Yoga is... Day 1 at Rishikesh Yog Peeth

I’m completely and totally and utterly exhausted.  I’m not even going to have dinner I’m so pooped but I’m going to find some energy to capture a few thoughts from my first day and shower before I lay my clean body down into what will ultimately be a pool of my own sweat.  LOVE that I planned this trip to begin during the last month of their hot/dry season, which, I guess, is forcing me to overcome some individual challenges from the start.  Some of you will be surprised to know, I haven’t sweat a drop during practice… me who is usually wiping the flood of salt water flowing from my shins when I’m practicing standard vinyasa at home.  This could be due to the fact that during the one we just had, 25 minutes of it was savasana where I wasn't sweating but fighting to stay awake and not snore on my first day.

Yesterday, I bought white yoga pants to practice in and I looked at the sales guy suspiciously and said, "those look too small," and he said, "oh no!  Look (proceeds to stretch them out to their max), they are just fine and will fit!"  I bought them, took them home, got them to about the top of my rower thighs and the base of my tiny booty and those suckers started to rip!  I wonder what his return policy is...

We have 3 primary teachers during the course of our time here.  One is for our morning meditation, pranayama, asana practice, the second is for our evening practice, and the third is our A&P and philosophy teacher, who is actually a doctor of philosophy, which has already led to some very interesting discussions.  The physical practice is at a rather low intensity right now and may be for the duration but the main reason I’m here is to ultimately learn more about the other major components of yoga so I can go deeper into the spirituality of my own personal practice and then maybe, when I get home, share what I’ve learned with others through teaching.  Yoga has been a very transformative thing for me thus far, from the things I’ve noticed physically to one of the main reasons I’m less of an intolerant assholey bitch.  I’m able to breath and not react and when I do, make it be a more rational reaction to whatever it is that’s happening...not all the time but some to most of the time.  I’m constantly working on not dwelling on the “cannot” and more on the “can” and just seeing life in a more positive light because really, what you put out in the world is what you’ll receive.  

So what time do I have to wake up? I’m sure you’re wondering.  Four fucking fourty five in the morning!  Omg!  Since it’s now the hot season they’ve had to push the morning practice to an hour earlier in the morning and an hour later at night, which mixed with jet lag, is pretty murderous on my energy levels.  The food is pretty fantastic but I will say, sprouted chick peas for breakfast, not my favorite thing.  Also, if I was on the biggest loser I would fail miserably because as it stands right now, I have a stash of Swedish Fish, frosted animal cookies and gummy bears in one of my bags that I’m not afraid to crack open at a moment’s notice.  Mmmm…Swedish fish.  Oh shit – the power just went out, which means my ceiling fan stopped, which means I’m going to slowly cook myself to death.

My room is very similar in simplicity to the accommodations we had at the convent in Lesotho, except there is no hot water at all, but seeing as how it's AZ temps w/o the A/C I'm totally ok with that, and I have my own room.  The toilet also doesn't work.  It doesn't know when to stop filling so it just fills and fills until it leaks out of the flusher area so I turn it off and flush.  Then when I flush, water comes out from the pipe that goes from the water holder into the toilet bowl.  I will just say I'm thankful it leaks from the top and not the bottom and considering the shower head is just chillin on the wall, the bathroom is perpetually wet, as designed.

This morning we did something so amazing and fantastic during the wee hours, we had a group neti pot session!  Holy shit!  If we're FB friends you may remember a status update I posted when I first used that thing that went something like, "omg the neti pot is the least sexy thing ever!  If angelina jolie knocked on my door, did the neti pot while standing there, I'd slam the door in her face."  I've gotten less grossed out by it during the course of the last year and even managed to watch my sister, with her husband, do the neti when she had a sinus infection and lots of great shit was coming out of her nose and Dave and I looked on in fascination.  30 people doing it all at once is quite the sight.

The water situation here is pretty good.  They have a beefy filtration system that makes the tap water drinkable and while I was nervous to try w/o sticking my Steri pen into my water bottle, I gave it a go.  So far, I haven't urinated out of my butt so I think I'm safe!

I’m finding part of me wants to be social and get to know everyone and part of me wants to hide at points in the day and just reflect.  I’m sure the hiding is because I’m still on Seattle time and that will change but it does make me want to go to an ashram after this, alone, and really force myself to have this personal experience.  At that time I’ll probably also cut off communication to the world at home but for now, I’m easing myself into this.  Hmm… I feel like I’m boring right now, and sticky, so I’m going to shower and sleep, thanks to the melatonin Dominic gave me before he passed out.

Oh and many have asked the lineage of the school I’m at right now and when you asked I had no fucking clue what you were talking about but I did some further research and the basis of the practice started with Swami Sivananda Saraswati.  ok.. i'm dying... it's storming outside and it's time for bed!

Xxxo,

Dirty