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Commitment for the New Year

9/22/2019

Commitment.

That's a big word. We all know what it means, and it is certainly true that some commitments are easier to make than others. What does it mean regarding movement?

You can commit to walking every day or going to the gym or taking a class every week. Some of us prefer the community and gentle peer pressure that comes from moving in a group or class setting. Some of us crave solitude and find we prefer to move on our own without the eyes of others upon us. Either way, when you commit to moving on a regular basis, you will find you gradually get stronger or more flexible or have greater endurance or breathing capacity from the simple act of sustained practice.

I have decided to renew my commitment to building upper body strength and increasing my shoulder mobility. Twice a week, I plan to do a limited regimen of exercises with numerous repetitions. Then I'll practice yoga and other movements on other days.

Supine pullovers with weights 10x
Hanging vertically from a chin-up bar 10 seconds, 2x
Some variant of push-ups 10x
Using a blanket on the floor, pulling from Incline to Downward Dog 5x. (This will start much smaller, working on my hands and knees first and building to the bigger version as I'm able.)
This whole set will be repeated three times for now, eventually four times.

This is a goal. It is possible I cannot do this much three times through. But I'm throwing it out there and seeing what can happen.

It is almost Rosh Hashanah. I love the Jewish New Year. It always feels like the real start of the year to me. So I'm taking this High Holiday season to start a movement commitment.
I'd love to hear: if you decide to join me, what are you going to commit to?

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Too Many Ideas

9/6/2019

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In conversation with my friend and assistant, Kim, I started dipping into teaching principles I've drawn on for decades. Some come from my former dance teachers. Some from high school teachers I had. Some are ideas from my yoga teachers, Roger and Kari, and some from other yoga and movement colleagues.

So here goes. A few thoughts on pedagogy and yoga that I've adapted over 23 years of teaching:

Get people moving. At first, moving will be enough. When they start to have questions, then you can begin to take them into deeper levels of self-awareness.
If someone doesn't take corrections repeatedly, it is time to stop offering that information and trust that the student is getting something from being in class even if they choose not to do what is being suggested.
Just because it works in my body doesn't mean it works in yours.
Yoga shouldn't hurt.
Know the difference in your own body between waking up new muscles (and the soreness that comes with that) and hurting yourself.
Fear is secondary. If you are afraid of a pose such as headstands, it is often because your body already knows it isn't ready to support that. The fear is a result of your brain listening to your body.
To overcome the fear, do the preparatory work. If your body knows it is ready, you will no longer fear going into the challenging pose.
Doing a fancy pose doesn't make you an advanced yogi, nor does it make you more evolved. Some of the most advanced and self-aware practitioners I know work in very simple poses.
Only work on the joints you want to keep mobile.
Weight-resistance and strength work are vital.
You can't work on alignment in the fancy poses. You have to have good alignment first and that comes by working in the simple poses.
No one movement is bad in and of itself. It's repeatedly moving in limited ways that creates problems and potential injuries.
Being open to new ways of moving doesn't mean letting go of critical thinking.
When I say "It's all yoga," I don't mean that anything at all is yoga. I mean that doing something with awareness and presence can be yoga.
Posture isn't the same thing as alignment.
Actions speak louder than shapes. (Making shapes isn't yoga; it's gymnastics.)

Finally, I have taken a former dance teacher's ingredients for what makes a good dance class and transformed them for my yoga classes:

Something up on your feet
Something down on the ground
Something requiring balance
Something that twists
Something that everyone can do
Something that no one can do

I have no idea if this list of ideas about yoga and teaching is of interest to you. But I have so many recent failed blog attempts because I had to get all this out of my head.

NOTE: Related blog post on my heretical yoga thoughts can be read here:
www.lynnshuck.com/blog/thoughts-from-a-yoga-heretic

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Commitment for the New Year

Too Many Ideas

Wool Gathering

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