Thursday, July 25, 2013

That time I quit yoga

Warning: this will only be interesting to my yoga buddies. I'm going to post pics that I found online of the poses I'm referring to.

I've been taking advantage of new student specials at yoga studios, and this week I tried a new studio.  I went to a class today that was mislabeled as an Ashtanga class, but it was actually dharma mittra. Never taken this type of class before, so I have no idea if my experience is similar to others, but holy cow...

The teacher was Mark Kan. Have y'all heard of him or taken his class before?

He instructed us to start with a strap. In my head, I'm thinking "ha, a strap. Ok. This will be an easy class.

Then immediately, he says "crow".



I'm thinking, "woo this is a whippersnapper! So happy for a challenging class!"

Next, he instructs us to "warm up with three forearm stands." This is a pose that I work up to, not warm up with! I can do it 50% of the time without a wall. Often I get so scared of falling that I can't even get into the pose 


Then, it all goes downhill from there. 

Imagine every hard pose. Ok, now imagine transitioning with a handstand. Splits directly to handstand. Crow to handstand. Firefly to handstand. I can do splits. I can do a handstand. But I can't go directly from one to the other! 

Next, he asks us to do forearm stand with funky arms (yemike!!!). I modify and do this In a headstand, which is ridiculous to think that a beginner modification ever has a headstand in it. Then, he asks us to go from this...

Straight to this...


Other poses: straddle handstand. Straddle forearm stand. Wheel to headstand. Chin stand to wheel to handstand (?!??). Flying pigeon to...you guessed it....handstand. Most I have blocked from my memory. 

And the most discouraging part?

I was the only one in class who couldn't do this s***! I literally just sat there and watched, mouth agape. If I had a camera, I would have been recording it. I actually apologized to the instructor for going to his class without reading the description, bc I had no idea that he was going to be asking for us to basically levitate. 

All I wanted was to go home, open a new bottle of wine, and eat cheese twists.

And that is the time I quit yoga. But not really, because I want to learn how to do all of that crazy stuff!

By the way, yogis, did y'all know that there is a championship for yoga? The national champion was practicing next to me in that God forsaken class...


Side note : it want godforsaken, just way too hard for me. As I explained to Daniel, I need about 80 % success in a yoga class to love it and learn from it...this class, I might have had 40%? I don't even know which pose to begin with! I feel like I need to take a beginners 101 class now! 






2 comments:

  1. Holy smokes! That was some story! I laughed as I read the play-by-play of the poses. I can only imagine! You are a trooper for staying in class and for wanting to go back. In my mind, YOU are the champion!!

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  2. Thanks stefani...not sure if I can show my face again in his class, but I do hope to one be able to do some of the asanas. There was a TON of chanting in sanskrit btw, more than just the typical ohm...it went on for literally 3 minutes. And i have no idea how everyone in the class knew the chant. Kinda freaky. we probably would have laughed if we were in the class together!

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