Vancouver with Swenson

Kalani Yoga, originally uploaded by lmpicard.

I just drove up to Vancouver this evening to attend a weekend workshop with David Swenson. David must be the most beautiful yogi I've ever seen practice; the guy really floats with amazing grace.

So the first evening (Friday) was an informal lecture on Ashtanga yoga. David seemed to take the topic lightly and interjected humor at every junction. I'm not sure I was fond of the style, but I did just drop myself into this studio after being 20 minutes late (given border crossing).

After his demonstration (absolutely gorgeous), we did do a practice of some basic A + B series to feel the breath, prana and practice our bundas. He taught me some subtle oppositions that caused my forward bends to go further and deeper.

What is fascinating to me right now is how my poses seem to work me, how I'm finding extension and length. I think the biggest learning lesson this evening was on drishti (internal focus and outward gaze). I discovered that our internal focus can deepen when our drishti is challenged by distraction. There is a lot of distractions in daily life. Our yoga is to have the subtle gaze yet deep understanding of who we really are, the true I am.