Mysore-style

Got to primary today and John proposed that we do it Mysore style. There was a second-series dude there, along with a few other regulars, so we went for it. I still feel a wee bit unsure of the order in places, but I kept my eye on the second-series dude and managed not to mess up.

It was sweaty and intense. I felt at the time like I wasn't fully focused, but afterward, I could only remember the practice and nothing else, so I guess I was focused enough. John always seems to be standing by me when I do prasarita C, and he was again today. Every time I wonder just how far he's going to push my arms over. Resist or go with it? I walk that fine line between stretching and pain, between "whoa, I've never gotten my arms so close to the floor before" and "ohmigod, I need to go to the emergency room".

Speaking of pain, during the chataranga between utkatasana and virabhadrasana I, I felt a pop somewhere inside my right elbow, toward the back of my arm. For the rest of practice, lowering into chataranga was painful, but otherwise it felt okay...no problems bearing my weight on my straightened arm. On the way home, I felt a slight dull ache down into my wrist, but now my elbow is only very slightly tender.

Given my state of mind yesterday, the Rumi poem John read at the end of class really spoke to me:

Undressing

Learn the alchemy true human beings
know; the moment you accept what

troubles you've been given, the door
will open. Welcome difficulty

as a familiar comrade. Joke with
torment brought by the Friend.

Sorrows are the rags of old clothes
and jackets that serve to cover,

then are taken off. That undressing,
and the naked body underneath, is

the sweetness that comes after grief.