Everyday is a new day, today was a good yoga day

Yoga today was outstanding. Half way through the class I thought to myself, "wow, Advanced Class really DOES improve your regular practice!" I felt strong and flexible, way more than I did during or before teacher training. It was like I was my old self again. I locked my knees in Hands to Feet Pose, kept my forehead and knees touching in Rabbit Pose, touched my head to my knees in the sit up and for the first time in probably a year, I got my heels off the floor in Stretching. I felt so good!

It was a hard class. Good class. My balancing postures still aren't there but I can see a big improvement in my overall flexibility. And to think, I have only done 2 advanced classes in the past week and a half! I can't wait until Thursday when I take advanced again. I hope to improve even more!

The Bikram Advanced Class is a class where you go through 84 postures in an hour and a half, sometimes 2 hours. It is fast paced but more relaxed and free flowing. It's a wonderful opportunity to expand  your yoga practice and take it to the next level. The postures are hard and you can get hurt if you don't listen to your body, that is one reason we don't do most of the 84 postures in the beginner class. Bikram designed his beginner class to be for all skill levels. The advanced class is, well, for advanced yogi's. Not that I am that advanced, I can't do many of the postures, but it is fun to try and to see how each class you improve...and now I can see how it improves my regular practice too!

The yoga competition also floated through my mind during class and anytime I felt the slightest bit tired I just thought about the competition and how I needed to really improve my practice if I planned on really competing. Just like any sport, you have to train for the competition and that means a lot of yoga. And 110% effort, 100% of the time. Frankly, it is hard to do. I've been "pacing" myself for months now, too afraid to really push myself for fear I would injure myself during training and even before training I wasn't trying very hard, again, for fear I would hurt myself before I left for training. Maybe those were just excuses, I don't know. Whatever it was, I feel like I am back on track and regained my focus.

Let's see if tomorrow provides the same great practice.