One week until Manju's Workshop in Crete.

One week until Manju's Workshop in Crete, we fly Friday, couple of days in Heraklion then head down to Rthymnon on Sunday.

One more week of tidying up practice, today I was trying to find a balance of sorts between how slow I like to take my practice and what's appropriate perhaps for the shala. Three long slow breaths instead of five seems to work, bring the forehead down to the knee but then slide on to the chin to look up, quiet breath to hide shorter kumbhakas, subtle uddiyana kriyas... seem to be coming up with a nice balance.

Last week was my first full week of full primary after all the Kidney stone issues which have gone on for, what three months, playing havoc with my practice along the way.

But it comes back.

Yesterday I thought I'd have a look at 2nd series, think Manju might touch on it during the course so might as well see where I am with it.

fingertip bind in pasasana
untidy Krounchasana
The rest acceptable perhaps up to Kapo which was.....interesting.

I've been working on some drop backs during the week so know there's some flexibility in my back plus the technique is still there but still....

Lots of setting up (hesitation), then remembered a comment about kapo only being 40 seconds ( did I really do a twenty-five breath kapo, 40 seconds sounds great about now).... plus a flashback to Angela's Kitchen kapo from a few years back where BANG, she's straight back into a tight kapotasana....

I did three, first one nowhere near my toes, second one close enough to shuffle in, the third one I pretty much landed on my toes, settle for that.

Main problem seems to be in my quads, some extra vajrasana/virasana Vinyasa Krama work called for perhaps.

from my practice book-  Link to Amazon

Decided to quit there, a couple of drop backs, a paschimottanasana then on to finishing,,,, but just before finishing....I wondered what HAS happened to my karandavasana?

Big surprise, straight down, nice and slowly and tight too  then back up, could barely hold it when I got it back up there and had to take a mini savasana before moving on to finishing but it was there, down and up again.... it was there.

Go figure.

Just goes to show, Karandavasana is more about technique than strength, what do you think 70/30 (70% technique/30% strength)?

Plus there's a dwi pada sisrsasana I know from including that entry to supta kurmasana....there's a 2nd series hidden away in there somewhere, no rush, no plans to start practicing it seriously any time soon but nice to know.

Manju.....

I'm sure I've had a hundred questions to ask him over the last few years blogging but can't think of a single one, so many of my old questions seem rather facile now...

or about me wanting to spout my own opinions, what DO I want to ask Manju, really?

Anything you want me to ask him?

And what am I going to take for this trip, for a weeks practice away, barely thought about that? What do you all take for week long workshops? How many sets of practice clothes, should I wear a vest? How many towels....

And my first week of Mysore EVER. There were those two sundays, five years or so ago and a a four day workshop with Richard Freeman but that's it as far as public Ashtanga goes.

Five weeks with Ramaswami of course but that was different somehow...or was it.

Seems such a curious thing to do, like going to a sento, or perhaps an onsen (more exciting).

Traditional home/personal bath

Sento (traditional japanese public bath)

Sento étiquette