Notes from a Study of Inversions// Deliberate Inquiry

Hi loves,

I’ve completed my month-long study of headstand, handstand and legs-up-the-wall. For this study, I practiced each posture every day for thirty days.* The idea behind this inquiry was to increase my personal knowledge of each of these postures over a set period of time. To truly investigate them. To know what my personal responses to being upside-down are right now.

And this was very helpful. I think I will make a habit of practicing month-long inquiries.

Creating a Habit

For some reason, as I was growing up, I felt like if I couldn’t do something “perfectly,” I was simply not meant to do it at all. Driving a manual transmission and playing basketball are things I still don’t do because I didn’t pick them up the moment I first tried. I struggled with this as an artist, because I knew I was meant to paint and draw and create, but that it was only partially intuitive.

My yoga practice, and specifically my meditation practice freed me from this notion. Practice for the sake of practice is indelibly drawn in my DNA, and meditation continues to remind me of that.

A few years back, I read Twyla Tharp’s Creative Habit. (I think this book is fantastic.) This, too, reiterated the importance of making a habit of one’s craft. Showing up, chopping wood, carrying water…this is never wasted effort, even if the day’s work ends up in the recycling bin. I am trying lately to impart this knowing to my students: show up, feel around for the edges of the shape, feel your form in the shape. Perhaps you wobble or fall or lose the integrity of the shape. This is useful information. And that is what we are looking for.

On that note, Gretchen Rubin’s Happiness Project found that doing things always/never is easier to maintain than doing them sporadically. This is radical truth. I think. Just keep showing up and showing up becomes inevitable.

In general, I found that in the first week, I was occupied with the physical investigation of the posture. Really feeling around for the center and then seeking out the edges. There is a level of proficiency (I mean this in the sense of *knowing* rather than do-ing, if that makes sense) that comes with doing something every day. I felt parts of my body from within I had not made contact with in awhile.

Beyond this physical investigation, once I was at home in the shape, I went to the breath. Being with the breath in the shapes. And inward and inward. Until the fascination was the blurred lines between my form and the rest of the universe I was making physical contact with at the time.

Making a habit of practice has a transformative effect. Shifts can happen slowly and quickly. The practice continues to have so much wisdom for me.

With respect to the specific postures, I made a video. Here it is.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndYDZ6C3He4&w=560&h=315]

Tell me about your investigation dears. What did you discover?

love.

k

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