This is a first in my yoga practice.
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.Our bodies are asymmetrical. Lacking symmetry. Imbalanced. The internal rotation of my right shoulder has always been tighter than the left. That tightness caused a lack of mobility, preventing me from bringing my right arm around my back and reaching up toward my head. My left arm can perform this motion but it takes two arms as well as wrist mobility, to bring the palms together in prayer behind the back. When this asana is presented In yoga class, I will usually do one of two modifications for this pose; either holding opposite elbows behind my back or bringing fists to touch which give an associative feeling and position of the reverse prayer without the mobility needed for the full expression of the posture. However this week as I took my regular power yoga level three class where we regularly do this posture numerous times in association with other other asana, my shoulders were feeling good, nice and warm. So, I made the attempt. And TAA (mother fuckin') DAA! Pashchima Namskarasana in its full expression!
Throughout the duration of class, I enjoyed an uplift in spirit as I had reached a point in my practice where impossibility was no longer part of my vocabulary. I have practiced but had yet to achieve other asana deemed by some way more difficult, such as handstand (adho mukha vrksanana) and full split (hunamanasana). However, in my heart, I knew those would happen with practice. My right shoulder (along with my hips, I'll save that for another blog) has been a point of contention and seriously doubted this asana on my body, would happen. It happened. Anything is possible on this yoga journey.
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Documenting my yoga journey and its progress is selfish and selfless. Selfish because seeing where I was and where I'm heading is a nice ego boost. Selfless because I was once a non-stretching bodybuilder whose only concern was size and leanness, where tightness through my body was starting to be felt. Now, I'm a 40+ mom, still a heavy lifter plus a yogi who's physical mission is to have a functional, mobile, healthy life when I'm 50+ which, in actuality, is not that far away. Namaste 🙏🏾.