stand up

Yes, the dreaded (wink) dropbacks have started. I thought I was safe from starting this til summer, perhaps, having gotten setu only a couple weeks ago. Ah, what do I know. So far, it is more odd than scary. Just learning to exhale back and inhale up and forward, no going to the floor (whew!) with my teacher to support me. Really hard to breathe, even doing just this, and hard to give some of my weight to my teacher..this is a real exercise in trust..I found I didn't dread or hate this at all. (we'll see about tomorrow, as today the element of surprise definitely helped) In the past, I have had very emotional reactions to backbends on my own, and to upward dogs in the opening suryas. Since getting setu, they seem to be on the wane. One other positive- I get the paschimattanasana squish now! I can't really believe yet that I can learn to drop back and come back up on my own, but who knows. There are a whole lot of other things I can do now that I would not have imagined.

I am also working on what I call the sideways bellyflop. It is the vinyasa out of marichasana A. On the right side, I can lift up, get stuck (and drop my foot) at the point where I am supposed to hook my foot behind my arm, then sort of scoot/jump/plop back in a completely tilted fashion, landing on my stomach. After this, I am pretty much done for, so the other side is worse, even though it is my stronger side. I know somehow my free elbow is supposed to support my torso for the jump back..but it seems to be a bit of a puzzle getting it there at all, let alone not running out of steam in the process. Plus I have a lot of fear because early asymmetrical jumpbacks from bakasana did not do nice things to my shoulders. This promises months and months (minimum) of  flopping around. To be honest, I sort of dread working on it..my mind goes..oh no, it's the "bellyflop" coming up when I am in janu C.

I am also recovering from a really fried brain from too much feldenkrais the past 3 weekends. The first 2 weekends were part of my training, which had the usual ups and downs. Last weekend, I tried to listen to as much of the audio for a few days that I missed, as I could manage. Turned out to be all about turning and lengthening the leg in the hip socket (and turning the pelvis about the femur). Very challenging, as most of the lower body lessons are for me. Somehow, something in my feet and legs does not connect well to my brain. Three ATM lessons later, I could begin to feel how my entire spine is affected when I turn my leg to lengthen it. One of the things I really enjoy about feldenkrais method is how you come to realize that your whole body is involved in every action, even a simple one - say lying on your back and raising your arms overhead. Too much of a good thing, leads to partial brain shutdown, however. By Saturday, I was so fried, that I tried to cook sesame seeds for breakfast, thinking they were steel cut oats (and wondering for over an hour why on earth they would not cook right..egads).