Baby's Got The Bends(sssssssss)

I don’t like snakes or back bends. There I said it. But this is blog not fortune cookie so I’ll explain but since this is MY blog I’m not going to just tell you why I don’t like snakes or back bends. No no no I’m going to tell you a little story about my life and relate it to why I don’t like snakes or back bends…well no, I’m going to tell you a little story about why I should be doing back bends and becoming a snake hunter. Well not a snake hunter but… Maybe I should jut get on with it,no?

So here I am not liking snakes, not liking back bending, and house sitting. I’m house sitting for my doctor actually because I’m a dog person and I need a vacation but can’t afford one. So my Doc and his wife asked me if I’d stay at the house taking care of their beautiful, aging dog Emma and you know, other things like checking the pool chemicals and watering the plants and walking through the acres of gorgeous land they have and sweating out my depression in the sauna. Its hard work, no it’s not, in fact I think part of the reason they asked me is because they know I’ve had a really rough month and a half and needed a break. So the other day I was walking down the stone steps do my daily pool routine, the house is built on a hill with beautiful rough boulders forming “walls” to keep the earth back and cut in a place for a patio and a pool. As I rounded the corner of the steps along the wall I saw this:

That’s about 2 feet of shed snakes skin! My first reaction was a pulse of fear because where there is snake skin there was an actual snake. Of course there was a snake it’s a rock wall, cool underneath, not to mention full of chipmunks and mice and other critters snakes snack upon, and warm on the top perfect for warming up that cold blood in the hot sun. *shutter* Once that moment passed my next thought was, “Cool! Snake skin!” because yes, my inner child is part 12 year old boy. And really once that initial shock goes away you can appreciate the amazing transformation that snakes go through. They shed their skin, and yes we humans are constantly shedding skin cells, our tissue renewing itself over and over again. But snakes do it way better. They grow out if it, they slough off the pieces of themselves that no longer serve them without becoming something all together different. That’s still Joe the snake lingering (ever so creepily) under the rock wall, just a little longer (*shutter again*) and more comfortable. So after my shock and young boyish curiosity I thought to myself how I really needed to work on my back bending. And I did…not. So the universe or mother nature or whatever got a little more insistent. The next day I walked down the stone steps and rounded a corner there was an actual snake. Luckily I was going kind of fast so my momentum wouldn’t let me stop even though I made a strange sort of strangled gasping yelp sound and nearly took a header.

I did my pool routine and then turned to look up the stairs for Mr. Snake Guy. I crept oh so slowly back up to the spot where he was sun bathing and he was still there. Full Diclousure: it was not the snake that had shed it’s big old skin, it was a common Garder Snake like this one:

I know they are not poisonous! I’ve always known that, just like I known that there is only like 2 poisonous snakes species that even live in Wisconsin. I still stood there rooted to the spot asking, out loud mind you, that Mr. Snake Guy please crawl back under the rocks so I could go back up the stairs. Yes, the other part of my inner child is an 8 year old girl. I’ve dealt with it and I still don’t like snakes. Nor back bends.

I don’t like back bends because they are uncomfortable. I’m pretty long in the torso for someone kind of short, and my thoracic vertebrae have very ling spinal processes: (that’s the part that sticks out like a droopy finger in the side view:

So back bending doesn’t come naturally to me, it hardly comes at all. Over the years I’ve been able to get into full wheel and a deep camel pose but I just don’t like how I feel in them. And now because I have all this bad stuff I’m trying to recover from over the past 6 weeks I don’t like the way they feel even more. Because the thing about deep back bends is that they open the front line of the body, they expose your heart and all I want to do is protect mine. I want to keep my heart safe while it heals from a painful breakup, a painful move, and the most painful of them all, closing my studio (that’s another blog all together!). So I don’t want my heart open at all, I’m exhausted and scared, just like I felt asking that harmless garder snake to go hide to I could go back to the house. 

I took a step forward tired of begging the snake to move and he flicked his little snaky tongue at me. Smelling, I don’t know utter shame and embarrassment, he decided he wanted nothing to do with me and went back in the rocks. I went to the house. Maybe it was the adrenaline for the encounter but I was a little restless, so I did down dog for a few breathes, then I shifted forward into plank and lowered down through chaturanga. I held there not wanting to come all the way up into up dog. So dropped to my belly inched my hands forward to my shoulders and began to straighten my arms, pausing to activate my legs and pelvic loop and I gingerly made it into cobra. A few breathes in cobra feeling my body lengthen and my neck grow tall then I took a breath out and let my head fall back and there I found the light.

Ok granted it was the light from the sky light because it was sunny out, but it was lovely. I closed my eyes and let the light turn the insides of my eyes pink and green before pushing back into child's pose. I gave a quick gratitude for the light and the sensation and then got up and went about my day. It was lovely little moment and now I love back bends and snakes…NOT. I still don’t like either of them but it was a reminder that just because some things scare us or make us feel uncomfortable doesn’t mean they aren't good for us.

Sitting Cat Style

Ask a yogi what the most challenging aspect of their practice and if their answer isn’t meditation then well, I don’t want to say they are lying but they probably are. Meditating is hard. It takes discipline and…well a lot of discipline and patience. To be really plain and kind of brash about it you sitting around waiting for nothing to happen. But really nothing, not a thought! I don’t even not think when I’m sleeping, seriously my dreams have taken a stress turn and I’m planning conversations and making to do lists in my dreams (whatever happen to old naked dreams, I’m leaving that open for your own interpretation). But back to meditation and it’s elusive charm. I want to have a meditation practice so very much badly. And I know that setting a routine would be very good for me and my half vata dosha but I’m having trouble setting one. So in the meantime I’m trying to meditate like a cat. 

Did she just say meditate like a cat? Yes, yes I did. But I don’t mean to purr as some anthropomorphizing chant like exercise, or to practice stillness by stalking small birds and baby rabbits. No, what I really mean is that the other day I practiced meditation like a cat might, in a patch of sun as it shined through the doorway. I didn’t mean to meditate that way, which is to say I didn’t have a plan. I’m still working my morning routine out. What I did was open the door to let the dog out for a pee. But if yoga has taught me anything it’s to appreciate things in the moment; big, little, and all kinds of in between. The light that morning was amazing, it was dappling through the ancient oaks, it was warming off the cold night air of early spring and it was inviting. I put my coffee down and sat in the doorway, eyes closed and taking in the morning. I was meditating like a cat by basking in the sun and letting it wash over me and for a few brief moments my (other) half pitta brain shut down and stopped thinking. I didn’t find nothing; I didn’t get to that ultimate detachment but got to contentment. Which for my life right now that’s pretty darn good. 

I was content, not bursting with joy or giddy with excitement, I was just there. I was in the moment, I was peaceful and I was grateful. One of my favorite yoga sutras is: santosha anuttamah sukha labhah, which translates into, by contentment we gain ultimate joy. So maybe I was bursting with joy and giddy. Maybe that’s what real joy feels like, fleeting and precious and all because I spontaneously meditated like a cat.

my sunny window and meditation mat

Sunday Funnies

Shameless Plug Thursday

I have an etsy shop. If you like things, you know...things,..yoga-ish things, you should check it out.

 Eye Pillows

Meditation Cushions

Papoose Mat Bags

Click to go there: Amy's Etsy Shop!

Non-violence of a 5 Year Old

I have, in the past, posted a few times about doing yoga like a 5 year old. For example; Sacred 5, in which I talk about my inner child but not in a boring therapy kind of way. So why bring up blogs from the past well because I was thinking about ahimsa, you know ahimsa one of the yamas, the one about nonviolence. No? Well here’s a quick definition via Wikipedia (don’t judge, we all use it):

Ahimsa (Sanskrit: अहिंसा; IAST: ahiṃsā, Pāli: avihiṃsā) is a term meaning to do no harm (literally: the avoidance of violence – himsa). The word is derived from the Sanskrit root hims – to strike; himsa is injury or harm, a-himsa is the opposite of this, i.e. non harming or nonviolence.^[1][2]

It is an important tenet of some Indian religions (Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism). Ahimsa means kindness and non-violence towards all living things including animals; it respects living beings as a unity, the belief that all living things are connected. Indian leader Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi strongly believed in this principle.^[3] Avoidance of verbal and physical violence is also a part of this principle, although ahimsa recognizes self-defense when necessary, as a sign of a strong spirit. It is closely connected with the notion that all kinds of violence entail negative karmic consequences.

So that’s ahimsa and before that I referenced being 5 and now I will tell you how they got mashed together in my brain. I was in a yoga class, a really good yoga class and at the beginning while we were setting out intentions for class I thought “boy do I need some ahimsa!” See I’ve been going through a pretty rough couple of weeks and I did what I lot of us do when we go through rough patches, I self medicated. I let creep back in some bad habits I used to indulge in, so before imaginations run too wild I mean I started drinking a lot of wine and smoking cigarettes, yep a smoking yoga teacher. I’m not thrilled but I’m also human. So I set my intention to practice ahimsa during class and maybe even after class and for a while. And it was lucky I did because it was a hard class, the kind of class that you might find yourself pushing your body past its limits because you really want to get into that cool arm balance. I did really want to get into that cool arm balance because I’m good at arm balances and I hadn’t done this one in a long time and I wanted to impress my new teacher.

really cool huh? Astavakrasana (Click to go to the Yoga Journal pose discrpition page)

So after some very deep hip openers we started working our way into Astavakrasana; I got it! I held it! then I face planted and giggled like a 5 year old. In fact I’d been grinning and giggling like a 5 year old all class. Because what became apparent to me as my face landed on my yoga mat is that the best way to practice ahimsa in asana is to practice asana like you are 5! Seriously have you ever been out playing with a kid at the park and you pushed them too high on the swing? They don’t grit their teeth and bare it, they yell or cry for a second and when you ask if that was to much they say yes! It’s kind of amazing. In fact there was a living room, easy chair headstand contest going on the other week at my friends house, it went like this: one kid did a head stand over the back of a chair, then the rest did the same thing, then a different kid did a different kind of headstand or the same one but with a different leg/arm position and then the others did that one. So the cool things is that if one of the followers did said variation and it didn’t feel good they came down and said “I don’t like that one” or “that hurts” and then did something else instead! Amazing! Try teaching an adult to do this, man do we the over 5 crowd hate it when we can’t do something.
So that’s it, that’s what I discovered about ahimsa and 5 year olds, where the asana in concerned they have it figured out. You can’t do yoga like you are 5 and NOT be practicing ahimsa. And good for me you can’t be practicing ahimsa like your 5 and not drink and smoke!

Meet the Blogger

Greetings readers,  I feel the time has come for us to meet. See, I'm a little shy when it comes to the internet, never really sure how much info i want to put out there. I don't really know why but for whatever reason I've been running this blog rather anonymously, today that changes, I am coming out of the cyber closet! And I'm starting with my name, Amy E Mills. Shocking I know, but when i look back over my blog there are some very personal things here so why not give y'all a chance to relate not to a faceless ghost writer but to me. I hope it's not too much of a shock like when you see a picture of your favorite public radio host.

So that's me, blogger with resident bead head as seen usually with a cup of (usually decaf) coffee. I am Amy, I live in southern Wisconsin (in a tiny town) and I am a yoga teacher and part time blogger.

And since this is a blog we should get down to the actually post for today and since I'm being all honest here are 5 true things about me as a yoga teacher.

1. I never intended to be a yoga teacher.
Nope, I went into my first teacher training with the goal simply to deepen my practice and gain a greater understanding of yoga's history and philosophy.

2. I don't practice everyday.
Nope again. I try to get on my mat but sometimes I get bogged down by my schedule, my emotions and on the off days an illness. And sometimes I have to accept that my yoga for the day is walking my dog or the couple of sun salutes I did between classes or simply trying to bring a little more awareness into my posture for a day.

3. I'm pretty dyslectic so mirroring is really tricky for me.
Yep that whole right and left thing has always alluded me. I flip numbers in addresses and credit card numbers, i write lower case Bs and Ps and sometimes i can't tell the difference between a lower case D or B without major debate. So with my natural inclination so switch things around in my head I went into theater, even more backwards because stage directions are given from the audiences perspective and left or right. So, should you ever take one of my classes you might hear a favorite catch phrase which is, "I'm going to turn my back on you know, not that I don't love you I just can't mirror today." My students love it!

4. Sometimes, when I'm standing in the classroom watching my students practice I get teary because they are so inspiring.
Speaking of students, I have an amazing group of dedicated yogis. I am easily one of the most blessed teachers ever, I know everyone's name and have seen their practices grow and change over the past 2 years. Sometimes it's what gets me through a class.

5. Quite often I have no idea what pose I'm going to teach next.
So True. I have gotten away from using my teaching notebook. This has its ups and downs; I'm not running to the front of the room every sun salute to see what I have planned next. But sometimes I build a great sequence on the fly and then forget it as I am saying the words out load. Sad but true. My students don't seem to mind or notice for that matter and sooner or later I'll hit the happy medium of book vs. improve.

Indie Pop Flow Playlist

My friends and students are WAY cooler than me. Seriously, I can speak most asana names in Sanskrit and a few mantra and prayers but they have endless knowledge of bands, solo acts and symphonic experiments that might as well be a foreign language to me. So a few of my super cool yogis have given me music to check out over the years and this is the playlist that has finally been born from it.

Lozenge of Love- Raidiohead
Manha- Thievery Corporation
Wilhem Scream- James Blake
Nude- Radiohead
City Middle- The NAtional
Islands- the xx
How Low- Jose Gonzalez
Fog- Radiohead
Heart and Lungs- Beach House
Home and Somewhere Else- Mimicking Birds
Don't Let It Pass- Junip
All Things Must Pass- Yim Yames
With Lightening In Your Hands- Damien Jurado
Beloved- (Thievory Corporation remixed) Anoushka Shankar

See WAY cooler than me. Download and give it a listen and if you are super cool too then leave me a few suggestions as a comment and I'll plug your awesomeness.

"Doubt is a pain too lonely to know that Faith is his twin brother" -Kahlil Gibran

Venus

Venus is out tonight, well Venus is out every night, but from my desk in the cabin I can see her perfectly as I work at the computer. When I was little I had this same view out my bedroom window. Had my alter under that window but I don’t really know it was an alter then, just like I didn’t know that when I was staring up at Venus and asking questions and sending out my wishes that I was praying. So often when I look back on my childhood and growing up I did a lot of things that were sacred before I knew they were sacred. I think maybe I’ve always had a natural pull towards the…well maybe you could call it the divine, but before I had a language for it I just knew it was bigger. Bigger than me and bigger than the religion they taught me about in Catholic School. 

If I was my younger self staring out of my old bedroom window right now what would I be praying to Venus for? Probably the things a young girl does; love, understanding, confidence. Not to dissimilar than how I am feeling now. I pray for my love, my sad little heart, that it will heal and be able to love again and to acknowledge and appreciate all the love I have surrounding me. I pray for understanding because we all want to be understood but we can’t walk around with a running commentary we just have to have faith that our actions speak to our good nature and know that the people that really matter will understand us and that those that do not, well, it’s not that they don’t matter it that we can’t hold people in the wrong for their interpretation of events. And I’d pray for confidence but really it think this is just me praying for love again. If I love myself for who I am with all my attributes than I will have confidence. A deep peaceful assurance that I am living the best version of me I can. 

My mind right now is not much different than a swirling atmosphere. Like a nebulous just waiting to burst and form stars. It’s really just chaos and in that chaos you can get distracted by all the flying matter and you can also step away, light years away, and see the pattern, see the beauty of stars being born, maybe even a universe, maybe a planet. Maybe that’s how Venus was born.

Sunday Funnies

A Walk in the Valley

Today I went for a walk, did you ever think you get obtain true peace of mind from a walk? No? Well don’t worry then, because you can’t. But what you can do is shut your brain up for a little bit. The past few months have been a little rough on my old brain, so much thinking; about life choices, my actions and reactions towards people, expectations, lack of expectations, rethinking communication and the validity of communication or the outcomes of too much communication/not enough. I get tired just listing a few of the things I’ve been thinking about. And today I was exhausted; it was all I could to just to make coffee, which doesn’t really count anyway since I drink decaf. But it was beautiful outside, the wind was pushing the early morning clouds away, the birds were signing, my dog was happy frolicking around in the high grass, so I thought, “what the heck a walk sounds nice.” And if you going to walk out in nature you might as well do a walking meditation or at least walk mindfully. For my walk I chose mindfulness, I wasn’t going to ‘think’ at all, I was just going to open my senses and see what the world had to offer. So here are some things I saw along my walk.

The Path:

Just to the right of the post you can sort of make out the path snaking through the valley, the 2 large trees on the top of the hill is where I was headed.

Fence Post:

But before I start off a little nature already. Mr. Wasp.

I can only imagine he was seeking some refuge from the wind, he let me get pretty close and didn’t fly off. Poor guy was as exhausted as I was.

Deer Track:

I wasn't the only one that thought a walk sounded good.

The back of my eyelids:

 No not really, I think this actually the inside of my pocket but about half was to the trees I stopped for about a minute and closed my eyes and listened to all the different birds. If I knew anything about birds I’d list the ones I saw, but I don’t so you get this.

Tree:

It’s a really beautiful tree, the kind of tree every kids wants a tire swing dangling off of and a fort built in the branches.

Red Winged Black Bird:

Can you see him? No? Let’s zoom in.

Pardon the pixilation; I don’t have a good digital camera. But dead center there’s a little black curve, that’s him and boy does he sing pretty!

Tiny Flower:

On the way back I took the low road through the valley and saw this little guy.

I think it’s a bird’s foot violet. But I could be wrong.

Egg:

Right in the middle of the path there was a bird’s egg.

Knocked out of the nest by the wind maybe. But I stared at it for a while. It was so perfect and white and smooth and it was a little life that didn’t make it. I tried not to let this sad beauty get my mind churning again so I kept walking. My dog and I got back to our little cabin and had a nice cool drink of water and sat for a few more minutes enjoying the outside before regular life drew us back inside.

I highly recommend mindful walking.

What a Yogi Eats...

... during Panchakarma.

KITCHARI! Yay, Kitchari! for 5 days. All kitchari, all the time. yay...meh.

But seriously. Panchakarma (cleasning program) is an excellent way to balance your bodies digestive fire. Kitchari is a very baisc meal that is easily digested by the body, it is also a fairly flexible dish so you can spice (ok well not too spicy) it up and make variations. Here is the recipe I followed on my 5 day panchakarma:



Kitchari

2TBLS Ghee
1/2tsp Mustard Seeds
1/2tso Cumin Seeds
1/2 cup Yellow Mung Bean Dall (soaked overnight in water)
1 cup Basmati Rice
1tsp Ground Cumin
1tsp Ground Coriander
1/2tsp Turmeric Powder
3-6 cups Water
Vegetables *If you are unfamiliar with Ayurveda try CARROTS, ZUCCHINI, GREEN BEANS, SPINACH (if you are familiar with Ayurveda and your specific Dosha check the links below for dosha specific recipes)

Method:
1. melt the GHEE in a heavy bottom pan
2. add the MUSTARD and CUMIN seeds and toast until the begin to emit aroma and pop
3. drain excess water from MUNG DAAL*, add DAAL, BASMATI, CUMIN, CORIANDER and TURMERIC
*presoaking daal is not necessary but it aids in easy digestion
4. stir until well combined but do not burn the daal
5. add 3 cups of water*
*you can add as much as water as you like depending on how soupy or dry you like your Kitchari, experiment and find the best level for you.
6. add vegetables
7. cook until veggies are soft.

In the picture above I substituted Quinoa for Basmati because after a few days of basmati only i was having trouble...hmmm how to say this delicately...pooping. Yep I said it, also quinoa has more protein than basmati which is good for active people. Or people like me who teach yoga and have to say things like Utthita Hasta Padangusthasana out load (much harder to do with a hungry fuzzy panchakarma brain). There are about 1,000 different versions of Kitchari recipes out there, just do a search in any old search engine or if you already know your dosha you can try dosha specific substitutions from Joyful Belly or try one of there 3 dosha specific Kitchari Recipes.

DISCLAIMER: I am NOT an Ayurcedic practitioner nor am I a doctor, seek the advice of licensed professional before starting any health/diet program.

Yoga of Heartbreak

It said that yoga begins the moment you want to leave the posture that is also true of relationships. If you love someone but there is struggle and even pain it’s just like being in a difficult yoga pose, you have 2 choices: you can get out of there, back to the safety and comfort of child’s pose, or a friends couch or a bottle of wine. Or you can stay and work, you can listen to your body and learn how to adjust your self so that the strain eases some but you also keep going deeper into the asana or deeper into the love between you and your partner.

I’ve been doing yoga for a few years now and there are still many asana I haven’t mastered, in fact full pigeon I think is something I will only experience in my dreams (yes I dream about yoga poses). But I still work towards opening my body because I know that it’s not getting into that picture perfect magazine cover expression of the pose, it’s about all the work that I do on the way there. It’s accepting my practice each day for what it is. And each day brings its own challenges. Just like a relationship. To love someone so fully that you accept exactly where you are each day for what it is, celebrating the moments that where so precious and looking forward to the moments not yet created. So there you are on your mat all warmed up and energized as you begin to move into that asana when you hit the edge, you are questioning whether or not to go further. Should you draw back and do a few more preparatory poses, did you exert all your effort already and can’t push any more or do you push too far and fall out of the practice all together. The metaphor should be self explanatory. This is where your yoga begins, the working it out part, the stick to, the good faith effort because you know deep down that this yoga stuff is good for you just like you know this relationship is good for you. But then sometimes it’s not.

What if a relationship or an asana just isn’t for you? What if you’ve been working for something but it remains unavailable to you. This is also where yoga begins. Yoga is also acceptance. Sometimes there are things our bodies just can’t obtain, so this time yoga isn’t moving deeper it’s being where you are, learning your lesson and moving on. Sometimes in class I tell my students when they come to a difficult asana to ‘wrap it up in love’ and try it again. And that’s what I’ve been doing in my yoga off the mat, when the difficulties arose I would wrap my whole relationship up in love and try again. I wanted to love my relationship into working just like I want to love my thoracic spine into a beautiful back bend.  But it’s not time for back bending and it’s not time for pushing anymore. There will always be love around my former relationship, there will always be quite a lot of love in fact but it’s time to step away and accept that this practice is now the practice of letting go. This yoga of heartbreak is about observing and healing and eventually growing. Maybe one day pigeon will be less elusive and maybe one day my thoracic spine will open enough so that this heart of mine can find some more love. But for now it’s me, my dog, and the mat; Om Y’all.