2008 in a Nutshell.

This is my first post in a year and a half! Wow, who am I now? I dunno still...

For the life of me I couldn't remember the name of this old yoga blog that I used to update on the odd occasion. Oh yeah: Dedicated. Haha, cute. Well, after a year and a half, I'm back! I had to google weird word combinations to get to my other old blog, which I remembered linked to this one. I can't believe that I used to keep 2 blogs...um, hi. I guess I used to have a lot of time on my hands because I worked at a lame office job.

Well...it's been a rough year for Adri and yoga. I returned to a steady Bikram practice at the beginning of June of this year. THANK GOD. Prior to that, I hadn't practiced Bikram yoga properly and regularly since June of 2007, which seems crazy to me now. Really? Yes, it's true. I'm just being honest. I mean, I still *went* to class at least a few times a month, most months, and some months I was up to a few times a week, but I was totally irregular and it never lasted and my heart was elsewhere. Where? I don't know. My heart was in a very strange place. Anyway, I decided to experiment with other styles and see what would happen. So here goes:

First I did a lot of spiritual reading and took a 2 month workshop style course in Kundalini Yoga (non-hatha) in mid-winter. Now that was an experience! We were asked to do a lot of journaling and sharing and exploration of the chakras. (By the way, no one was ever able to tell me whether the chakras are meant to be viewed as symbolic or if they are real things in and about our bodies. Is that something you're supposed to decide for yourself?) However, I already do a lot of journaling and sharing. I'm a pretty open person, except where I'm very secretive, and nothing about that workshop changed that about me. So, the truth is that I didn't really like the class and I'm not sure how or why it was beneficial for me, but I definitely don't regret taking it. Like I said, it was interesting. (By the way, at first I was really scared I would awaken my kundalini and eff my life up completely - that's what all that stupid reading did for me! I read too much, honestly, especially when it comes to spirituality, I mean you're supposed to do not read. Anyway I can't believe that I actually thought this was going to happen to me. I'm paranoid about the weirdest things.) Oh yeah, taking that course also qualified me to stay for free at a supposedly beautiful ashram in eastern BC as long as I'm under 31. I don't know if I'll have time to do that, but you never know, and I might want to go to an ashram someday and perhaps decrazify myself.

While this workshop was going on and I was dragging my lazy butt to Bikram yoga 1-3 times per week or less, I randomly decided to sign up for the 9 week starter package practicing *"Hatha Yoga" at Open Door, which extended into mid-Spring. (*I really hesitate to call certain styles of yoga "Hatha" as opposed to some other style or name because as long as the yoga is physical, it's Hatha. You know that, right? Ha-tha, sun-moon. For instance, at Open Door there are two names for classes, Hatha and Power, but Power IS also Hatha, so the distinction bothered me. It was the same at the Ashtanga studio I used to go to; there were a bunch of different types of classes ie Ashtanga, Vinyasa Flow, Yoga Nidra, etc. but only one of them was named Hatha. One last thing: Bikram yoga is absolutely a Hatha Yoga practice for the many people that have asked me about it!!!)

I enjoyed my brief stint at Open Door. I really did. But most of the classes were about as tough as a Swedish massage, (though almost as relaxing!) and a Bikram practitioner like myself has to wonder about that. I'm not criticizing, you know, I loved it and perhaps it challenged and moved me in ways that I don't realize. I'm just saying that I am not at a place spiritually or physically or whatever that I'm going to feel satisfied with a practice that doesn't properly challenge or even maintain my strength and flexibility. I know that might sound un-yogic but 9 out of every 10 things I say are pretty un-yogic and I'm a Bikram adherent so what can you expect?

That being said, one of the "Power" classes I took was one of the hardest yoga classes I've ever taken in my life. WEIRD. I was dripping with sweat, and it was hard for me to work up a good enough sweat when I did Ashtanga Yoga, though I believe that's because I wasn't strong enough. It's hard to describe what this class was like or why it was so hard - we weren't even doing vinyasas. All I remember about the teacher is that she had just gotten back from someplace in India and this was her first class back - yeah, well, she worked me to the bone. Also, it was early in the morning and I'd done a Bikram class late the night before, so my muscles basically went on strike. Later, as I was walking to the bus stop I was so freaking tired and shaky that it took me about quadruple the time to get there that it normally would have.

However, like I said, most of the classes at that studio are super-relaxed. I would highly recommend that place to people with stressful jobs/lives, hands-down. One time I fell asleep and dreamed for about half the class and no one said a word. FACT. I couldn't imagine dreading going to yoga at Open Door - it would be like dreading looking at a picture of an adorable puppy. Doesn't make sense. I mean sometimes the class was a bit harder than what I'm saying and when you throw those vinyasas in there it starts to feel like more of a physical challenge, but most of the yoga wasn't really like that. Anyway, let's just put it this way: if I had all the time and money in the world I would totally go back to that studio!

Moving right along, in late May, early June I got back into Bikram yoga for about two weeks steady, during which time I was very proud of myself, but then I spent the second week of June at my cabin in Point Roberts. I went for six consecutive classes at the Vinyasa-Flow style studio there. That was definitely challenging for me, I mean I was drinking through that with being on vacation, you know... So, it's a really cute little studio shaped like a miniature barn, attached to a really lovely bed and breakfast, and when you look out the window you see horses grazing! Isn't that nice? A lot of the people that practice there are quite a bit older and some are just plain OLD so you would expect the yoga not to be ultra-challenging or fast-paced, but I was sore as hell that week! The lady that runs the studio throws a lot of (what seem to me like) traditional abdominal exercises into her routines. I think that's why, or partially why. I got my butt kicked a few times.

By the way mommy came for her first (and only) yoga class EVER that week, to the "Gentle Yoga" on Thursdays. She did really well, kind of. So, if you're ever in Pt. Roberts, definitely check out Madrona Yoga, especially with Kathleen on Mondays and Tuesdays - I absolutely love this woman.

For some unknown reason, after that I never went to another yoga class period until the 5th of June. WTF?! Why do I do that to myself? The whole time I was like, "what are you doing, why aren't you going to yoga, you need to go back to yoga, you're going to regret this, you already regret this and you're not even finished your regretful action..."

Well thankfully, (thankfully to myself, that is), since the 5th I've been doing Bikram at least every other day except for the brief time I spent in Calgary, but that doesn't count. I'm very proud of myself. It's about bloody time. I feel enormously relieved, and better about myself, my life, everything. I feel like I had my figurative "year abroad" and now I've come home to Bikram yoga, where I seem to belong. Of all the Bikram yogis I am definitely a person that is aware of the controversy surrounding this style of yoga and I DO have my problems with it, believe me. However, I know now that this is the yoga for me right now and that this IS the community I want to belong to, flawed as it may be.

I like to think that when I used to write in this blog, I was such a good girl. I was really excited about the yoga and I was making steady progress and I still had that beginner's glow about my new-found practice. Needless to say, things have changed since then. I got frustrated, lazy, discouraged, jaded and disappointed. However, I persevered, and now I'm back with new purpose. I don't think I'm at square one. I know I'm not at square one. But, I've got some work to do before I can really take this to the next level, and that's what I want to do. That's what I'm in the process of doing!

I said that things changed for me at the beginning of July, but actually nothing *really* changed until after I went to the seminar two weeks ago with Ren Soriano. At one point during the seminar I found myself thinking, "why am I here, this is such a waste of time." I didn't feel that he was giving any good tips that I didn't know and a few times I actually questioned the validity of his advice, which struck me as rather IFFY to say the least! In addition to this I felt out of shape and hungry (nice combo there) and couldn't bear the thought of having to take class after six hours in that hot room. I couldn't stop dreading it, which is what I've hated about my yoga practice in general, why I DREAD GOING. Who the hell DREADS yoga, that's absurd.

Anyway, I'm not going to get heavily into the seminar right now, but I'll say this: something that Ren said completely knocked me off my feet, and you know, I honestly think that if I hadn't spent $100 and gone to that seminar all by myself I would not be writing this right now. My practice would have been at danger of slipping and sliding into temporary oblivion once again, and I would have remained lost. But, for once in my life I listened to my gut instead of the crazy voices in my head and did the right thing, and I made the yoga equivalent of the realization of a lifetime. I really did. I did not understand something absolutely vital until two weeks ago, and before that time I was just a visitor to this world.

Now I live here.