Primary and the answer is, Six.

With rain-threatening skies which turned to sunshine, baby inside, and company, I was still able to manage an outdoor Primary, 3 dropbacks and standups and a full closing (25-10). Getting in Sunday practice is HARD.

The answer to my "will there be crowds" question is, SIX. Six students on the first day, but all of them signed up for the whole 8-week program, so the studio just made a little under six hundred bucks. You're welcome.

Drop-ins are possible for that class, so I'll be trying to build that up all week. I think that after the series, some people will drop off. Maybe not; they seem to be in for the workshoppish format and then on their way.

Predictable non-attenders: people who at one time saw me and asked when it was, saying they'd "try to make it." Yep, seen that before. A student whom I did get to the studio, but did not get interested in my own series. Yep, saw that coming. People whom I know are out of town some Sundays and thus didn't sign for the whole program (this will be a rich source of drop-ins). Past regulars that I've not seen in weeks (there's no telling what those people are up to).

Attenders: current students (yay you guys!), past students who were regular for this same class, people who've seen me pull stuents in vinyasa classes. A good mix. Real live exposure to me seems to be the key. That's typical here; it's a very "I know that teacher" or "I've seen his/her practice" town, very unwilling to go just on a class description or a reputation long-distance (unless a master teacher comes to town).

Still, I bet if this series goes over well, I could pitch it AGAIN in the winter.

Standups remain even after time away.

I discovered the title line today: three days without a full Primary, and a lot of hip-tightening sitting at this computer and elsewhere, and yet even with tighter, more ballistic dropbacks, standing up remains.

It's done the same way I described it a few posts ago: drop back, walk hands in. Rearrange feet so they're wide-hip distance (but not mat corners) and pointed front. Throw self upward. Hands leave floor. On the first throw, they inevitably return to the floor. But on the 2nd-3rd throw, up I come, as if the rib cage moves horizontally until it "hooks into" the navel, and KAPOW, I'm standing.

There is quite literally a "line of power" from at least the solar plexus to the pubic bone. Probably from the chin, but I can't track it past solar plex. I think that I like my feet closer when standing, than when dropping back, because the hip flexors help to PULL in standing, whereas they need to RELEASE when dropping, so I expect soon to discover that dropping back is actually, in a way, HARDER than standing up.

This is true in Kapo too, though: it's easier for me to pop up kneeling than it is for me to get my heels. Let's parallel (in a way that might be erroneous) taking the heels to dropping back without ballistics. I don't unballistically drop back. But I do pop up, and thus, I pop up. That's all theory. Sounds good so far.

I want to start dropping back, and spending five breaths down there before coming up. Curious to see what that makes visible.

The ten-breath wheel has been very good. Gets deep into, and then past, the tight glute mechanism of the right hip.

Tomorrow, company and baby or no company and baby, the plan is to PRACTICE before I teach. I want to be on to the GILLS before this first class.

Dave Stringer

has just been in town and that kirtan was some good stuff. Check it: "Kirtan is like punk rock, except with ecstasy instead of anger." I love that.

Do-it-yourself ecstasy. Sure, the rhetoric about brain chemistry is going to send many people back to "What the &*&%^%#%$# do We Know?" (and many people either love or hate that film), but it sounds too good to simply pass off without a try.

DS told us that recorded music put an end to "everyone being a musician" in cultures and traditions where music was taught by practicing it (singing, instrumentation, whatever you've got). J has said similar things to me, about the ways that in the UK, people will sing or play (J was speaking specifically about Irish dance and the musical culture which accompanied when it was a tradition, way before it became RIVERDANCE (oy!!!)) but in the States, our "music" has become in large part whatever pop tunes we listen to. We listen rather than participate. I wondered if singing along with the Stones in the stadium counted.

I got my voice into a few chants and it felt good, and I thought of a thousand things that are FAR too complicated and deeply narrative to get into here; I'm not in the mood for one of my novels right now.

People are apparently curious and asking, about my two-month Ashtanga thing at the studio. That begins on SUNDAY. I've missed the hell out of teaching on Sunday, and the cool bit is that I'm subbing the big 20-person vinyasa class on Saturday morning, so I'm gonna sell it there, and then I'm also subbing the Monday night ashtanga show, which I will ALSO sell to both Saturday and Sunday crowds (if I get crowds). It could be good.

.02 on "vinyasa yoga," both locally and conceptually.

Most of the studios here teach "vinyasa." I think, actually, that in the US, probably MOST studios teach or at least offer "vinyasa." What IS that, exactly?

This isn't going to be one of those "ashtanga vs. vinyasa" posts or even one which tries to isolate a clear difference between the two (my current thoughts on that are that ashtanga is more dynamic (jumpier) and vinyasa tends to be more static (series of poses held one after another) but even that's a generalization)).

Locally, "vinyasa" means a heated room (heat is the new gimmick here) and a series of poses that tend to be held in sets (i.e., 2-4, maybe more, poses in one standing or seated go). I think that's the standard definition nationwide, probably, of course with a thousand variations. There often aren't inversions, but again, that's variable.

What has chronically irked me about the local "vinyasa" scene, and thanks to recent posting elsewhere, I also now know that THIS can be national, too, is the rhetoric on TEACHER BIO's. A LOT of ex-dancers. A LOT of ballet backgrounds. That's fine. But the rhetoric about the yoga is completely obtuse, general to the point of downright misinformation. You already know some of the nuggets: "Alignment and breath are key in his/her classes" or "S/he believes in a heat-inspiring flow" or "Yoga had been looking for her/him for years" or "Breath will be linked to movement in this flow class" or "Come and stretch and exert at the same time" or "S/he was at first attracted to the physical benefits, but later discovered the more emotional benefits as well" or "A daily practice of yoga allows us to leave one undesired thought per day, on the mat." On and on like that.

What is one to come away with? Well, let me address some realities first.

1) This obviously promotes an experiential preference either for the teacher, the environment or the specific poses and/or class setup (or gimmick).

2) This generalized rhetoric about "breath" and "benefits" suits ALL yoga practices. Hell, you could be talking about Kundalini or Rusty Wells, there's no damn way to tell the difference.

3) Generalizing or not, this is actually a good way to get people who are brand new yoga practitioners, into a room. "What am I in for?" "Well, it's a physical exercise that stretches you and provides emotional benefits over time, and relaxation." See? Imagine you're a truck driver or someone who works 40/week typing in an office. Couldn't you use some stretching and relaxation?

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When I go to a different studio (and I've been to five different competing studios) I more often than not see a COMPLETELY different gang of yoga practitioners, even in vinyasa rooms. There is BARELY any crossover. On the one hand, this says, "WOW, Indy has a HAPPENING vinyasa scene" because that's FIVE DIFFERENT vinyasa rooms with over ten people in them (ten people is a big class in this town).

Each studio tends to have its regulars, and then there are the portable yogis like me and like a few people I know, who go over HERE, then over THERE, and why not try THIS out, and so on.

All I could tell about any of the classes in advance (ANY of them) was gimmickery: one has loud rock music, another has a famously hot 95 degree room, another has a famous instructor with an Integral yoga background, and so on. Well, it's impolite to call it gimmickery. ONE salient feature appears and sometimes, that salient feature is really nothing more than, "You'll love this class!" Sometimes it's nothing more than the level: "This class is an introduction to yoga." And that's it! Huh? YOGA? Which yoga, what yoga, are we talking limbs here? Wha'???

Instructor lines here are sometimes unobvious or simply not mentioned. Sure, there are a lot of Jonny Kest's people here, because of his big studio in Michigan. You see Kripalu sometimes on people's bios, or Yogaworks (because one studio in town has a long-distance YW training program). But in other cases (and MANY other cases), you see NOTHING about training other than "s/he is certified in hatha yoga" or something like that. Huh? Are you ALLOWED to NOT say that? Certified WHERE, certified in WHAT, from WHOM? People, this MATTERS.

No wait, maybe it doesn't. To people off the street, who don't speak yoga teacher-ese, the training SCHOOL doesn't matter. Neither, maybe, does the training TYPE. See how weird and yet fine this is? All you need is to say some of the key nuggets: "His/her classes link breath to movement, promoting stretching and relaxation." That's all you need. TA-DA!!! You're now a yoga teacher.

And the appeal of this kind of anti-information in teacher bios is that classes become dependent on the teacher; yoga styles turn into "Billy Yoga" and "Julie Yoga." There's no other way to make sense of the scene. Nobody has a history, nobody has a lineage.

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But now, let's be nice. There's an upside (a few of them) to vinyasa yoga. For one, there are teachers with clearly defined senses of the vinyasa they teach. Rusty Wells. Larry Schultz. Moses and the Kests (in the Michigan scene; I don't mean to be San-Francentric, hahaha!). There are clearly defined teachers HERE too. Hell even the formulaic YogaWorks class format, which is apparently taught in their teacher training, has a pattern, has a sort of bodymind map.

But whereas Rusty Wells sometimes offers specific poses in his workshop descriptions (for example, we know that "Crumble" is full of splits and inversions) and even has a poster of his standard "Bhakti flow," in local vinyasa flow here, we're still likely to get the fuzzy nuggets: "You'll breathe and be led through a set of vinyasas; be ready to sweat!" Huh? SET of vinyasas? WTF are those?

And sure, Rusty Wells has dedicated followers, you bet. So does Larry. So do the Kest brothers. It's not bad to have followers; what I'm criticizing above is a type of yoga marketing which is SO GENERAL that it's the TEACHER him/herself who becomes the yoga distributor. It's DEPENDENT following, not INSPIRED following.

Put another way (and I'm taking this from somewhere, I forget where), some yoga studios teach students to LEAN, and others teach them to STAND.

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A good thing about vinyasa yogas generally--no matter how general the teacher bio--is that it promotes experience, perhaps at worst out of curiosity about the nearly total lack of information that we see in many cases.

Because "yoga" here and I think throughout the US, means physical movement (asana), vinyasa yoga becomes the mainstream. Sometimes there's a split between "hatha" and "vinyasa" which in actual yoga vocabulary is impossible and nonsensical, but which in Western usage means, respectively, "gentle" and "more adventurous." But that's tending to be replaced here by the actual levels themselves, so you get "beginners" then "intermediate" and then "int/advanced" (I've never seen a class here strictly labeled "advanced"). Or you get "Yoga for Condition X" or "Yoga for Quality Y" which again is great for marketing but bad for specificity.

In a way this generalization syndrome in descriptions of teachers and styles, fits an audience which "wants to become more flexible." The demand is as general and fuzzy as the supply. It fits. More flexible WHERE, more flexible HOW? And FOR WHAT? For walking downstairs comfortably? For putting your foot behind your head? See? I shouldn't even get started on the desire to "get in shape." That's the most vile and general of all of them. "IN SHAPE?" By what standards? Does that mean physical condition? Looking good naked? Eating well? Cardiovascular fitness? Something else? A combination? Again, some marketings are more specific about this, and some are terribly, TERRIBLY general.

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Nonetheless, generalizations sell, or at least, they create curiosity. Then you get the teacher, you get the room, you get the gimmick or not, and if your friends also go, you get community. People like that. Then it's largely interpersonal dynamics, same as picking a personal trainer.

Admittedly, some people do NOT, for example, want to invert. This sets some limits on classes they'll go to or not. But other students are never going to be INTRODUCED to an inversion, and that is something I would want fixed (if it were up to me). I would want things more specific; I'd say that in the experience of a class, this would happen, but I know from experience that it's not always going to.

Sometimes the class is just the gimmick; it's the loud music or it's how hard the "sets of vinyasas" are on the core. That's just gym-exercise-ball routines in a yoga studio. Other times it's breathing, and so you learn how to do shining skull or some other mode, but not necessarily what that's FOR. Same as with many asana; you do some standing, you do some seated, but without any sense of WHAT those poses DO. HOW they build on each other or how they counterpose each other, or WHY they're put together like that.

And so reviews of classes come down to like generalizations: "That kicked my butt" or "That really chilled me out" or "Omg I feel so different now" or "I love how it's different every time" or "S/he gives really great adjustments" or "The poses were too hard" or "His/her class is really tough" and so on. Add a sprinkling of "I'm not flexible" and you've got it. Here, it's totally a sell by teacher and flavor of practice. It's exactly like personal training: a mix of interpersonal relations and preference for or aversion to the given tasks.

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For a practice which is so dedicated to self-knowledge (or at least the pursuit of it), we end up demonstrating our self-ignorance in many cases. This is true of much of life, and maybe it's required, to a degree, in a yoga studio. Maybe it MUST happen this way.

A yoga practice (of whatever or however many limbs) should make yogis of us.

Its job, to my thinking, is to turn us on to self-knowledge. It should be noted, of course, that I think the job of EVERYTHING is to do that. Returning to topic, then: the yoga should turn us on to self-knowledge, should make yogis of us. For me, that means turning toward home practice. Turning toward changes in life practices outside of the yoga studio. Not being those "Sunday only" churchgoers. But it also means being able to STAND, both IN and OUT of the yoga studio. To KNOW what to DO, outside of those spaces. Not just "to know a sequence of poses," but to know WHO ONE IS, outside of the yoga studio. To not be one person within and someone else without. To "recharge" from the practice, or, as Larry once put it, to "go to church."

I'm gonna get judgmental: when I read an ambiguous, generalized teacher bio or studio description, I feel like I'm going to get ambiguous, generalized instruction on ambiguous, generalized "yoga." I feel like I'm going to always need to go to that teacher--to become ADDICTED to that person--because I will NOT be able to "do the yoga" without that room and that person. This isn't because I need the person's presence, but because I don't have any idea WHAT THE YOGA IS.

The yoga MUST give us a standing place, NOT be a swamp.

If the yoga keeps or makes us stupid, then it's not the yoga we need.

In the end of it, those two sentences are really my criteria for "the yoga." It's not about "vinyasa" versus Kundalini or anything like that. It's not the type at all, it's about whether or not any given class or practice gives us access to "the yoga." If we come out feeling good or feeling relaxed, great, but one can feel relaxed in a swamp. One can feel good and healthy and have learned NOTHING.

I recently traded in the Krisna Das for a homemade pop album, with stuff like Coldplay and Death Cab for Cutie on it. The yoga, if it is the yoga, can be done to ANYTHING. Jazz too, YogaDawg, you know it.

We must be able to stand up, look around, learn, understand, feel; turn each of those in and around to the others. We must leave the studio with these SKILLS.

Back on target, Breathing, Backbends

I took all of last week off, except for Tuesday. Too much life, too much work, too much article writing, et cetera. I returned to practice yesterday, doing the usual Primary and to Supta Vajrasana.

Often I imagine myself somewhere else; it's not a willed thing, it just happens during practice: old Mysore rooms, even Youtube videos. I imagine company, audience (depending). The effect of this begins as extra energy (remember I'm a big extrovert) but it always ends with tension, performance anxiety. It starts within me and it ends outside me, distracting.

Yesterday I imagined teaching students, in the spirit of demonstration, and eventually this faded "into" just practicing, and it got really breath intensive (which was not willed either). Just bigger inhales, exhales; longer ones. Probably inspired by Grim's experiments with Vinyasa Krama and its emphasis on bandhas.

Longer breaths make panicky or tight poses easier. Sure, we've heard that nugget before, but to PUT IT IN YOUR BODY is a whole different animal; seriously, it has nothing in common with the cute little yoga statement. Experience does NOT devolve into language, not without losing something that is ESSENTIAL.

I made myself lengthen breaths in hard places like Utthita Hasta Padangusthasana, Marichyasana D, particularly on the second side, Navasana (that takes some WILLPOWER, folks--to hold that fifth one for long breaths???!!!), Supta Kurmasana, the rolls of Garbha Pindasana, the pull of the shins toward the face in Urdhva Mukha Paschimottanasana. Longer makes calmer. I wasn't out of breath after Supta K, for the first time in I don't remember how long. I was never rushed anywhere, there was a deep and residing calm in the whole thing IN MY BODY, but the mind was rushing around, panicking about balance or about intense stretching or about endurance, always doubting me/itself in hard poses. But I forced myself to extend breaths in those places and no disaster occurred (none does anyway; so you come out of Navasana; what do you lose?).

I can't seem to settle on a backbends strategy. Over and over I write what I'm going to do, and then I do something different. So be it.

Yesterday, and extending into today, I decided to hold each Urdhva Dhanurasana for ten breaths, no matter what it took. I don't yet have the endurance to do this and come down to my head between. But I did four yesterday, with a full come-down between and some recovery breaths. But that's 40 breaths of backbends, and in the longer holds, tight spots begin to dissolve. It's broader rather than a set of sharp peaks in intensity, if that makes sense. Today I did all five, so 50 breaths with recovery breaths in between. I LOVE holding UD for ten breaths. It's not hard. But of course, coming down halfway between, and then pressing up, sustaining the backbend, THAT's hard. I'll build it.

How does this affect my dropbacks-standups? The effects are good.

I notice that with each backbend, my hands move closer to my feet (again, my rug is striped and so I can see this progress). I still drop back feet wide, and I feel them turn out a bit as I drop, then I turn them back in when I land. I'm at the point now where I can hang back and see myself reflected in the TV screen behind me, which is about 14 inches off the floor and five feet, maybe, behind me (this is indoor practice, of course, no longer by the garage). It's definitely a 90 degree bend and then some, and I can feel the spine get long as I bend, the bend is really happening in the low abs, right in the hip flexors. Good good stuff. Hands over is hard now; turns up the stretch to the point of discomfort, fairly easily. But I extend my arms fully, inhale, exhale drop. I land semi-softly; it's ballistic but not TOO far.

Yesterday I did not make it to standing; to knees, three times. Today I made it to standing what I will call two-and-a-half times. I land, walk in, and inhale, pop the hands off the rug, then they land again. Inhale again, pop the hands up, and mostly they land, although in the latter two standups today, I sprung to standing on the second throw. The first time, I came up, but lifted my head BEFORE my chest, and lost the balance. NEARLY standing, but lost it and crashed onto hands and butt. That hurt the right wrist, but not for more than about a minute. The next two times, I came up springy, had to step to fix it in space (which would have cost me points if I'd been an Olympic gymnast), but DEFINITELY two springy standups; no wall necessary.

Very cranked about that when it happened, but mellower about it now. Kapo was still a mess, but I think of my UD practice as building resources for it. Maybe with a single adjustment (the way Clayton changed my Baddha K forever), Kino can set my Kapo on the good path at the end of October.

So, so quickly: seventh series, Indy ashtanga scene.

Three months and some now: all smiles, some sounds, constant movement, ongoing sleep battles with the crib (this one even wiggles in his sleep!). It is far, far improved. Sure, there's still crying, particularly this wacko intense "I'm on fire" style crying, before sleeping. When the hell does THAT end? But all around it, things are good. More pleased, more interactive, the raw beginnings of phonetics, random noises, babble, but still, good. One can SEE that brain develop. The kid still looks mostly like me. It's weird giving yourself a bottle.

Tonight I taught my first Primary at the new place, my first in more than a month, since my Sunday gig was cancelled. EIGHT students and one teacher, who had cool poses. A guy got into his first full Lotus. I assisted people in Chakrasana. And so forth. A good time, but the new place wants us either to close at 8:30 (and we don't start until about 7:25, with classes letting out and intro and such) or sneak out the side entrance so that the counter staff can go home to kids and so on. Everyone has committed time, but my time, for example, is committed on the second Monday of the month to teaching Indy's ONLY full led Primary, and I had to cut most of closing for time. I'll admit I'm annoyed about this, but it's stupid, can't ask people to sacrifice their babysitter to a bunch of yogis Primary series.

It's going to be impossible to build an "ashtanga community" here if we don't let people HAVE THE PRACTICE. Because the classes that are partial Primary (aka 75 minutes, in which only a few people can even DO Primary much less teach it) don't link to and aren't connected to a class which then does FULL Primary, nobody sees the difference and students continue to just randomly go to whatever time slot or teacher personality suits them. OY! Here, let me roll my eyes for like half a fucking hour. This is what my "series class" is meant to repair, but the thing is, I can't recruit from any kind of base, I just have this scattershot exposure to random students on off days, and I have to pull them into a practice they've never heard of. Practically the only appeal I have (and it's a questionable one) is my SICK pose library (which I demonstrate on Saturdays for the early morning vinyasa crowd). This is a sickness which is, of course, relative. In the Kino Chicago sessions, it won't be THAT sick. But in Indy's vinyasa scene, I have MAD poses. Eh. Whatever.

Anyway, seventh is much more pleasurable now (although with work it's hard) and the ashtanga scene is still problematic. Yep! Still Indianapolis!

Totally enjoyable half Intermediate.

The day almost ran me out of time: I knew from yesterday that this might happen. So in the marvelous space of Indy's Peace Learning Center, where my Thursday night class happens, I did 5-and-3 salutations and Intermediate through Yoganidrasana, three wheels, four dropbacks and attempts-to-stand, and a 15-8 close.

Great practice. Rushed for time, I did the whole thing through backbends in 45 minutes. Intermediate in this fraction is fantastic, really good: a twist, a giant forward bend, seven backbends, two hand balances, two twists, and three ways to put a foot/feet behind your head. It's marvelous, what a great sequence.

No time to screw around or divert or get into tangents: I even left out the Hanumanasana in the Prasaritas. Breathe and move. Breathe and move. No feet in Kapo but who cares! Vinyasa!

I have been worried since last week about my ability to foot-behind-head. That's even tweakier in the outer knee than lotus is. But in Eka Pada I took the knee well back behind the shoulder, spent five breaths twisted slightly away from it (which is a nice stretch for the outer hip of the opposite thigh and also something in the low back area) and then just took it over. And it stuck, even the right foot, which is connected to the tighter hip. Five breaths seated, to get used to it, five folded, and then five pressed up, leg extended (no Chakorasana exit today). Endurance. Stretching into the hip. Great stuff.

I hooked the feet in Dwi Pada but they were, as usual, loosely hooked and sort of poking over the top of my head (yes, my legs are that long; Liz, I STILL owe you a photo). But I hung out there for fifteen breaths, at least, (yes I realize that this goes against my "no tangents" rule stated above, but mostly I was talking about Kapo there), trying to balance, wondering if I should reach up and adjust the feet to get the pose more fully. If I can ponder something in a pose, that pose isn't THAT hard. An adjustment could have put me in a full Dwi Pada.

Therefore, my Dwi Pada is easier than my Kapo.

Then Yoganidrasana was great, and I slipped on my fourth wheel (on the Manduka black) and so went right to dropbacks.

I'll try to reconstruct my backbending experience. It basically validates yesterday's theory:

My feet turn out when I drop back with feet flat; I can feel them do it. But I turn them back in when I land, and it seems to be ok. I note it each time and ask myself not to do it.

I walk the hands in at least once; I know that if I feel the rock forward happen in my KNEES, then I can't stand. Time to tighten the wheel and walk in again. I want to feel the rock forward happen in my NAVEL. That's where standing comes from.

I dropped back out of panic, heels up, on the third one of the four dropbacks, and could NOT find the proper hand-to-foot distance for a rock up to standing. So NO HEELS UP.

I didn't get a full stand out of any of the four today, but I did have some interesting balance-point gravity-defying moments in rocking up and taking the hands off the mat. The key DOES seem to be, hands closer to feet. The closer they are (but not so close that the hip flexors panic out of over stretch and force me to take my heels up or spread my knees apart), the easier it is to rock up into the NAVEL, which again, is key.

So on the second and fourth ones particularly, I noticed that I'd rock up, to fingertips, then again, and hands would come up, and then I'd land the hands CLOSER to the feet, as if the "throw" to stand up increased the opening of the hip flexors a bit. Rocking up from this closer landing felt even HIGHER in the center of gravity, and it felt like a stand up would be easier.

On the fourth (and last) dropback, I rocked up and just for a second, HUNG in the air, hands suspended over the mat. Then they dropped down again. THIS is what I want more of; that's the beginning of control, a crack in the ballistics of dropping back and standing up.

It's like when you're coming out of your early, unsteady headstands in closing sequence, and you finally HOLD the Urdhva Dandasana for a second.

So the new plan is this: drop back, rock up and land the hands CLOSER. EACH TIME. RAISE the center of gravity, and then CONTROL the launch, HANG it, and then eventually, STAND.

I'm actually ready for Kapotasana to take a few more years. That sounds insane, given that it's already kicked my ass for two years, but this, I'm certain, is the royal road. Hands closer to feet, control the hip flexors stretching and then contracting, in order to take the ballistics out of the backbends. Put that in Kapo terms, and you get, exactly, hands closer to feet, increased flexibility, then increased strength, and control throughout. Drop back, Kapo A. Stand up, Kapo B.

Three Days of the Long Program.

Each day has been easier than the last, particularly given the week off which preceded them. Monday, I felt like I'd throw up in Kapotasana. Tuesday, I was trapped, hands under my head, in Kapotasana, hands not to feet, but I added hangbacks. Today, I was first not-to-feet, then did four formal to-the-wall Kapo dropbacks (my "catpaw" innovations as Karen has referred to them and as they are now known) and then Kapo'ed again, fingers firmly to toes, about a knuckle deep.

These three Kapos represent MONTHS of practice. It means that my "actual" Kapo is probably larger than any of them.

Standups did not happen on Monday; they happened to the knees on Tuesday; today they happened, but a wall was necessary to "support" the pubic bone and let me complete the un-arching to standing. Again, this is a buildup, a recovery of skills rusted over the stressy week off.

Lotuses were what I was looking out for; those and Supta Kurmasana. Would the right side of both knees permit the poses? Monday, I had to modify, loosen all my lotuses, and really wish the stretch in Supta K from the knee into the hip. It was tough, but no poses were lost. Tuesday I was deeper in standing half-lotus, easier in Marichyasana lotuses, no worries in Garbha Pindasana. Today, again, easier all around. Supta Kurmasana included. I might be able to put that foot behind my head tomorrow.

Primary really IS a healing practice; when I have physical issues with/from ashtanga practice, a return to Primary is always advised.

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Backbending recipe: I believe, right now, that the key is hands closer to feet in Urdhva Dhanurasana. The hip flexors are the tight point in the Kapo arch.

Work toward ENDURANCE in the wheel. I moved to 8 breaths once upon a time, over the winter. Do it again.

Keep placing head down CLOSER to feet each time. Each wheel is tighter than the last.

Drop back CLOSER. Feet flat helps this. Sure, the drop with heels up is closer but that's because it takes the hip flexors out of the equation. That's cheating.

WALK IN before standing up. See about walking in TWICE. Work toward springy standups, the ones that will come when the hip flexors and abs aren't maximally straining from the bend and the drop. NOTE: walking in sufficiently far will increase the stretch and technically make standing up HARDER, at first. It might do well to walk in only once and then look for the springy stand.

Intermediate tomorrow--the whole thing--is the plan.