Checking In

A week after I wrote about my belated resolutions, I am so happy to report that I finally got off my arse and walked the 3.8 km home one day after work in 35 minutes and went back to yoga today after a 5 month hiatus. I am pretty sure my wrists were bruised from all the downward dogs I had to do because holding up my weight with my twig-thin wrists (my arms are disproportionately thin compared to the rest of me) for all that prolonged time was no easy feat. However, I did survive the 90 minutes and had such a great sweat detox I felt so good after.

I also made 3 micro loans on www.kiva.org and helping others to help themselves is a fantastic feeling. We have so much and so many people have so little. We spend $50 on a meal and that could be a month's salary for many living in abject poverty. We can all do more, and be content with much less at the same time.

And I also went back to my bread-making, with this cranberry and walnut loaf baked in my brand new Valencia orange Le Creuset dutch oven.

My life is finally moving back to a good and calm track.

Yoga

The last few weeks of yoga have been as follows:-

Week 1: Sick. No yoga.
Week 2: Auckland. No yoga.
Week 3: Back to yoga, ached for exactly 7 days which is unusual but probably expected in light of the 2 week lapse.
Week 4: Decided to skip regular Saturday morning power yoga which turned out to be a good idea as G's friend, Kylie rang up at short notice for brekkie with her baby in tow. Missed the afternoon class and had the first swim of the season instead which was really refreshing. Ended up going to Sunday vinyasa class instead.

And what a workout I got at today's vinyasa class with Andrew. It was my first time in his class and it wasn't a fast-paced class but holding those poses for durations longer than I thought humanly (my definition of what I humanly could do) possible, really got the chi (or qi) going very quickly. The internal fire was burning strong, finger tips were engaged and the flow was coursing through my limbs. The feeling of the chi flowing through was a physical sensation. Holding oneself in a particular position for an extended period of time required inner core strength and also a degree of mental strength, to overcome the physical strain and pain one feels.



Next goal: to be able to do the Crow. And that I know is going to be not just overcoming the physical aspect which is just building up my arm and inner core strength, but the mental part which is the bigger challenge.

So It Doesn't Kill You

So Bikram Yoga didn't quite kill me. But this morning when I finally got out of bed and tried to make my way to the bathroom, I was giddy and like a pinball, bumped my way all along the two narrow walls of the corridor, as I tried to walk a straight path. That was not a good sign, so I crawled back into bed. I turned to my right side and the room started spinning around. Oh-oh, vertigo? Might have been triggered off by the yoga I think.

I guess I will have to write off the Bikram Yoga after all, and just go to regular yoga classes. Fainting spells during class is one thing, having this ongoing vertigo attack today is another. I don't feel so bad when I sit still, but when I try to stand, everything goes woozy again.

I hope this goes away soon.

It'll Only Make You Stronger

As I struggled to not faint at Bikram Yoga again tonight in the middle of the variety of standing poses we were put through, I debated if I should give it up and go back to regular yoga where at least I get to work out a in a normal environment. And not feel like I can't breathe and that I'm going to collapse from lack of air and the thick blanket of humidity pressing down on my chest.

But as the poses moved into the lying ones, the fainting spells got better, and I was able to do more than Monday. I felt a little bit more motivated, and more assured that I wasn't going to suffer an imminent stroke from not getting enough oxygen to my brain. I was breathing better, my lung capacity feels like it's being opened up which is good. And my skin looks shiny and radiant after each class. I like the fact that I am detoxing and purging all the badness from inside with the buckets of sweat expelled.

The instructor from Monday remembered me and asked how I felt after tonight's class. I honestly replied, "I feel a BIT better." and held out my index and thumb a distance of an inch to emphasise how MUCH better I felt. It was an improvement, and I think I'll stick it out to the third class.

This is literally a case of "if it doesn't kill you, it'll only make you stronger".

Turn The Heat Up

S-W-E-A-T

Buckets of sweat. I haven't sweated (yes, not "perspired" because it doesn't bring home the point I'm trying to make here) this way in the two years I've been in Sydney. Actually let me rephrase that - I've probably sweated more tonight than the total amount of sweat in the entire time I've been in Sydney.

I was at my first Bikram Yoga class where the studio is heated up to 37C. The class was 90 minutes long, I think I probably managed to do about 70% of the exercises, the other 30% I was trying not to faint from the heat, humidity and difficulty in breathing.

It was a good workout, if all that detoxing is a measure. My skin feels smoother, more radiant and I swear my pores are smaller. On the minus side, apart from the faint feeling, my chi was also going haywire. My hands, arms, legs and head were tingling like crazy. It's good to get the chi moving, but it's certainly not fun when it's so tingly it feels like I'm all numb and unable to control my limbs. The instructor assures me that it's normal, especially for a first-timer and things will get better with more practice.

The pluses outweigh the minuses. I'm definitely going back for more.