Book clubs and Hot Yoga classes…
It’s a Tuesday, almost at the end of a very busy (albeit public-holiday-riddled) April and my last class was almost 10 days ago, and while I said being fanatical about anything isn’t really my style, I was actually intending to attend more than like 4 classes this month!
Annnyway, such is life, and so I find myself preparing to navigate through peak afternoon traffic into Claremont for the 4:30pm class! I get there in time and find that I will be experiencing instructor Karen Venter’s Yo Bikram class for the first time.
Truth be told : I struggled (again) ! Karen had an accent of some kind, which made sure that I would listen even more intently and I got the sense that she knew exactly what she was doing, which meant that my class was in good hands! I appreciated that she described the postures in detail, explaining exactly what sort of discomfort each posture was likely to cause, as well as what the internal effects of each posture was, but I found that it gave me a false indication in terms of the timing of each posture as she would be describing the posture in detail and I would be counting down the seconds of each posture, it always seemed to be about 5-10 seconds longer – and my brain wasn’t quite prepared for that!
She seemed like an amazing person, with a sense of radiance as she guided us expertly through each moment of the session. She somehow seemed like one of those people who could share the tale of a life experience and totally enrapture her audience, without needing to articulate her story with larger than life gestures!
I realised today, that the nausea and disorientation I usually felt towards the end of the class, was due to the fact that there were like mini Savasanas after practically every posture after the VERY long initial warm up and the swift reclining and needing to abruptly find my way to an upright position, frankly made me feel rather uptight, so I’m going to try to avoid those beautiful Savasanas and bite through the exertion until the end of the class – hopefully this will feel better!
So my first month of resuming my classes comes to an end, and I haven’t lost a millimeter, not surprising since I barely averaged one class per week this month, but I definitely feel a difference in the consciousness of my breathing, and in the quality of my sleep, and being a semi-insomniac, my usual bed-time is somewhere between 2 and 3:30am, so I seriously appreciate the better quality of rest, even though it seems to be stealing a few hours of my day, since I’m falling asleep much earlier, even on the days I don’t attend a class! The pic at the top, btw, is just an idea of what I consume as I’ve had many questions about that, and please don’t judge.. I’m not a health fanatic, clearly evident by my choices in the pics, and in any case, this blog was meant to be a reflection of my experiences, although I think I am also pretty reflective of the everyday, average Jane! I mean, seriously … who resists the sweet stuff ALL the time?! Moderation is key, I heard! 🙂
But I’m hoping to do more than 4 classes for May! Fingers crossed!
Lunar Reflection 