Regular yoga practice saves you money!

Ok, not my words exactly...
This was the subject of the newsletter I get from my yoga studio.

So how does regular yoga practice actually save you money!??!

Apparently, when you practice yoga on a regular basis (3 times a week or more), you breathe more deepily and discover a heightened sense of inner awareness and you discover a slight energetic pulse throughout the body which in turn grows into intuitive understanding of diverse elements that determine your physical and mental states.

As your body becomes lighter, your mind is calmer and clearer. You have a clearer understanding and respect for your body. As you start to appreciate your body more, you will not want to drag it down with heavy foods or alcohol (?!) and intuitively want to nourish your body with healthier foods.
You will naturally develop a sense of proportion and moderation, therefore less likely to gorge yourself on food like that man on "Man Vs. Food" show!

Whether this is true or not remains to be seen. All I can say is I have not seen a fat yogi (but this could also work vice versa. If you're fat, you can't do most of the moves anyway) and as you may recall from my previous post, I found myself (unconsciously) eating healthier and less of the food! And I certainly have no interest in consuming lots of alcohol but I still enjoy a drink or two.

Hmmm...

Yoga anyone?! 

Eating habits

Yesterday I had lunch with an old buddy (Mr.O) I had not seen for about 3 years. MR.O's expression was that of amazement when he saw me and the first thing he asked was: "Have you lost weight??"
In fact, I had lost weight since the last time he saw me. Mr.O continued with a: "I think you lost about 10 kilos, didn't you?"
I laughed because I only lost about 4 kilos. When I mentioned that to him, he said "No no, you must have lost more!"
So then I went onto explain that I was about 59 kilos when we used to work together and now I am 55. All throughout our lunch, Mr.O continued with his surprised and confused expression and perhaps thought I was slightly bending the truth.

The fact is, I have not lost that much weight and 4 kilos is about all I lost. But I do recall another friend saying that I had lot "so much weight" a few months back too. So I wondered if it is because I lost a lot of fat but built muscle. After all, muscles weigh more than fat.

Plus, as bizarre as it sounds, I don't eat as much junk anymore. It just doesn't interest me. When the yoga studio was closed for about two weeks and I didn't get my fix, I was starting to go back to my old eating habits. Chips at night, chocolate during the mid afternoon, fried stuff etc etc. But after attending yesterday's first yoga class for the year, I am slowly reverting back to the yoga eating habits. Not that I am doing this consciously. It is just something I notice because I'm very in tune with my body.

Anyway, in saying all this, I'm still craving some Bollinger champagne. I made a very successful trade with a rare earths company on the last week of the year and decided to celebrate my success (and to usher in the New Year) with a good bottle of Champagne. First time trying Bollinger and although I've had Veuve & Moet before, Bollinger was much better for the same price.

Hoping to end 2011 with a bottle of Dom!

Happy New Decade to everyone!

Stress & yoga

My yoga studio has been closed for about a 2 weeks and hence I hadn't done since then. I suppose even the instructors get a little stressed running the classes and need a well deserved break during the festive season!

When the studio opened for three days, I eagerly looked through the timetable to see what classes were available. Alas, it did not say what type of classes they were going to teach so I picked the most convenient class for me. The class turned out to be a slower paced Hatha (I usually do basic flow classes). I'm not usually a fan of hatha, which is a slow stretchy style of yoga. It requires stamina and patience to hold the poses whereas a flow class is vinyasa style and requires more strength and focus.

Out of desperation I decided to give it my all because I was absent for a couple of weeks and my body started feeling different; stiff and less energetic (and no, it was not because of overeating and binge drinking during the festive season!)

As I was pulling a pose where you lie down on your back, bend your knees and put the bottom of your feet together to open up the hips, I realised how much it had stiffened. It felt uncomfortable to lie down like that. It requires a lot of time to get the hips to open up and I felt rather shitty with the fact that all the months of practice was reverting backwards because of the absence in the practice.

Then I remembered how one instructor who said that we store stress in the hips and therefore we need to get rid of the stressful thoughts as we practice these moves. The only thing is, I haven't been stressed at all. Who gets stressed during the festive season?!

So I'm thinking that all that talk of storing stress there is a whole lot of tosh! Unless I was stressed out without even realising it! I suppose it can be quite stressful deciding what to eat and drink during the holiday period!