One Year Of Yoga

This winter has marked one of Blacksburg’s coldest in recent memory. Still, in a small building on 401 S. Main St., a fitness studio has managed to keep its customers cozy with a balmy average temperature of 104 degrees — and that’s just part of the normal workout

via Hot yoga turns up the heat in order to maximize the burn – CollegiateTimes.com.

The P90X Videos have a strictly yoga class. My husband and I did this one together. It was similar to a tough Vinyasa Class I’ve had. I was actually very impressed with the flow of the poses and definitely felt like I had a good workout when I was done.  It seemed like we hit all my favorite poses.  He called crow pose by a different name.  I’m not sure if different people have different names for the poses, or if he just mixed up the names.  There was definitely a different feeling doing it our living room. Yoga studio’s are more conducive to a meditative practice.

What a wonderful yoga class today in a beautiful studio with windows looking out into the rainforest. This class was taught by a Maya Yoga intructor and was really fun and challenging. There was a nice energy you could feel. The class was two hours long, but moved so quickly, only my muscles realized it. We attempted Scorpion Pose, and I was only able to do the set up for it today. Yesterday we tried it also and my muscles were still feeling it. I did not feel strong enough to try getting my feet off the ground. The instructor helped me with a shoulder opening pose instead which was very helpful. The studio was far, and down a dirt road. It took about an hour to get there, but definitely worth the trip. I think I will try to make it there again soon!

I didn’t sleep very well last night so I was hoping a morning class would help me energize for the day. We have so much to do to get ready for our trip back home next week and I was thinking about all the things I needed to get done instead of getting some z’s. The class included a 7 minute meditation, which actually went by a lot faster than I expected. It was a nice class, not too fast, but just enough intensity to make me feel like I did something. It definitely helped me feel more awake and ready for what the day will bring!

Today’s class was packed. This was definitely a popular class and intructor. She called it a “Yin/Yan practice”, in which she alternated a slower Yin pose with a more active Yan pose. It was different and it’s always good to shake things up a bit, but it made the class feel a little choppy.

I went to the noon class and I was really glad I did. I like the instructor and it was a pretty good well rounded class. I knew I’d feel better once I did it. I think the winter weather may be contributing to my hybernating tendencies. I look outside and just want to stay home. We’ll see what tomorrow brings.

This morning’s class was good. I took the early morning class which helped get it out of the way for the day. The only thing is, my muscles are so stiff in the mornings.

Today was a good basics class. Fun to practice basic poses and really think about your alignment in the poses. I don’t seem to need blocks anymore in the twisting poses which is convenient. I have never liked using props. It could be from my Bikram background. Bikram is against using props, because he feels that people start depending on them. We did use blocks for some resorative back poses at the end of class. I always feel unsure about these. It is never clear to me where the block should hit on my back. I always worry that I’m going to do it wrong and make my back sore. I’ll have to look into this in my yoga anatomy book.

I liked today’s class. We really worked our quads today. Also, my hip flexor muscle started talking to me. It said “I am not warmed up enough, take it easy”. So, I backed off of the pose and it calmed down. Every day is different that is for sure.
One question I sometimes ponder is why some teachers are so certain they need everyone in a straight line. Today’s teacher was an “everyone in a straight line” guy. The bad part of this is I layed my mat down behind, and in the middle, of two girls and he made me move forward and squeeze in between them. They were very nice and each moved over a bit to accomodate, but I don’t understand the point of this. I could see if we were spread out on opposite sides of the room, but just a little in front or behind each other to respect one’s personal space? Does this really need to be corrected? Sometimes I think it is a sign of a new teacher that feels like they want the class to look like the environment in which they were trained. I guess I will never know for sure. I just know that when I am teaching, I will not do this to my students.

Today’s class was fun. The instructor seemed really creative. We did some new poses. One exercise we did was while laying in Savasana, we lifted our heads about an inch off the ground, while flexing our feet. I was surprised at how difficult this was.