Our Practice – Dekasana (Airplane Pose)
I was laughing reading an article that landed in my email the other day about airplane pose. The instructor wrote that their student quipped, “if yoga is so ancient, how is there a pose called airplane?” As we know, ancient yoga was a breath and meditation practice with a few poses, mainly seated, as outlined in the Hatha Yoga Pradipika. Yoga as we know it today has roots in the Mysore Palace tradition* which added much to those few asanas outlined in the Pradipika (I mentioned this in the August 8 blog). It is a pose that I only recently “remembered” and will include this week in our practice. I like it because it feels more accessible than warrior 3-it is warrior 3 with arms reaching back (flying like an airplane). The pose combines balancing with strengthening the core, hamstrings, psoas, hips and quadriceps. The attached article gives a good tutorial for dekasana.
*For more on the historical roots of yoga, the following article is a good overview.
Living Our Yoga Off the Mat
Can yoga make us better listeners? Problem is, most of us do not listen with the intent to understand, we listen with the intent to reply. This is partially due to modern society giving us so much access to things to “listen to” on our headphones, home speakers, etc. that we have forgotten how to consciously listen. Conscious listening is defined as the “process of listening to others by subtracting the fears, beliefs, expectations, judgments, and control strategies both within yourself and others from the process to understand the deepest motivations and intentions behind our words and theirs. In this process, the only intention is to understand.”
Without conscious listening, we lose our understanding and connections with each other, and that can lead to problems with our relationships – and perhaps could have much wider global implications.
I found several articles on the topic very interesting; this first one explains more about conscious listening.
This second article offers some tools for improving our conscious listening. The tools suggested which include incorporating some silence into each day and savoring the “hidden choir” of mundane sounds, sound very much like yoga! In class we focus on being present, savor silence in savasana-the same tools recommended to improve our listening and understanding of each other are just what we try to do each time we come to our mats. This is an example of carrying our yoga off the mat into our daily lives.
“When people talk, listen completely. Most people never listen – Ernest Hemingway
"The word listen contains the same letters as the word 'silent'"
Nurturing with Food - Apple Pie Oatmeal
We are in apple picking season. If you are like me you may go picking and find yourself with extra apples and can only eat so much apple pie….I am a big oatmeal fan and am always grateful when my husband takes the time to make the steel cut kind. Being more of an on-the-fly-in-a-rush breakfast maker/eater, I came up with the following to make something good, quick, healthy and to put to good use the surplus of apples we seemed to be accumulating!
While it is not exactly apple pie, it is a tasty and quick breakfast and includes that apple a day for keeping that doctor away….
See you on the mat!
Namaste
Julia Anne