headstand

I haven't practiced sirsasana (headstand) since I left Virginia. I have practiced scorpion a few times, and I have learned how to practice it against a wall. Before I moved to Portland, I was practicing headstand against a wall nearly every day and building core strength. It's easy for anyone to kick their legs up against a wall and stay there, but the idea is to get your legs away from the wall, and stack the ankles over the hips and the hips over the shoulders and zip up the core to hold you there. Tonight, I decided to roll out my purple mat and give it another whirl. BAM! I got up. And I didn't need the wall. It was like magic. Keith counted and I stayed up for 18 seconds without the wall. I didn't even use the wall to get up! It was amazing. Then I let my ego take over and I decided to practice it in the living room with no wall at all. I told myself there was a wall there if I needed it (of course there really wasn't) and I got right up. Apparently I had my mind convinced there was a wall there because I felt my left foot reaching for it after about 5 seconds and that was all it took for me to come crashing down. Keith had his nose in a film book and didn't see what happened, all he could say was, "honey, be careful don't hurt the tv." I realized then that he had not seen what happened. I sat there for a minute, taking a mental scan of my body to see if I had paralyzed myself, and I then decided that I was fine (aside from the mat burn on the left side of my face, which you can't even see). Keith caught the tail end of it and said it looked like I came out of the pose with intention and on purpose. A yogi always falls with grace :) But the thing is, when you come out of headstand, your feet are never supposed to go over your head unless you are doing some crazy headstead-flip-to-wheel type of thing. The feet come down to the back of the mat so you can drop your knees and rest in balasana for a couple breaths.

So the moral of this story is, never let your ego cloud your judgement. Ever.

PS- I am totally fine. Not hurt at all. And from now on, I will practice headstand daily until I master it 110%.

xoxo,

t