What just happened today?

I am dubious.

I had a bad day yesterday. Very lunar practice with no namaskar, which took me into deep forward bends in a cold body. Not fun, frustrating, challenging, torturous, ungrounded, painful and quite depressing to tell the truth. As we had just moved into the heart chakra, the result of this was that I was sad the whole day, and to be honest, quite frustrated with my inability to achieve anything at all. It all ended with a walk back home in the cold, and - first time i see that in LA in July - RAIN!

So I am dubious because today turned out to be the total opposite, in a very surprising way. I had an amazing practice today to start with. We are working on the heart chakra, Anahata, and so went down the road of a somewhat lunar but very deep practice. And to be surprise, I managed many firsts in my life: almost full triang mukha eka pada paschimottanasana (http://ashtangayoga.info/asana-vinyasa/primary-series/11-Triang-Mukha-Eka-Pada-Paschimottanasana.html), then reclined version, straight up into eka pada urdhva danurasana back into the reclined version. I also managed a full lunge with a back bend, far enough for my fingers to touch the earth. It may not seem much, but if you guys have seen the tightness in my inner hips and upper spine, you would appreciate the progress.

After that, we had an amazing lecture (3rd in a series of 4) by Paul Eduardo Muller-Ortega, a renounced scholar in religious studies. Today was amazing. This guy is not only a scholar, he is an avid practitioner of kashmiri shyavism, and of tantric yoga. This was so deep, simple, beautiful and enriching. I thank Shiva for allowing us access to him (very difficult to get to see him) and to him for being so enlightened.

And after that, we had a fun teacher's lab. We went through all the marma nadi namaskars again, and after that had some fun. And one more first, I got into titibasana!!!!! For those who wonder, it looks like that: http://ashtangayoga.info/asana-vinyasa/primary-series/21d-Supta-Kurmasana-Vinyasa-out.html.
And not just that, I then managed so lightly to go from eka pada hasta bujhasana to astavakrana to eka pada koundinyasana B to bakasana. Several times. No effort.

I like California, I am better here :)

Anyway, good day, with a lot of connections with a lot of great lovely people.

Shanti and Shivoham!

IY