Echoes of Belfast…

Bike ride up the canal – 12th June

B led and I followed. Sometimes I lack the motivation, and I’ve learned its ok to carried along on the crest of B’s enthusiasm – confident that I’ll get into it as we go. And I did. We had a crackin’ day out.

So we got the bikes into the car and took a drive to the Abergavenny Canal, parking up at bridge 74. From there, we got onto the canal and headed north. At leisure. Having relay races with the barges – could do with one of those in a setting such as this for holidays and weekends away, rather than the traditional caravan that I loved in my youth . Gorgeous day with dappled sun thru oaks and beeches. Astrantia (the carrots cousin) from gardeners world last night all along the banks. Tipping their white crowns to the passing weekend captains and their slightly merry crews.

Met a man mooring his barge up at the back door to his cottage. Now, there’s a life.

Turn a corner and into shade. Wild garlic. Woah. A picnic table on a bend accessible to those with boats or water wings. A buzzard bursts out from the crown of a beech tree and disappears off down the hillside – looking for carion or the next bus to Abergavenny. The sky above filled with silent paragliders and hang-gliders who dip in and out of our narrative. We’re like ants to them as they live their own adventure in the sky.

What a day. Glorious in its detail. Soul singing and batteries recharged. Joyful and deep down tired.

Life is good.

(Photos below in ‘Abergavenny – only a canal away)

Abergavenny…it’s only a canal away

Just passed bridge 74...a proper working canal!!

Text above ‘ 12th june – bike ride up the canal’…

Oh...a barge...it should be less exciting, but it's not

Photos from the M4 corridor

So there's the M4

Quick update from a day out on the bikes (mid-May):
Cycled along canal heading back from 14 locks and found a thousand tadpoles and ducks with ducklings and moorhens (?) With chicks. Within about 4m of M4! Poetic really.

Tadpoles don't mind the noise

No more tapdoles...

Cycled back thru town- saw parts of Newport I hadn’t seen before. And potential yoga venues (if I was looking for avenue…).

last one of little packets of frog potential

With the M4...at my back

Tired after a busy morning sailing on the canal

Just to the right of the ducks

Nesting

[? Text order/ layout]

...there ye go

A 2 bird job

...canal to the left of path

...Any ideas which ones?

Happy New Decade!

For those of you who want to make fundamental changes to their lives this year, here’s a resolution for you (or a challenge). Either way) you are hereby cordially invited to join me in a daily yoga routine:

- 10 minutes a day, every day. Thats all.

Oh, and get to a class when you can. With a teacher you trust.

And just see what comes from it: time spent out of your head and into your body. That’s the key… Trust me, it’s greater than the sum of its parts. Well, that’s been my experience.

Not that I’m under pressure, but…

…A little bit busy.

Apologies on the lack of current posts…I’ve recently presented at ‘Devolution and Divergence’ conference – what a buzz. An excellent insight into the workings of academia. Fingers crossed other opportunities come out of it. Now, I need to do a presentation for placement and settle down and get my dissertation down (and a fair amount of other school work).

In the meantime, I’ll still be teaching classes Mon, Wed and Friday: see details on www.betterway2be.com

Hwyl fawr,
hibernopithecus

Twitter…ahem

blog updates now available on Twitter…I’m hoping it all happens automatically. We’ll see…

The Austin’s Iyengar Summer School

If only we could do 20 hours of yoga every week. 

We I told people that I was going to spend my summer hols doing yoga in Sunderland, I got a lot of ‘oh-it’s-grim-up-north’-type reactions. On digging a little deeper, none of the people with these views had actually been to Sunderland. I blame the Daily Mail. And to be fair, Sunderland is lovely. We had the bikes out and cycling along the river in into the  National Glass Centre and up the coast passed Roker. Parts of it had that Victorian seaside resort feel. And the people we met were great. And the weather cooperated too. Only one day rained out.

The summer school is usually the last week in July and the only entry requirement is that you want to further your own practice. I can’t recommend it highly enough. Gordon does 2 hours in the morning (a civilised 10-12) and Margaret does a further 2 hours in the evening. You can go to the morning ones or the evening ones or both. The plan is that you attend all 5 days. The cost for both was £85. Were else could you get yoga  of that standard for that price?

It was lovely to meet Gordon and Margaret again. I had met them both before. Gordon was the moderater in my level1 teaching cert and Margaret moderated the level2. So, no pressure then. The meeting was much more relaxed this time around.

So why Sunderland? You would never guess if you didn’t have inside information. Sunderland is a hotbed of Iyengar yoga. It was amazing to be in a class with so many experienced yogis: the wealth of experience from my class-mates (never mind the depth of insight from G and M) was quite astounding. And all of them there to learn more.

So, Sunderland?  I did my teacher training in Norn Irn. In Broughshane of all places. It was co-ordinated by a local legend (sorry Margaret, but it’s true) called Margaret Gunn-King. And as there were no senior teachers available to provide the training in Ireland, MGK approached the Austins. They weren’t available to take it on, but suggested 2 senior teachers who had been assisting them in their teacher-training programme. And that’s how we came to meet Dave and Diane. Over a 2 and 1/2 year period they took alternate goes to fly over to NI and teach us for an intensive weekend. ‘A hero’s journey’, Dave called it. Too true: a life-changing one for me. So…there’s Sunderland for you. [Let me know if that veers from the truth D and D].

Dave and Diane were at the evening sessions. MGK and Linda and Janet (two fellow Nrn Irn yogis I trained with) came over and a student of mine and her pal came too. The Celtic Connection, apparently. I liked that. There were people from all over. And rightly so.

The Monday classes were general. The the rest of the week was designed to reflect the 4 week programme in Pune: a week of standing poses; a week of forward bends and inversions; a week of back bends and a week of pranayama. We had a day of each. We tried to meet after each class and discussed what we’d done and recorded the conversations. I’m in the process of typing up some notes from these recordings. I’ll not be sharing on the blog however. You have to have been part of the conversations to get a copy. Obviously our students will see the benefit in future classes. In fact, it’s been a joy to get back to teaching: it’s really energised both my teaching and practice. I was in Cardiff on Sunday morning with the breakfast club in a tiny corner by the National Museum as the Big Weekend had stolen my usual place. And in the sun too.

More on Sunderland soon…

Great way to start the weekend

We’ve been  meaning to do it for a while now, and finally time and finances and opportunity were in alignment (in saggitarius, with mecury retrograde;-). We got to go to Bristol for a hard working yoga class. It was like  a school trip: B and  I were up early and waiting for C to pick us up. He has  been going to  this quite regularly since Xmas and  we talked a month or so back about going up together and splitting the cost.

 

So there we were, down at the bus station at 9 in the morning, with our mats and the sunshine for company. Waiting for a lift in a car we wouldn’t recognise…you can over-plan these things.

 

The class was excellent: just good to get the challenge of a hard working yoga class. It was at the Yogawest studio (http://www.yogawest.co.uk) and Lynda took it. I have been there once before for a professional development day last October or so, but this was the first class (and the first time I met Lynda). It was described as a level 2 class: for those who have done at least as year of Iyengar training. We started with some salutes: urdhva hastasana into uttanasana then later into adho mukha svanasana, with trikonasana and parsvottanasana and parsvakonasana variations. Nowhere quickly, lots of detail on the side ribs – and on other things besides. Lovely to listen to someone with an easy familiarity with that level of detail. We spent some time in urdhva dhanurasana – from a high bolster, going straight up. Good advice on my stiff wrists: turn the hands out. That worked. Lynda also got us to keep the weight in the feet/legs and split her description of action in the buttocks into 3: top buttocks keeping a constant length in  the lumbar  spine; middle buttocks lifting straight up (I reackon this is why my glut med was so sore over the weekend); and bottom buttocks – lengthening away.

 

We finished with a supported halasana over a chair for 5/6 min and a bit of a supported, prone twist to both sides. Afterwards, I introduced myself to Lynda and got some information on the Junior Intermediate Level 1 teaching. It all happens on a Friday: you pay for the 10-12 class in the moring and take an hour break before going to the JIL1  session in the afternoon. L said it was fine to go along to a session in a  pay per go fashion (I’m quite convinced that I need to enhance my personal practice over the next year before I considering going for the next level). I also have a difficulty with teaching Fridays. She gave me a list of future dates…I have them here somewhere…

 

It really is a lovely spot: all the equipment you need is there (we didn’t need our mats in the end); a purpose built space filled with photos of BKS, and other smaller visual prompts and inspirations; flower beds outside build out of great big railway sleepers, complete with a compost bin tidily along one wall. B and I sat outside in the sun and enjoyed an apple and basking in the warmth of our asana practice waiting on C: well, not truly waiting. He wanted to finish off with time on the ropes and the backbenders, and sure we were happy to bask in the glow of being alive.

Easter hols

I feel like I’ve had a well  earned break over  Easter: caught up on sleep; on digging in the allotment and planting up some seeds. I’ve also been in contact with IYA(UK) about doing the next Iyengar Yoga teacher  training level: Junior Intermediate level 1…It doesn’t sound too impressive, but in typical Iyengar fashion, it’s understated (and difficult).

I put a powerpoint together about the allotment: it’s on the website (Yoga homepage). It’s the ‘story so far’ sort of thing. it was a lot of fun to put together something on powerpoint that didn’t require presenting to my peers for a change.

All that said, I still have a few things outstanding: digging out the dandilions from the front lawn; selling some books online; rebuilding the PDA…and of course design and justify a Patient Information Document for Tuesday…I’d better get started