March 29, 2022

Morning, Friends!

Welcome to my last post of what has felt like the longest month in creation (except for April 2020, which lasted 300 days.)

Oh! And the last post of Women's History Month.

So, as I know I've said before, the first yoga I ever practiced was Ashtanga yoga, a rigorous type of vinyasa yoga (broadly that's yoga that links breath and movement) where you practice the same poses in the same order every time and employ a gazing point, or drishti and bandhas or body locks to help with balance and focus.

To me -- rather arrogantly, I'll freely admit -- THAT was yoga. 

So, when I trained to teach non-Ashtanga vinyasa yoga, which, yes, linked breath and movement, but NOT in the same order, I was thrown.

But, I wanted to be a teacher, the training I'd enrolled in was great, and hey, if I truly wanted to learn something, which I did, isn't humility part of that process?

I dove into the lessons, into deepening my understanding of what yoga is, into the readings and the philosophy and the sequencing. There were long days, longer nights, and lots of tears.

And lots of new poses. Yes, there are 75 poses in the Ashtanga Primary Series and that's not all the poses.

One such pose? Goddess pose. Utkata Konasan in Sanskrit.

It's not a particularly difficult pose. Challenging to hold, but not difficult to do per se. But it WAS new to me. Sure, I got used to it in classes, but I never really used it in sequences because it wasn't part of my yoga vocabulary.

Until recently.

I quite like Goddess now. It's a deep hip opener, especially if you drop into your seat more and more with every exhale breath. It asks that you keep your heart-space open and your spine long, stretches the inner thighs and strengthens the legs, knees, and core. And, as with most if not all poses, it challenges the mind to stay focused and still as you sit in the pose and simply breathe.

More than anything, though, it reminds me that on the mat, we can try and learn and be new things. And that's pretty powerful.

Like the goddesses (and, yes, gods) we are.