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Thursday
Jun042015

Misalignments highlighted

When I first began Mysore, a deeper pose (Supta Kurmasana) in the Ashtanga Primary Series highlighted a minor scoliosis, a lateral deviation and rotational deformity of the spine, in my lumbar spine, which had never bothered me before. Now I had a new area to protect as I felt pain and repetition inflamed it.

Repetition awakens ego

As I kept going daily—in Mysore-style, you practice the same sequence each day, adding on as you go but do not get taught the next pose in the sequence until you master the previous ones—I went into protection mode and analysis mode. I spoke with the teachers, trying to explain for my own discernment. But, I was also protecting my psychological ego because this pain was stopping me from moving on so I needed to provide an explanation for my failures. It was also stopping me from being spiritually present.

My mind was wired on explanation. Ashtanga Mysore-style of yoga can bring up many of the mind and spirit’s impassable issues with its repetition and ritual. I was running into one of them.

Dedication allows skeletal correction

It would be 8 months later, as I went deeper into the latter half of the Ashtanga Intermediate Series that I realized positive skeletal changes occurring in my lumbar spine. Miraculously, one day this correction was so great that I felt taller, pain free, spine more erect throughout the day and even had to adjust the driver’s seat in my car as its regular setting was now putting pressure on my neck. Anatomically-speaking, the cervical spine (neck) is directly related to the thoracic (rib cage range) and lumbar (lower) vertebrae; it is all one spine! This seems obvious, but for me—deep into my analytical yoga practice—it was a revelation.