Last Saturday after teaching the two morning classes, I made my way up to Wilmette and took an inversions workshop with Kathryn Budig. Some of you might know Kathryn from various covers of Yoga Journal or may have done her Yoga Journal podcasts or videos.
I heard she was coming to the area and quickly signed up to experience one of her classes. Let me start off by telling you that inversions are my nemesis. I can do a pretty decent headstand, but when it comes to balancing on my hands with my legs over my head, my balance goes right down the drain and my legs don’t stay over my head for very long. I’m much more comfortable practicing any forearm or handstand pose against a wall that I know will stop me from flipping over. If I’m to be really honest with myself…and here comes a confession…because I’m not very good at these poses, I don’t practice them as much as I know I should.
These past few weeks I have been so inspired by my students who come into class and try something that they don’t think they can do. Often times the first word out of their mouth is “I can’t do that,” but with guidance, patience, determination and a lot of hard work, many of my students have been able to lift, leap, twist, hold, and balance into poses they never thought they could. So with that, I thought… I need to practice what I’ve been preaching and meet one of my biggest yoga pose challenges and enrolled in her workshop.
Feeling a little bit anxious, I arrived with plenty of time to sit and collect myself. The room quickly began to fill up and soon I was mat to mat with at least 45 other students. Several yogis were already warming up with impressive handstands and jump throughs. As I surveyed the room I knew there were definitely some advanced practitioners here to learn more complicated inversions from Kathryn, that unlike myself, were just trying to learn how to balance in Adho Mukha Vrkasana (handstand). Kathryn came out to explain how the workshop would progress and started us out with a lovely albeit very challenging flow sequence. Just my cup of tea! Then she introduced the first of many inverted arm balances. With grace and ease Kathryn lifted her legs over her head at least a dozen times or more that afternoon to show us the next and the next and the next inversion we were supposed to be practicing (all three pictures I’ve attached of Kathryn here were introduced to us). I on the other hand, not so graceful. I must thank the very nice yogi that saw how much I was struggling and offered to help me up or be my wall through many of the poses. By the way, the pics you see here are filed in the poses labeled “um maybe not this lifetime.” With my man made wall I did as much as I could. Several times in the 2.5 hrs of practicing, the inner dialog would start with “I’ll never be able to do this”,”I’m so bad at arm balancing”, “Why don’t I practice this more often” and wouldn’t you know it, I would loose my focus and not be able to kick up. Kathryn would then so kindly interject and reminded all of us to be okay with where we are at and said ‘You are perfect, right now’ several times to encourage students like myself who were scratching our heads thinking, “How do I even get my foot off the ground here?” She also reminded us that we will fall, that this isn’t easy and we will experience soreness tomorrow morning. She also said, if you want to get this, you have to practice a little bit of this EVERY single day.
So it’s now Wednesday night and I can honestly say I’ve done a little bit everyday since Saturday. My goal is not to be able to master the poses you see pictures of here. It’s simply to gain more confidence and a better sense of balance upside down. Besides inversions there are a lot of poses I’d let to get better at like Urdhva Prasarita Eka Padasana (standing split), and I know wanting and doing are two different things. Saturday’s workshop was an uplifting eye opener for me, reminding me that I need to also bring attention to that which I don’t like so much, and like my students who diligently come week after week, I need to commit myself with discipline, practice with an open-mind, and every time I fall get up again and again.
Namaste,
Claudine
