• Check in, centering, balanced hatha yoga set considering contraindications, relaxation (with imagery as appropriate),
• Balanced pranayama considering contraindications, meditation/centering.
• Include at least one suggestion from Karma, Bhakti, Raja, or Jnana Yoga tailored for this client.

Notice: What are the practices you use during your day to care for yourself, nourish yourself across the koshas and through all the senses? What are the practices you use to practice vairagya/non-attachment?

Practice: Awareness practice - checking in with the layers, without trying to fix or change the sensations she notices. Try at different times of the day (morning, between clients, before bed), different positions (seated, standing, supine).

Practice: Supta Matsyendrasana and Restorative Mandukasana - when in doubt, add more support. See if you can fill in the secondary curves of the body with folded towels, pillows, blankets.

Practice: Bhramari Breath (when congestion is done)

Check In

Awareness Practice

Raja Yoga: Sutra 1.12

Heaven and Earth Grounding Practice - she uses a similar practice for herself to prepare before clients, using the imagery of being a tree

Surya Namaskar - hands on massage table

TRE: 2 rounds, 10 minutes

Restorative Mandukasana - with bolster under the torso and block under the forehead

Shavasana - in addition to bolster under the leg and neck pillow, offered client a small weighted heart pillow which she placed over her heart during the practice.

Client had done a lot of power washing over the weekend, and has a lot of congestion with a sinus infection. Has been using her neti pot and resimax vibration device (?) - sounds like it can be placed at marma points and generates a gentle vibration. She had been exploring bhramari breath as best she could with the congestion - she will work with it more once the congestion clears. Had done Surya Namaskar at the wall and enjoyed the movement, as well as two self-guided sessions of TRE during the week.

After the awareness practice, client reported being aware of areas of the body being "achy, talking" that were not usual places of discomfort: left knee, left forearm. Her low back has been tight, due to propping herself up the past several nights in order to sleep with the congestion - all in the anamaya kosha. In the manomaya she reported feeling fear during the awareness practice. She shared that during an MFR session with my friend, Colette, she saw an image of Atlas holding the world, and felt like God was inviting her to "Give me the weight of the world." At the same time the instrumental music playing in the background of the session changed to the only song that had lyrics in the playlist, and it was a song talking about Jesus - for her she felt that it was definitely not a coincidence, and did share the experience with Colette. Celebrated her awareness of all that she is carrying, and her continued exploration of letting go.

With the congestion was concerned with inversions, but client found standing and table-supported forward bends relieved tension in the low back, and even seemed to improve the congestion and sinus pressure. Encouraged her to take the rounds of Surya Namaskar slowly, elevating head above heart as needed/reducing the range of forward bending movements.

Guided the client through the TRE exercises, supported at the wall and with hands on the table for the wide fold, after which again the client reported feeling less congested. During the rounds client felt different tempos and rhythms of tremors through the adductors and into the low back, feeling it move up her spine like "a wave going up the spine." She also felt movement in her core, which she described as more superficial, perhaps in the fascia?

Client particularly enjoys twists after TRE, so explored a restorative supported supine twist, which also provided a gentle stretch/opening across the heart space for her. Introduced Supported Mandukasana for her to explore for low back tension, encouraging practice once the congestion had cleared. With the angled bolster she felt some nice traction in the low back, but the congestion made it too uncomfortable to practice today.

I had intended to guide the client through a kriya exploring self-massage and working with the marma points of the hands, some of the practice using a marma stick. Just due to fatigue I accidentally left the marma stick I had for her at home, and wanted to gift it to her as part of the session so she could continue home practice. I decided to add these to our next and final session.

Still working to translate my understanding of the koshas and the sutras into more everyday language. Spent some time talking about the koshas, and the client connected with them very well. She's been reading and listening to works from Dr. Joe Dispenza, and has been trying to bring more awareness to her physical body as a result. She understood the awareness practice as a way to bring attention and connection to not only the physical layer, but the deeper layers as well. I feel like there's much more we can discuss when it comes to sutra 1.12 on practice and non-attachment, but isn't that the case with all the sutras? I feel like continued study and exploration is a lifelong journey - for myself as well as clients who are interested in studying them further.

I'm still pondering/working with/struggling with this. I want to continue to talk about sutra 1.12, include the kriya for the hands and marma exploration, and also offer an extended practice of supported matsayasana with blocks under the scapulae and head, bolster under the legs, followed by yoga nidra. I feel like she's at a place she can explore TRE on her own/unsupervised, and I really want our final session for case study purposes to focus on the tools of yoga. I will have an ongoing relationship with her as I rent the space in her chiropractic practice, so we can continue to explore sutras together. Perhaps my struggle is wanting to feel like I've offered her "enough" - and this is part of my personal practice of vairagya?