a Yoga Instructor is Born

Today my father and I made a visit to the Dr. Anita Roberts Memorial Garden, a small garden and patio and sculpture dedicated to the memory of my mother on the NIH campus.

When we arrived, two Indian gentlemen were having a quiet chat. After some time contemplating and absorbing the environs, I asked them to snap our photograph, and we struck up a good conversation. They asked me what I did, and I stated: "I'm a yoga instructor." to which both their eyes lit up, and one asked me about Pranayama (alternate nostril controlled breathing) while the other quizzed me about a particular yoga school in the heart of India.

What was strange was the role reversal: I had simply assumed that since they were Indian, they would be yoga experts... when in fact they were looking to me for advice. Two Americanized Indians asking an Indianized American about the finer points of yogic breathing.

I did the best I could to transfer the knowledge to them about the core practice of breathing, about opening your heart and lungs with simple backbends, about the vinyasa of matching your breath to the movements, and about the most important work of integration into your daily life, so that you are in the mode of deep and clean yogic breathing all day every day.

We said our goodbyes and I realised, entering the lobby, that I had just given my first formal yoga instruction. And all I had to do was to say "I'm a yoga instructor." And so it was, and so it shall be. Namaste.

Galactic Girl in Flight

In my tender youth, I discovered that I had a talent for illustration. One of my very first drawings (there were three)
depicted my idea of an angel: an ample, athletic woman in full back arch, naked, flying through space, her hair flowing wildly in the wind. I entitled the piece Free Flight.

Max and I walked the dogs today, and engaged in a stimulating conversation about the imminent human colonization of both Mars and extra-solar space. We also had a lively debate about the flight-readiness of Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo. I recalled from the unveiling (at which I was present) at NextFest 2007 that they planned for first flights in 2009. So upon our return to the house, we Google-duelled until wikipedia provided an adequate answer: First consumer flights in 2011ish.

Upon studying the "artists renderings," I noticed a small graphic on the hull of the ship, and zoomed in with curiosity. It appeared to be a classic WWII pin-up girl! I am in genuine admiration of Branson's balls. The first consumer spaceship and he puts a pinup girl on the front. As soon as I saw her, I was shocked at the resemblance to my drawing, which has been present in my mind more and more since I've been basing and flying.

A little more investigation and I found out her name is Galactic Girl, that shes modeled after the Vargas girls of the early 20th century, and a natural evolution of the Scarlet Lady which graces the hulls of Virgin Airways fleet of Boeing 747s.

I posit here that Galactic Girl is no stranger to the art of Acroyoga. :)

center photo of Jake B & Kathryn U playing acroyoga

Early Rise & Ecstatic Dance

Yesterday was certainly the highlight of my time in the City so far.

It began with an early morning rise, 6am at the foot of Grace Cathedral. I motivated, called Albert, arranged to meet him for coffee at 6:30am, and rapidly packed my gear and headed down the street. The early rise and hot coffee kickstarted it perfectly. He gave me the key to his place so I could store my stuff and take a shower. I walked on over to Yerba Buena Park and did a 30 minute intensive calesthenic / yoga workout. Headed back to Albert's place, shaved and showered. Combined with the haircut yesterday and the shower last night, I was really beginning to feel like a civilised human. I put on my rave pants, a clean shirt, my new sunglasses, and went out to make love to the world. All that and it was still only 8:30 in the morning!

By 9:00am I was at the library, getting my list done of topics to research and photos to post. At 11:30am I left the library to meet Albert for lunch, and for the first time since I arrived, I was opened by two ravishing girls sitting on the steps of the Asian Art Museum. We had a pleasant little banter and I continued walking. Note to self: clean shaven, freshly washed, well costumed, with sunglasses is a good look for meeting people.

At noon I met up with Albert and got treated to a delicious spicy and mightily filling Thai lunch. Back to the library to wrap up some things, then walk/jog a brisk 2 miles to meet Rosie at Cafe Gratitude...

This place lived up to expectations, and then some. The Cafe itself is simply a genesis point of positive energy and intention in the universe. There are signs everywhere expressing happiness and positivity, there is good art, glowing people, and don't even get me started on the food. Rosie showed up a little after I'd gotten settled in and introduced me to Treasure, who I'd seen practicing handstands on the outside wall. Yes, free balance handstands are a big deal in our little community of yogis, acrobats, and circus performers. Even better is getting up into them in style, kick-free. But more of that later.

Rosie and I sat down and caught up on eachothers happenings, threw some thoughts around regarding a Burning Man art project shes involved with (a wonderful piece called The Heartbeat Amplifier, and found out we were both to be participating in the same dance celebration that same evening. We talked about what plans I had to live and work in the city, and shared intel about yoga / movement play and an upcoming yoga teacher training in Brazil. She ordered the Aloha juice and I the I'm Cool Milkshake.... which merits its own descriptor:

The I'm Cool Milkshake is comprised of all organic ingredients, fresh mint, ice cream, spirulina superfood for the green color, and crushed cacao nuts for the chocolate... making it just the perfectly sublime mint chocolate chip delight ever. I tasted it, Rosie asked me what I thought, and then she said "wait for it... wait for it..." and the delicate bitter of the cacao nuts hit me, a full 5 seconds after the sweet coolness of the initial sip. Galactic Yumminess!

Rosie introduced me to the manager of the Cafe for a potential job opportunity, with decent pay for the work [...and just as I was writing this, I met someone with a room to rent just 4 blocks away!] We parted ways and I enjoyed a nice breezy walk to the BART train. I bought a ticket and literally as my foot came off the escalator, my train arrived. I smiled and did a little jig as I headed East to Ecstatic Dance.

Historic Sweets Ballroom was literally a 2 block walk from the BART station, wondrously convenient. I walked in, where I was greeted by a gentle man who checked me off the guest list. Deep shamanic sounds and chanting could be heard from upstairs as I ascended to the ballroom. The energy felt good.

The ballroom was ginormous, and perfect. Massive hardwood dance floor, over two hundred and fifty feet to a side, with a stage. A few couples doing some nice flow contact improv. A girl in a purple dress setting up an altar by the huge two story windows. A cellist improvisationally playing, who I find out later is in fact Mystic Pete.

I flowed through the space a bit, then moved into some basic yoga and warm-up stretches. Soon, Alicia circled everyone up, and we began a series of loosening up exercises, alternating between silliness and vocalizations, animal behaviors and roleplay. And then it began time for the "formal" contact improv to begin. We started with about 15 of us in circle. Everyone was asked to emanate a tone of their choice with their breathing. A sublime harmony and strong vibration filled the room. I entered the contact theatre.

The rest of the night just got wilder and wilder. I had spent the day reading the "Art of Courtly Love" and the related "Code of Chivalry." That was good. It caused me some minor amount of restraint and allowed me to breath slowly and naturally through some very intimate contact movement.

By the time contact improv was wrapping up, there were about 25 people in the ballroom, and Alicia wisely encouraged us to welcome the newcomers. Someone had told me earlier "no talking on the dancefloor", which was awesome, because as a fairly well understood guideline of the community, it meant we could use only our bodies to communicate intention, or to invite another to dance with you. I had learned the magic of contact improv invitation a month earlier in Atlanta, which was basically to saddle up next to someone, and to either gently or vigorously (as the spirit moves you) come into skin to skin contact with them. That moves to eye contact, and with subtle pressure and a deep sensitivity to how hard the pressure is returned, a couple moves into contact improv play/dance.

The music transitioned as smoothly as I'd ever witnessed between the natural acoustic cello and a chill intro by Haj of Sub Swara, one of my absolute favorite dubstep/electronica bands who I first encountered during my tenure in NYC. The sun begins to set, more and more beautiful people come in, organic food and a big water cooler is set up, and the dance starts to move in full swing. Before I knew it there were well over a hundred people moving and gyrating and hooping and yoga-ing and acrobatting and contacting in fluid, graceful, ecstatic time to the seriously deep bass beats. It reminded me of the Hooper's Ball, without the hoops, and with far deeper pair contacting. I shared both deeply intimate and ridiculously fun movements with a series of rapturous partners.

Playing with different partners energies was a really wild exercise in humanity. Some had the strength of goddesses, some were hyper, some wanted strong lead, some were dramatic, some felt like equals, and there was every different style present. I was both fascinated and enthralled by the interplay between gentle, mutual touches, and strong, firm lead... it all depended on the partner. I learned through the course of the night how to deliver a firm, confident leading touch / handhold -- and how to emply a grip of steel when your wild partner decides to do a full backbend supported solely by one clasped hand and my counterweight.

The flow continued for hours as we danced and danced and danced till midnight, when the music finally came to a raucous close and everyone gathered in small groups for conversation and cool-down.

I chatted with some newfound friends, shared some hugs, and headed back to the streets of the City for a delicious slice of Italian Pizza.

Power

A wise woman told me many years ago that the foundations of yoga were:

• strength,
  
• balance, and
  
• flexibility.

For many years those three served me well, and I focused on finding balance within the triangle they defined. And then I started studying martial arts. And two more concepts were added to my movement arts vocabulary:

• speed, and
  
• power.

Speed is easy enough to define. But it really took hiking the Appalachian Trail to grasp fully what was meant by power.

While hiking the trail, I had many dreams where I was given tips and tricks on how to make my hike more effective and enjoyable. I also was able to observe many deer and bears very close, in their natural states. To see a deer bound gracefully through the forest is one of the most beautiful movements I can ever imagine.

The message I got, from both dreams and nature, was to reduce my movements to their pure essences. That all extra wobbling, vibration, or sloppiness of movement is, in effect, wasted energy. And this is how I came to meditate on the concept of Power.

I started really examining my stride, and working on perfecting its form. Keeping my spine erect, my head level, and my heart forward. Moving my feet one step at a time with conscious intent, and firm footing.

Within the timeframe of one month, my quads had been tuned into highly efficient machines with cables of steel. I knew how to walk solidly with a heavy load on my back.

Upon my return to civilization, I knew I needed to continue exercising, since I had really enjoyed the benefits while on the trail (calmness, lower heart rate, ability to breath deeply and fully, general feeling of wellness, ability to eat as much as I wanted and still lose weight :). So I put together a basic exercise program that I've been doing 6 days a week ever since.

Just as with the trail, I started to really slow down the exercises, and to focus on perfecting the actual forms. I found that this was making my workouts harder and harder without increasing the reps. For instance, doing sit-ups without jerking the head and arms up at the start, keeping the heart forward and spine perfectly rigid for the whole movement. Or doing push-ups in extreme slow motion, being sure to keep the entire body rigid, and coming *all* the way down until nose and pelvis are barely touching the floor, then up slowly. But after a while, I wasn't sure that these slow motion exercises were helping me at all.

Then yesterday morning, I was in a bit of a rush, and decided to do all my normal exercises as fast as possible, with no cool down breaks. I was startled by how easy it was! And then I understood what had happened: by training in slow motion, I had built tremendous amounts of power, while at the same time training my muscle memory in perfect form.

So, then, the definition of power: being able to inject a maximum amount of energy and intention into a movement, so that when and if it comes into contact with something else, it will literally pass through it because its force is so strong.

What really brought this all together for me was learning the guitar. I've applied the same concepts. To work on chord progressions, I practice at like one tenth normal speed... and be sure to let the chords resonate for the maximum amount of time; then, when I speed up to normal speed, the strumming patterns fit right in, because my body already has the perfect timing nailed down for the transitions.

gravity?

Meditating on three activities: hiking the AT, acroyoga, and contact improv... their relative merits, relations to gravity and partners.

Hiking the AT: mostly male, often solo, extremely grounded, weighted down with 50 lb. pack, 8+ hours a day of direct work with gravity, placing one foot in front of the other. Points of contact: pack to shoulders / hips, feet to ground. Basic goal as I realised it: to move the pack North. because the pack has become your base. you can run ahead without the pack, but eventually you have to go back and get it. The distance only counts when the pack moves with you. Goal is very simple: move north. Improvisation is conversational, but often participants simply reduced to: move North.

core value: reduce & simplify, discipline
strength: 8
flexibility: 2
balance: 5
mobility: 10

AcroYoga: fair male/female balance, requires partners, alternating of extreme grounding (supporting complete weight and responsible for total safety of one other human) and complete aerial freedom (when flying). Base is rock solid, glued to ground, fixed position of core. Flyer is completely gravity-free, often inverted, often with no line of sight to any ground plane. Partner points of contact are primarily hands and feet, hips and back. Partners maintain arms length distance. Bone stacking. Truly superb balance can compensate for lower strength. With added energetic balance of thai massage: physical manifestation of gratitude to the base. Here, the base is your support. Improvisation only comes between advanced and trusting partners; generally working within fixed vocabulary of forms and sequences. Some verbal communication in sequence. Typical session lasts only 3 hours, twice or three times a week. Wonder if anyone does Acro 8 hours a day?

core values: freedom of flight, metta, boldness
strength: 7 (advanced)
flexibility: 5
balance: 9
mobility: 1

Contact Improv: mostly female, requires partners, fairly grounded, multiple points of contact with partner and ground. In fact, all possible points of contact between partners (including breaks and re-connects), most flexible of all forms in that regard. Often on all fours with ground, or even lying / rolling. Partners get truly intimately close. Often feel strong pull of gravity. Inversions, catches and carries dynamic, trust-building when successful. Complete improvisation and real-time. Very little if any verbal language... all in body and eye contact. Each participant responsible for their own safety, even when aerial. Typical session 2-3 hours. Free switching of partners.

core values: improvise, listen, move, act
strength: 7 (advanced)
flexibility: 5
balance: 6
mobility: 5

---

I'm having fun looking at these in their metaphorical aspects. In the future, will have to add rock climbing, martial arts, and fire dancing to the matrix... so stay tuned for part 2!

at last!

At Burning Man this past year (2008), I got to make inroads into two communities near and dear to my heart: AcroYoga and Contact Improv. My entry into the world of Contact Improv was both spasdic and powerful; after multiple rejections using the naive and traditional technique of "tapping in" to a dance, I finally paired up with a fellow improver, a guy, closed my eyes, and we rolled, flipped, and flew powerfully through the core of center camp. After that, the kid who had rebuffed me earlier came up and gave me some pointers. Then a girl from Atlanta came up and said we just had to play like that back in the city.

I was so energized and charged up from this experience that I vowed that upon my return to Atlanta, I would facilitate and teach a contact improv jam at my favorite yoga studio, Jai Shanti. I immediately announced my intentions to Jeremy, and upon return home, contacted Bill about the possibility. He was enthused.

Somewhere along the line I googled Contact Improv, and found that there was a long standing group already in place at Emory University. I got on their email list and made plans to participate.

Fast forward 9 months.

I made the short drive to Emory, and arrived. Met a kind woman just outside who used her keycard to let us into the Dance Studio at the Schwarz Center. I was delighted to see that it was indeed a serious dance studio, replete with high ceilings, wall length mirror, and pro sound system.

The next three hours can only be described as being in complete flow... barely a verbal word was spoken, as we all let our bodies do the talking. I found the "care to dance?" language the most natural and intriguing of all... basically, just walk/crawl/dance/leap on up to your chosen partner, and connect by touching some part of your body to theirs... proceed with natural flow from there.

There were episodes of roleplaying, laughter, fear, strength, laziness, and everything else in between as we rolled and flowed through the space.

The only thing I can critique the general form for is a proclivity to be low to the ground... gravity is a real force, and often in the CI I've done, one or both partners are on all fours or rolling over one another in prone positions. This very different from my AcroYoga practice, where one partner is, by and large, completely aerial at all times.

I can imagine, however, that just as in acroyoga, as trust is built between partners, that more and more challenging aerials can be accomplished. To quote Louise Runyon, the local mother of CI:

Contact Improvisation is a dance form where two partners maintain contact of body surfaces - the shelves and ledges of the back, front, sides, hips, shoulders, and head. The giving and sharing of weight is essential to Contact, which often involves partners lifting and rolling over each other. In Contact Improvisation you entrust your full weight to another but are always ready to fall, to roll to the floor; the bottom line is that you have responsibility for your own weight and safety. The beauty of Contact is in the effortless conversation of two connected bodies in motion - more than anything else, it is about listening.

of note: "you have responsibility for your own weight and safety"... this is opposite from acroyoga, where the responsibility is primarily with the base, and secondarily with a spotter... the flyer is encouraged to make maximum risk poses in trust of those other two.

kundalini activation

Through Yoga it is possible to transcend the genetic code to complete freedom (svatantrya). After untying the Knot of Brahma [first chakra, muladhara] one moves beyond the attachment to the world of names and forms and after untying the Knot of Vishnu [heart chakra, anahata] one moves beyond the attachments caused by emotional ties to traditions and commitments that appear as loyalty to a particular order. The individual egodissolves here and the will of god prevails. One no longer feels responsible to the particulars of the world of names and forms, fully comprehending its illusory nature. One understands lila (divine play) and acts out his role without further creating seeds of karmas that will bring one back to this world of maya. One begins to hear anahad naad (anahata nada, the cosmic sound) and shrutis (cosmic frequencies); shrutis are heard by yogis and then delivered to the world in the form of mantras; organized as a unit, the shrutis constitute the body of the Veda.