Knee injury and Vinyasa Krama

I wrote this draft two weeks ago but forgot to post it. (Where it says a month ago read six weeks).

About a month ago I injured my knee and posted about it here. Nothing too serious, just an old injury from twenty odd years ago that plays up in the cold sometimes. I'd ignored the signs and walked around London all day. The following morning I could hardly stand.

My Practice, what about my Practice.

I couldn't really bend my knee so that was most of Primary out of the window and half of Intermediate. If this had happened last winter I would have been devastated, I hadn't come to Ashtanga from another style of yoga, Ashtanga was all I knew, as it was I was still thinking, 'What if this is it and I can't practice Ashtanga anymore'.

Luckily this year I'd come across Ramaswami's Vinyasa flexible Krama. Flexibility is it's middle name. OK, I made that bit up, but it should be it's middle name. Hell of a lot of asana variations in Vinyasa Krama, the system is designed to be adapted to the needs of the yoga practitioner.

So I took it easy for a couple of weeks adapting my practice, then added a few modified Intermediates, dropping asana that affected the knee and adding a couple of others from VK.

With more thought I could probably have added asana that work similar areas of the body as the ones I was cutting. As it was I kept it simple and took the opportunity to add asana from Vinyasa Krama routines that are less well represented in the Ashtnaga series. Parsva Bhangi (side poses) for example. Also Purva Tanasana (anterior stretch poses) In Primary we just get Pursvottanassana. From Vinyasa Krama's Supine sequence I added Apanasana (Pelvic floor poses) and some light Dwipadapitam (desk poses) which were easy on my knee, as were a lot of the shoulder stand series from Supine. I added these to finishing, to take up the slack from dropping Urdhava Padmasana, Pindasana and Matsyasana as well as Baddha Padmasana, Yoga Mudra and Utpluthi. When practicing Intermediate I added most of VK's Bow routine and went backbend crazy followed by long Paschimottanasanas with the different VK hand/arm variations. To Sirsasana I added a lot of the VK Inverted subroutines, there are some asanas that work on the knee but being upside down you can approach them much more lightly.

Best of all I felt I had Vinyasa Krama to fall back on. If I couldn't do Ashtanga anymore I could always practice Vinyasa Krama and that would be just fine, more than fine. What wicked wit and gifts had had the power to seduced me back to Ashtanga anyhow?

Vinyasa Krama doesn't have Jump backs and Jump through, other than at the very beginning and end of a sequence. Not being able to transition became less of a drama than it might have done a year ago. I used the extra time to really slow the breathing down and stay longer in an asana as well as repeating. Can't do Marichiyasana B and D that's OK repeat A and C, Can't do Karandavasana (misery) then do Pincha twice and stay up there longer, breathing more slowly.

Last week I was pretty much back to Full Intermediate bar a couple of obvious knee centric asana. With the extra time that gave me in the morning I worked a little more on Kapo and Dropping back. This morning my knee felt fine enough for a loose, full lotus and even Utpluthi, the only Asana I missed out was the left side of Vatayanasana.

UPDATE : My knee is just about back to normal, copes fine with Full Vinyasa Primary and Intermediate. I'm back doing Vatayanasana on both sides, Garbha Pindasa and with a lotus tight enough again to jump back from Supta Vajrasana. The only thing I find is that for longer periods of Meditation and Pranayama I find it best to sit in half rather than full lotus, at least until the weather warms up.

Exploring Pranayama

This is just a post about my own evolving Pranayama practice, for a more detailed treatment try here.

Last time I posted on Pranayama (excellent just worked out how to do the link thing on blogger) it was Viloma Ujaii, the alternating nostril/throat technique and Kapala bhati, the panting fire breath thing.

This time it's Kumbhaka (retention) Pranayama. I think this is my favourite, the alternating nostrils techniques become confusing (although I still do it for five rounds or so), I find it hard to keep the count and for an extended period my arm gets tired (ahh bless). This is a much simpler but arguably more intense version.

You breathe in and retain the breath, you breathe out and hold the exhale then repeat. That's pretty much it.

It becomes interesting when you start slowing the whole thing down, long, slow steady inhaling and exhaling. I started off with a count of 5:5:7:5 inhale,retain,exhale,retain and now it seems to have settled on 10:7:10:10. I can't seem to even up the inhale, after breathing out so slowly and then retaining the breath, the first part of the inhale is a little fast. Supposedly the retention after the exhale should be a little less than after the exhale, tried it and it evened up my inhale. now its 10:10:8:10

It gets very interesting when you bring in the bandhas and this is why it's my favourite. I've been focusing on Intermediate lately and it just doesn't feel as grounded as Primary, less seated poses I suppose, which I find are the most comfortable for engaging the bandhas. It used to bug me but now I know I'll be doing this at the end of the practice, so I'm much happier.

This is how I approach/experience the bandhas. Towards the end of the exhale (2/3) I let myself become aware of the slight lifting sensation of moola bandha I begin to focus on it and intensify it, drawing it up. As it gets as 'raised as it's going to get uddiyana bandha has begun to become slightly activated, my lower abdomen drawing back towards my spine and up.

This next bit is an added extra . At the end of the exhale I draw my abdomen all the way up creating a cave beneath my ribs and then draw in at the sides as if I were about to perform Nauli Kriya (which I do last few breaths on the video). I tend to hold it for a count of five and then slowly relax it in readiness for the inhale.

It's much harder doing the whole nauli thing when your seated, as opposed to standing and bent over with your hands on your knees. After a few breathes it starts to become a little easier though.

At the moment I'm spending about 15 minutes on pranayama, a couple of minutes on kapala bhati, about five rounds of Viloma Ujaii and the rest of the time on this.

Anyway that's how I'm approaching it at the moment, obviously you wouldn't do this after eating or drinking anything.

Why do it? I love the focus and concentration involved in this. You get much more in touch with the whole bandha thing enabling you to employ them more effectively in the asanas, seems to have been a great help for karandavasana and of course the jump back and jump through, Bakasana B is another that comes to mind. I also find it very calming and use it throughout the day, though without the full uddiyana and with a lighter ratio.

When I do it at work I just sit up straighter with my legs wider as if I'm trying to ground my perineum more and then off I go, though with a much quieter Ujaii to avoid attention.

It's still very much work in progress but as I've said before I'd rather drop a couple of asanas from the series if I'm rushed (though not from finishing) than cut back on the Pranayama. Meditation I might cut back to five minutes followed by the Pranayama chant, then do a proper seated meditation and chanting when I get home but I'm finding I want to do more Pranayama rather than less.

Tried to catch the sound of my breathing but mostly caught the sound of the plumbing (no that's not my stomach rumbling ).

Long headstands

Before anyone jumps straight to the video I should point out that it's the yogic equivalent of watching paint dry, nothing happens, no really, NOTHING happens. The only source of mild amusement and possible interest is scrolling the play bar back and forth to watch the clock in the corner move and perhaps the uddiyana bandha. What with my dodgy knee it's a slow news day here.

I did a ten to fifteen minute Sirsasana on Sunday and it felt pretty comfortable. I liked how I was approaching the count, 25 breaths up 25 back down, so thought I might see about staying up longer today, 30 minuets, perhaps even an hour.

Annoyingly the video stopped recording before anything interesting happened, seems my camera only records for fifteen minutes before cutting out. Going by the count I figure I was up about twenty to twenty-five minutes when I noticed my toes and feet were going numb. I tried flexing them, rotating my ankles, some side and backward/foreword splits to get some circulation going. I'd done the inverted VK routine a few times in the past and been up in headstand for about forty minutes or so, but while your up there you doing all kinds of asanas so perhaps that's why I didn't experience any numbness then.

I decided to call it quits and see if anyone here can shed any light on this. Now I've heard that you can build up to two hours headstands and I'm sure somebody commented here once that they'd done an hour with the Darby's. So what's the story, is this something that passes? Any suggestions? I was doing some intensive breathing while I was up there, deep breathing, engaging the bandhas, is that a good thing or a bad thing, should I keep the breathing soft and light? What do you think?

Now I don't necessarily want to stay in headstand for two hours or so, but I like the idea of a comfortable 40 minute inverted meditation.

Playing with Vinyasa Krama arm positions as prep for Dropback and Kapotasana

Played with back bends this morning. A kind of back bend focused Vinyasa Krama practice. Taking a break from primary and intermediate for a couple of days until my knee clears up (see last couple of posts).

So practice this morning consisted of a couple of long Sury's, three breaths in each stage then a 25 breath Uttanasana. Part of the Vinyasa Krama Tadasana routine followed, including the back stretching and different behind the back arm positions. I've mentioned these before. I like how they seem to open up/stretch different areas of the back and especially how reverse prayer brings back the shoulders. They give nice support as you bend back into them too, allowing you to stay back longer and work on the quality of your breathing. From them I went into a couple of dropbacks and then filmed part of the routine.

Then it was a 25 breaths Paschimottanasana, part of the VK Bow routine including Salabhasana which led up into Kapo through its 2nd series prep, again employing the VK reverse arm positions to see what effect it had. It was OK didn't reach my heels though. Wish I'd remembered to try the taking turns with an arm outstretched routine I used in the dropback on the first half of the video, next time.

After than I did a quick shoulder stand prep and a 25 breath Savangasana followed by a ten minute Sirasana. I used my meditation timer, turns out that counting up to 25 long slow breaths (nice bandha engagement when upside down) and then back down again is about fifteen minutes. Count up and down again and that's a half hour headstand.

I finished with a 25 breath Maha Mudra right side only (so as not to bend my left knee) ten minutes Pranayama, twenty minutes meditation and about another ten minutes chanting.

Really enjoyed it, nice practice, came out at about an hour and a half.

Forgot how much I enjoy the freedom to explore that Vinyasa Krama invites. Think I'll keep one day a week for exploring the sequences and subroutines some more.

The video below explores/plays with the Vinyasa Krama reverse arm positions as prep for dropping back and for Kapo.

Knee's still playing up.

As I mentioned before in the last post it's just a throw over from an old knee injury. It tends to play up a little in colder weather. Plus I was walking a lot on it the other day. I felt it playing up but didn't take any notice of it and carried on walking all over London., my own fault for not listening to what it was telling me.

This morning I did a very light Vinyasa Krama type practice, focusing around a couple of Key asanas (Uttanasana, Paschimottanasana, Sarvangasana and Sirasana plus the odd prep pose). I then did Maha mudra on the right side and then Pranayama, Meditation and a little Chanting (PCM). I did the PCM with my right leg in half lotus and the other outstretched, seemed to work OK

Thinking a Vinyasa Krama practice again tomorrow, perhaps the bow Subroutine and lead on into Shalabhasana, and Kapo including it's prep. Then some serious Urdhva Dhanurasana dropback work, haven't done enough of that lately. Want to turn the knee issue into a positive and make the most of the time I can't practice Ashtanga proper. Of course I could do Primary or Intermediate avoiding knee affecting asanas but I tried that earlier in the week and it just fell unsatisfactory, and irritating.

Feel quite upbeat about it actually. If this had happened last year I think I would have felt pretty down about it, couldn't bear to miss a mornings practice, even begrudged the rest day and never took moon days. Since the Vinyasa Krama stint I'm much more relaxed about it all. I kind of feel I have a better understanding of what's important in my practice, the breath, those long exhales, my focus on the bandhas and the PCM. As long as I'm able to cover a few key asanas for 30 to 40 minutes it doesn't really matter.

I practice Ashtanga again because I enjoy the form, find it challenging still and because I can. I practice it with pretty much the same Vinyasa Krama focus which is in the spirit of Yoga Mala. I'm still fit and strong enough to do an intensive practice and while I still can and I enjoy it then I might as well. But it's what's inside that form that really seems to matter to me now.

I'm reminded of how Krishnamacharya told Ramasawami that if he was practicing for an hour then he should practice forty minutes of Asana and twenty minutes of PCM. Doesn't seem to matter which asana you practice so much (other than the key asanas mentioned above), but rather how you practice them. And besides, being away from Ashtnga proper for a couple of months doing VK didn't seem to impact detrimentally on my Ashtanga practice, it's all good.