Dancer moves

Last week I had a cousin-in-law (CIL) of mine ask me to come in and help her at her newly opened restaurant. Having never waitered in my life, I wondered what it would be like.

Luckily for me, it was not too difficult because it is relatively small in size (only 9 tables in total). The CIL advertised on the local paper recently so she started getting an influx of interested foodies.
On my second day as a waitress, madly running around serving customers and attending to their needs, one of the customers said (as I was topping up their water cups);
"We're going to have compliment you"

Feeling my chest expand with pride (because I thought she was referring to my super-efficient and super-speedy waitressing skills), I said "Oh really?". The customer then says; "Yes, we have been watching you. You move very gracefully. Are you a dancer?"

I nearly chocked with laughter. I have never in my life been asked this and although I have been told that I have poise, no one has ever said I move with grace. And certainly nobody has ever mistaken me for a dancer.

"Oh no, I'm not a dancer at all." I said. But then I realised it must be because of yoga so I added: "Maybe it's because I do yoga. It makes me more nimble and softer in my movements"

The customer then said "Ahhh yes, yoga does do that."

I didn't bother to say that I'm an equities trader running my own asset management business. It just seemed so "un-graceful" to say what I do for a living.  :)

Abs!

At the end of our yoga session, the instructors usually add ab exercises. It's pretty hard (even for a generally fit person like myself) and so I've been avoiding it by pretending to do some back stretches instead while the others willingly give it a go. The good thing about the instructors in my yoga studio is that they don't push people and stress that they only go as far as they feel comfortable. And hence, they have not been nagging me about it.

I think the instructors realised I was actually fine and was just being lazy and so they started telling me to do the ab exercises. I thought: "Alright, alright".

The moves don't take too long. You lie down on your back, then pull your legs up so that you are at a 90degree angle. Using your abs, you put your legs down about 1/3 way down. Hold hold hold for about 5 breaths, then down your legs go for another 1/3 way down, hold. Then lower the legs to about 6inches above the floor, hold for 5 breaths. And no, you don't lower the legs to the floor but repeat the whole sequence by raising your legs up to the ceiling. Do this about 3 times.

It's pretty hard and hence why I've been ignoring them but having done it 3 days in a row, I started seeing some very nice definition on my abs. This in turn has fueled the desire to do more and not be so tardy during the class.

It's truly amazing how much yoga can sculpt the body in a short space of time. I never saw such results so quickly with anything I had done previously (crunches etc). Go yoga!!!

Road un-rage

I made a trip to look at an investment property today. The area I have been researching is about an hour's drive from where I am. And today, I took a friend along to accompany me!

On our way back from the two properties we saw, the highway was bumper-to-bumper. This was quite unusual for this highway at around this time. As we were crawling on the highway, I turned to my friend and mentioned that I am a lot more patient with traffic nowadays and that I put it down to yoga. My friend has known me for many years and so, she is all too familiar with my nasty temper and road rage. In my pre-yoga days, I would curse everything and everyone in sight, pull out my hair or perhaps punch something.

My friend then said it was probably due to aging! She is partly right but there is a reason why yoga helps with road rage. It's because road rage isn't really because of the roads or bad drivers. It's because there is something that is simmering inside of the person and the traffic/bad drivers is just a catalyst to push the person to the boiling stage of emotions.

Regular yoga practice calm people emotionally and  therefore even when faced with frustrating moments, people are less likely to blow up because they were probably never in that simmering emotional state anyway. That's my two cents.

Yoga is just a tool to better equip ourselves against ourselves.

Confidence in trading

I'm feeling good today. Feeling confident and stable enough to put a trade through.
Last time I put in a trade for MGX and I didn't feel good about it before, during and after it went through. But I felt pressured to do something because the market was having a good day, mining stocks were doing well and things looked on the up.

This is the same stock that I had a nightmare about on that night. The one that plummeted and sure enough it did the next week.

Whether this good feeling today is an intuition, positive feelings that I bring upon myself or a universal signal, who knows! Bring it on!

Psychic!

This sounds bizarre but I'm having more psychic experiences!

I think of things, for example, and then it will happen. I think about a particular person and then I'll get a call or email from them a day later or so.

I had a dream that one of the shares I bought 2 weeks ago (MGX) plummeted. Sure enough, a few days later it did after it came out of its trading halt.

Last time I dreamt that I failed one of my MBA subjects which I ignored because I knew that I wasn't going to fail (I put in a lot of time and effort into it) and sure enough, I did fail it.

These are just a few examples and perhaps I should write down these things when they happen.

It's really freaking me out!

The progress so far

It's been about 3 months since I started this yoga on a regular basis (average 4-5 times a week). So what changes can I see?

• Leaner body especially my arms. It almost feels like my arms are longer!
• Butt is tighter and slightly higher
• Getting up in the morning is so much easier. I feel light and therefore don't feel like a slug crawling out of bed.
• Although the body is light, my body feels like it is as strong as steel. Hard to explain because one would think it would have to be heavy to feel strong but I don't feel this way. My movements are much lighter and smoother but if required (in a fight for instance) I think it can take a bit of a hit (could this be from Ki???)
• My posture has improved. I've been told I stand up straighter than before. 
• I'm hungrier more frequently (probably from the body fat being replaced by muscles)
• I'm generally calmer (emotionally and mentally) and less moody. 
• I have a little more respect for people and less judgmental with those I meet. 
• I don't feel like pulling my hair out and screaming if the market goes the opposite way. I take it as it is and reassess my strategy (yes I'm bothered by the Irish "debt crisis" and China slowing their growth but what can I do??)
• I'm eating a little better and it's by choice. Because I have more respect for my body, I want to eat better to nourish it. 

And what hasn't changed?

• I don't feel like I'm "one" with the universe 

:)

General Health

Today I got to talking with an older, big, burly male in the yoga class. He is a former rugby player who is now a remedial masseur.I met him a few weeks before and spoke with him for a bit. I'm not the type of person to get easily intimidated by someone but I found this guy to be a little bit. Perhaps because he was a lot older than myself and had a bit of a strong presence about him.

If I were to describe him, I'd say he is like a taller caucasian version of Diego Maradona less the jewellery that Maradona wears.

Anyway, I found out that he was not only a remedial masseur but a Reiki master. As I mentioned in the previous post about the mumbo-jumbo enlightenment business, I don't know how effective Reiki is but I know it is something to do with energy (universal) and its healing powers.

He was kind enough to take the time out to explain what Reiki is, his experiences in what it did for some people and why it's important to be "attuned" (whether it be through yoga or reiki or so on). He also talked about how everyone wants to have perfect health (working as a remedial masseur, I'm sure he comes across a lot of people who try to achieve this) but that they neglect their mental and emotional health. Although a person may be "physically healthy", if he/she is suffering mentally or emotionally, the stress will manifest itself physically. (I always did think stress is the number one reason for ill-health!)
He then said that when everything (mental, physical, emotional) is ok, then we should be focussing on our spiritual health.

I don't really know what spiritual health is but it made me think about our preconceived notions and percpetions we have of people we meet. I never thought of this man as a "spiritual healer" or someone who even remotely thinks of spiritual awareness. He just seems likes an English ex-football hooligan with a penchant for drinking, smoking and living the good life.

It's made me realise the importance of getting rid of these notions and being open to what is brought to us.

Now for that Reiki session with Mr.ex-football hooligan!

Leg strength

The other day I was outdoors sitting cross-legged enjoying coffee and the company of a friend. We decided to get a move on and I asked the friend to help me up. As he lent his hand, I grabbed it and lifted myself up.

Funny thing is, I didn't need any of the help from my friend. I don't quite know where the strength came from but I got back home and tried it again.

Sitting cross legged, I leant a little forward to lift my torso and butt off the floor whilst balancing on the outside edges of my feet. Then I just straightened my whole body and that was that!

I know that I couldn't do this before my yoga practice. I had to use my hands to lift myself off or have someone help me up.

Yoga has done amazing things to tone and strengthen my arms and the back. And although the results aren't as easily visible on the legs, being able to get up so easily from sitting on the floor is an indication of a strengthening of the lower body and an improvement on balance.

As for my upper body, my triceps and biceps are much more toned and I have those deltoids! My lower back which has always been rather soft and fleshy now has virtually no fat. All I feel in my lower back is my bones and hardness. Maybe doing all those backbends (locust, cobra etc) has dissolved the fat there. Who says one can't spot reduce their fat?

Bad drivers

My possible downfall in this whole yoga journey may be that I'm expecting yoga to be a fix-it-all. An instructor once told me that yoga is not a fix-it when he found me complaining that my shoulder was still aching (has been for years because I'm a computer addict) even when I was doing yoga.

Today I found myself on the road cursing bad drivers. I was only on the road for a total of 20 minutes and still managed to come across them. One Ute driver zoomed straight across the roundabout without even looking to his right to see if there was any cars approaching (ie: me!).. Another driver was parking so badly I found myself stuck behind the car asking why these people don't go get some proper lessons and stop being such a hazard on the road for everyone's sake.

 As I made my way to a shopping centre for my morning coffee and scan of the finance news, I wondered whether I should turn right or go straight. Both directions lead to the entrance of the shopping centre. At the last minute I decided I am going straight!

So what do I find myself doing?? Driving straight through the intersection to go up the ramp. Only issue was that it was a RED LIGHT! How lucky was I that there were no cars on either side of me!!!
Talking about bad drivers I must be the worst driver on the road. I'm so busy thinking how crap everyone else is that I break the rules on the road!

If yoga brings positive energy to oneself, it must also bring negative energy. I think it's called Karma!

Flowing like the water

I was rather excited to see Namaste Yoga back on one of the pay TV channels this morning. So I made myself some toast and sat down to watch the 2 episodes. Of course I did not get up to do it myself because either I'm lazy or because I want to memorise the sequence and different asanas to try at a later time. (Yes, it's because I'm lazy!)

One of the things I picked up from watching it today was that, these people look as though they are flowing between their poses. They move as though they are moving under water. Very smooth, very controlled.

I began to wonder why I look like a near-broken machine when I do yoga (I'm exaggerating a bit here). As I blankly stared at the TV munching away like a couch potato, I realised why. Yes, it's partly because these people on TV are professionals and they probably have been practising for years but it was also because their core muscles (abs) never seem to hang loose.

Sometimes I forget to keep those muscles engaged when I'm focussing on breathing or lifting the limbs. And therefore my body doesn't have much of a stable ground to start from.

So, now that I realised this, I'll pay more attention and see if it makes much of a difference.

A quote by Buddha

Today's class was full of beginners and my usual instructor took her time to go through and explain each of the asanas with them.

They didn't look like the fittest (nor the most flexible) bunch so I think they may have been really pushing themselves to do some of the moves.

As usual, we did some vinyasa (flow style yoga), then went into balancing (tree pose, dancer's pose and eagle pose) and finished off with some bridge pose and the plough pose. As we cooled down with some supine twists, the instructor said: "There is a quote by Buddha. He says that Pain is inevitable in life, but suffering is optional".
Although she was saying this in relation to pulling yoga poses and advising the beginners not to do anything that feels uncomfortable, I thought how true this is in the attitude we have.

The world is how we choose to see it...

Mumbo Jumbo self-enlightenment

I went to the Mind, Body and Spirit festival over the weekend with an open-minded companion. I have been there twice many years back to get an aura photos but my intentions were a little different this time.

As I walked through the halls, I wondered if  all of these methods, trinkets and theories weren't just a load of hogwash. Some customers were getting massages whilst the masseur made hissing sounds, some were getting "spirtiual healing" and some were getting their auras cleared. All of which involved someone performing these acts on the willing customer.

There was a free seminar about meditation so the faithful companion and I lined up. When everyone sat down, the speaker briefly takled about meditation. He said that meditation is used to think in a different way because our thoughts can be the reason for the stress we feel.
So, during meditation, instead of directing the thoughts to the thoughts that cause stress, we direct the thoughts to "no stress" (as he put it). "Ok, that's an interesting way to put it" I thought.

After that initial 2 minutes of telling us what meditation is, what does he do? Puts on their meditation CD, asking us to follow the instructions and meditate for 10 minutes. Serious??!!? I mean, the exhibition centre was packed out and it was damn noisy.

So, after the 10 minutes of quasi-meditation, the speaker gets back up and says, "If you are interested in buying the cd, bla bla bla... ". I found myself bolting out the door!

Moving onto another stall, a guy came up asking whether we had heard of this particular type of meditation. I think it was Sahaja or something. He went to explain about the chakras and how the energy can be blocked in one of the 7 points saying that to reach enlightenment, it needs to be free from the crown of the head because that's where it gets blocked.

So, what's the purpose of letting the energy go out from the crown of the head I asked. Apparently to reach enlightenment and be one with the spiritual world (or something like that). He mentioned that I should take a seat with one of the instructors and that I'd be able to reach enlightenment after 5 minutes. Oh please! As if anyone can reach enlightenment in 5 minutes. It took someone like Siddartha decades, did it not?!

Eating pretty well

Ok, so the last post was about taking a couple of cancer sticks and enjoying myself! Although I had a moment of weakness (and probably will for the rest of my life when it comes to these cigarettes) I am generally eating better.

I never really thought twice about putting certain shitty food in my mouth but nowadays I wonder how much chemicals go into packaged food and whether I want it to go into my body. I put it down to having a little more respect for my body and therefore being more aware of what goes into it.

I guess it's no different to caring about something and therefore you want to take care of them/it..

Yoga increases desire to smoke??

I'm not a regular smoker but occasionally I will give in to the cravings of an Indonesian cigarette. I'm not too sure if other countries make such cigarettes but these particular ones I have cravings of are made of tobacco, cloves and has a sweet taste to the tongue.

The other day I was thinking of these cigarettes for about a week and tried to resist but could no longer! I gave into the urge and had two. I felt rather disgusted with myself BUT it was damn good!!

I thought doing yoga would stop these cravings???

Energy flow

So after the fat finger trade, I tried putting a sell order for a small profit this morning but had issues. It kept coming up with an error message saying that I did not have sufficient shares. ?!?!
So then I got on the phone and spoke with a rep of the broking firm. He said he'd place me on hold and fixed what he needed to. I was monitoring the share price whilst being on hold and I realised the share price kept increasing. I took it as a sign that maybe I wasn't supposed to sell it at that initial low price!

So then I (nervously) put in a higher sell order and hoping it will go through, made my way to lunch time yoga class. Yoga classes are always a good way to calm oneself when feeling a bit nervous.

Whilst driving, I got to thinking about energy and how yoga is supposed to help with the flow of the energy within oneself. Now, this sounds all loopy and spacey but I started wondering if the proper flow of the energy within onself actually opens the person to receive outside energy (universal). The universal energy is supposed to give you what you want, if you ask for it. At least that's what it says in the book "The Secret".

Either that, it's because I have accepted trading my own methods than what's out there. There are a lot of systems out there and lots of information and this can cloud or even confuse a trader. These days I just do what I feel is right and what works for my type of trading (very short term with smaller profits rather than riding a trend). Yoga gives me a sense of self and an acceptance of my own ways.

And the last theory is that, perhaps I'm just getting better at trading! :)

Fat finger trade!

If anyone is familiar with the term 'fat finger' in trading, that would be me today albeit under slightly different circumstances!

For a short term trade, I put in an order to buy shares and if executed, I put in a sell order at a higher price for the same day. Today, I made a mistake of buying the same number of shares twice and hence doubling the brokerage fee! And ending up with twice as many shares as I had intended!

Panic, panic, panic!! But what am I to do?! The orders went through and I can't exactly deny a mistake on my part.

Yogic breathing... calm, deep, blue sea....... Mental clarity, emotional detachment...... breathe, breathe, breathe....

What will be will be! If my sell order goes through, I make a profit and if not, I gotta cop it on the chin and cut my losses....

emotional detachment.. .detach detach detach...

Finding a partner

After class, I got to talking with my female instructor. We started off by talking about yoga in general and I opened up to say how much I think it was changing my outlook. I said that I feel as though I'm becoming a better person (more patient, more calm) and that I didn't feel so mentally cluttered.

She then told me about another one of her students who, when she started 3 months ago, was a very self-conscious, shy and submissive girl. The instructor then went onto telling me how much this girl had changed and after 3 months, she was standing taller, speaking with more confidence and apparently even found herself a boyfriend! My instructor said, "I know it sounds all cheesy and stuff but she has changed so dramatically that she's almost unrecognisable."

I went onto add that perhaps through yoga, you accept yourself a little more and by being "present", you let things be. I think when you let things be, you stop putting pressure on yourself. This in turn probably releases pent-up energy and by releasing it, you're more readily available to accept other energies that flow.

This post sounds really quite spacey!