Coast to Coast with I Love Yoga

It's been a couple of weeks since my last post, but I still have good intentions of posting regularly on what's happening with the yoga world here in WV and beyond. We'll start with beyond...

Do you remember the big green bus that rolled through town last October, bringing the happy I Love Yoga folk with their groovy clothes and even groovier acroyoga workshop? I missed all that fun because I was out of town for yoga teacher training, but have since had opportunity from one coast to the other to enjoy the company of these fine people.

I met up with Moses in San Francisco at the Yoga Journal Conference the end of January, and again, along with the beautiful and gracious Zeina, the first week of March in Miami. What cool yogis and yoginis! They invited me back into their design room and let me create a couple of shirts (I could have done that all day), and then proceeded to choose from their racks all good things to bring back to WV for The Folded Leaf. Moses and Z let me keep the shirts I designed for free, bless their kind souls!

Ashtanga Intermediate Practice

We have finally begun an Intermediate Ashtanga practice at The Folded Leaf. As a somewhat reluctant Ashtangi I joined the group more as an explorer of the craft than as an admitted devotee. After studying with Bobbi Misiti last weekend, some of the class were inspired to keep with it, and to admit where they are on the practice...ready to leave the comfort of primary and enter the unfamiliar territory of second series.

The comfort of primary series is undeniable. All that folding into yourself, bowing down, and listening to the invitation to honor the highest inner self as the practice takes you from point A to point B, a nice little jaunt from paschimottanasana to the soft cushion of savasana. Today, talking with Annie about this newest addition to the schedule, she said that primary is "very mashed potatoes." I thought that sounded just about right. Comforting and homey.

Second series, with all the extreme backbending, impossible binding, arm balancing, and seven headstands (not counting the finishing sequence), is like a neon charge enticing me to try while also warning me to not go too fast. This stuff must be tackled piece by piece, respectfully and with a beginner's mind.

I think I'm ready to get started.