Something must have been truly inspiring for me to revive this old chestnut, huh?Out of nowhere, I started floating back to catvari in Surya Namaskara B this morning. I flattened my hands to the ground, lifted a bit in Uddiyana, and sent my feet back. The first time it happened I didn't really notice. The second, I was all, "Wait... what just happened?" Then during the third, fourth, and fifth I was sort of blissed out.
What's odd is that last fall I started TRYING to float back. I had been practicing for 2.25 years, and I felt that I shouldn't be jumping anymore (thanks, ego... stupid ego). So I kept working on mastering the float. Of course, I failed miserably at it and eventually relaxed back into my practice. Now that I've actually done it, I understand why it was that I failed.
Floating is (as it sounds, duh) about ease and not effort. I was really open this morning, so all it took was a solid handprint and a little lift. And without the jump back in my Surya Namaskara the rest of my practice was so much more peaceful. I think that, even though the jump helps me to understand the lift, there's something about the gearing up for it and the landing that punctuates my practice -- amps up the excitement or jars me out of the meditative aspects of vinyasa. I'm curious to see what degree of additional peace can be cultivated when my body figures out how to float forward.
Who knows whether I'll be able to even do it tomorrow? If I am, though, I'm going to try and float forward, too. I mean... uh, I'm going to ease into floating forward. Or, uh... I'll try to. No. Uh... I'll just do whatever happens.
Here's a video of some dude who floats with an amazingly light touch (I didn't look like that!), complete with Sanskrit counts:
