Trying the right way (8 classes/6 days)

I know I should be bursting with energy, but I am quite wiped out after completing a morning and evening class! I feel as if lemmings are rebuilding all of the muscles in my legs, and I am looking forward to going to sleep in an air-conditioned room.

My morning class was great, and I owe a lot of that to an instructor who taught at Bikram Yoga Brewster for a couple of months this summer: Laurie.

Toward the end of her stay, Laurie spoke sternly to me after class one day. She said she sees my grimaces and she knows I am upset with myself when I am unable to do postures and instead rest out in savasana. She told me I need to try, even if I can't do it. One day I will be able to do it. Always try. Try the right way.

So I've been trying the right way. I can't touch my forehead to my knee in the compression postures. I can't reach both of my feet in bow. I can't grab my heels in rabbit unless my hips are between my heels. But when I can, I try.

And today I saw pay off. I usually skip locust pose, mostly because it makes me feel nauseous and that nausea ruins the next few postures for me. But today I tried it, and I was able to lift both of my feet off the ground at the same time! So I was super excited to do it again in the evening, but alas my nausea was back.

I have struggled with nausea since starting my Bikram yoga journey in 2009, and I know most of it is what and when I eat.

Part of trying the right way is eating the right way, and I'm trying that, too. I gave up dairy (milk and cheese, I occasionally have real butter with bread at restaurants) in June. I have also recently realized that as much as I love red meat (oh, I love it a lot), it does not love me back. Ideally, I'd like to eat a mostly plant-based diet with an occasional serving of fish for protein. Right now I can only cut back on red meat because we have so much of it in the house that it would be a waste for me not to partake. My parents sent me a huge cooler full of meat for my birthday in July, and there's no way I'm not eating those sirloin steaks! I know I will just suffer in Bikram the next day, and I will have to be okay with that. Or maybe I won't suffer at all. No expectations, right? That's such an important mantra of this yoga. As Andy, a Bikram Yoga Brewster instructor, said tonight: Sometimes you think you're going to have a bad class and you come and have a great class. Let go of expectations.

I'm working on letting go of my expectations. And I'm trying the right way!