Right before I left for San Diego, I finally sucked it up and registered myself as a competitor for this year's regional championships...
(For those of you just joining us, or for those who are new to the concept of yoga competition, please refer to this post that I wrote up last winter: Yoga Competition?! I was very organized and did a whole little mini-series of posts on the international championships last February.)
Everybody on the same page? Great. So I was a huge wimp last year and didn't compete. I was still in grad school at the time and my practice was at kind of a low point, so I had a good excuse. But this year I'm a fricking full-time yogi, so I had no excuses at all. Time to dig up a leotard and get my butt on stage!
The championships for my region are happening in one month. Plenty of time, right? Sure. Starting this week, I'm doing beginner's series pretty much every day, advanced series 2 or 3 times a week, and practicing extra postures on my own almost every day. Also need to start actually doing my 3 minutes routine...
So far it's totally been worth it. Okay, "so far" I've only been practicing for comp for 4 days!! But to my total surprise, I've already had a little breakthrough. I've started practicing some extra backbends, working on finding my upper back muscles, and I'll be damned. I found my shoulderblade-scapula muscles! I can actually move my scapula forward and glue my shoulder onto my chin in standing bow! (Finally! Finally! Finally!) This has always been a goddamn struggle for me. I mean, I think every teacher who I've ever practiced under has been like "J, shoulder to chin, shoulder to chin," and it still was fricking killing me. I can do it in a do-or-die situation (which I discovered at teacher training when I was trying out for demo and Brandy said "Anyone whose shoulder isn't touching your chin, you can leave, you're not in the demo." Magically, my shoulder stayed on my chin that time.) But normally, in class, there's this big fricking gap that just comes and goes and generally drives me nuts.
But now... I can actually move my shoulder forward to the right spot and glue it there! I have a muscle that does it! And it's easy. And it took me, like, 3 days, I shit you not. I'm so baffled. But delighted. Definitely not complaining. Shoulderblade-scapula, you will not defeat me anymore! Folks back home, you will be so surprised when you see me practice again. Even my studio owner was already like, "Um, whoa, what did you do?!"
I sure hope I haven't jinxed myself by writing this post.
And that's probably the second-most exciting thing that's happened to me all week. (The most exciting? I had 18 first-time students in my class last night! I love Groupon.) Aah, the glamorous life of a yoga teacher. Now I'm off to Trader Joe's... I need me some microwave pad thai!
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