The Art of Folding Myself into a Paper Airplane

Seattle Yoga News

“Yoga is a light, which once lit will never dim. The better your practice, the brighter your flame.” — B.K.S. Iyengar

Petful

“Move your joints every day. You have to find your own tricks. Bury your mind deep in your heart, and watch the body move by itself.” — Sri Dharma Mittra

Seattle Yoga News

“The body benefits from movement, and the mind benefits from stillness.” — Sakyong Mipham

Vitamin-Ha

“The yoga pose you avoid the most you need the most.” — Anonymous

http://www.yogadogz.com

“Yoga. Because punching people is frowned upon.” — Anonymous

Today is Day 15 of my efforts to practice yoga every day. Because I’m a kid at heart and need the visual encouragement and acknowledgment, I’m giving myself a gold star on my desk calendar each time I complete a practice. The first week I started on a Tuesday, and so earned 6 stars. Last week I got 7! Today I’m going for the 2nd one for the week.

Aside from the gold star nonsense (but if It WORKS….) I AM feeling looser. I overdid one day last week, getting a little too enthusiastic for this old woman’s body, so I’ve been waking up with a sore back each day since. My husband is applying muscle gel with arnica, which is like Icy Hot and makes it feel better quickly. Then I continue my yoga practice, loosening, stretching and hopefully strengthening my muscles each day. My back is hurting less each day, so I think I’m doing a good thing for myself.

I’m 72, so I’m doing “Gentle Yoga” (A DVD put out by sixtyandme.com with the wonderful instructor Cat Kabira. Actually, I’m kind of doing my own thing at the moment, rather than trying to keep up with the DVD, just stretching in all directions s-l-o-w-l-y, CAREFULLY, B-R-E-A-T-H-I-N-G into the stretches, one area at a time.  Ahhhh!

If I DO find myself folded into a paper airplane, it’s my own fault.