Bird Yoga

Former Anusara teacher Christina Sell recently posted:

“Well, it seems like the trend is around class titles and so my workshops still have these class titles [ed: like “Myths, Metaphors, and Tales of Transformation” and “Exploring the Boundaries”] but soon there will come a day when the title just says, “Back bends” or “Forward bends” and my big plan is to be teaching more and more from an intensive perspective where students are there for the whole thing and the class title and content is incidental.”

I’d like to push this further. I propose a series of classes or practices that proceed from the imposition of a limitation (on space, props, time, etc.) To wit:

1. Yoga for a 3-D box whose sides are planes extending from the edges of the mat (so no poses that stretch beyond the boundaries of the mat)

2. A class or practice of poses that can all be performed on an airplane in the space typically available for stretching one’s legs in coach class

3. A class or practice of poses that can be performed on asphalt at a rest area using as props only items you are likely to have in your car

4. A class or practice of yoga for hotel rooms using as props only items that either a. most people pack (belt, books) or b. most hotel rooms have (phone book, weird throw blanket at bottom of bed)

5. Yoga in which the practitioner’s hands never touch anything (the ground, parts of the body)

6. Yoga in which the soles of the practitioner’s feet never touch anything else (the ground, parts of the body)

7. 1, 1.5, or 2 hours of yoga using only one prop (one block OR one strap OR one bolster OR one wall)

8. Ditto for yoga using as a prop only wall space is less than 4’ wide

9. A whole practice of poses in which one is always facing the floor

10. A whole practice of poses in which one is always facing the ceiling

What else?

Second time this week!

1 minute each (1 min. to each side for two-sided poses)

Adho Mukha Virasana (child’s pose)

Urdhva Mukha Svanasana (downward-facing dog)

Uttanasana (standing forward fold)

Vrkasana (tree)

Utthita Trikonasana (triangle)

Parsvakonasana (extended side angle)

Virabhadrasana I (Warrior 1)

Virabhadrasana II (Warrior 2)

Ardha Chandrasana (half-moon)

Parsvottanasana (pyramid)

Parivritta Trikonasana (revolved triangle)

Parivritta Parsvakonasana (revolved extended side angle) (my current version of this is marginally passable at best—can’t keep my back heel down, and have a hard time figuring out whether the top arm goes over my ear at an angle [which seems anatomically improbable] or perpendicular to the ground]).

Adho Mukha Virasana

Then:

Adho Mukha Vrkasana (handstand) (55 seconds!)

Pincha Mayurasana (feathered peacock) (30 seconds)

Sirsasana (headstand, with variations) (4 min)

Salamba Saravangasana (shoulder stand, with variations) (4 min)

Halasana (plow) (1 min)

Bharadvajasana (30 seconds each side)

Paschimottasana (intense stretching of the back toward the west from heels to neck) (3 min)

Savasana (corpse) (4 min)

I use a timer app called Meditator for the intervals—incredibly easy and flexible.

Did you also have doubts about this three-year retreat business? Consider yourself vindicated.

http://www.elephantjournal.com/2012/05/psychosis-stabbing-secrecy-and-death-at-a-neo-buddhist-university-in-arizona/

Christie McNally, the primary religious teacher of 37 people at the retreat and a longtime teacher of partner yoga, recently stabbed her husband—who it appears was terribly disturbed—in what she claims was an accident; he subsequently died of dehydration in a cave near the retreat:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/90220087/A-Shift-in-the-Matrix

Here’s the letter describing events from the point of view of Christie’s prior husband and fellow yogi Michael Roach, the “spiritual director” of the Diamond Mountain retreat:

http://diamondmountain.org/an-open-letter-from-geshe-michael

the area between the top cervical vertebra and the skull. GO!