If today is any indication of what is to come, Fall is here in Chicago. Rain is dropping, leaves are falling and there is so much transition around– weddings, babies and people heading back to school. It’s a good time to look at ourselves and determine what, if anything, we would like to change.
Yoga is a wonderful way to observe what we are holding on to. With that knowledge, we can then decide what serves us. Through yoga practice we can begin to understand and then move through old narrative that no longer serves us– things we tell ourselves about who we are, old emotions that linger but no longer serve a functional purpose.
On this rainy fall day, I had the privilege of teaching a private yoga lesson. I learn something new every time I teach and for that I am grateful.
During the Fall season, I like to let go. This fall I will loosen my grip on self doubt and trust more than ever that I am all that I need to be.
Below is a sequence that is meant to be practiced slowly and with reflection. Move through each posture at your own pace and take note of what comes up for you in each posture– physically and emotionally.
- body scan
- sama vritti (sama=same vritti=fluctuation) 4 inhale 4 exhale, notice if you’re holding your breath
- balasana (childs pose)
- table top
- Cat/Cow (dynamic movements, notice any areas of tightness)
- Adho Mukha Svanasana (down dog)– knees bent, hips high, see how long you can make your spine
- come to the top of your mat
- Uttanasana (forward fold; knees bend, sway side to side)
- Tadasana
- Standing side stretch (dynamic movement to breath)
- Samastitihi
- Surya namaskara A, 3x
- right leg high…
- Virabhadrasana 2 (warrior 2)
- Trikonasana (triangle)
- Goddess
- Prasarita Padottanasana (wide legged forward fold)
- Virabhadrasana 2 (warrior 2)
- reverse warrior
- cartwheel arms down to the mat… lower down onto belly
- low cobra
- table top
- Adho Mukha Svanasana (down dog)– left leg high
- Virabhadrasana 2 (warrior 2)
- Trikonasana (triangle)
- Goddess
- Prasarita Padottanasana (wide legged forward fold)
- Virabhadrasana 2 (warrior 2)
- reverse warrior
- cartwheel arms down to the mat… lower down onto belly
- low cobra
- table top
- Adho Mukha Svanasana (down dog)
- come to standing at the top of your mat
- Vrksasana (Tree Pose)
- Viparita Karani (legs up the wall)
- supported bridge with bolster (experience fullness of breath for several minutes)
- Supine Twist
- Ananda balasana (Happy baby)–make sure spine is on ground
- Savasana
- seated meditation
Fall is beautiful for many reasons. Galway Kinnell’s 1980 poem, “Blackberry Eating” speaks to both the sweetness and the prickliness of the season…
Blackberry Eating
by Galway Kinnell
“I love to go out in late September
among the fat, overripe, icy, black blackberries
to eat blackberries for breakfast,
the stalks very prickly, a penalty
they earn for knowing the black art
of blackberry-making; and as I stand among them
lifting the stalks to my mouth, the ripest berries
fall almost unbidden to my tongue,
as words sometimes do, certain peculiar words
like strengths and squinched,
many-lettered, on-syllabled lumps,
which I squeeze, squinch open, and splurge well
in the silent, startled, icy, black language
of blackberry-eating in late September.”
Happy Fall, friends!
-acorn
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