The shala window's were soaked in perspiration and all those amaizing yogis around me droping back and coming back up effortlessly, I just had to. Whoever came to help me drop back was getting the question: How come I am not "getting" the breathing? why do I get dizzy?
Right at that point I feel Sharath's hands grab my waist, and all thoughts vanish. I was silent again.
The inevitable happens, I get dizzy as I come back and so I stop for a moment and tell him that I am dizzy. I have heard it many times and one more time he tells me: "breath deeper, don't stop". Countless teachers have told me this before, even James even told me that! but I still get dizzy.
Then I soften, something in me softens, my eyes maybe, my jaws, he says "don't stop, keep breathing", I do. I drop back, he only leaves me there for two counts and brings me back up.
From the space created by the silence I hear these words come out: "little by little". He gets a hint of recognition, "yes" he says and smiles, and offers more help: "drink more water".
I just "did yoga" the right answer "little by little" came from some visceral corner of my energetic being.
Then today Magnolia, who is one of the great assisting teachers, helped me again. She asked me to breathe much, much deeper, to the point where I felt like was force breathing, as if I was dying, as if I was grasping for air. And for the first time, adding silence to effort, going little by little, I did not get dizzy.
Right at that point I feel Sharath's hands grab my waist, and all thoughts vanish. I was silent again.
The inevitable happens, I get dizzy as I come back and so I stop for a moment and tell him that I am dizzy. I have heard it many times and one more time he tells me: "breath deeper, don't stop". Countless teachers have told me this before, even James even told me that! but I still get dizzy.
Then I soften, something in me softens, my eyes maybe, my jaws, he says "don't stop, keep breathing", I do. I drop back, he only leaves me there for two counts and brings me back up.
From the space created by the silence I hear these words come out: "little by little". He gets a hint of recognition, "yes" he says and smiles, and offers more help: "drink more water".
I just "did yoga" the right answer "little by little" came from some visceral corner of my energetic being.
Then today Magnolia, who is one of the great assisting teachers, helped me again. She asked me to breathe much, much deeper, to the point where I felt like was force breathing, as if I was dying, as if I was grasping for air. And for the first time, adding silence to effort, going little by little, I did not get dizzy.
yes yes, little by little, it's only recently I've noticed my breathing has become regular in backbends. I used to hold my breath half way down dropping back and breath in too deeply coming up so that i couldn't breathe in any more half way up, could still get up but it was an effort, bit of a strain. Now i breath out more slowly as i drop and force myself to inhale slowly coming up, it really is true that the breath carries you up, or perhaps it's then chest expanding, whatever it is it helps and takes away the strain. Glad you and James are having a wonderful time, hope he had a good practice today too.
ReplyDeleteThanks G, we did, is just a lot more draining here for some reason, maybe cause we want to do it all right... I am still working at understanding this "breath" carrying you into upwards position... but not getting dizzy was a revelation... Guess when you say chess expanding, what that really means, for me to happen is that I need to breathe a lot deeper than I think...
ReplyDeletetoday i try a yin yoga! it was nice, breath is sometime so hard to stick on
ReplyDeleteWow, are you changing Lilasvb?
ReplyDeleteDo you think we stop to hold our breath( not intentionally!)in preparation to taking a big inhale? If that is the case,this account really turned the light on for me! I think I do a lot of breath hoarding when I think I need a lot of strength. Thanks for sharing this.
ReplyDeleteWow! It looks like you are reaching a turning point/breakthrough point in your dropping back! Congratulations!
ReplyDeleteI get dizzy coming up from my standing forward folds. I always thought it was because I came up too fast, but even when I tried slowing it down, it didn't help. I'm going to try what you're saying: work on deeper breathing and see if that helps.
ReplyDeletesereneflavor, I guess I do, did, who knows? I get it now that I cant stop at all, must keep flowing and breathing for "The life of me"!, like beyond what I imagine deep.... IT turned a light for me too! :-) and I hear you on the breath hoarding, like Iyengar says, we become greedy for "life" for the "breath" hee hee, he has a point
ReplyDelete@Nobel, I found something for you, will photograph later, it is called "Sidhi cafe" and I think it completely closes your theory, will send hee hee... I guess I am reaching a breakthrough... I hope today, in a few hours the back bends will flow full of breath
@YYogini... I get that too... drinking a LOT more water has helped enormously (just like Sharath said), and also breathing for the life of me, much much deeper... they are not kidding when they say breath deeper... they are really not :-)