Except They Go Backwards

Yesterday I went to a sound meditation instead of Zumba. It was a tough decision but the sound meditation event is only once a month and when it was over with, I made a silent vow to go to the next one which will be the last session before summer.

The meditation is 75 minutes but usually feels like 20; I slept well afterwards. Monday had been so intense that sound therapy just seemed like the right thing to do.

I was tempted to go to Zumba today but had to remind myself that it's not a very good experience trying to make it to a 5:30 p.m. class so I went swimming.

There's been a young boy taking lessons and I listened in.

Pretend that your legs don't bend; you want to keep your legs straight.

The arms are the same for the backstroke as they are for freestyle -- except they go backwards. 

Okay, I know some of these techniques but it never hurts to be reminded. When I saw the dive rings poolside, it made me think of Katy Bowman and it totally made me want to play with them.

I loooove swimming--grew up doing hours of it daily. I swam in the ocean and a very small community pool, and despite being on the swim team in high school, doing the same stroke over and over again isn't how I feel connected to water. Instead I prefer to swim in wild water, where the temperature, flow rate, shape and surrounding terrain dictates how I need to move through it. I like my strokes being a response to something. I like my strokes to constantly change. I still love pools but what I naturally do in them is swim along the bottoms, dive to the bottom over and over again--throw things to have to scout to find them. That's how I introduce variability into my swim time--how I use many strokes, many different body parts, while in the medium of water. That's how I swam as a kid and how I still swim today! #moveyourdna #alignmentmatters #springbreak #californiavibes❤️💦💪🏾👣

A post shared by Katy Bowman (@nutritiousmovement) on Apr 2, 2018 at 1:15pm PDT

But First

Yesterday we were all settled on our mats and then You've been great but when is Joy coming back?

What a question...

At the end of class, I loved it when Erin said And thank you for letting me guide you while Joy is away...

During one of my pre-work reading sessions, I read a Prevention magazine article about Nutritious Movement. My favorite line:

We are capable of moving and repositioning our bodies in small but powerful ways 100% of our waking hours.

I'm not sure what struck the biggest chord, but I'm motivated to dig deeper and move more. Reading Nourish Your Body Through Movement also reaffirmed my decision to keep doing yoga even though I crave the simplest and gentlest of classes.

Listened to the first episode Katy Bowman's first podcast as I walked to work today. Of course, I also checked out Bowman's Instagram account and this post has inspired me to incorporate more hikes into my regimen.

For those of who might think my kids are always stoked to go out on an all uphill hike in the rain, allow me to share this picture. (P.S. My daughter picked this out as the picture to share capturing her mood; she was ok with me posting it.) As you know, walking uphill is different than level-ground walking. We can go 6 miles no carry and 10 miles all downhill, but uphill is where they're least conditioned to (because we keep picking flat because it's easier to go far and thus more enjoyable for all). Nevertheless, going uphill is required to develop the parts necessary for going uphill. To continue to avoid it is to continue to be missing necessary parts. SO. We found a cool 1-mile steep climb in the forest, that leads to an old fire lookout. We'll do this once a day for three more days, improving each time and then they'll get to see firsthand how they improve. But until then, #whinefestcentral #gooutsideanyway #MoveYourDNA #letthemmovetheirDNA #thisispartoftheprocess

A photo posted by Katy Bowman (@nutritiousmovement) on Aug 7, 2016 at 4:02pm PDT

This morning's pre-work reading material came from the March issue of O: The Oprah Magazine about soul mates. In Work Wife Mallory Ortberg talks about her business partner and cofounder of The Toast. I love it when she writes:

I stumbled upon her work on a different site back in 2011, and the only way I can describe how I felt is that I wanted her brain and mine to collide into one another at maximum speed in the middle of a sun meadow.

Yeah, I think their relationship definitely falls into the soul mate category...