Just practicing twice a week at the local studio, I am devoting 5 hours per week to my yoga practice. It takes about 20 minutes for me to walk to the studio (15 if I really book it), I’m in class for 90 minutes, and then another 20 minutes to walk back home. Add in additional time for chit-chat at the studio, showering, getting changed, and that’s easily another 20 minutes, which brings the total to about 2.5 hours for one yoga class.

Now if you go 7 days a week, as I used to, that’s a whopping 17.5 hours per week devoted to yoga! That’s a full waking day (and then some) for most adults. Spread that out over a year, and you’re looking at some 55-60 waking days spent doing yoga. Or two full months!

This was my yoga schedule when I used to live in L.A. I can’t say that I regret having spent so much time doing yoga. It’s just that now, after having taken some time away from the mat, it seems astounding to me that a human being would ever spend that much time doing yoga. Going twice a week is already a considerable time commitment. Today, I can’t fathom going 7 times a week.

I know, however, that I need to increase the regularity of my practice to really start enjoying the benefits of yoga. So my immediate goal is to increase my practice to 3 times a week, but this has proven challenging. Part of the problem is the lack of weekend classes at the studio where I practice. You pretty much have one class a day you can go to on Saturdays and Sundays. If you miss those classes, you’re out of luck until Monday.

In addition, I’m having trouble justifying the amount of time I’d be spending on yoga if I went 3 times a week. Somehow, I used to have no problem spending hours and hours at the yoga studio. It was my second home. Nowadays, though, I feel like going to the yoga studio is a luxury and an indulgence. When I’m there, I often find myself thinking about all the things I could be doing instead of yoga. I often feel guilty before and after class for “wasting” so much time. I’m not sure how my attitudes changed so much, but they have. Maybe this worrying and anxiety about doing yoga is just further proof that I need to spend more time doing it, not less.

Here’s how I used to do Chaturanga.

But now I learned a new way. This helpful teacher at Dhyana Yoga made some adjustments for me and suggested that I allow my elbows to flare out to the side a bit when I go through a Vinyasa. She also suggested that I sink my chest in Plank Pose, before shifting into a Vinyasa, so as to ensure that my shoulders don’t roll forward. I might not be reporting her instructions 100% accurately, and I’m sure that I probably missed a thing or two, but I think I got the gist of what she was trying to tell me. This teacher’s approach to Chaturangas/Vinyasas was really quite surprising to me, since I’d always been told to keep my elbows in tight to my side body–so tight, in fact, that my arms may even brush the sides of my chest as I lower from Plank into Chaturanga. Also, it’s a big no-no in most Vinyasa classes to allow your elbows to flare out to the sides.

This teacher at Dhyana, though, offered me a new approach, which I think is how they do it in Anusara (maybe someone out there can set me straight on this…). What I noticed is that when I did Vinyasas the way this teacher suggested, it bothered my shoulder much less. I felt my chest muscles engaging more, and there was less strain on my shoulder joint. Today, I’m a big sore from practicing, but it’s muscle soreness, not that bad, achy, “I screwed up my joints” soreness. I haven’t felt that good, post-yoga muscle soreness in so long, I almost forgot what it feels like! I really hope that this new approach to Chaturanga and Vinyasas will make enough of a difference in my practice so that I can continue on without having a relapse of my shoulder problems. I guess only time will tell whether this is the solution.

This teacher also gave me some suggestions for modifying my Down-Dog. More on that next time….

As with my first class, this second class of the year made me feel very odd and disoriented. One thing I noticed is that teachers often espouse one set of beliefs but manifest a totally different set of beliefs in their actions/teaching. A lot of yoga teachers will preface class with some familiar slogans about “just do your best” and “yoga is not a competition, ” etc. (I used to do this myself when I taught yoga.) But the very same teachers often go on to push their students, and create an environment in which it’s all about doing tougher and tougher asanas, the pinnacle of which is handstand, arm balance craziness (see my digital asana project videos). I would like to find a class where the yoga really isn’t about the physical feats. As I mentioned in a previous post, I think it may be time for me to get away from Ashtanga/flow/Anusara yoga, and take up Iyengar or (dare I say it) Kundalini.

As someone who used to be an advanced yogi (purely from a physical asana perspective), I find it odd and discomforting to take a flow yoga class and not be able do any of the things I used to do. One reason for this is simply my ego. I know that I used to be able to do some pretty unusual and even amazing things on the yoga mat. Now, I’m lucky if I can do down-dog without hurting my shoulder. But beyond my own ego, there’s something else I’ve noticed about these more exercise-oriented yoga class–there’s not much there beyond the exercise. Don’t get me wrong, exercise is good, and there’s nothing like the yoga high after a hot, sweaty class. And I recognize that asanas can be very powerful and that the physical asanas can go hand in hand with the other aspects of yoga. My observation, though, is that a lot of yoga classes are really just fitness classes with some “spirituality” sprinkled on top. Now that I can’t really do yoga for fitness, I think I’m finding certain types of classes don’t have much to offer me.

I’d certainly like to get back to the point where I can do a strong asana practice and enjoy all the benefits of sweating, twisting, inverting, etc. But I feel like I’m also looking for something else, something that I won’t ever find in a mainstream flow class sponsored by Lululemon and YogiToes.

Although I should have been excited to practice yoga again, I actually found myself depressed about it. It’s very humbling (even humiliating) to go from being an “advanced yogi” to practicing at about 10% of the intensity that I had grown accustomed to. I’m trying to be thankful for just being able to do any yoga at all. But it’s very difficult to accept that, at least for now, I can’t do or shouldn’t do even simple poses that were once second nature to me.  Hopefully, I can turn this long, drawn-out injury into a learning experience. I definitely used to be one of those yogis who was proud of all the acrobatic stunts I could do, all the strength and flexibility, etc. To have all that suddenly taken away and not return is quite difficult for me. I know I should be able to “let it all go,” but that just hasn’t happened. At least not yet.

Yesterday, for the first time since I’ve been injured, it really hit me that I might never be able to recover the practice I once had. I may never lift myself from crow pose into handstand, or jump gracefully from down-dog into an arm balance. I may never even be able to do a proper vinyasa again. As I practice yoga at Dhyana over the next three months, I think the biggest challenge for me will not be the asanas, but accepting my limitations, and accepting that they may be permanent limitations. As of now, I’m not sure that I will be able to meet this challenge.

I did practice about 3 times a week on my own, a kind of modified Ashtanga practice, but it’s just not the same. I couldn’t do down-dog, plank, arm balances or most inversions. It’s like my practice went from 100 MPH to 2 MPH.

Over time, though, things did improve, albeit very slowly. Then, sometime around September of 2010, after taking lots and lots of Celebrex to get the inflammation down in my shoulder, I finally regained full range of motion in my shoulder without any pain. I immediately started practicing Vinyasa Flow yoga again. Not surprisingly, my shoulder got bad within three weeks. It hasn’t recovered since. My shoulder now seems to just be in a permanent state of grinding and popping, with a mild to sometimes sharp pain. I don’t have health insurance now, so surgery is out of the question, at least for now. I’m worried that I’ve screwed my shoulder up permanently. I’m 33 years old and feel like an old man!

So why did I buy a 3-month pass to a yoga studio? Well, the main reason was that I couldn’t pass up the deal. They were offering 3-month passes for just $90. The catch, though, is that I have to activate the pass by March 1st. More likely than not, my shoulder won’t be better by then. So I’m going to try to restrict myself to only doing standing poses. I bet this will annoy some teachers, but c’est la vie. I also plan to go to some restorative and beginner classes, where I can get away with not having to put any stress on my shoulder.

For the long term, though, I’m finally rethinking my yoga options and am considering giving up on vinyasa flow altogether. Right now, my two best options are Bikram and Iyengar. But I haven’t seen any Iyengar being offered in Center City Philadelphia, and Bikram is something that I’ve just never really been able to get on board with…

In any case, assuming I can manage to get back into some sort of yoga practice with some sort of regularity, I hope to begin posting again on this blog. I see on the administrator’s page that the blog is still getting some 300+ hits a day, so thank you to everyone who is still reading. I also noticed that the blog reached a significant milestone a few weeks ago–it passed 300,000 all-time hits! With any luck, I’ll be able to post again with some regularity and give readers something new to look at and think about.

Eugene

I’ve been doing physical therapy and have taken ungodly amounts of Ibuprofen, but none of this is really helping. If anything, the pain, grinding, and locking in my shoulder has gotten worse in the last two months. I tried doing some yoga, thinking that it might help, but it just made things worse. So, needless to say, my yoga practice and rock climbing are both on indefinite hold right now.

Instead of climbing and yoga, these days I’m doing a lot of running. This is not my usual activity, and I’ve found myself struggling to get into it. One reason it’s been so difficult is that my cardio-vascular health is probably not all that great. Yoga and rock climbing just don’t get your heart rate up high enough to deliver serious cardio-vascular benefits. So, in a strange way, this injury might be doing me a lot of good, since it’s getting me to run a lot. I’m running 3-4 miles, about 5 days a week. For me, this gets my heart rate up, keeps me from going totally stir crazy, and actually is helping me to improve my fitness in ways that yoga and climbing never did.

I don’t want this to turn into a running blog, or a blog about whatever I’m up to, so I decided to take a hiatus until I can get back into my yoga practice. Hopefully, my shoulder bursitis will resolve itself pretty soon, and I can get back onto the yoga mat. Most likely, I’ll be practicing at Dhyana Yoga in Philadelphia this next year. (Thank you to everyone who sent me studio recommendations!) Once I get back to my practice, I plan to start posting on this blog again. Until then, Namaste!

Classes will still be held in the same space (Blooming Lotus above Roots), and all class packages with Bloomington Power Yoga are valid with Mukti Yoga.

There’ve been a lot of changes at Bloomington Power Yoga over the past year, including the departure of most of the original teachers. Susan, Rusty, and I have all stopped teaching, but Kelly will continue on, and there are now several new and wonderful teachers who have joined the mix. The new name, Mukti Yoga, means “liberation” yoga, and is intended to reflect the various changes at the studio. Please support the new teachers and help the community to thrive and grow!

- Eugene

At this point, I’m not sure if I’ll try to teach in Philly. There’s a small possibility that I will, but I can’t say for sure yet. At the very least, I’m excited to be practicing yoga again in a big city.

In yoga classes, you’ll often hear the teacher say “listen to your body.” This phrase is somewhat ambiguous, and is open to all sorts of interpretations. Some students take this phrase to be code for “as soon as you feel any discomfort whatsoever, back off.” To me, this approach is exactly the opposite of the spirit of yoga, which teaches us to be unattached. If we cling to comfort, though, and expect the yoga practice to be manageable and easy from beginning to end, then we are in the grip of a very strong attachment. We want to remain in our comfort zone, and our aversion to discomfort turns into a kind of pathology in which we think all discomfort is bad and that the whole point of yoga is to feel good. But this is precisely the kind of restrictive mentality that we’re trying to free ourselves from when we do yoga. In yoga, we learn to accept what comes, be it difficult or relaxing. Without challenge, yoga becomes self-indulgent and even hedonistic. Without challenge, yoga promotes stasis instead of encouraging growth.

But how much challenge is too much? Surely, there’s a point at which more challenge is a bad thing. Our bodies, after all, do have physical limits. And when we exceed these limits, we are likely to get injured.

Unfortunately, it’s often difficult to tell if you’ve exceeded your physical limits until you’re clearly injured. One approach is to just accept injuries as an unfortunate but necessary part of the yoga practice. (Of course, this doesn’t mean you should be reckless. And you should also respect where you are in your practice. Someone who is new to yoga shouldn’t, for instance, be trying to add handstands to their Sun Salutations. This isn’t pushing your limits–this is just being stupid.) In a lot of sports, people just accept that injuries go with the territory. Talk to any serious gymnast, tennis player, rock climber, runner, etc., and you’re likely to find someone who has not only suffered from an injury in the past, but who is currently managing one.

With yoga, anyone who practices with regularity will likely encounter some sort of injury at some point. This is especially true for people who practice Ashtanga and/or Flow. Eventually, though, you might get sick of all the aches and pains. Personally, I’m getting fed up with icing my wrists, shoulder, knees, etc. One way to avoid this would be to stop practicing yoga altogether, or cut back and do yoga less frequently and/or take easier classes. A better alternative, though, might be to try different styles of yoga, and to be open to different forms of challenge. It’s important to remember that there are other kinds of challenge in yoga besides physical challenge. Sitting still in silent meditation for 20 minutes, for instance, is a kind of challenge that is primarily mental in nature, but it is still a tremendous challenge nonetheless. Also, in yoga, you can find great mental challenge in physically undemanding poses, just as you can find great mental challenge in physically demanding poses. The key is to learn what those various challenges are, and to make sure that when you do practice yoga, you are open to challenges in whatever form they might take.

Iyengar and Kundalini are two traditions I hope to explore some more. Both offer the benefits of asana, but, from what I can tell, practitioners of these styles of yoga are much less likely to suffer from physical injuries. The reason for this, I take it, is that these styles of yoga do not adopt the “no pain, no gain” mentality that is dominant in other styles of yoga. Or, to put it more accurately, Iyengar and Kundalini seem to cultivate a much richer and broader notion of challenge, one that includes, but is not limited, to physical challenge.

There are some obvious things you can’t do when your shoulder is busted. No downward-facing dog. No handstands. No plank. No Chaturanga. Also, no lifting your injured arm in any of the Warrior poses. This pretty much means that you can’t even do Sun Salutations.

So what can you do? Warrior poses are still possible, but you have to do them with just one arm up. You can do side plank, but only on one side. Not surprisingly, things start to feel a bit lopsided when you practice like this. Often, in yoga, there is an emphasis on symmetry, but there is really no way to have a symmetrical practice when one of your arms is out of commission. What have I learned from practicing yoga asymmetrically? Well, one thing I learned is how attached I am to balance, symmetry, and evenness! It was an interesting challenge for me to try to just accept that my practice was going to be wonky for a while. At first, after my injury, my initial impulse was not to practice at all. Better no practice than a lopsided practice, I thought. After a week or so of this poor attitude, though, I found myself getting stiff and tight and anxious. Eventually I just had to do some yoga.

For a few weeks, I managed to practice at home every two to three days, doing 30- to 45-minute sessions each time. This past Monday, I finally went to a yoga class for the first time in over a month. My shoulder has been healing quickly, so I was able to do mostly everything that I used to do, minus the handstands, arm balances, etc. But for the first time in many years, I was just grateful to be able to do a normal downward-facing dog and Warrior II, poses I’ve come to take for granted. As I’ve had to learn several times now, there’s nothing like an injury to teach you a little something about gratitude.