Best Practices-November 7 2012

"As you prepare your body, so you prepare your mind. As you train your body, so you train your mind. Take some time every single day to nourish the temple of your body through vigorous exercise. Get your blood circulating and your body moving. There are 168 hours in a week. At least five of those hours should be invested in some form of physical activity. Health is something most of us take for granted until we lose it. Don't let that happen to you." -Sharma

So true so true. 

November 4th Sunday afternoon

"You become your environment. Become more selective in the news you expose your mind to. Be more deliberate in the way you read your newspaper and in the way you watch your television. Before you start reading the morning paper, have a purpose in mind. Use it as an informative tool to serve you and to make you wiser rather than as an excuse to help you pass time. And resolve to expose yourself to influences that help you become the person you want to be." -Robin Sharma

Jim Kallett Seminar Oct 27th 2012, Saturday

For those of you who may not know of Jim Kallett I will begin by telling you a little bit about who he is and what he does. Jim is one of the original and select few instructors that Bikram hand-picked to represent him to conduct posture clinics and seminars around the world. He has lead seminars in Singapore, India, and throughout Canada & the USA

A senior faculty member of Bikram’s Yoga College of India – International Headquarters in Los Angeles, California, since 1998. Jim Kallett has been International Judge and Coach for the International Yoga Competition from 2003 to present. He is member of the Judges Committee for the USA Yoga Federation. He became a certified teacher during Bikram’s 5th ever teacher training program in 1997! It is clear that Jim’s passion is what he is able to do each and every day of his life and better yet he is able to share his knowledge of Bikram Hot Yoga with everyone around the world. He allows himself to be accessible to us all. Jim is also the owner/Director of Bikram’s Yoga College of India, San Diego. 

I want to start off by saying how informative this seminar was; from the three hour lecture that was held on Friday Oct 26th to the full day seminar Saturday completed with a full classroom, hot and very sweaty class. The energy in the room was endless and all the Bikram Yogi's who managed to make it out from afar was absolutely incredible. 

I am grateful to have had the opportunity to ask questions about my practice and be in the presence of a mentor such as Jim Kallett. 

I will share with you all the information I took from the weekend with Jim and hope for you to find some value in my notes etc. 

Standing Deep Breathing 

The nose and mouth are only a passage way (close valve so its barely open) to control like a valve-feel vibration, hear sounds-inhale should sound like a million grasshoppers in field about to feast, exhale should resemble your car exhaust. 

When we use our regular breath we are only using 20% of the lungs, with breathing exercises in Bikram class we are using 100% of your lung’s capacity.

By sucking in the stomach (abdomen) you are moving the diaphragm out of the way to allow the lower lobes of the lungs to be inflated with fresh oxygen. The more you open the rib cage the more the lungs are able to expand in every direction, also giving the lungs more time to drawn the oxygen from the air you bring into your body. 

6 seconds in is equivalent to 6 pounds of oxygen. You must control breathing especially the last 3 seconds in and 3 seconds out as it is your human nature to want to inhale at the 3 second point but it is your mental and physical strength to control that feeling and continue.

Keep your buttocks tight, and knees locked, make sure your body is aligned absolutely straight.  Make sure your always listening to the dialogue-it will guide you.

When you yawn in standing deep breathing its due to the fact you are waking up the lungs. Do not judge it, only observe it. Keep it simple. 

Self-Realization-realizing the strength you didn't know you had. 

Half Moon Pose with Hands to Feet Pose

In Half Moon Pose it shows everything about the health and state of your spine, it also can potentially show your personality etc of you and your body. Forward bend-suck abdomen in. Hold the breathing-means don't let all the air out, does not mean to stop breathing. The second you stop breathing your body goes into oxygen debt. (80/20 breathing) exhale automatically happens so you do not have to think about this. 10% of the breath will automatically be lost when you bend your body into postures. (Result effect of what is happening, no need to think about this while you are doing it) Legs, hips and back all stretching equally. “Natural Human Traction”. 

Open you shoulders to open your chest and rib cage. Focus on right shoulder forward, left hip toward the mirror. Grip is key.

Backward Bend-opening your heart, fear, opening your spine, the spinal cord is free, relax into this posture, Trust yourself. Elbows locked, breath up, relax your neck and back. Lift the chest in order to help bend the upper spine and by doing so this shall help the arms fall back over time. 

Quivering in the core-is due to the fact that your body is trying to build muscle memory. Nothing wrong with this, natural organic body response. 

The warm up for hands to feet pose is not vital as to which way a person does it-keep it simple do not add or remove anything just move your body to get the snovial fluids moving. Arms are first priority to get them in the right position first, behind the legs then you are able to pull with proper grip. Lastly focus on the straightening of the legs.

“YOU don’t DO Yoga, You TRY Yoga”.-Jim Kallett

Awkward Pose

Stick your butt out and sit down. (2nd part) Use Stomach and core muscles. When coming up in (3rd part) concentrate on squeezing knees together, the tighter you press them together and use abdominal strength you will slowly be able to over time come up-slowly, controlled. 

Eagle Pose 

Stretching opening 14 major joints in the body simultaneously. For home practice you can easily sit in your living room at home watching television and with legs parallel to the floor and get your legs into eagle position hold this for 5 mins at a time and then relax. By doing this it will help your legs get use to latching in this way. 

Quite often when people have injuries or issues with their knees, the factor really lies behind the hips. 

Good for the reproductive system. Fully Flushing the body with freshly oxygenated blood.

PARTY TIME!!

Standing Head to Knee Pose 

Under ground foundation is the most important-When you observe the structure of a house the foundation is the most vital part. Without foundation is does not matter how the house is built (how the posture is) it is all in the set up. Lock the knee (knee cap comes up and upper thigh flexed). Must follow steps through-Lock your knee, kick out your leg,  Both knees locked, elbows down, Hold still and bring head down. Don’t get stuck where its comfortable, but at the same time do not move forward unless your body is ready. 

Sarah (personal feedback)-Focus on kicking out my leg more, keep BOTH knees locked and bring elbows into my calf. I am physically ready to do this posture I need to think less, and do. Just focus and DO NOT think about falling out, and when I am able to hold it just observe do not think about how I haven't fallen out. It is ok. HOLD it and when I can I will hold it for as long as I want, and nothing will be able to steal my peace. 

Morgan (personal feedback)-Focus on lock the knee, lock the knee, lock the knee (Mantra) and keep the weight in the foot equal all over. He is able to kick out because he is able to just observe the pain in the back of his thigh and accept that its there. It has no effect on the posture itself. He can do it. 

Standing Head to Knee-Is strictly MIND strength-also called RAJA YOGA.

Interesting fact!:

*Harvard Medical School is going to do a scientific study on Bikram Yoga and how it effects the neurons and body. 

Make sure your hand grip in this posture is right below the toes to help stretch back the Achilles tendon.

Standing Bow Pulling Pose 

Have to come down, 50/50 stretching and balance you will never fall out. Teetering happening-if your kicking this wont happen. Solution to any problem in this posture is to kick harder, kick harder, kick harder! Raja yoga is this yoga. MIND yoga. “Its not what your doing its what your thinking”-Jim Kallett 

Kick Back and relax the shoulder. MANTRA Kick back!

Is also a back bend so feeling compression in the lower back of the spine that is normal. Do NOT ever think about the hips-that is not the intention of this posture and you should not concentrate on that whatsoever. Stretch the shoulder forward.

Balancing Stick Pose

High speed blood to the brain. Blood pressure builds up so much when your holding balancing stick, reaction pressure expands the arteries, flushes through, clears out the blockages in the arteries and veins and goes straight to your brain. In this posture you are strengthening the heart muscle. Have to you use 110% of your strength all at once to ream the benefits. Every muscle tensed. 

Standing Separate Leg Stretching 

Middle upper spine stretching, whole body stretching 360 degree angle. Keep a good good grip and pull down, chin up and focus on touching your forehead to the floor. By pulling you are elongating your spine. In this posture you are fully stretching your sciatica, so if you suffer from sciatic pain you should go to where you can without intense pain and then hold it. When you experience sciatic pain, you should ice it and then use heat compress to treat it. Massage-roll on a ball. 

“Never modify a posture-just back off and do less if you must, but never change the posture”. -Jim Kallett

Triangle Posture

Must sit down low enough, femur bone must be parallel. The technique is what is important in this posture especially, it does not matter what others look like in it as everyone’s genetic make up is different, we will all look slightly different and be in different parts of practice. Opposite stretching between both arms shoulders. Twist your spine and lift your head and turn it all the way until it hurts to avoid degenerative spinal diseases in the future. Push the knee back with the arm and eventually there shall be space between this area. 

Be aware that your not over compensating the rotation in the hips. 

Standing Separate Leg Head to Knee 

Activate the immune system, balance the internal glands inside the body. Never compromise the forehead to the knee as this is the most vital part of this posture. 

It is normal to fall out because this is a balancing posture. All of these postures are balance postures so this is common. Press your fingertips into the floor above the toes. Point the fingers into the ground. When coming up and switching sides pick up the toes and rotate the feet-by doing so you will ensure the space between your feet is consistently the same amount of space. Look at the stomach and suck the abdomen in. 

Tree Pose

Little by little this posture takes time to develop your self awareness and understand how and where to push. 

Don’t sink or collapse, stretch your spine up, bring your hips down to the heel without putting any pressure on the heel. Natural Human Traction Toe Stand and Tree Pose must keep the hip down. 

Savasana is completed 26 times in the floor series alone. Biochemical benefits of the postures happen here, Nutrition & Relaxation. 

Wind Removing Pose

After your food has been digested it works its way through your digestive system and the ascending colon, descending colon and transverse colon, promote gastronomical diseases such as  chrohn’s disease, colon cancer, ulcers, by moving everything and cleaning out the pipes of your colon. 

We tend to produce excess acid when we are stressed, which can cause many problems, when doing wind removing you are preventing your digestive system from overproducing hydro chloric acid. 

Eventually you should be able to grab your both legs without having to bring up your head and shoulders. Exhale a bit to help bring your legs closer into your chest.

Back flat and pull as hard as you can.

Interesting Fact!:

44 pounds of fecal matter was found in John Wayne upon death when an autopsy was done. Regular American male’s have average 22 pounds of fecal matter inside the bowels while they are living.  

Cobra

Hand placement is key, as there is only one right way to have your hands in the right position, elbows at a 90 degree angle and using all your spine strength to life your body off the ground.

When certain vibration bone density increases. You’re Type 2A muscles contract when doing Cobra pose, by doing so they increase bone density in the body. ex. Eagle Pose-increases density in the bones. 

It takes more than just taking Calcium to improve bone loss when your body has no idea what to do with it. 

Locust Pose

Access, unleash and realize that unused unknown power that you have. Must push through and not wait until the 10th second to drop, keep pushing. Push your hands down lower to help get the weight more into your shoulders. Kick up and back. This posture uses strength. Ultimately you should not be focused on the hips coming up but try your hardest to keep lifting whilst keeping the knee locked. 

So this is about where my laptop started to die...I hope you all found my notes to be helpful in some way and maybe you had just needed a friendly reminder of what had been said in class. I loved this seminar, and I think I learned a lot about myself and my practice in the short time Jim was here. I was actually slightly shocked by how much we as humans on a regular basis under estimate our true potential, our strength and our mind’s power. I know now that as much as I pick apart my practice and sometimes am a little hard on myself I must always come back and realize that I don’t DO yoga, but I practice yoga, and just as in life, yoga is an ongoing never ending practice that will continue to change. I feel more drawn towards focusing on my Raja yoga aspect of practice and really want to try and be more simple. As Jim said a number of times-just keep it simple. Do not think, but follow the dialogue and it will guide you. It will. I felt my emotions pour out of my body during the seminar on saturday when put up in front of the class to do my standing head to knee and voice my concerns about how I was not progressing and how I was unable to keep my head to my knee, but you know what, now I know what I was doing wrong all this time. I was not keeping it simple. I was over thinking it and by doing so I got caught up in my head. This seminar was absolutely incredible and I am overjoyed to see new and even senior people to this practice all getting up in front of the class and being supportive of our inquiries. I think this is just amazing and all the love and support is a community of its own. Namaste friends and let’s keep it simple!

“Natural surroundings serve to stifle the endless chatter that fills our minds so that our true brilliance can be liberated. While you spend time enjoying nature observe your surroundings with deep concentration. Study the complexity of a flower or the way the current moves in the sparkling stream. Take your shoes off and feel the grass under your feet. Give silent thanks that you have the privilege of enjoying these special gifts of nature. Life’s simplest pleasures are life's best ones.” -Robin Sharma “Daily Inspiration From the Monk who Sold his Ferrari