Ahhhhh, Day off

I thoroughly enjoyed my day off and spent much needed time alone. Its lovely being immersed in the teachings and surrounded by such beautiful people, but for an introvert like me its nice to retreat and have some down time. The Omega campus is full of secret serene little places to retreat to, and I spent the day hopping from one sanctuary to another. Tomorrow starts another five days before our next day off. Speaking of, I made an appointment for a shiatsu massage (a whole HOUR) for my next day off, which will be Friday. Yay!

As it happens, yesterday was one of our longest and hardest days yet, so the day off today was much needed. Yesterday we spent all morning learning and doing adjustments on each other. It was quite a site - the whole hall transformed into a photo shoot as people scrambled to photograph the adjustments taught by Sharon and David. I have to admit I played into the furor and snapped a couple of my own......ok, maybe a bit more than a couple - I snapped 102. Here are some favorites:

In the afternoon, we spent hours going over standing poses. David started with Tadasana, which he broked down into pieces, explaining proper alignment from the toes up to the eyes. He emphasized how Tadasana should be found in almost every subsequent pose, so we can apply the same alignment rules to many of the other asanas. Throughout all the rest of the poses, David emphasized the importance of proper alignment in order to get the energy flowing. Without this proper placement, the energy gets stuck or escapes from the body, not going up the sushumna nadi as we want it to. This is where adjustments come in; David and Sharon really feel strongly about the importance of adjusting students to help them get into the proper alignment in each pose. They were taught this by one of their beloved gurus, Sri K. Pattabhi Jois, who always told them that, "Without touch, progress is very slow and may take many lifetimes. And in this age, there is no time for that!"

The expert hands-on assisting is definitely one of the trademarks of the Jivamukti Yoga Method. And practice makes perfect, so we will be doing a lot of adjusting on each other in the next weeks to come. I am excited and can't wait to apply these new skills to the Wednesday Jivamukti class at Flow Yoga Studio when I return!