Friday, July 2, 2010

Practice - outside of Carnegie Hall

Practice is never what I think it is going to be.

Practice is never what it was.

Practice is
and,

until you understand that a practice is something you can play with for life ...
you practice practicing.

Begin
breath
For some it is hitting the mat, tying shoelaces or a fly, sewing on ballet ribbons, waxing the surf board, fingering the keyboard, tuning the instrument, entering a room, putting on the music, escaping to the outside, going through scales, flexing the hands.

Middle Game
My specialty is figuring out ways for you to take what you learn physically into daily life, to support you through the dailiness and the perfect imperfections, detours and interruptions.

Whether it is baseball practice, horse training, swimming, yoga, practicing scales for an instrument or choreography for a dance sequence, soccer, running, biking, polo, sailing, setting the table for a meal, preparing for sleep, painting a wall, the idea is to make it yours.

The practice is for you.
It isn't for your teacher.

You may fight your body and psyche, run battles in your head and traffic, get angry at your teachers, but it's your practice, it's your fight. That's why the Warrior Pose, Horse Stance, the Bridge, Univeral Pose and thousands of other postures and moves were created
.. to wear down our monkey brain scattery thinking thinking thinking,
ego and projections, and
... to get strong ... to find the ease
... to discover your focus and how focus changes and is fed ...
... to play with the repetition, and ... play.

Play at life and with life breath.

End Game
It's your practice.

photo: Sitting 'n' Yakking 'n' Practicing a Stretch: taken by Joy Hylton