Another Injury...What´s Happening!?

First, six weeks rehabilitation from broken ribs, then one week of a bad cold missing the workshop with Dena, and now...a sprained knee! Yipee! Yoga bliss was short. Sunday´s and today´s practices were great. I felt strong and flexible and energetic and soo happy to be able to practice fully again. And then, at the end of the practice, while getting into supta virasana, my right knee pops.

I don´t know what happened. I do that pose every day. I was really warmed up. Maybe I got into the pose too quickly. Maybe my knee was a bit misaligned. Maybe there is no use in asking why.

On the way back from work today I was litening to a pod cast with one of my favorite Buddhist teachers, Gil Fonsdale. The talk is called "Working With Difficulties". It was just the right talk for me right now! He suggested that how you look at difficulties can change the way you perceive them. Difficulties, or obstacles, is the path, the dharma. Being open and aware, accepting them and seeing what you can learn from them instead of seeing them as problems, can profoundly change the way you experience them. Then they become openings to growth instead of walls you walk into.

I so do want to have an injury free, pain free, full practice. But, I probably have something more to learn!

Things Are Never Perfect

After 6 weeks with broken ribs, and one week of a bad cold during Dena Kingsburgs workshop, I am, hopefully, back on track. This mornings practice went really well. Well, if I disregard the fact that my right wrist has started hurting when I do up- and down dog and jump throughs. When I told my teacher and said that there always seems to be something in the way of a full, energetic pain free practice, she said: "welcome to the club". I guess that´s the thing. Things will never be perfect. That´s why you have to enjoy and appreciate every moment as it is, because it will never be perfect. And when it does feel perfect, enjoy, because tommorrow it might not be.

Top Performance With Vegan Diet

Well, I guess I was not ment to fullfill Denas workshop. I am home with a bad cold, trying not to be bitter, grr. I was really looking forward to the workshop, and I paid a lot of money for it too! Ok, there it is said, so now I can move on...

Taking the time to surf a bit about one of my favorite topics besides yoga: health and nutrition. One of my concerns this year has been with topping my energy levels. I came across athlete and vegan Brendan Brazier, who has written a few books on the subject, and has some really informative videos on his website.

http://www.brendanbrazier.com/vega/index.html

It didn´t work to embed, so you have to visit the website.

Workshop With Dena Kingsberg

Today was the first day of a week long workshop with Dena Kingsberg at my shala in Stockholm. She has two classes of 2,5 hours every morning, and I am going to the earlier one. I was a bit worried about getting up at 5 am, but this morning it went fine. We´ll see during the week how it feels. I start working tommorrow, so it might get a bit tougher then. Also, today my throat is feeling really soar, so we will see what happens. Bloody unlucky to get sich when somehting like this is happening. But, this whole year seems to be about realizing that nothing ever turns out the way you predict and hope for.

Anyways, it was a great class. She held a led class, focusing on elongating the spine. Before getting into any pose, it is important to first elongate the spine (using the badhas to help), then twist or bend or fold. If not, the vertebraes can be compressed, and that might cause probelms in the long run. The arms and legs are used as a tool to help the body understand to suck in the belly and elongate the spine. Even withou arms and legs she said, we can still do yoga. Everything important is in the torso.

She said one nice thing(well several, but here is one): there is no use in trying to impress people with trying to reach further that you can. The people that are worth impressing are not impressed, and the people not worth impressing don´t understand, and therefore there is no use in impressing them either!

The idea of the practice is to remove obstacles; physical obstacles in the body, obstacles in the nadis that inhibit the flow of prana and mental obstacles that inhibit you to see things as they really are.

New Insights, I Think

Two weeks since the accident, and I´m feeling better. I stopped taking the pain killers after four days. They made me feel really bad.

I went to the shala yesterday, to pick up my yoga mat for the trip, and do some pranayama. It felt great. I got so much energy from the other yogis. Gosh, I´m really missing the practice!

But, to the insight. Several things have happened this year that have made me realize that to be able to be happy and balanced, the only possible way of handeling life is to be flexibel, and go with the flow of things. To not have so many expectations. In whatever happens, there can be something good. During my meditation classes, I had another insight (what an insightful year!), and that was that even though you experience pain, perhaps somewhere in your body, or in your soul, you can always find a pleasant feeling somewhere in your body, or a peaceful space in your mind. The teacher spoke about having focus and width at the same time. First, it sounded almost impossible, but when I tried it, it was an amazing feeling! At the same time that I was focusing on the sensation of the breath under my nose, I could feel my whole body. Hard to explain how it felt, but it was a very expansive feeling. Same with the pain and pleasure thing.

So, even though I won´t be able to do so much ashtanga at Yoga Plus, I´m sure I will have another focus, and perhaps something really good will happen. Maybe I will develop in some area that I hadn´t anticipated (cause I´m trying not to anticipate....:-). I´m bringing two books from the Bihar School of Yoga: "Mula Bandha" and "Yoga And Psycology". I´ll do pranayama and meditation and hopefully I can do some asanas as well. Whatever happens, it´ll be great!

Broken Ribs...

Really bad luck and bad timing. But, accidents happen, and the best thing is to try to accept it and do the best of it. I´ll be going on a yoga holiday soon, and I guess I won´t be able to do much yoga for the next 4 weeks or something. And in the begining of August, Dena Kingsberg is coming to Stockholm, but hopefully I will have healed sufficiently by then to be able to do atleast a modified practice.

So, what has happened? I was invited yesterday by my brother in law to go "Segwaying". It´s a kind of vehicle that goes forward when you lean forward, and stops when you lean back. It looks very peaceful and easy. All was going well until we were supposed do go downhill a quite steep gravel slope. Somehow my segway got a backspinn or something, and the next thing I knew I was falling over it in full speed. I landed right on the wheel with my rib cage. I´m glad I had a helmet, or I would have had a cuncussion as well! My first thought was that I had broken my ribs. Then everyone was saying (denial I guess), that I was probably just bruised. So, we went back , and then we went for dinner. All the time the pain was getting worse and worse. On my way back home, I decided to go to the hospital to check it out.

Well, after four looooong hours at the emergency, I finaly got to see a doctor who said that I most probably have fractured ribs. Healing time 4-8 weeks. Nothing to do but take pain killers. Lots of them! I am taking three kinds, three times a day (poor liver)! He said that it was important to manage the pain. I looked it up on the net, and it says that it´s important to be able to breath in deeply so that the lungs can heal probably. Otherwise there is a greater risk for lung infection. Good thing I know how to do pranayama! The pain is really bad when I inhale deeply, and whenever I move! I also have pain in my neck. Hopefully that will go away soon. Hope it´s not whiplash or anything, but that it´s just pain from the muslces straining in the fall. The pain is said to get worse the coming days, and then it will subside slowly.

I won´t be doing any yoga for the next weeks. Too painful to just move! I don´t know how soon I can start doing asanas again. I do beleive it´s good to not be completly still when injured, but still take it easy. Anyone have any experience of this? I´d be glad for some advice.

A Time To Reflect

The summer holiday is a perfect time to stop, a space inbetween, a time to reflect and think about what has been acomplished during the year, and what you wish to acomplish for the second half of the year. I beleive that you need time away from your everyday activities to to get this room in time and space to see yourself clearer.

Here are some questions that I will be asking myself this summer. The best thing is to write them down. It becomes more powerful then, because you then have to be more specific than if you just answer the questions in your head.

1) What do I already have to be greatful for?
2) What are my hopes and dreams for the rest of the year?
3) Are there any obstacles that are in the way of acheiving these goals?
4) What can I do to remove these obstacles?

I beleive that one of the greatest obstacles for most people is fear. It is a habitual way of thinking that is deaply rooted in our minds. A great way of overcoming fear is to visualize. Take a situation that you wish to acheive, but where there is fear in the way (ex: talking in front of other people, traveling on your own, changing jobs, expressing feelings, leaving a bad relationship, creating new habits etc). Imagine yourself in that situation. First feelings of fear are most likely to pop up. Just let them pop up, but don´t hold on to them. Then when things have calmed down, see yourself in the situation that you wish to acheive. Do this every day, and fear will diminish. The hard part is just doing this everyday, creating this new habit. It´s much easier to just go on in our old habits, like watching TV at night, or facebooking or blogging:-) instead! Or perhaps the fear that things can actually change! It´s much safer to just be where you are...