More practice tomorrow before class. I think the frequent practice probably helped me get used to headstand more and more. The fear of falling is not so bad now but it is still there... trying to rear its head everytime I do headstand. But it is only a matter of time I conquer this fear and do my headstand in the middle of the room. It's very soon... I can feel it... hehe...

My vegetarian journey has been totally "destroyed" when I binged out at dinner yesterday. An associate treated a good meal at a Japanese bbq restaurant.... oh boy... It's hard not to eat in such situation... Anyway, what did I eat? Beef tongue ( it's really good... ), melt in the mouth beef ( I think I almost ate one cow... i suspect it was wagu beef slices and cubes ), foie gras ( goose liver cooked with butter on a silver tray... after cooking, so much oil came out of the foie gras that they were floating in pure liquid oil - definitely "bad" for health ), slices of lamb ( absolutely tender and no "lamb" smell ), prawns, squids, scallops ( this is good stuff... fresh scallops )...

Seriously... I am turning into a cow...

Help!

I need to go on a detox....
Serious... and plenty of power yoga....and ashtanga yoga!

OM~

EDIT : Ok, now I am feeling sick... I did not know that the way they made foie gras... this is pretty sickening. I am definitely off foie gras for life. Though I am not a bird person ( yeah, don't really fancy them... ), the way they made foie gras is terrible and cruel. Read about this here.

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Perhaps it is time to look for a chinese sinseh to “iron” out the final kinks in the neck or just lay low on yoga?

The only concern is all my hard work that I done so far for my headstand will be wasted… will I forget how to?

But the most important thing is to get the neck pain totally out before I attempt any other pose that can cause further stress to the neck and that includes headstand. I guess the best way is to let the neck rest and perhaps go for a nice hot yoga ( someone says it can help… ).

OM~

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Ok, I am very happy to announce that my headstand time has increased to an amazing 8 seconds! ( near the wall! hehe )

Just fab! That’s why I love yoga so much. It gives your body and mind challenges to overcome. I was watching Tony Robbins video on youtube yesterday and he mentioned that some people use violence as a way to break out of their boring life, a life that does not connect.

All people yearned for connection with other people, to give and contribute to people, to feel other people. Using violence is the way some people can get their instant “high”, a change in their emotional state. Imagine pointing a gun at someone’s head, immediately you get a rush of feeling and you get to “connect” to that someone. But it’s all for the wrong reason!

I think getting into a headstand is a much more gratifying feeling Plus I love it when people and friends tells me that they finally managed to do a particular pose, I feel so happy for them as I understand what it means. Every little improvement counts as they move you further ahead ( even by a tinee weenie half a millimeter…. )

Back to my headstand… Now the control is in how I shift the body weight about my head and elbows. (the feeling of going up is now more stable… I can feel that if I engage my legs I can move with so much control) Shirley has advised me to try to extend my head to gain a more stable base. She said that is exactly like standing except it is now the other way.

The best part is i am now looking forward to do headstand… I even sneaked in a headstand during a handstand… The fear of headstand is probably fading slowly. I hope to move away from the wall soon!

PS. To all of my friends who are in Hong Kong Yoga Conference, ENJOY YOURSELVES!!! Come back and share your experience soon!

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I am proud and happy to announce that I am now doing a 4 second headstand!

Glorious!

For the very first time, I can feel myself being able to balance for a whole whopping 4 seconds. Ok, it may not be alot to many people but for me it is a great sense of achievement. ( much like the day when I figured out how to kick up to a handstand against the wall ). This is the first time I can feel my weight on my elbows and head and by shifting those weight, I can sense that there was balancing action working. I guess part of the process is to get used to being upside down!

Guys and gals, ONE DAY… the day is coming!

Slowly but steadily I am going to increase the length of time up there. Then I will slowly shift away from the wall.

OM~

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This time I tried to go up without the wall with the single leg up first. But fear creeped in and my body refused to synchronize with my mind. All the time, my mind was like, “can do it”, “nothing to worry, to fall is not going to hurt”, “no biggie”, “go half way, no problem one”…. erm… But they did not work… HAH…

So I immediately shifted my mat to the wall. This time, I started to visualize myself lifting up and balancing on my head.

The Actions :

1. Lift up the first leg up as high as possible (walk both legs as close as possible to the head before lifting up).

2. At the same time, as Bo says, we must root down or “make the base” heavy. So I pressed really hard down on my elbow and extend my neck ( throat opening slightly ) with the head pressing down.

3. Then I breathe in and “hugged” the muscles of the inner thighs of both legs ( the lifted leg as well as the leg still on the floor ). I guess to me hugging means engaging the thighs and spreading the toes ( press the balls of the foot out – I sometimes get cramps in my leg while engaging the muscles so I tend to soften a bit… )

4. At this point when the muscles are engaged, I do feel the legs are light and the lift of the bottom leg is much in control by me. Then slowly lift the bottom leg up. Quite unlike the usual method of going into headstand where I often feel that I lose control of the leg when I go up and I do not know where are they or what they are doing. Hence I often have my legs sort of like “loose” and “floppy”. But using this method, I feel more in control and I can concentrate more finding the balance.

5. Here I can balance for a few seconds like 2-3 seconds. After that, I just slightly wobbled and the legs fall back a bit and touched the wall. The next step will be to move further from the wall and try to balance.

One thing I observed was that headstand takes up really alot of strength for me.

Technorati Tags: Headstand, Salamba Sirsasana, inner thighs

During Bo’s class last Thursday, he taught us how to go into headstand using another variation.

I tried the 2 basic ways of going into headstand, using the Ashtanga yoga way and the Hatha yogaway. Ashtanga way is by lifting both legs simultaneously into the headstand. This is more difficult for me as it requires tons of core strength. Besides by going up this way, the body may not be able to be entirely straight. The usual hatha way is to go into the pose by first bending one knee followed by the other slowly. So half way point is that you will be balancing in half headstand with legs bent in. Once you are balanced here, begin to extend the legs up ( either single leg at a time or both ). In effect, you will work your way up to the full headstand step by step.

I used to practice doing the Hatha way. Stable and slowly. But more difficult to detect the balance point for me when I try to extend the legs up.

The variation that Bo taught was to lift one leg straight up first as high as possible and then slowly lift the other leg to meet the top leg. I find that it helps with the balancing more and the body can be maintained straight as opposed to the previous two ways. It is also like having a safety “catch” in line… you probably won’t fall backwards when you have a leg still in front and you can adjust the position of the front leg or head as you bring it up slowly to meet the top leg. In effect, I feel I have more control and hence more confidence.

Try this way and let me know if it works for you too!

OM~

Technorati Tags: headstand, Ashtanga yoga, Hatha yoga

Crow Pushups
My crow is more stable now. I think my arm and shoulders have probably been strengthened by the tons of chaturangas and handstands. In one of the classes, we had to go into crow and then “pushups” as in lower arms and the push up again. Tiring! But if you can engage your core more, this will be a piece of cake ( as the teacher showed us… )

The Longest Handstand
For the record, I could only hold 1.5 minutes and my wrists are “gone”. But this is great training for building arm and shoulder strength. As you train, you probably will feel lighter and lighter. Bo recommends us to do this the moment we get up every morning to build the strength and balance in handstand. If you have read my earlier posts, I had BIG problem back then in kicking up into handstand against the wall. I had a fear and I just could not kick up to handstand. But now I am happy to say that I love doing handstand. It’s fun and I love the fact that I can kick up lightly against the wall ( without the thumps… ) I work hard to get to where I am now and I am proud of it . So start slowly, start small, keep practicing, improve little by little and then ONE DAY you can do it! ( as in life too! yey, me going to overcome my headstand barrier…! )

Again Headstand…
Especially in the headstand area (see pose here). Not quite there yet but at least now I have moved from the 2 seconds to a few breaths with the knees tucked in at the half way mark.

The feeling is a bit different now in the headstand. I am finding the “feeling” to balance, or at least I thinking getting the “feeling” of what it means to balance upside down. It’s like I am more in control now as I “felt” my way to control the balance. Plus I know that by extending the head and elbows down to the floor, the balance seems to be more steady.

Am I getting to enjoy it more? Hmm…

But I am moving and gaining a little confidence at a time.

Another first!!! Coming up from Kapotasana
Kapotasana ( see this article by yoga journal on how to practice to go into it ) is a pose I finally can do due to Bo’s Anusara teaching. The day I managed to touch my toes with my fingers, I was so happy! But then I had always have to go out of the pose by going back down to lying and then slowly coming out of it. For the first time, I banished the fear and just did it by coming up from the pose straight up, lifting from the chest up.

Taking that big step confidently and just do it. From then onwards, the fear is gone as you know you can do it. It just happened. I listened and my body says “yeah, let’s do it”.

OM~

Technorati Tags: yoga classes, Crow, chaturanga, headstand, Kapotasana

In every class I go, especially when it is a Power 2 class, when the teacher wants everyone to go into headstand, I am always the one who had to look in awe as the rest go so easily up into the pose. Sometimes I feel embarrassed… a Power 2 student that cannot go into headstand? The rest are all steady and they had so much fun doing all the variations. I am telling myself everyday, “ONE DAY…” !

But as they go into their headstand variations, I will always try my normal frills free headstand as I attempt to overcome my fear in my headstand. I must say it is slowly bearing fruit. I am a least able to hold with the knees to the chest for 2 breaths ( I am going up in my headstand using the hatha yoga way). I feel more stability now. I think I am like testing the “limit” of where my hip is supposed to be without falling over. I think I am getting closer now to where I am supposed to be. But I have yet to feel the hips entirely but I am beginning to learn how to engage the core muscles when inverted. I also found more awareness on my head and the arms as I extend onto the arms and elbows as well as the head. ( somehow I tried to extend the head to the floor but the head seems to press into the clasped hands instead, causing some unsteadiness… )

Shirley helped me a lot today by just being there behind me, rooting and watching to see if the position I go into is correct. It’s like a gentle hand supporting and encouraging and never judging. So glad to have her as a friend

The next step is to be able to keep myself steady at half headstand for as long as I want. I think I need to get the balancing part figured out… hmm…

OM~

Technorati Tags: headstand, headstand variations, hatha yoga