First, a word on the yoga championships. I am hoping to participate in them again this year - it would be my third year now! - so I decided that I might as well get my shit together and start ACTING like I'm going to give it a try.
In keeping with this, I decided to do a first "rough run" of my competition routine after class tonight. But since the competition is done in an unheated auditorium (or possibly a mall this time?!), I've decided that this year I want to practice "cold" as much as possible. So I took class at 4:30, showered off, came home, put on some dry clothes, set down a yoga mat in my backyard, and practiced postures while my sister cooked dinner for us. My friend came by at 7 and I asked her to be my camera-girl and take a video of me. This was actually a great idea, because having somebody watch me - even a good friend who is totally ignorant of yoga and impressed by everything - gave me a considerable performance adrenaline jolt, like "oh, ok, we are seriously doing this now!" (She was a great audience - she goes, "I'm pretty sure that cobra thing you did defied the laws of physics." She also said, "That doesn't look like a rabbit!")
In my short-sightedness, I did not clear my memory card beforehand, so we only captured about 1 minute of the 3 minute routine. Whoops. But I got to see the first two and a half postures, and that gives me plenty to think about!
First posture: standing head to knee. Hmmmm. Why does my kicking leg drift up in the middle? How long has this been going on?! I can't tell whether it moved BECAUSE I was loosing my balance, or whether I started to loose my balance because it moved. But very good to see!! Also, would love to get forehead higher on the knee.
Third posture: floor bow, cut off in the middle. Not sure if I saw the final posture or not.
Second posture: standing bow. The topic of this post!!! I am totally surprised and delighted to see that my standing bow is NOT the total train wreck that I was envisioning. This might actually be my new favorite picture of this posture on me. (Posture-wise that is. Camera-wise I think it's like 1 megapixel resolution, pretty ugly.) Hooray!! There are still plenty of things that I want to tweak (like the shoulder alignment and the placement of that free arm, which is in a really odd position), but the essentials all look okay to me. I was so sure that I was loosing the grip on what used to be my favorite posture... but I guess I've still got it in there somewhere! And I have to admit that it really is MUCH easier to do without all that SWEAT.
Don't hate me for being vain enough to post the pic... it's late at night, I'm just now seeing it for the first time, and it is making me kinda happy. :)
Taa daaaa!! Keep it locking....
