Body – Page 4 – The VeganAsana

The last week has been more than a little challenging physically, and it has me thinking about the ways in which chronic pain, being a yogi, and attempting a raw food diet interact. As with most thing (oh, that middle path), there are challenges and benefits to yoga and raw foodism for individuals with chronic pain. In this post, I consider my own experiences and link to some research and information about these connections.

Being an individual with a chronic pain condition makes yoga more of a challenge, in some ways, but also provides immense opportunities for benefit. When I do yoga on a regular basis, I find that my pain levels are lower. I believe this is due to multiple factors. First, having stretched and warmed my body regularly, it seems like I am not fighting with my muscles along with other things (i.e. my hamstrings tend to get ridiculously tight in an effort to manage the surrounding joint issues). Second, when we exercise in ways that release endorphins, it causes a reduction in pain. Finally, yoga makes me feel more peaceful, overall. When I’m peaceful, I am better able to just notice pain instead of becoming totally enmeshed in it. That makes it much easier to cope with. Though I do see these benefits for my pain level, and research supports them, I do find that sometimes it is hard to maintain my practice in the face of chronic pain. For me, morning and late day are the worst times for pain. Coincidentally, they are also the times I am most likely to be able to attend a yoga class or practice at home. This means that sometimes I don’t go, because I hurt and I simply cannot make it. Pain also prevents me from going as deeply into poses as I want. I have previously admitted that I do have a competitive nature, even though I understand that I should not in yoga, and feeling that I’m “doing it poorly” can be enough to suck away some of my joy in the practice if I’m not careful. Finally, when I am already in pain, I can’t always tell where my edge is. If I’m not hurting much, I know exactly when to stop moving into a pose because of the level of discomfort. But, in a flare, as this week, everything hurts and every position hurts. So, it’s difficult to tell when it’s “too much” pain and I have sometimes overextended and then paid for it later.

The raw food diet, for me, similarly presents opportunities and challenges in relation to chronic pain issues. I started this eating plan with the hopes that it would make a large difference in my inflammatory response and thus would significantly improve my health. That has not yet happened (though my digestion is certainly better), but I’m still hoping that it will. So, I’m “planning” on that benefit. A second positive of the raw food diet for pain is that some foods are believed to reduce pain/inflammation (like leafy greens, pineapple, some spices) while others are thought to encourage it (like artificial sweeteners, nitrates). While these benefits are not to be dismissed, I have also found it a challenge to manage pain and raw foodism. When I’m having a difficult time, I have found that it has an impact on my metabolism, blood sugar, energy level, etc. And, I tend to not want to eat large quantities. With cooked food, it is relatively easy to increase or maintain adequate intake even when eating a lower quantity. With raw food, I have found this more difficult. Consequently, I am not only experiencing the weakness of the medical issue, but also feeling weak simply because I haven’t taken in sufficient calories to support my body. I continue to hope that, as I become more accustomed to eating raw, this will decrease.

So, what is the upshot for me? I know that I will continue to do yoga, and I think that I will continue with a high raw diet. But, while doing so, I think I need to pay better attention to the pain that my body is experiencing, and not overwhelm the body with the plans of the mind, nor expect that a pain free life is the ultimate goal. I think that both yoga and a mindful raw diet might help me do this, if I practice. As B.K.S. Iyengar has said: Yoga teaches us to cure what need not be endured and endure what cannot be cured.

For more reading about these issues, see:

http://www.aolhealth.com/condition-center/chronic-pain/foods-inflammation

http://pain.about.com/od/exercisehealthylifestyl/a/pain_and_diet.htm

http://nutrition.about.com/od/dietsformedicaldisorders/a/antiinflamfood.htm

http://www.yogasite.com/chronicpain.htm

http://www.yogajournal.com/for_teachers/2551

http://www.yogajournal.com/for_teachers/2561

http://www.telegram.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070514/NEWS/705140355/1012 Continue reading →

Those of you that know me well know that I am a rule follower. But, I’m an odd rule follower… I tend to follow the “meta-rules” and not the specific “do this” sort. So, for appearance, I follow the “Be true to yourself” rule, but then don’t follow the “women should have nice pretty hair” rule. Today, I’ve decided to talk about yoga rules, and why yoga rules.

From the outside, it may seem like yoga is full of rules. And certainly, you will find that individual classes or studios may have specific rules (wear a shirt, no shoes inside, don’t enter after class starts, no children under X). However, most of the other “rules” of yoga are more like recommendations, which are all then bound by the larger meta-rules that make up the practice. Lately, I’ve been really working on adjusting my own specific rules about yoga (and life) to be more in line with these larger meta-rules.

Yoga is about the uniting of the body, breath, and mind – This meta-rule is an important one, because it’s very easy to get so focused on the body that the other things get lost. I’m not going to lie; I like the fact that I can actually see muscles in my arms and shoulders now and my belly is darn solid. But, that’s not the underlying purpose of yoga. Realizing and believing this is actually a relief, because it helps to decrease the pressure to do a really kickass high strength and cardio class every day and encourages the yogi to consider what the body, breath, and mind need at that moment instead.

Anyone can practice yoga – Again, this is a meta-rule that may not be obvious at first. When I got my very first yoga DVD, several years ago, I watched a morning yoga class (20 minutes) with Rodney Yee and thought, “Hey, I can do that!” Then I watched an evening yoga class with Patricia Waldron and thought, “Oh, I am so screwed!” At that time, there was no way I could even sit in a “comfortable cross legged seat,” let alone begin to think about a wheel pose. Eventually, I learned that, because the “rules” of each pose are fully adaptable to the individual yogi, I could get through a session by making the adjustments that my body needed at the time or substituting poses that were suitable for me.

The breath is primary – I recently was reminded of this meta-rule with force when I started taking in person classes instead of just online sessions. Over several years of online sessions, I had gotten pretty good at moderating my breath, but that was partly because the instructors at Yogatoday.com frequently remind you to breathe (inhale… exhale) and tell you which type of breath might be most appropriate to the asana. In class, the instructor didn’t do that, and I realized about 45 minutes in that I had been holding my breath most of the time. Not only did I not accomplish the uniting of breath, mind, and body in that session, but I actually created tension and pain in the body and stress in the mind by holding my breath. It’s a good meta-rule to remember.

It’s about you and no one else, and where you are now and nowhere else – I’ll let you in on a little secret… I can be kind of competitive. It’s mostly competition with myself – I want to be the very best at whatever I do. But, of course that requires some sort of comparison for judgment. This too, I was very quickly reminded of when beginning classes with a “live” peer group. At home, I was the yoga mama. I rocked the yoga mat. No one else in the house was as yogi as me. Then I went to class and immediately got too focused on what everyone else was doing and where they were in their practice (she can put her head ALL the way on the floor and mine is hanging at knee height… I clearly suck). Again, I was preventing myself from truly experiencing the benefits of yoga by refusing to be in my body and to meet my body where it was, instead of trying to make it be something else. After a couple of actual physical injuries sustained from pushing far beyond my edge, I’ve (temporarily, I’m sure) learned this lesson.

Yoga truly begins when you leave the mat – I love the 30, 60, 90 minutes a day that I spend on the yoga mat. It makes me feel good physically and mentally. I sweat in a good way… I stretch myself physically… I calm my mind from the usual maelstrom of “to dos” and “must fixes.” But, above and beyond what happens during the yoga session is what happens when I leave the mat. I believe that yoga makes me a better person. I feel calmer, kinder, more easy on myself and others. I think I yell less (you’ll have to check that with the spouse, kids, and pets) and smile more. I’m more appreciative of what others can do and less judgemental about what they cannot. And, I think I see more “kinds” of beauty in the world and in the people around me.

So, these are my yoga rules and why, for me, yoga rules.

Namaste

Tag Archives: Body

Ruminations (Rheuminations?) on Chronic Pain, Yoga, and Raw Foodism

Yoga Rules