Hot Yoga

Inspiration: Ahimsa

~ Lydia ~ 2 Comments

449dcf88e3fb85b77436f009c8e67eb4 633694bf4e584b79078835eee69ec9f3 ahimsa

I had an amazing week on my mat.

At Gaia Flow they always emphasize focusing on your own practice and not looking at your neighbor and try to do their practice. To not go further than you can. To not strive to go somewhere your body isn’t ready for.

Prior to my Wonderlust 2013, I assumed this didn’t apply to me and I jumped right into their hardest level courses just as fast as I can. It’s not that I’m an overly competitive person, it’s that I saw people doing amazing poses and was just like “Yep, that. I want to do that. Now. Right now.”

But now we’re post euro trip. As I’ve said before, I had to start back in the easier classes. The more I’ve stuck with these so called “easier” classes it the more I realized how I was becoming more flexible and more graceful in moving from pose to pose. It’s been kind of an amazing thing to be a part of. I’ve really changed my outlook on my yoga strategy and am looking forward to mastering those foundational poses and improving my practice. One of the girls whom I I have yogi envy of, stated that she has been practicing for 8 years. I, on the other hand, am going on 8 months. So can I really expect to be at her level? Hell to the absolute no. But the improvements I’ve seen in my practice just make me so excited to continue my yoga journey, one downward facing dog at a time.

The other reason that my yoga week has been so amazing, is that we are working on practicing Ahimsa this week. Ahimsa is practicing nonviolence. Do no harm to yourself or to others. Or as the image above states, peace with yourself, peace with the world. If you have love for yourself, you’ll spread that love into the universe. Every class you go to the instructor may have a different perspective, anecdote or suggestion on how to bring this into your life. I believe that taking my yoga practice a little slower is just one way to practice Ahimsa, but that’s just on my mat. The beauty and the goal of Gaia Flow Yoga is what you bring from your mat to your life. So one of my instructor’s provided us with this little nugget:

If you truly love yourself, you could never hurt another.

– Buddha

I just loved this and really connected with it. Because truly, if you love yourself, you know how important happiness and love truly is. So you would never want to steal that away from someone. Whether it’s a stranger, a close friend or a family member. I think this is just amazing inspiration and a great goal for yogis and non yogis alike. I plan on bringing this into my everyday life. Although I do believe I never purposely cause pain or harm to those close to me, what about those strangers you pass on the street or the barista at your local coffee shop? I wouldn’t say I’m ever openly rude to them, but why not smile, ask how they are, and actually care about their response? In the end, they’ll feel great and you’ll feel great.  (The practice of ahimsa also might explain why yogis are just so happy and nice all the time)

All that to say, my yoga practice and my instructors at Gaia Flow were such an inspiration for me this week. Now excuse me why I go drink a gallon of water to recover from last night’s sweat fest on my mat. TMI?

Gaia Flow Yoga

~ Lydia ~ Leave a comment

FcDeApGJ109 namastenamaste2

About two months ago I started yoga at Gaia Flow Yoga, a hot yoga studio in Addison. It’s been quite the amazing journey thus far. At Gaia, they practice with love. This means that we occasionally turn to our neighbors and say “I love you”..which really can feel a little ridiculous at times. But yoga is all about letting go, and letting go of feeling silly is certainly one of them. We are also taught to act with love and kindness, and to love ourselves. Love where you are today in your practice and love where it will take you tomorrow. When you walk into the room, you let everything go. To be distracted by work, friends or anything else is taking away from your practice. Each class is a gift you are giving yourself, and you should enjoy that gift. And it’s so unbelievably true. When I leave any of the five classes, I feel fantastic.

The overall point of practicing love is that the things you practice on your mat are to transcend into your day to day life. Every week there is something new for you to focus on during your practice and during your week, called Sadhanas (yamas or niyamas). For instance, one week was to not be greedy,  called Aparigraha. Each class I went to that week, the different instructor had a different interpretation as to how to practice it that week. It went beyond the typical money greed, and into bigger things. Perhaps to you it meant greedy with your time when you should be spending time cultivating your friendships and family relationships. Speaking of the instructors, they are all amazing and lovely people to be around. Really, everyone who attends the classes are in general, happy and nice people. But I mean, I guess we are all yogis, so how unhappy could we possibly be?

We are also a sweaty bunch. And I mean sweat – y. Oh my lanta. You leave completely drenched and your body begging for a nap. As I begin dipping my toe into more difficult classes, I am learning how weak I actually am. I’ve always had what I oh so affectionally refer to as “man arms” but despite the proud biceps and triceps definition I have gained from doing weights all year, those suckers aren’t getting me into a handstand. It’s all new muscles being worked, toned and pushed to their sweaty physical limit.

Practicing yoga has also had other affects on me outside the Gaia Flow room. I am even more interested than before in learning about other religions. Often when the yoga instructors mention a God they say “your god or my god.” I find this fascinating as it pulls religion into your practice without constricting your beliefs. I also find myself taking deep breathes when I get stressed, overwhelmed or upset. Taking a few breathes, remembering my practice, have taken helped ease stress in my day-to-day life. Another take away from Gaia Flow is they always say when we start warming up to notice the slight pains, any tightness or anything else out of the ordinary. Notice it and accept it. And then breathe into it. To not get frustrated with things you cannot change is huge for me. To not get frustrated but continue striving for more. I have also improved my diet since kicking up my yoga practice. You develop a natural desire to treat your body better (and being around super yogis twisting in all directions is definitely encouragement).

I suppose yoga isn’t for everyone, but I bet you’d be an easy convert. An activity that is physically challenging, emotionally enlightening and full of awesome people? No elliptical can quite give you that satisfaction in your workout and in your life. Well, now I must be off to my weekend warrior class to be impressed by those pretzels around me and to hopefully finally get into a headstand!

The divine light in me sees the divine light in you. All my love, namaste.

(see? I’m practically a natural.. okay so maybe I’m still mastering that downward facing dog..but no matter)

Images (1, 2, 3)

Pouuur some sugar on me

~ Lydia ~ 2 Comments

For the love of all that is splenda, give me SUGAR.

My roommate and I decided to go on a two week, no sugar diet/experiment. We were both just kind of curious to see if we could do it, and if so what it would feel like. Would we be overcome with a new found energy? Would we shed 20 pounds? Would magic fairies raise our metabolism to a point of life-long fat burning power? Could we possibly kick that chocolate craving we have after just about every meal that only increases about one week every SINGLE month? We set out to find out.

sugar

The first few days were painful. Rice Krispie treats, donuts, and chocolate cake were all offered to us within the first 24 hours. Worse is that we both work with a bunch of jokesters who find it highly entertaining to taunt us with Oreos instead of providing carrots. After those first few days however, it wasn’t so bad. We had already decided at the beginning to only cut out added or processed sugar. So fruits, milk, Simply Orange, and whole wheat grains were up for grabs. So we really did have a ton of options, it was just a matter of studying nutrition labels and consulting with Google.

I bought sugar free bread, cinnamon instead of brown sugar for my oatmeal, natural/no sugar added pasta sauce, natural peanut butter and jelly, whole wheat pasta, and a bunch of other over priced healthy things. Everything taste pretty much the same. The first week I was supposed to be carb loading for my half marathon that weekend. For me that meant eat pretty much what I usually eat, but I just wouldn’t have to feel as bad  about the copious amounts of pasta I so enjoy. Lunch was also quite difficult. You couldn’t have deli meat, so you either had to make chicken the night before, eat a very plain tuna sandwich or PB&J. I also found, however, that cutting out sugar alternatives, like Splenda, was imperative. Splenda makes you crave sugar. It’s like an endless cycle of fattening. You have the Splenda alternative to satisfy your craving for sugar in a no-cal way, but then a few hours later you’re drooling over some fudge with no idea what happened. To that effect, not eating sugar made me crave sugar less. This was a much healthier and happier endless cycle that I would much rather be a part of.

Going out to eat was a total pain in the tush, however. EVERYTHING is terrible for you. It took me 17 minutes to find something at Panera that wouldn’t break my new diet. I managed to avoid going out to dinner, and for the best. No one likes being that person at the table listing off all the things they don’t want on their plate. “Yes I’ll have the cheese burger. But with no bun, ketchup, mustard, and french fries. Oh and is your cheese all natural?” At holiday parties you had to turn down offers for dessert, and try your best not to offend. Especially when you’d be forced to explain why you are turning down a perfectly good piece of birthday cake and suffer through a 20-questions interview on “why the hell are you doing this?”

All in all. I highly recommend the experiment. I felt great. I think this is largely thanks to a lack of guilt. When you get to bed that night you feel good about every food decision you made ( except when we were offered chips and queso, both naturally sugar free. We went to TOWN on those ). That’s not easy feeling to come by as a girl. The downside of it all was the Monday-post experiment. Donuts, Rice Krispie treat and a Sprinkles cupcakes for dinner? Don’t mind if I do. As a result of two days of complete binge sugar eating, I’ve taken the experiment up again, but a little more laid back. I want to cut desserts out from my daily diet and save the calories for special occasions where I won’t feel guilty about having a slice of delicious, specially made, birthday cake. I think it is often easier to cut things out completely, than it is to eat in moderation. It stops that “oh I’ll just have one. Okay and maybe another. And I mean I worked out this morning so…” This next experiment will also be playing perfectly into my new post-half marathon work out routine that incorporates weights, hot yoga and less running. Let’s just hope this doesn’t fade faster than last year’s “Do 50 sit ups everyday” resolution. I like to think of this as less of a resolution, and more of a lifestyle change. If I’m going to Find Tiffanys in 2013, I want to do it looking and feeling great.

Images (sugar)