Focus Forward Friday: Rabbit Pose

Photo above via the Bikram Yoga Women's Retreat on Facebook. 

Photo below by yours truly!

Focus Forward Friday: 

A weekly ritual for deepening your practice.

Today's focus: rabbit pose. Anyone out there love this asana? It's the deepest forward fold in the Bikram series, and a great compression posture that comes pretty late in the floor series. 

I find that I have a love-hate relationship with this posture, mostly because of my tight cervical spine. I have to be really careful not to overdo it or go too far... yet at the same time, on days when my neck needs it, Rabbit can be the best medicine! It's one of the most healing postures I've found in Bikram.

My advice for those new to rabbit? Really put a lot of weight into your hands. Pull harder than you think you need to. And do use a towel over your heels. I know some studios teach against this, but that's disappointing to me. You don't want the chance of slipping and throwing your neck out of whack. 

Whatever your studio's dialogue style, be sure to take it slow in this posture, and don't expect results overnight. It can take a long time to feel the stretch move from your neck down your spine, but once you do it's totally worth it!

Photo via Bikram Yoga San Antonio.

Another tip: introduce your belly to your spine and really suck your tummy in. By clearing this space in your abdomen, you'll be able to stretch farther and with more ease. Like in Standing Head to Knee, this is a critical first step for this posture. And a reason not to eat much before class!

Rabbit is also great if you've got a cold or have thyroid problems (it's supposed to aid immunity and balance hormones). Score!

To read more about rabbit pose from Bikram headquarters, click here.

Photo via Bikram's site.

Finally, a little explanation about this series. I realized the other day it's not exactly clear what Focus Forward Friday really is, or why I started it. So I wanted to give you all the whole story :)

Photo via Threading in the Choirs.

Focus Forward Friday is a weekly reminder here on the blog. Its main purpose is to remind you of your own strength and that you have the choice to place your focus where you want it to be -- and that goes for when you're in yoga class or not on the mat!

Wherever you are, you have the power to focus forward. To focus on the present moment. To see yourself in the mirror, doing your yoga -- or see your true self, living your life -- wherever you are right now.

But only if you want to.

The series is also a weekly exploration of where a dedicated yogi should place his or her focus. Each topic I choose is meant to inspire you to think more deeply about how you use your yoga both on and off the mat.

You can think of Focus Forward Friday as a little party every week on the blog. Photo via Max Wanger.

The bottom line behind the series is to get you thinking creatively about how to live your yoga one week at a time. I hope it helps! 

If you have any feedback, please feel free to leave a comment below. Or chime in with a topic you'd love to see me post on next Friday! I'd love to hear from you.

Have a happy weekend, all. Enjoy spring time floating in the air! Get some time with your loved ones and go for a bike ride or have a picnic. I'll be enjoying some time in the hot room, with my Hubs, and with my cousins from North Carolina.

Namaste.

Photo via Sloan Photography.

Ballerinas

Photos via The Ballerina Project. More about them on Facebook, too.

A long time ago I posted about awesome urban ballerinas. Thought I'd share a few more of those inspiring and incredibly graceful images today.

Isn't it amazing how bendy and beautiful they are?

Age Old Tree

Photo and inspiration for the poem from I Am An Age Old Tree.

A poem for your Friday afternoon. Just because :)


Age Old Tree


An age old tree stands in the desert,
is greeted by the blankness


of stars. What echoes, what remains,
what the branches say to each other.


They say nothing.
All are branches standing upward.


What seems to continue 
despite darkness, despite cold,


dampness, dusk, dust.
Perhaps we are all branches,


the standing upward our only way
of calling out into what we don't know,


can't remember, shouldn't have seen
as children. For beyond the throes of pain


lies a calm we can find
only with the heart open.


Once you have a heart,
you can remember where you are going.


An age old tree stands in the desert,
where snow begins to fall.

Find Your Peace

All photos are frames taken  from the film. Wondrous!

I just discovered this amazing video via YogaDork. Ever wonder what happens when a bunch of New York yogis decide to get together with the collective intention of creating more peace and happiness in the world?

Well, here you are.

Choreography and creative vision by Molly Lehman. Revery Media New York City. Song by Trevor Hall.

A pregnant woman practices on a rooftop. Two commuters stretch out before their train arrives.  A ballerina-like yogi does backbends by the water. This little film is full of beauty.

Tats, Mats & Sexy Ladies @ the Women's Retreat

Bikram babes at their finest at the 2010 Bikram Women's Retreat. Most photos taken from their Facebook page.

Classes with Raj Choudhury and Emmy Cleaves. Sunrise workshops. Surfing lessons. Parties, fancy food, and beautiful ladies. The one, the only: Bikram Yoga Women's Retreat!

Looks like the 2010 retreat was awesome. It's wonderful to see such powerful, dynamic photographs. Besides Facebook, I found these here and here.

Loving this tattoo.

Intensity meets grace.

Emmy coaches a stunning posture.

Flower petals blooming.

Catching some waves in their time out of the Torture Chamber!

Check out the ankle tattoo.

A spine made for backbends.

Taking flight.

Look at that feminine beauty! Total props to pregnant women who bring their babies to practice.

Did you or any of your friends or teachers at your studio attend? I'd love to hear your stories below. Hope to join you next year!

Come Up Higher On the Toes

Above: my beautiful friend Bailey executing a fantastic toe stand on the beach.

Below: cowboy boots are great for tromping in leaves, but not for doing toe stand.

Toe stand is one of those crazy postures that doesn't seem possible at all when you first start Bikram yoga. I love it because the entire standing series prepares you for it: pure concentration, only the breath and the body, intense focus. 

Cowboy boots: fun to wear year round.

Toe stand: an under-appreciated master posture. It stretches the feet, the heel, the mind.

Cowboy boots: they give you incredible ass-kicking power!

How is your toe stand going? Does it make you feel powerful and centered? Which postures help calm your mind?

Men. Yoga. Yes.

Lithe and strong, like a yogi.

These incredible photos are by a friend of mine from high school, Emily Voigtlander. She's a talented artist with a dashing boyfriend, Jordan, featured above. They are living the dream in San Francisco with their adorable pup named Willow, writing a sweet cooking blog, adventuring in the city, and loving each other well.

I am about to feature a series on men who do yoga here at Alive in the Fire and I'm interested to hear more about your views on masculinity, strength, power, balance and equality. Do you tend to see a lot of women at Bikram classes? Feel outnumbered if you're one of few guys in the room?

Do you notice a difference when men teach in comparison when women do?

How do you witness yoga as a tool to bring together members of a local studio, and of a world community, regardless of gender?

What would you like to see change? Are there ways we can use the yoga to transform our perspective and truly bring an open mind to our life experiences whether we experience inequality or not?

Are you personally willing to practice the genuine concept of "Namaste" in your life?

"The good in me sees and acknowledges the good in you." I am here; you are here with me. 

"I bow to you." I recognize your beauty, presence, power. 

"I honor that place in your where the whole Universe resides. And when I am in that place in me, and you are in that place in you, there is only one of us."

Men, women, yogis. We are one.

Em and Jordan and their pup, Willow! I couldn't resist; I really couldn't. :) 

Such a happy family! Miss you guys and hope all is well.

Poetry in the Posture: Toe Stand

Photo Via LifeInterstitial's Flickr Photostream.

So I've recently fallen in love with the last posture of the standing series: Toe Stand. A posture that will test your patience, develop your focus, and seriously work out the muscles in your feet, Toe Stand is a great one for yogis who have been attending Bikram awhile and really want to get deep into the meditation. Don't be worried if it takes you awhile -- it's a difficult posture to do -- but if you stick with it, the thrill of floating right above the floor will pay off. Plus, you free your knees and ankles of rheumatism, arthritis and gout, and you strengthen your stomach. Go, toe standers!


Also, a little poem dedicated to the posture. Enjoy, my yogis!

Balance Alone

We support ourselves

on point, on perfect

balance, both sides equal,

mind and body made even.

Steady eyes level

the mind. A gaze

goes a thousand miles,

a clear empty cloud –

being without thoughts the ideal –

goes farther.

Implausibility achieved:

what would appear to be

floating.

Our bodies made clear,

empty, like clouds

floating, hovering, we linger.

Our bodies made into birds,

small perched perfection

grown from a tree,

held closer to the ground

as if we were sparrows

who have been calmed,

no longer the flitting, stir-crazy

creatures they generally seem to be.

Here, we sit on our own energy.

We need not flit

from corner to corner

of a sidewalk, hopping,

making our own flittering

dance of jumps and nerves…

We are not sparrows.

We are still. We get here

by trust in our own bodies,

we carry this moment

motionless harmony of thoughtlessness –

the mind filled only by equilibrium,

balance alone –

what we bring to the beach,

the busy street,

the tallest woods,

prideful in their soaring limbs,

steady trunks…

the balanced bodies

we take home after class.