Today was an interesting and chaotic day. Woke up with the wonderful sciatica pain, which dominated my morning until yoga class. We had a super senior teacher, Cindy, who was WONDERFUL. She's been teaching for 27 years - started along with Emmy as two of Bikram's first students in the United States, and has been doing it ever since. She taught us the literal meaning of various sanskrit words while we lay in savasana. I had to run out of the room right before the first breathing pose to pee, as my bladder suddenly approached bursting point, out of nowhere. But when I came back, she complimented me in Half Moon Pose, saying that she was glad I went to pee because I had a beautiful Half Moon now that my bladder was empty.
We started Anatomy today, meeting Dr. Tripani, yet another of the absurdly overqualified top-of-their-field experts who are here to teach us. Anatomy & Physiology was WAY more interesting than I expected, and the pace of the class was really surprisingly fast. He's a chiropractor, among other things, so when I went to speak to him after his class about sciatica, he felt around on my back and informed me that I have scoliosis of the lumbar spine! Hoot! Like I said, bring on the numbness and nervous twitching. He gave me a series of tips for how to modify and focus my Bikram Yoga practice to address this and fix it - so, THAT's exciting.
I did the first part of Awkward pose today. I got up, delivered the dialogue, and I really thought I rocked it. I thought I had tons of energy, was fast and direct. But when I was done, they said I didn't seem sincere, like I meant it, and that it seemed a bit casual. So I had to do it again - I tried to add "oomph", but they gave me the same criticism - I was starting to feel really embarrassed, and then they demanded that I do the pose as over the top as possible - which I did - it was just LUDICROUS. I felt like Richard Simmons on crystal meth. And when I finished, all this applause and then they responded, "Exactly! Perfect! If you do your class like that, you can charge $100 per class!" Yadda, yadda. To be honest, I am surprised that I had had that kind of energy in me, but also - I'm surprised that this is the kind of class they want me to teach. It felt so crazily overdone. But everyone I asked about it afterwards was so thrilled with it - do I maybe hear my own voice as more intense than it actually is? I had so much energy after doing the pose that way that I was twitching for a half an hour.
So beware, Anika - I may come back and teach class like Richard Simmons on crack.
As an aside, this evening's class was my hardest class to date - I started to actually pass out - seeing darkness on the edge of my vision and little stars. It was scary. I turned out to have extremely low electrolytes, and could barely stand up after class. Scary. Electrolytes! My friend!!!!
Do your worst, week 3.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
Yeah, electrolytes. You'll find them in FOOD.
I'm helping!
What's it like to have too many electrolytes? Lately, I've been skipping the salt pills etc. and just drinking water. I can't seem to find any systemic difference in experience across the salty vs. non-salty days.
Chris, if you get a chance, Emmy is a great one to talk to about working through things like your sciatica/scoliosis...she often has great suggestions for other poses to do after class too. (hence there's often a queue to talk to her after she teaches!)
I wonder, will you have Richard Simmons hair to go with your class? Or the color-coordinated jogging suit? I can't wait! ; )
No...don't ask Dr. T to tell a joke!
Who are we kidding, you won't have to ask for them, you will have to endure them!
Megan - I'll get you some of those popsicles for you when I am in LA, do you think customs will mind if I bring a chilly bin? ; )
Post a Comment