Revisiting Yoga Journal Conference NYC 2011: Sadie Nardini

I haven't discussed some of the other workshops I took at the Yoga Journal Conference NYC 2011.  Another workshop I enjoyed thoroughly was with Sadie Nardini. Sadie is very personable, very authentic, very comfortable. One thing I love about her is that she explains why she is instructing you to do what you are doing; she gives you reason and I think reason makes people feel safe and feel confident in the teacher. Her sequencing is very intelligent.

Sadie also gave us really strong, sensible instruction in Side Crow (Parsva Bakasana) and Eka Pada Koundinyasana I. To get into Side Crow, she had us begin from Paravritta Utkatasana (Revolved Chair) position, as most instructors would. However, after bending the elbows and before placing the knee on the upper arm, Sadie had us walk over slightly towards the arm we would be balancing on. This, she explained, gave us the twist you need in Side Crow. When I first began practicing Side Crow, I had used both elbows to support me. Sadie believes this is not so great for the shoulders, because they cannot stay aligned when you push both elbows under your body. Therefore, when she had us walk over to the one side, we would only support our Side Crow with the one arm on the side we were twisting to. The other elbow is free and this way you can maintain the Chaturanga shape of the arms (with a ninety degree angle). The same principles apply to Eka Pada Koundinyasana I, of course, as it is very similar to Side Crow. I had never been taught Side Crow in that manner before.

I always imagined that eventually one would work towards practicing Side Crow with just the one arm supporting you. I have moved to that place in my own practice, but haven't encouraged it in my instruction enough. I thought of the second arm as like a training wheel, something that was there for support, but eventually you could take off when you learned the technique. I hadn't imagined it really hurting you much though, because the elbows could still stack over the wrists practicing that way. However, using both elbows to support you seems to distort the flatness of the upper back, the chest, and the shoulder.

(Side Crow with both elbows for support)
Incorrect, according to Sadie's instruction:

(Side Crow with only one elbow for support)

 Correct, according to Sadie's instruction:

After giving this subject more thought, however, I can think of an arm balance in which one deliberately wedges the elbows underneath the body. Peacock (Mayurasana). If nestling the elbows under the body were that detrimental, why is the alignment of Peacock instructed the way it is, even as per Yoga Journal? I imagine the placement of the hands (orienting the fingers backwards in Peacock as opposed to straight forward in Side Crow) affects the structure of the shoulders. Thoughts...?

Yoga Journal Conference 2011: Seane Corn - Each Moment Conspires to Reveal The Higher Self

On Sunday, I took a workshop with Seane Corn "Everyday Miracles" at the Yoga Journal Conference NYC. I thoroughly enjoyed her discussion on how symbolic each moment, each encounter, each event, and each relationship is to our spiritual growth. Everything in your life, Seane said, you've chosen. I have heard this before from my teacher Mokshapriya, and have come to believe in it. We choose -- most of the time unconsciously -- the conditions and circumstances of our lives in order to gain insight, to learn about ourselves, and ultimately, to improve ourselves. The instances that are you most challenged by, in fact, are the greatest occasions for learning. This is especially applicable to the people in your family... because they are best at pushing your buttons and you cannot easily get away from them. They are there to do just that, to irritate you, to challenge you, to make you change. They will not stop testing you and behaving in the way that they do until you come to realize this and learn from it. Once you do learn from it, you can feel liberated knowing that they probably will stop pressing you or the conflict you were once stressed by will magically disappear.

To put it simply, each and every moment conspires to reveal the higher self to you. This is why when you are in a rush, you are frantic, impatient, unmindful, and in a panic because you are running late and just need to get to where you are going, you will almost always end up stuck behind the slowest-moving vehicle on the road, you are unfailingly detoured and delayed further, because that is the way the universe works. The universe will smack you down when you are living from a place of ego and attachment and will test you to try and set you straight, teach you patience, love, compassion, acceptance, and nonattachment. 

So the next time you find yourself in a dilemma, profoundly irritated by someone right in front of you, ask yourself what it is they are mirroring to you about yourself. What is it that they are trying to reveal to you for you to work upon? Open yourself up to this, be willing to explore these questions, and in fact, embrace these questions because we are so lucky to be in the position to ask them.

Yoga Journal Conference New York 2011

I have so much to say about this. First of all, I am still in the thick of it. I have another day to witness.

Perhaps the most beautiful is the way it has unfolded in front of me thus far. Centuries and centuries of knowledge and wisdom and love and light sparkles all around the hotel like neon glitter. You can hear, feel, and see this energy all around, through walls, through ceilings, and through floors. It feels like there are little outbursts and uproars of Oms all along 6th Avenue, but realistically it is only confined to the walls of the Hilton: the walls we have chosen, the walls we push up against, the walls we kick up against, the walls we rest against, the walls that separate us, or the walls that unite us...