Yoga # 32 and # 33: handstand workshop! and Chinese folk dance # 1
Yoga # 32 and # 33
Friday April 9, early morning, and Saturday April 10, 1-3pm
20 minutes and 120 minutes
1035 minutes total
Friday I did a bit of relaxing yoga. Pretty standard. Saturday, I went to a two-hour handstand workshop at Enso Studio! I went there once before and really liked it. The handstand workshop was taught by Adam, one of the owners of Enso, and I liked him a lot. He started out by talking a bit about handstands, why they're challenging and things to be careful of. Then we spent about half an hour warming up with yoga before trying some handstand preparations. First we practiced kicking from a downward dog position, just to get a sense of what the kicking feels like. Then we tried kicking a bit more and trying to lift the legs, to get a sense of what it feels like to get the pelvis over the shoulders. This was the bad part for me--I totally surprised myself by kicking so hard that I flipped completely over, falling on my head, right shoulder, and right side. On the hard wood floor. I started to cry, not so much because it hurt (although it did) but because it was such a shock, and so scary. This is the sort of thing that people who don't do handstands are afraid of--falling on your head on the hard wood floor. And it is scary. Adam handled it really well, though--made sure I was okay, let me sit out for a while, used it as a moment to talk to the class about handstands being scary (although I actually can't remember much of what he said), made sure I was okay again, checked in repeatedly over the rest of the workshop. He strongly suggested I move over and try using the gymnastic mats around the room instead of continuing on my yoga mat on the wood floor, and I agreed. I just hadn't thought before that I was capable of doing something like that, which was the only reason I hadn't moved to the thick mats to begin with.
After I recovered a bit, I tried the next exercise, which was placing hands on the floor and walking up the wall. I've done this before, so it was good to do something familiar. I can easily get my feet up high on the wall, but to get them to a point where my body is at a right angle and the hips are right over the shoulders--that I can't do yet.
Next we worked with 3-4 partners in a supported handstand. One person kicks up into the handstand, while the supporters stand one on the right, one on the left, and one in front. They catch her legs and hold her up, so she can't fall down or fall forward. The supporters then lessen their grip a bit, so the handstander can practice feeling her arm strength and using her core muscles and leg muscles to hold herself up on her own, while still feeling safe. This was a really great exercise, and I'm glad I was with a nice group of women who made me do it. I actually ended up with Kelly and Lisie, who both teach yoga at Enso, so that was interesting--Lisie taught the class I attended back in December, and I really admired her, so it was neat to see her feeling nervous about a technique and working through it. Each of us did handstands twice, and then supported the others while they tried. It was a real rush, a neat feeling to do it and feel so safe. I really got a sense of what it takes to hold the pose, and it's hard. I'm really not sure I have the arm strength to do it yet.
Finally, we all pulled up a space of wall and tried kicking up into a handstand independently. I wasn't able to do this at all, and I think part of it was feeling scared of falling. I also spotted Lisie for a bit and helped her get up into her handstand on her own--she's totally strong enough, but just seemed nervous about it. Kelly, the other Enso teacher, seemed to really get the knack of it, so that was cool.
Over the course of the workshop, Adam mentioned a few things as being important for doing handstands successfully. One was keeping the hips square as you try to kick up. A lot of people will rotate the hip out on the kicking leg, which throws your balance off. Adam also emphasized core strength and relying on the mulabanda and udiandabanda (root lock, and, um, belly lock? mulabanda is the muscles in the perineum, udiandabanda is in the belly). Having the core muscles engaged really helps give the strength to hold the pose. When kicking up, it helps to keep the kicking leg straight. Also, it's important to have the fingers spread, and to let your hands hold your weight and keep your balance the same way our feet do--we might sway back and forth from toes to heels to keep balance, and doing the same with the hands will allow you to stay more balanced in the pose. And don't forget to breathe.
Adam also emphasized that doing handstands is a journey: in a two-hour workshop, nobody's going to suddenly start doing perfect handstands. He told a story about how he once took a class with David Swenson, who's a major ashtanga guy, and how it took Swenson three tries to get up into a good handstand to demonstrate one to his class. Even someone like David Swenson doesn't do a perfect handstand all the time, so how could we? It's something to work at.
I feel pretty sure that I'm just not strong enough for this yet. However, I still want to work on it and do some of the preps to build my strength. I think walking the feet up the wall will be good for this--if I can get myself into a right angle and be okay and able to hold it, that will say a lot for my strength level, because I really can't do that now. Also, I want to go out with F sometime to the park and practice kicking up and falling over. The falling over is still too scary. We stopped at a park today that has a sandy area where the creek overflowed--a nice soft surface to fall on. We'll go out and get really dirty and try some handstands, and with F to spot me I'll feel safe. I also want to get back to doing headstands, because I can do them and the core strength to lift up into a headstand seems pretty similar to that needed for a handstand. Practicing headstands will help with the whole thing, I think.
And I definitely want to go back to Enso soon. Once Chinese folk dance is over, I'm going to skip the belly dancing segment and just get back to yoga class and go at least once a week. There are also some other workshops coming up at Enso--a backbend workshop and a women's self defense workshop--so I might try those too.
Oh, and Chinese folk dance is hard. There are accessories: a fan and a handkerchief. It's hard enough coordinating my own feet and arms without having to worry about what my fan is doing. My wrists also don't bend enough to be able to whirl my fan around properly. Also, this is one of those dances where being a member of a genetically smaller cultural group is beneficial--I had the same problem with flamenco. Elba the flamenco teacher is a tiny curvy Spanish woman; Lan Wei the Chinese dance teacher is a tiny Chinese woman. They both look beautiful and graceful doing their respective dances. I need to ask Lynn if next year we can have a cultural dance where it's an advantage to be a big gallumphing European giraffe. Maybe something German, or a polka, or Irish step dancing. I suspect Chinese will not end up being my favorite.
Friday April 9, early morning, and Saturday April 10, 1-3pm
20 minutes and 120 minutes
1035 minutes total
Friday I did a bit of relaxing yoga. Pretty standard. Saturday, I went to a two-hour handstand workshop at Enso Studio! I went there once before and really liked it. The handstand workshop was taught by Adam, one of the owners of Enso, and I liked him a lot. He started out by talking a bit about handstands, why they're challenging and things to be careful of. Then we spent about half an hour warming up with yoga before trying some handstand preparations. First we practiced kicking from a downward dog position, just to get a sense of what the kicking feels like. Then we tried kicking a bit more and trying to lift the legs, to get a sense of what it feels like to get the pelvis over the shoulders. This was the bad part for me--I totally surprised myself by kicking so hard that I flipped completely over, falling on my head, right shoulder, and right side. On the hard wood floor. I started to cry, not so much because it hurt (although it did) but because it was such a shock, and so scary. This is the sort of thing that people who don't do handstands are afraid of--falling on your head on the hard wood floor. And it is scary. Adam handled it really well, though--made sure I was okay, let me sit out for a while, used it as a moment to talk to the class about handstands being scary (although I actually can't remember much of what he said), made sure I was okay again, checked in repeatedly over the rest of the workshop. He strongly suggested I move over and try using the gymnastic mats around the room instead of continuing on my yoga mat on the wood floor, and I agreed. I just hadn't thought before that I was capable of doing something like that, which was the only reason I hadn't moved to the thick mats to begin with.
After I recovered a bit, I tried the next exercise, which was placing hands on the floor and walking up the wall. I've done this before, so it was good to do something familiar. I can easily get my feet up high on the wall, but to get them to a point where my body is at a right angle and the hips are right over the shoulders--that I can't do yet.
Next we worked with 3-4 partners in a supported handstand. One person kicks up into the handstand, while the supporters stand one on the right, one on the left, and one in front. They catch her legs and hold her up, so she can't fall down or fall forward. The supporters then lessen their grip a bit, so the handstander can practice feeling her arm strength and using her core muscles and leg muscles to hold herself up on her own, while still feeling safe. This was a really great exercise, and I'm glad I was with a nice group of women who made me do it. I actually ended up with Kelly and Lisie, who both teach yoga at Enso, so that was interesting--Lisie taught the class I attended back in December, and I really admired her, so it was neat to see her feeling nervous about a technique and working through it. Each of us did handstands twice, and then supported the others while they tried. It was a real rush, a neat feeling to do it and feel so safe. I really got a sense of what it takes to hold the pose, and it's hard. I'm really not sure I have the arm strength to do it yet.
Finally, we all pulled up a space of wall and tried kicking up into a handstand independently. I wasn't able to do this at all, and I think part of it was feeling scared of falling. I also spotted Lisie for a bit and helped her get up into her handstand on her own--she's totally strong enough, but just seemed nervous about it. Kelly, the other Enso teacher, seemed to really get the knack of it, so that was cool.
Over the course of the workshop, Adam mentioned a few things as being important for doing handstands successfully. One was keeping the hips square as you try to kick up. A lot of people will rotate the hip out on the kicking leg, which throws your balance off. Adam also emphasized core strength and relying on the mulabanda and udiandabanda (root lock, and, um, belly lock? mulabanda is the muscles in the perineum, udiandabanda is in the belly). Having the core muscles engaged really helps give the strength to hold the pose. When kicking up, it helps to keep the kicking leg straight. Also, it's important to have the fingers spread, and to let your hands hold your weight and keep your balance the same way our feet do--we might sway back and forth from toes to heels to keep balance, and doing the same with the hands will allow you to stay more balanced in the pose. And don't forget to breathe.
Adam also emphasized that doing handstands is a journey: in a two-hour workshop, nobody's going to suddenly start doing perfect handstands. He told a story about how he once took a class with David Swenson, who's a major ashtanga guy, and how it took Swenson three tries to get up into a good handstand to demonstrate one to his class. Even someone like David Swenson doesn't do a perfect handstand all the time, so how could we? It's something to work at.
I feel pretty sure that I'm just not strong enough for this yet. However, I still want to work on it and do some of the preps to build my strength. I think walking the feet up the wall will be good for this--if I can get myself into a right angle and be okay and able to hold it, that will say a lot for my strength level, because I really can't do that now. Also, I want to go out with F sometime to the park and practice kicking up and falling over. The falling over is still too scary. We stopped at a park today that has a sandy area where the creek overflowed--a nice soft surface to fall on. We'll go out and get really dirty and try some handstands, and with F to spot me I'll feel safe. I also want to get back to doing headstands, because I can do them and the core strength to lift up into a headstand seems pretty similar to that needed for a handstand. Practicing headstands will help with the whole thing, I think.
And I definitely want to go back to Enso soon. Once Chinese folk dance is over, I'm going to skip the belly dancing segment and just get back to yoga class and go at least once a week. There are also some other workshops coming up at Enso--a backbend workshop and a women's self defense workshop--so I might try those too.
Oh, and Chinese folk dance is hard. There are accessories: a fan and a handkerchief. It's hard enough coordinating my own feet and arms without having to worry about what my fan is doing. My wrists also don't bend enough to be able to whirl my fan around properly. Also, this is one of those dances where being a member of a genetically smaller cultural group is beneficial--I had the same problem with flamenco. Elba the flamenco teacher is a tiny curvy Spanish woman; Lan Wei the Chinese dance teacher is a tiny Chinese woman. They both look beautiful and graceful doing their respective dances. I need to ask Lynn if next year we can have a cultural dance where it's an advantage to be a big gallumphing European giraffe. Maybe something German, or a polka, or Irish step dancing. I suspect Chinese will not end up being my favorite.