Posts In: beginning yoga

by Amy Caldwell

Ask anyone who practices meditation regularly and they’ll tell you: it’s never the same experience when you sit. Sometimes you experience stillness in your body, but not your mind. Sometimes you experience inner stillness, but not in the body. Sometimes it’s both, sometimes it’s neither.

As COVID-19 continues and tensions run high, consider trying this acronym for your meditation practice: ARGH!

A: Allow – give yourself permission to sense, think, feel – and meet yourself with compassion.

R: Relax – use tools such as deep breathing and yoga practices to help you relax.

G: Gather – be kind while gathering your attention on whatever is needed, your breath, your conversation, or the task at hand…

H: Help – help one another. Allow yourself to be helped AND help those in need.

“An emotion like anger (that’s an automatic response) lasts just ninety seconds from the moment it is triggered until it runs its course. When it lasts any longer…it’s because we’ve chosen to rekindle it.” 

– Jill Bolte Taylor, author, In My Stroke of Insight

Remember that your meditation practice is simply practice. Instead of focusing on something you can’t control (the quality of your experience), try to focus on what’s immediately accessible (like noticing the present moment and slowing your breath). When we do this, we can take our practice off of our mats and into our daily lives. <3

This month we’re showcasing Kimberly Mackesy who leads an all levels Iyengar practice Saturdays at 9am. Kimberly brings a deep understanding of alignment principles to both her practice and teaching. Her conscientious instruction is clear and effective, expertly distilling the essence of each asana (pose). See our full schedule here.

What is your favorite style of yoga?

Iyengar Yoga. It gives me everything I need. There’s a Sanskrit word, ?raddh?, that means “trust which comes from revelation.” (Sutra I.20.) As its benefits have revealed themselves over the years, my trust in the Iyengar method has deepened. I’ve committed to teaching within the lineage. That said, I also know that every person’s yoga journey is unique. Yoga in the modern day comes in so many forms that I truly believe there is yoga for everyone. As B.K.S. Iyengar himself repeatedly expressed, “yoga is one.”

What first attracted you to yoga when you began your practice?

I was a stressed out college student. I was searching for answers to life’s big questions, and frankly I was depressed at what I was finding so far. Meanwhile, my dad convinced me to try yoga because he thought it would benefit me physically. I had no idea then that the physical health benefits are just one (albeit important) piece of the puzzle.

I started out with a 10-week gentle Hatha Yoga course at UCLA. The teacher was this radiant elder lady who brought her own tape deck. She taught the same poses to the same tape week after week…and I loved it. Simple, simple poses. Like clockwork, the yoga gave me a break from my stress. It gave me peace, breathing room, if only for an hour. I was hooked right away.

About a year after my first yoga class, I enrolled in the interdisciplinary teacher training program at the Center for Yoga in Los Angeles (co-taught Diana Beardsley, who now co-leads Teacher Trainings at Yoga One). I found my first Iyengar Yoga teacher, the beginnings of my own teaching voice, even the seeds of my career during that first teacher training.

What is your favorite yoga pose right now?

Padmasana, lotus pose. I find it deeply soothing structurally, organically and spiritually (that’s after lots of practice, of course). I love working with my students on the poses that prepare padmasana. With practice and sequential preparation, padmasana comes when the student is ready just like its namesake, the lotus flower, blooms in its own time. Mr. Iyengar actually compared the 8 limbs of yoga to the petals of a lotus flower: they all unfold at once to reveal the brilliance within.

What pose is still the most challenging?

Savasana, or corpse pose. The urge comes to adjust, to move, to try to balance the body. The mind wants to wander too because that’s its nature. It’s a tremendous challenge to surrender and be still, but that is exactly what savasana asks us to do. Paradoxically, that’s one of the reasons it’s so effective.

If you were an animal, you would be: a dragon! It’s my birth year in the Chinese Zodiac. And I’m a redhead, so it suits me.

Describe what yoga means in your life using just 6 words: Profound healing on all levels. AUM.

What might your students be surprised to learn about you?

That I’m looking for a husband! I don’t date my students, but I do take referrals. 😉

Do you have any words of wisdom or advice for new students?

You’ll feel something from the very first class, but the subtle benefits of a yoga practice take time to accrue. Consistency is key. Come to class twice a week or more and practice at home whenever you can, even for a few minutes a day. Yoga’s benefits show up in proportion to your efforts. Yoga can bring you more than you ever imagined, but only if you stick with it.

What it means to modify your yoga practice and why everyone should feel empowered to make changes to their practice during group classes.

One of the biggest differences between a beginning yoga student and a more advanced student is their ability and willingness to modify poses during class. Sometimes the best pose for your body that day is not the one the instructor just called out. Adapting a posture to better suit your energy, strength or flexibility is a sign of a conscientious practitioner who is connected to and honors their body. Knowing how to modify a posture to be easier or more difficult is only half the battle – it’s also important to consider why a modification will enhance your practice.

We’ve all been there before, the new kid in class trying to hide in the back when the instructor guides everyone into tree pose. You shakily lift one leg off the ground and place it against your other leg, concentrating as hard as you can to avoid toppling over when the half-flamingo, half-model instructor guides the class to “leave your hands on your hips, bring them together in front of your heart or grow your branches up towards the sky!” Glancing around the room, you notice that most people are reaching their arms upwards, so you try too and flail your lifted foot to the ground.

In this example, the options for arm position reflect increasingly challenging options for balance. Keeping the hands on the hips brings them in line with the body’s center of gravity, increasing stability. Bringing the hands to the heart helps a student check in with the midline of their body, still providing stability but moving further away from that center of gravity. In contrast, raising the arms overhead introduces an element of instability to challenge a more experienced student’s balance. The arm position appropriate for you depends upon how experienced you are with balancing on one leg and how grounded you feel on that particular day.

Luckily, there are some rules-of-thumb for when it’s appropriate to modify a pose and how to determine which modification is right for you!

1. Go With The Flow. In a vinyasa or flow class, instead of trying to modify each pose during a sequence or dropping into child’s pose halfway through, try to stay with the class for one whole sequence on each side of the body. Rest in downward facing dog or child’s pose during repetitions of the sequence and rejoin the class the next time they come to downward dog or a forward fold.

2. Pay Attention to Order. When teachers offer several different modifications for the same pose, they’ll usually begin with the most basic and work up to a more advanced variation. For example, you might start out by holding plank pose with the knees on the floor, the next option would be to lift the knees so your whole body is parallel to the floor, then you could bring one knee to touch your arm and from there advanced students might come into an arm balance. Don’t worry about being the only person in the room with your knees still on the floor – it’s better to challenge yourself with something you can do rather than risk injury attempting the flashiest variation offered.

3. Know Your Limits. Strike a balance between challenging yourself with poses and variations you’ve never tried before and recognizing your ability level. Yoga teachers everywhere breathe easier when they see a new student stay with the most basic form of a pose for a few weeks. When you can practice the basic variation with ease, go ahead and try out the next step! Maybe you’ll get it right away and maybe you’ll need some more time to work up to it – that’s why it’s called yoga practice, not yoga perfect.

4. Every Day is Different. Even if you can sink your thigh parallel to the ground in extended side angle and bind your arms with ease, you may not feel like pushing yourself to the max if you’ve had a long day at the office. Determine your energy level at the start of class and honor your body if it tells you to rest. After a long day, even the most experienced practitioners prefer to stick to the basics, focusing on a deep connection between body and breath.

5. Sometimes It’s All About Style. Slight variations in form exist between different styles of yoga. Some schools of yoga teach that the feet should be touching during a sun salutation and others prefer the feet to be placed hip-width distance apart. Some teachers will ask that you interlace the hands overhead in Warrior I, others will expect your arms to reach straight up towards the ceiling. In general, these types of variations are simply a question of style. Be open to trying new styles but also feel free to stick with what you know and try to be gracious if the teacher comes around to correct you.

6. Ask Questions! Lastly and most importantly, don’t be afraid to ask questions before or after class. Explain which poses you find to be difficult and ask if the teacher has any suggestions on how to modify or refine your practice. If the teacher came and adjusted your alignment during class and you’re not sure why, ask and you’ll remember next time how to make the adjustment yourself.

Hopefully these tips give you the confidence to modify and experiment with your practice during class. Yoga can be an amazing journey of self-discovery and empowerment as long as you step onto your mat with a student’s heart, willing to learn whether it’s your first time or your ten thousandth.