Grounding Fall Sequence 2: Ode to Warrior 3
On of my favorite teachers ever used to say, "Balance postures aren't here because they expect your perfection - they are here to teach you to be okay when you're on limited resources."
Meaning - you teach yourself that you can be okay on the fly. You learn how to create a sense of rootedness, connectedness and grounding without both feet firmly planted. I love Warrior 3 because it's so stinking hard for me - it requires laser-focused integration, power in both of your legs, awareness of your hips, recruitment of all the muscles in your spine & torso, and upper body mobility and strength against gravity while your arms are overhead. It's a LOT of work to hold your calm here - staying balanced inside as much as outside. So this week in class we took Warrior 3 a bunch of different ways. We did this for two reasons:
- To learn how to establish roots "on the fly"
- To notice how changing your relationship with gravity completely changes your relationship with the pose... and your perspective...
In another blog post, I wrote about someone who walked into one of my classes recently and said: "Oh my god this is a yoga class? I HATE yoga!" - ha ha - yep - right before class. Why doesn't this really bother me? I'll give you a hint ... it's related to perspective. Here's THAT story.
While no two classes I teach are ever the same - below is the rough map I used this week for class. The goal was to appeal to the "vinyasa" crowd, still offer a balanced full-body experience, prepare the body for warrior 3 and then test it in several permutations. Enjoy!
