Becoming bendy & finding our innner mula bandha

We have one & a half days left here at Purple Valley. This morning we finished our last yoga class & we were filled with bitter sweet feelings. It has been a magical two weeks. We have explored our dedication to yoga and the yogic path, questioning our motivations & ultimate desires as they relate to our yoga practice. We have had deep & thoughtful conversations with our humble teachers & moments of humor when our male instructor discussed how he would practice yoga if he were pregnant. We have searched for answers to unanswerable questions about the difference between yoga & religion, between philosophy & dogma, & the difference between lollys & lollypops. We have both been able to deepen our practice on a spiritual as well as a physical level. We have tried to wrap our brains around the idea of mula bandha only to be told it starts as the physical experience of tightening your pelvic floor & becomes more than a core strengthening activity an "energetic" lifting from your root!! We also learned that if you look off into the distance and then down to the tip of your nose you feel it in your root lock area (do it, I dare you!!!) During our Sunday morning practice, we secretly listened & observed with amazement at the "really bendy people" (who visit on Sunday) whose breathing sounded like an ocean & bodies twisted into seeminly impossible postures. I marveled at this guy people refer to 45 day Ian..he meditated for 10 hours a day for 45 days...WITHOUT TALKING!!!!

Kelsey discovered that she can relax her arms & twist them behind her back without pulling them off & she is really really close to doing a headstand without help. I have discovered that I can almost lay flat on my stomach with my legs wrapped over my shoulders & that I can do a back bend without pain in my shoulders. The word breathe took on a whole new meaning especially in those really twisty poses & the phrase "bend or die" became our secret mantra.

We made total strangers our best friends & laughed at what seems like nothing, we have been touched by the kindness of these strangers & inspired by one another. Our nights ended with fits of laughter at speed scrabble matches (where people were prone to making up words) & our own silly behavior once in the safe confines of our room. And we continued to stuff ourselves silly with good food!! To put it simply it has been splendiforusly superb!!!

We have visited more beaches, explored a spice plantation & took two cooking classes. Did you know that only one pineapple grows on a plant at a time and that if you cut the top off of the pineapple and replant it a new plant grows and produces a pineapple? We visited markets and haggled till we liked the price. We befriended a shop keeper whose name translated to "happy together", which prompted us to break out in song, while we drank tibetan chai tea with her.

I have been so happy here, so genuinely joyus of heart. One of the things that I have appreciated & enjoyed is that the women who run this place, as well as our instuctor are not super thin bendy types. They have strong, healthy, flexible bodies, of all different proportions & they are proud of their bodies curves & shapes. It's food for my soul to be around women like this.

We contiue to try to understand the nuances of driving in India. As in many countries I have been in horn honking is a special talent. Each honk has a different meaning, one honk for I am passing you, another for move you are in my way, and still another for watch out danger!! The rules are beyond my ability to understand...disregard the lane lines, drive with four to five people on a scooter, text and talk on the phone while driving, let go of the steering wheel to pray as you drive past a temple, but the police will pull you over if you have five people squished into a in cab. The pricing seems to have no rhyme or reason even when it is printed on a nice piece of paper...the same price to drive 15 minutes as it is to drive almost an hour??? And the people, cows, and stray dogs walking all over the road seem to disregard the cars even when they are inches from hitting them, nothing leaves on time and no one is in a hurry.

But.....I suppose when you grow up believing in reincarnation...if I did not get to "it" in this life time or I did not get "it" right in this life time then maybe in the next, there is no stress or hurry to get out of the way of a car. It's really a lovely idea.....no tic lists, no to do list, no check in the box, no hurry to get this or that done, no stress to get into the next yoga posture...if you don't get it now then maybe in your next life. It's even more beautiful than that because what you do with your life now matters...it matters for your health now, the quality of your life now & for your loved ones NOW (and if you believe in reincarnation it counts towards your next life).

But don't be fooled...I am still me and Kelsey is still Kelsey...manic, crazy, happy, sensitive, a bit impulsive & full of love!!!!

And now.......LUNCH!!!