Dude...Do Yoga!

Thought I'd share a great article on why yoga is for everyone...including you dudes out there. Written by NYC Yoga Instructor and founder of Core Strength Vinyasa yoga, Sadie Nardini. Love this girl! Enjoy! :)

Places of Old

So I've moved to West Chester, PA and it is everything I could have hoped for of course. I love the town and have since I went to school there (West Chester University) and graduated in 2005. It's felt like home ever since, and I am happy to be back in the area. The town is quaint with all of the restaurants and shops and sweet little buildings with so much character. It's also always buzzing with people and events and things to see. The college students are funny/annoying, a town that will never grow old (weird, right?) There's all kinds of people there, all ages, and I appreciate that. I feel honored to be able to get in my car and drive 5 minutes, park, and be out and about among the streets of this gorgeous little town. Feels right.

Drove back to Berwyn close to our most recent apartment and even though it's been so recent since we've relocated, I got the old familiar ache in my stomach. I definitely get this when I go to Ephrata or Lancaster City (not so much Lansdale, where I grew up, for some reason), and I even used to get in West Chester a little when I would visit after moving away. It's this sort of dropping of the belly, a brief pain that isn't exactly painful, just present. As I drive around I notice the houses and I think, Ok good they're still there. A little smile, a breath.

I'm like that when I "go back" and revisit these old scenes, my old homes, my past lives in some small way. Wonder if others are like that too?

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a class

i am surrounded by people, so a tendency to compete creeps up throughout the class, and i am again and again returning to my own breathing, my own sweat, and my physical sensation. i am in eagle pose. it's hard, really really hard to keep up with this practice. i lift my elbows, i sink my hips. i smile at myself because i used to loathe this very pose. with practice, with years of practice, i can slip in and out of balance postures with grace. i have more control over my muscles and i hear where they are going, where they want to go, where i want them to go. i find a balance within the balance. through the flow i use my arm strength, and am aware that i should use more upper back strength as well. i need this. i need chaturanga, up dog, down dog, repeat. i need to flow through these things with grace, i love it, and it's so hard. my back tells me this: do this practice 1.5 hours a day, really? that often? i need to do that, get back into that like i used to. it's hard. we start off in child's pose, and i know what's coming: the guts and the glory. it's sort of strange how at the first few sun salutations are more like eye openers, and then as i open i am faced with just plain goodness. just the link of breath with movement. when i don't practice this practice i feel it. so it's worth it, it may take a minute to admit it but it's worth it. it may be freakin hard as hell...but i love it.

Savasana

My mom shared this with me after taking one of my yoga classes. I've been wanting to put the yoga experience into words like this for a long time! She's also written a book, which you can find here :)

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Savasana

Before I opened the door I smelled the Pacholli. The incense filled the crisp night air causing me to wonder...
I took this as a good sign. I am blessed.
My daughter is my yoga instuctor and she is not a cynic.

I am stong and yet, my left leg shakes during the lunge...warrior pose i think.
To be a warrior I must breathe and stare at the outlet on the wall,
to look elsewhere is to lose my balance. Sometimes I can do it
other times I wobble and look very silly.

She works me hard and I can hardly stand it, stand up. Reach.
She asks me to reach and stretch and open up my fingers to the sky.
My left lung is damaged from my life, my path...
it hurts me deeply. I feel it thru and thru and thru,
this ouch in my chest and, of course, in my mind.
But I must reach up and look, see those fingers.

There is no condemnation to be found in this hardwood room;
candles illuminate softly, reminding
pressing into us that we too should not be hard on
ourselves. That we should illuminate our light.

She presses down into my stretch with her hands
a gentle force, she holds my head, my skull and pulls it away
streching the spine, releasing stress.
i like it and smile. i try not to smile. i should be serious i think, but i am not sure.

After the moves and poses and ballet of it all~ at times it feels like ballet, so graceful
i get to rest, lay on my mat and put into my mind nothing
or accept what is there. my intentions may be revisited. i have breathed into them
this evening and let them go
rather than rule...
savasana makes me weep
at her beauty and skill and soft words and stong hold
and my bad lungs.

Savasana fills my eyes with tears that run down my cheeks quietly
in the glow of candle.
and no one knows it. not even her.

Afterwards i tell her, embarressed and a little ashamed about the lung
and she hugs me, because that is what she is
my yoga teacher.

something to say

i used to live in west chester and now i live here again. danielle and i bought our first house and are all moved in and we love it. three floors, with finished basement, two full baths, two bedrooms, and lots of trees all around. every window you look out you see trees! bliss! i love feeling rooted and being able to drop my belongings in a room and now i can settle in at my own pace, enjoying the choices of where to put things, and then sitting in it knowing you're not rushed. no lease. no rent. money is being well spent. ahhhhh. so nice.

today we get fios cable, which i am excited about but also afraid of because i know i can get easily sucked in to watching....everything. but i am excited for fit tv, or whatever it's called, so i can do yoga on demand.

couch session

i'm into stuff like:
joseph arthur
meeting folks who teach yoga
3-legged downdog
turning the tv off and closing my eyes
hangin with two beautiful german sheperds until sunday
headstand 101 workshop this saturday
believing in my own power
hazlenut coffee
livin in a new house next weekend
teaching with my hands
opening throat chakra
laying down and taking care of myself
being in movement like all the time
remembering over and over again that this moment is a wonderful moment
trying accupuncture for back
chilly temps
no music in the car
taking a yoga class everyday of the week