The Yoga Ship is Going Down

On Christmas Eve, I showed up to a packed house. My studio had just one class that morning and everyone came. I was feeling completely back to normal and not at all sick. Since the room was packed, I knew it was gonna get hot in there! I sat up in a spot where I would be able to get a little breeze from the fans if they were on but not too much.

Class started off well – very well. I felt strong which was great because I hadn’t felt strong in days. I had a great half moon and even the first part of awkward was good (for me).

But, as I’ve said here before, all you can do is be in the moment of any given posture. Those first few postures up through SH2K were great. But somewhere around Standing Bow things started to become a little less than great. At first I just needed to come out of the posture early, but by triangle I felt myself starting to go down.

By tree pose I was completely down for the count. And I literally mean I was down for the count.

Oh, I managed to pull something off that sort of resembled wind removing pose, and I did one sad set of cobra. And then that was it. I was done. During spine strengthening I requested some electrolytes and laid on my back in savassanah. I couldn’t even do savassanah right. I felt ill just laying there. I had to bend my knees up just to get through it.

Somewhere around camel I started sitting up again. I wasn’t doing any more postures, but I would do a sad little sit up and then sit there while everyone did the posture. I did that for first set. Second set was a long savassanah (with my knees propped up still). I struggled through the final breathing exercise and then managed to haul my butt into the hallway where I sat against the wall for a moment. I needed to put my breathe mat in the hamper at the other end of the hallway. Felt like the longest walk ever.

All that said, one of my yoga buddies pointed out that I had a great class. I stayed in the room. I moved through the experience. I took what the class gave me. We don’t often think about “bad” classes as being “great” ones (at least I don’t),  but this was an opportunity to think of the class differently. Really, it was an opportunity to think of class simply as class and not on a dichotomy of good/bad.

Staring at Joseph

As you know, this weekend my studio is hosting Joseph Encinia, the 2011 Bishnu Gosh Cup Champion. My weekend with Joseph got started a little early. On Friday, I showed up to the 4:30 class and learned that he was taking it. Not teaching it. Taking it. I was two mats down from him and one row back. This strategic position meant I could see him during class. Of course, it was also a challenge not to just stand on my mat and stare at him the whole time. I managed. But if I *happened* to fall out of a posture I might have sneaked a few peaks, you know, while I was regaining my focus to get back in the posture. Sure…right….

Just from Friday alone it was obvious he had beautiful, amazing postures. Duh. Of course he would. But you know what else? I didn’t speak to him once on Friday and yet he just radiated this energy that was calm and peaceful. Any stress I might have felt about taking class and seminar with him on Saturday has pretty much disappeared.  Also, I saw him drinking water in class (more than once!) and sweating like a mad man which tells me he IS human and not super yogi.

The best part about Friday came at the end of class. People were in final savassanah. I got up to leave. I gathered all my materials together and then – real quick – decided I would sneak one last peak at him. He’s absolutely gorgeous. You would stare too. I figured he would be laying in savassanah, you know, on his back and staring at the ceiling. Nope. Wrong. When I went to sneak a peak he was looking right at me. And he gave me a big grin.

Damn it! I was so busted.

And I don’t care. Today he is teaching class and seminar which means it will appear normal and not at all crazy to stare at him. Although I’ve already received word that class will go longer than 90 minutes. I don’t think it’s going to be a Mary Jarvis 3-hour marathon, but I’m guessing 2-hours. I’m sure I’ll have lots to share.