eyes closed, one leg

ive been working on this for years.  it is not easy.  then an athleta catalog comes in the mail for beloved wife & there is the model doing the one leg with eyes closed, at rest, blissful, wearing something that is for sale.  in my one-leg standing career so far i have done that for as much as 3.5 breaths before the lean begins that leads to the topple.

i want to be as flexible as a 15 year old girl

so i'm doing the neck exercises (head turns) on one leg recently.  lots of failure, where i like to be with new stuff.  today i noticed (eyes open) that head turns below horizontal did not disturb one leg balance as much as above horizontal, horizontal itself being "ok" still it is all hard to do.  so i can look down on one leg basically no problem, but if i look up its like one leg with eyes closed.

what are the implications of that?  there is a vestibular component and a mechanical balance component, the mechanical can be isolated easily enough, i can try to align my hips & shoulders, etc.  the vestibular - i dont have "balance problems" yet there are mechanical positions for which vestibular fails.  isn't that interesting?

use of sword in yogoid mode

I have been sick with tenacious green mucus upper throat. 2 weeks of un-painful cough, no fever, some malaise.  there was some outbreak of reverted old patterns.  here's hoping that i don't end up as the 9 year old i once was.

missed aikido 2x weeks.

i've been using the sword as a guide to the lines in my AM stretch.  holding it in any position will always give me something to align with.  if i move a part i can watch the sword perhaps not move demonstrating that i did the isolation correctly.

going through the various stretch movements things are done that are absolute nos in martial, like bending the torso over a straight leg.  in martial the leg would always be bent unless taking a breakfall, but in the AM stretch the goal is to produce the stretch burn in the outside of the forward leg, so the positioning is "anti-martial."

then there's that kneel thing that may someday turn into that superyoga position with the head back & a hand touching the over backwards touching the raised toe of the flexed kneeling leg.  i can't do that yet but the girl model in the yoga clothes catalog can.

anyway, use of the sword in yogoid mode.  useful.

this is why there is the adult advisory

2 years later i am always reminded of sex every time i do bendover leg stretches. there is that anticipatory tension in the hamstrings of the coming stretch: it will burn, that is known, i still am not keeping those muscles completely relaxed through the stretch. the flinching tension & the wanting not to do it are overriden by the master, whoever that is, the one with the mask & whip, the "me." so there is the triumph of engagement. once through the "gate" the muscle goes with the flow and responds appropriately in accord with its instincts & training, driven through "pain" to pleasure.

other muscles, smaller, more in front, better known, they are easier, they just open up, "i" walk right in.

so i wanted to breath in on extension & out on flexion, so the moment of going past the barrier, where the indrawn gasp might occur if too abrupt an entry or too much anticipatory tension or too much rush of pleasure, is that an extension or a flexion? an awase moment, the two moving parts breathing together, expiring through the crisis of contact into the next thing. extasy.

unbind mind no time

6/4/2011
i went back to the original set of sensory exercises i used to sit and do:
start with visual (that's what "i" do):
what is in front of "me"
what is to "my" left
what is behind "me"
what is to "my" right
what is above me
what is below me
similarly with the other senses however defined

then proceed with the now pretty standard first thing now become second:
visual attention at infinity through the directions up-down, sideways, diagonals,
same with actual eye movement
same with actual head movement, eyes at the zero point
then on to the shoulders, etc.

most stretchy-burny for "me" are those first and second standing touch-toes. stiff hams & low back. all those years of sitting in chair. just a week ago or so i rearranged my office so i can stand & compute. voila, a new set of imbalanced muscles & joints starts to realign. new stuff in the body arrangement, not same old chronic aches & pains from always doing the same things the same way. no wonder people aren't happy. efficiency. bah. we have no idea.

it was onrushing events of life kept me away so long. rush has not abated. i continue to have a daily run & a daily stretch-meditate warmup session. the physical happiness thing is strong, lasts hours, amenable to freshening up (the happiness thing) with little 1 minute stretch-move-meditate sequences, always possible to do them differently for added interest. head circles with eyes moving oppositely left-right, etc. or just standing in natural position rocking slightly side to side (knees unlocked of course) observing the layers sliding past each other, trying to find the infinity focus.

tried the visual attention thing at the beach where the infinity focus is the show in town & was unable to find the radius at which the multiple images merged and became "flat." no layers to look at, a different zero point would need to be found, where, the vestibular sense.

which reminds me, the standing balance so habitually tied to the visual that standing on one foot with eyes closed is a different story then with eyes open. now i can practice that while i work, while i practice typing with my eyes closed.

distended belly

we see these buddha statues and "natural guy" pics from like China with big bellies and we're so look skinny here cause we all eat too much right, so its an issue. so in my warmup its like go for it and its hard cause there's so much pride and vanity. so my shomens have been weak. its been work on footwork and toe-knee-pelvis-shoulder-head alignment and always gaze alignment, make the cut straight, keep the shoulders relaxed and watching the cut stay weak. but ah, today, in the midst of the constant pelvic adjustments, oh, aha, and i let the belly go and the next cut had the power. and the next, etc. so its oh, that's why.

must wait for the questions to properly organize before they can be asked. answer falls out of the "that" out there.