I got in really late to Pune last night and after some dinner could hardly keep my eyes open. I drifted into a deep long sleep….
…and woke up this morning to head to the institute for registration. This year I have a mixed bag of teachers and most of my classes are in the morning. Practice times remain the same, as always.
As I was telling some other students who registered along with me, the month in Pune always has a lot to teach you. The learning curve is steep and you learn more than you can sometimes process.
I’m still not done with the registration formalities. I have to submit a letter from my landlord, some kind of identity proof and the duly filled out registration form. However, in the true RIMYI spirit of ‘practice first and everything else will follow’, I’ll go for the evening self-practice. As Pandu told me this morning, ‘Aap shuru to karo. You’re a known face here.’
“Ok sir, theek hai.”
amount of water you put into it won’t stay in it. Similarly our bodies have to be ready for Pranayama for it to be effective and not harm us. Devki said that many times students ask her why we aren’t doing seated pranayama. The reason is that most of us aren’t able to maintain a straight spine throughout the practice. With a crooked spine the breath is constricted and the organs of breath are uncomfortable. (BKS Iyengar has said: Crooked body crooked mind.) The organs of breath need to be disciplined before we can start to control the breath. For this reason we spend almost 90% of the class in a supine position using bolsters and blankets.
As we are settled in our positions with bolsters and blankets, Devki talks us through what we are doing and the importance of it. In yesterday’s class she said something relevant to what I wrote about in my 
the chest, we allow a metaphorical ‘airing out’ of stale and painful emotions. Everything that happens to us results in shaping our world view and behaviour. Sometimes what happens to us is painful and unfair. Unfortunately, these events make an imprint in our minds and effect our behaviour. We sometimes never let go of painful memories and they fester in our subconscious brain and almost always result in psychosomatic pain.
I’m staying at the same place I stayed in last time. For some reason, ever since I got here, I’ve been unable to get a restful sleep. When you spend a lot of time upside down during the day, you just feel like crawling into bed. There have been times when I felt like I should sleep during the day, but strangely, I wouldn’t be able to! Then one day while walking home after a super long self-practice session, I realized what was happening. The backbends that I have been practicing daily are the culprits. I’ve observed that whenever I practice backbends, I am an emotional wreck for a while. It’s not something that I can distract myself from with inane stuff on Netflix. It’s a bit more serious. And it happens to a lot of other people as well. When you bend backward, your emotional centre is exposed and open. Sometimes this causes the flood gates to open. You remember insignificant things and start to feel bad about them. Or events that you thought you’d already dealt with come to the fore and you realise that things aren’t ok. It’s a barrage of emotion that erupt and possess you and bring you to tears. But if it’s an emotional detox, then it’s probably good to get this stuff out of your system to clean up your space. So despite the fact that I absolutely dread backbends, I keep pushing through. I figure that once I’m done purging all this emotion I’ll be able to sleep better. At least I hope so. Time will tell.
