donutszenmom.com

Lots of incoming viewers with keywords that include: kapotasana, sacrum, pain, ache, too much pain to sleep, lower back, injury, etc. Yikes. Kapotasana, which is, I think, probably at the heart of most of these keyword searches, is quite the challenge.

Yesterday I wondered a bit: why haven’t I been feeling the fear? I used to have a good bit of dread as soon as I hit pasasana. Avoiding the dread made me happy to do all of primary before launching into intermediate. I am very good at saving fear until I really need it: it’s a little something I learned during my climbing days. Terrifying climb coming up? No sense feeling fear on the road trip to the death trap. No sense worrying about it while camping out the night before. Won’t help to worry on the hike to the site. Standing at the bottom of the climb? Well, too late to spend time worrying now. And so it goes. I use the same principle in practice. I have some rules: no worrying in the morning when I get up; no worrying during standing; might as well enjoy primary. That’s where the discipline used to end. Once I finished primary, it was off to get a swallow of water or visit the ladies room. Just to take a bit of a break and psych up. I knew I couldn’t hang on to that habit, so now I soldier through. And sure enough, today I realized that I’m not feeling any pre-kapo dread during the opening backbends of intermediate. I’m even fine when I get to ustrasana. Laghu vajrasana is a pose I actually enjoy, so no worries there. And then… there it is… the leviathan before me. Except Volleyball Guy always comes over and helps, so I can’t get too undone. Just a quick sinking feeling in my tummy and then it’s time to just get on with it. So today’s realization is that the mental part of this new hunk of practice is settling down. Sure, there’s plenty of physical work to be done, but that’s just about putting in the effort.

At the beginning of practice today, I noticed a stuck place in my left mid-back. Like something was askew. Something like a vertebra. “Oh gosh, this may be bad. Kapotasana may put my back out since it’s already kind of weird.” But I put off the worry and figured primary would likely work out the krink. And it did. I can finally understand why people who get their practices split can be reluctant about giving up poses. I always imagined I’d be thrilled to split and ditch a whole bunch of poses. As it turns out, though, I am feeling pretty attached to the long warm up that is primary.