yay!. We got to sing, chant and do all kinds of lovely gentle moving postures.The teacher also took us through a toning & movement meditation from the Shintaido martial arts tradition (Shintaido Tenshingoso Sei). It was lovely and very gentle.  I will certainly do it again in my own time and would like to commit it to memory. I have posted a video of the sequence below but unfortunately can’t find one with sound (which really makes the experience fuller).

Day 61: The things we remember from when we were young

Tags

mantak chia, Meditation, toaist yoga

Yesterday I was exhausted. I knew we were going to a friend’s house in the afternoon/evening so I had planned to do some yoga when the baby napped midday. I fell asleep with her instead. I think my body is having a hard time adjusting to the extra load on my schedule with this teacher training. Plus it is the peak of fall allergy season which always drains me.

We got home late so I just did a small meditation in bed once the baby had settled. I did the Microcomsic Orbit Meditation (by Mantak Chia) that I learnt years ago when I was 19. I know it very well and don’t really even have to think about it anymore when I do it. My body just remembers the energy centers and points. It all feels very natural and easy. Just what I needed. I’ll put a little more effort into yoga tonight.

Day 52: The Five Elements and Rubber Man

Tags

Five Elements, paulie zink, Taoist, taoist yoga, Yin Yoga

I finished going through the asanas on that CD by Paulie Zink and all I can say is that his beginner class sure didn’t feel beginner to me. He did do several poses I suck at though. One of them is Shoelace. I don’t know what it is about this pose. I find it so difficult. I don’t feel like I have tightness in my outer thighs but when I do this pose I feel an incredible amount of stiffness. I have this with my bum too (yes my bum). I never feel stiff or sore in my bum but then when I get a massage and the practitioner gets to my bum.. OUCH! I guess my bum is really tense. Why don’t I normally feel it? Anyone else have that?

One thing that Paulie did touch on in this beginner class though was how some of the postures relate to Taoism and the Five Elements (or Wu Xing). I was very interested to hear him talk about this and hope he gets into more detail with the other lessons I still have to watch. The Five Element System is something that I have had ample exposure to and I find the whole thing fascinating and incredibly relevant to my own health. There are many systems like this out there but for some reason the Chinese one is the one I relate to the most.