Back to the sequences

This week I've been reviewing Ramaswami's book. This morning was the turn of the Supine sequence, Now for some reason this has always been my least favourite, wasn't looking forward to doing it but I'd done the rest so eventually after much stalling I got on the mat. Loved it. Aint that always, or at least so often, the way.

Supine is a complete practice in itself, you have those leg movements at the beginning, a kind of reclining version of the usual standing sequence, then there's the inversions at the end. Add a couple of sury's, a little tadasana and a headstand and your good to go.

I've spent a lot of time this last year trying to turn Vinyasa Krama into an Ashtanga style practice, you can do it, it works and there are arguments for approaching it that way but the sequences are wonderful just as they are. Each has it's share of forward bends, twists and backbends, your covering all the bases.

So I think I'm going to stick with the sequences pretty much just as they are for a bit. Still Start off my practice with tadasana a couple of sury's and some subroutines from the On one leg and Triangle sequences and finish with Inversions but the middle section, the meat in the sandwich will be either, Seated, Asymmetric, Lotus, Supine or Bow/Meditative sequences, just as they are on the page. For a while at least

Holiday practice update.

I mentioned in the last post that I was using this holiday as an opportunity to review the Vinyasa Krama sequences as laid out in Ramaswami's book The complete guide to Vinyasa Yoga.

I hadn't planned on blogging till I came back but I'm having such a ball I can't help myself. I love these sequences. I don't tend to practice them this way anymore but rather build a practice from the subroutines from the different sequences or use the subroutines to modify my Ashtanga practice. This is such a joy though, love how the postures build upon each other, how the poses are related. It's like looking at a piano and seeing all the scales and chords laid out before you when your used to playing sax and having to hold everything in your head.

So far this week I've practiced
Monday : the full On your feet sequence
Tuesday : traveled half the day but practiced the Seated sequence when I got to the hotel.
Wednesday : the long Asymmetric sequence in the morning and the full On one leg sequence in the late afternoon early evening.
Thursday : Lotus sequence and then in the evening a kind of advanced Asymmetric and seated practice.

Tomorrow being Friday I'll stick with my Ashatana Primary for now but continue on through 2nd series. In the evening I want to look at some of the orphan subroutines from the back of Ramaswami's book

Saturday will be The long Supine sequence with the Inversion series in the afternoon.
That leaves the Bow and Meditative sequences for Sunday before heading home.

All of these practices start off with the short Tadasana sequence and a standing sequence built on the ashtanga format, some Sury's, Triangle and On one leg subroutines, been mixing those around all week, some I haven't practiced for ages. I finish off with Inversion vinyasas.

After the asana which have been taking two and a half hours or so ( making the most of being on holiday), I've been indulging in long Pranayama and meditation sessions, forty minutes each.

Lots of post ideas have come up, there are some tricky postures in each of the different Sequences so want to do some 'Focus on tricky posture' posts, leg behind head in Asymmetric say, Natarajasana in On one leg, that kind of thing,figure I can adapt some of the older posts on th ashtanga blog and update them for Vinyasa Krama. Suggestions welcome.

Strikes me that that's a very Ashtanga approach to blogging, how to get into postures and how the practice is going etc. Do other types of yoga blog differently, not sure I can go about it any other way though I fell less tied to the asana here.

The hotel has a pool so I've been jumping in for a swim and sauna three times a day.

Not a lot to eat around here, I went to a shop in the village, sorry THE shop in the village, for some fruit but there's nothing, not even an apple. No diet coke either, or even diet Pepsi ( not that I'd lower myself), twenty different types of red bullish drinks though but I don't touch the stuff. It's Like stepping back in time here, one village shop, a church and five pubs. Did I mention I grew up not that far from here.

So food has been a large breakfast, really large, after practice and that's pretty much it except for some Japanese rice crackers my much loved and appreciated Mother-in-law sent me from Japan for my birthday. Oh and tea, lots of tea.

Holiday practice

I have a weeks holiday. M is sending me off to Wales to a little hotel with a pool by the sea., just about to leave might get to Practice on the beach perhaps, always fancied that.

The plan is to take the week to review all the Vinyasa Krama sequences, haven't practiced them as they are in Ramaswami's book for a quite a while, looking forward to it. I get to have a long three hour practice on my day off but be nice to indulge in that daily for a bit. Long long stays in postures, excited.

On Ramaswami's course we built up to forty minute pranayama sessions, I do that on my day off but the rest of the week I split it between my morning and evening practice. Looking forward to doing the full eighty rounds both in the morning and evening while I'm away.

And meditation of course lots of meditation.

Yoga sutra's are coming with me, be nice to chant through them again (there's a lot of beach so can chant them as loud as I like), thinking about doing that everyday, don't chant as much as I'd like to, tends to be the first thing I cut back on, though I tend to be chanting away at my bench while doing repairs.

My Yogajavlkya for a start, the ipads coming so perhaps it's time to download The Waste Land app for the long train journey. I have the Yoga Upanishads on the Kindle app, looking forward to reading them again and some Heidegger obviously. His Discourse on Thinking is coming with me, a tiny book but you probably need to be on a deserted mudflat to really get stuck into it. I have an idea that his use of Gelassenheit (releasement) might bring an interesting perspective on surrender. Will need to take some Eckhart I guess as it's kind of his usage that Heidegger is borrowing. Oh dear, book bag getting full already.

Book bag was getting full but managed to turn everything into pdf's and put them in ibooks. what with that and the Kindle app the ipad is all I'm taking.

Hotel has a small pool and it's walking distance form the beach so looking forward to swimming, Greece a couple of months ago reminded me how much I love to swim and I crave it now.

So will be away for a bit, no blogging though I might tweet or update FB occasionally (will put twitter back at the top of the blog).

Let you know how it went.