She's Good

After three years, the batteries inside of my Garmin Vivofit tracker gave out. Anticipating that the batteries would wear out sooner than later, I purchased replacements more than a year ago but couldn't find them. Ordered more and chided myself for being disorganized.

As I tried to replace the batteries, a spring shot across the room never to be found and the tracker, which was already falling part, fell apart further so I decided to spend Christmas money on a new tracker. Went back to the Fitbit brand and got a Flex 2 which is lighter than the Vivofit. Didn't really like the fact that the Flex doesn't have a display but I'm used to it now...

The other perk is the Fitbit app; didn't use it last time but now I'm logging water and I've been drinking twice as much water as I have been drinking which is a sad commentary on my water intake...

Messaged my yoga trainer, Stacy, so that I could get one of my assist/adjustment classes out of the way. I decided to do this requirement with my trainer at one of her private classes. When I jump in, I jump all the way in. I did think that a private group would be smaller and, possibly, a better foray than a class of, say, 25; it's January, you know...

I was so nervous and wasn't quite sure how the set-up would be or how I would execute my assists. Stacy asked everyone to introduce themselves and to talk a little about why they practice yoga and, of course, everyone was super welcoming, nice, wished me well and it was cool to hear their yoga stories.

Stacy thanked me at the end of class, which made me breathe a sigh of relief. It's a pleasure to watch Stacy teach; she’s good at what she does.

Well, Warm Up Then...

As I prepared for Zumba yesterday, went to retrieve my water bottle from the car and decided to see if my mother wanted to go to the Botanical Garden instead since we are having unseasonably warm weather. My mother enjoyed herself and quickly came up with one of her constituents (my word) that she can take on an outing to the Botanical Garden...

My favorite statue in the Linnean House surrounded by poinsettias. 

String beans?

Bells Chimes at MO Bot

Garden Glow Prop

A Caribbean Feel in the Climatron

Went to a yoga adjustment workshop after vising the garden. I was excited and terrified about the workshop but it turned out much better than I expected.

The whole yoga assist/adjustment thing is interesting because many teachers don't give adjustments anymore and most teachers only give them to students that they know very well and I can totally see why.

I like the advice of our workshop teacher, Kim. Don't give anyone any creepy, tentative assists and Stacy, our YTT trainer, has pretty much said the same thing. Their advice is to get consent, let them know what body part you'll be touching and do the assist firmly. You should also get student feedback and even when you don't get verbal feedback, you need to tune in to people's body language.

Overall, it was a great workshop with lots of good advice, including that if you don't feel called to give assists or don't feel comfortable doing it, you can totally opt out as it's not a necessary part of being a yoga teacher.

I also recalled what Stacy said about observing people practice yoga and how it's is an intimate experience. Kim asked me to get into Wide Legged Forward fold so that she could demonstrate an adjustment. I heard someone point out the position of my head and feet. One of my regular teachers came over to offer a block and experimented with putting it at different heights.

Head and Toes, not relaxing...

Kim said that she's noticed that even in savasana, the final relaxation pose, that people have a hard time letting go. As we continued to discuss, Stacy simply said It's a known issue.  All that to say, we are learning and looking at bodies and alignment and gets intimate. It totally felt like there was a hot, spotlight on me...

But it was so exciting when we talked about Pigeon pose and external and internal rotation. It was like an episode of CSI and also a reminder that none of us know all the answers.

Example of an adjustment...

At the beginning of the workshop, someone asked Kim if we were going to warm up and she asked us if we felt the need and, to someone's affirmative response, she said, Well, warm up then. Let's give it 10 minutes.  Kim is the opposite of pomp and circumstance.