arturoyogi

Archive for August, 2008

combination toilet and sink

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OK, so despite being an architect, I had never been exposed to this. My visiting friend put a group of friends together who have known him through different times of his life - his cousin from childhood, his buddy from early career years in Houston and myself, from his mid career years in San Antonio. We visited at the home of his friend originally from Houston. What am I writing about? The toilet. It doesn’t have a sink in the same compartment where it is located, so the previous owner of the flat installed a toilet that when you flush, water comes out of the top, allowing you to wash your hands. It definitely is something to talk about. We enjoyed the most delicious Mexican food on Haight Street and later shared some ice cream back at the flat. I did not observe calorie restriction today but enjoyed a charming afternoon going to a Buddhist meditation and later to the visit and dinner. I didn’t have my camera with me, so I borrowed the image is from this site, which claims to be a directory of wonderful things.

good practice happy kid

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Practice in Berkeley was very strong today. Springy Sitarist commented that the weather is warm and it makes our muscles supple. This is the time of our Indian summer - the two short weeks of actual warm weather here. I over ate yesterday, so the influx of calories must have given me the impetus to keep going. I think Teacher got my hands to the floor in Prasaritta Padottanasana C. My arms did not resist the gentle pushes downward. In Supta Vajrasana, I was really squared away, no irregular body twists while going up and down. Backbending was very good. Assisted dropback practice was very strong, with the legs really working in bringing me up. The knowledge of what needs to be happening is there.

Have a happy Labor Day weekend. I wanted to mention, for Alfia’s benefit, that at the soiree yesterday I met the neighbors of my friends in Oakland. The neighbor is a sculptor from Ecuador. He and his wife have the most beautiful and friendly 3 year old boy I have met. He told me they had traveled to Kazakhtan to adopt him. Well he is certainly a very well adjusted and happy kid, very well loved by his parents and neighbors.

how do newbies get into yoga?

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an old friend who is 3 years older than i had called a month ago saying he wanted to visit the city and do basically what i do on weekends, including yoga. i said ok, that he should not stay out late the night before because i would meet him at his hotel lobby at 6:00am on Sunday for the trek to the shala in Berkeley. he seemed enthusiastic about the adventure, until the reality of what this meant set in. he would have to eat lightly the night before, have some fruit at 5:00am and practice some standing poses in a shala. he thought he was going to a meditation meeting. i explained the practice was meditative because people are following a routine while concentrating on the breath. the meditation event we were going to go to would be at a different time, and that would actually be a sitting meditation. the yoga involved movements. eventually he called to cancel going to yoga because he said he did not want to wake up early on his vacation. i think he wanted to stay out late, but that is another story. it got me to thinking, what is the process by which someone is exposed to yoga, learns it and keeps practicing it? i don’t think it is going cold to a room where mysore style is practiced. i think people go to a led class, learn some asanas, feel better in their bodies, then decide they want to do this more often. at that point, the teachers of the led classes should sense that this person wants to develop his or her knowledge of yoga further, just as the teacher has done in his or her own path, so they should direct them to study with teachers of the self practice method. so i think you get exposed to yoga in gyms, and possibly shalas, feel better and then seek out more classes in in it, until you want to be deepening the practice and you find shalas where the self directed method is taught. do you cybershalamates have similar opinions about how people find and keep this practice?

my expression was serious in the picture of me in front of a painting because i did not know if you could photograph yourself within the DeYoung museum. for the picture of me outside the DeYoung i thought of yoga in order to relax my expression. the friend referenced in this story made and broke almost every plan he made for the weekend. he took all sorts of advice from me and proceeded to do different things, because his opinions seemed more prudent to him. he psychoanalized me withouth my request although he is not in the medical field. pema chodrons books have been guiding me through the weekend. there are too many stories that i will not tell. i enjoyed going to a party on my own Saturday. my friend did not want to spent a lot of time at this soiree, so i suggested that i go alone. there i met interesting people from everywhere - 4 continents, people of amazing values. our host just built a tent retreat in the backyard of her home, but that is another story for another day.

Kadayawan Festival in Davao, Phillipinies

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My friend Jessica went to the annual Kadayawan festival in Davao, in the south Phillipines. This is an agricultural area of the country and it happens that durians are in season at the moment. She accompanied fellow photographers and took beautiful poignant pictures that capture the beauty of the Filipinos of this area. The pictures are posted here with her permission.

The following five pictures were taken by Jessica’s friend Shem Longakit. The first three are of the lovely Jessica and the other two of durians.

A fruit stand with durians.

bakasana to donkey

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I practiced with Second Series poses, from Bakasana on. Legs behind the head poses generate a lot of internal heat and make dropbacks feel nicer.I am teaching myself new software on my spare time. Here is a page from the training manual. Recognize someone? Look who posed for the picture in his spare time, Donkey! You look good, man. So many talents. Palo Alto with the FUR!

For those of you who spent a sleepless night worrying that I wore my practice shorts inside out yesterday: I wore them correctly today. I checked.

practice perspective

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Practice - hello? I have been taking care of some personal things that disrupt my schedule so practice today, after warmups was only backbending - and in reverse at that - dropbacks on the wall, bridge, Urdvha Danurasana. This must be up there with the strangest practices so far. It’s not ashtanga, but it is yoga nevertheless. I felt a calming of the fluctuations of the mind.Through the marvel of Photoshop, you’ll never know that I wore my shorts inside out without noticing. Oops! I guess I wanted to understand their structure from a different perspective. And laugh about it now. And speaking of perspective, it was a mistake to align the bottom of the mat to the viewfinder in the camera, because it was at an angle, therefore in perspective, with lines projecting in angled directions. Topsy-turvy, that.

During the bike ride to the office, a girl zoomed by pedalling aggressively and wobbling at the same time. Later, a few yards in front, she was on the floor, in great pain. Either someone cut her off accidentally, or her wheels caught in a street drain, causing her to fall. She hit the side of her head. Many bikers got off their bikes to offer calling 911 or the police. We asked her if she was alright, whether anything was broken. Eventually, someone offered her a hand and she stood up. She had a concussion on the side of her head. She had many piercings under her lips, with pointed jewelry. If that jewelry pushed against her skin in the fall, it must have hurt a lot. Why do people wear that stuff? It’s different, but not so cool.

danurasana variation chain

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found it

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So I was scanning something that a friend asked me to scan. It required removing the lid of the scanner, which is one of those Dell scanner, printer, fax dooder uppers. When I removed the lid and jozzled (sp?) it around, out fell the long lost advanced series DVD, which I had inadvertently placed in a pocket the lid has. So now I will have 2 copies, the moment the new one arrives. One for home, one for travel? It pays to do things for friends. In celebration, I photographed it along with a few other things from my altar.

My poor neighbor. I was at my best hamster-in-the-cage this morning, waking up at 4:00am, accidentally dropping a wheelie to the floor, rattling the printer lid, pulling and pushing assorted furniture, stumbling into the foot stool at the computer, opening and closing the apartment door, which makes a vacuum sound every time it opens because of an automatic closer. All the time I was saying, “don’t make noise, don’t make noise” Aha, yea. The noise wakes up one of my neighbors, the American. The other neighbor, an Argentenian, would have to be awoken in an earthquake.

CR yoga sandwich

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yoga humor -humor can be a way to say something you want to convey but feel you can’t convey it seriously. i wrote this a while back but did not post it, not sure of how it would be taken. since Cody shared a while back what he envisioned would be an ideal practice for him, i came up with

technical specification sheet for a calorie restricted yoga sandwich

this low fat, low carb sandwich involves preparing the sandwich bread of the standing sequence (at least the first five asanas, more if possible) and the closing sequence.

the meat of the sandwich (hold the mayo) is (your choice of)

_ if primary series - first 1/2 of primary to marichyasana d
_ if primary series - 2nd 1/2 of primary from navasana to the first asanas of second series
_ if second series - first 1/2 of second series to dwi pada
_ if second series - second 1/2 of second series from bakasana to the 7 headstands
_ if third series - the first five or six asanas that the body will allow
_ if third series - the next however many asanas the body, and knowledge will allow.

pick up lint around practice floor prior to eating
light a candle
burn a small patchouli incense stick
send blessings to buddha
send blessing to your teachers and cybershalamates
serve sandwich on a bed of lavender and eucapyptus scented mat
hold the chips - nothing fried

eat sequentially during the week in the order described (a primary sandwich before a second sandwich, a second sandwhich before a third sandwich etc.)

this is a journal, so i’m sharing my speriments. i’m not saying this is the method nor that this is what you should do. YMMV.

driver primary cycling

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There was a different driver for the transbay bus trek this morning to Berkeley. This one took only two rest breaks, rather than the four that last week’s driver took. I didn’t miss my connecting bus.

Because my practice was spotty last week I felt like doing only Primary Series today. It was a nice and strong practice. Teacher gave great adjustments, reminding me particularly to engage the bhandas. During Bhujapidasana I got a cramp on my left calf muscle. But I continued gently on. Those don’t usually occur during weeks of steady, continuous practice. Now I realize that I totally forgot to do Navasana. Ha!

In the middle of the practice the thought popped in my head that this week I’ll resume cycling to work. I had stopped because the room in which we stored our bikes is not available, because it is a mechanical room. I will tie the bike to something on the street and take the pull away seat out daily. In this city any element of a bike that is not tied down and screwed down is stolen. I’ve had my bike broken into many times. But what is the use of having one if you can’t use it? It is great exercise to bike to work.