Wholistic Fitness

can ilg tell you HOW MANY have c(om)e to me throughout the decades saying, “Oh, i’ve heard about your yoga classes,  i’m not ready for that intensity yet!”    broken back yogi ilg responds to them, “are you ready to die in the next breath?  do you KNOW what you are going to do when you can’t manage another inhale?”   come to my yoga classes or online training and train with a spinal paralysis thrivor (not just survivor) self-recovered through yoga… i can bestow a Proven Path if you are willing to Rise Higher…pic courtesy of WF Archives of ilg yesterday during Early Morning Practice…sandbags weighting my decade-old injured pelvis…you want this or default to spiritually-numbing surgery?   How BAAAAD do you really WANT to Rise Higher?

as i sit here, sleep deprived, next to Dewa – who threw up 15x last night without one complaint or whine* – it struck me how Blessed we are to have encountered this precious lofty Path of Wholeness together.  sometimes, being sleep-deprived calls forth a different energetic reservoir from within the subtle body.  i have encountered tremendous inner, astral, and pranic gateway openings during my mountaineering career which often pivoted upon chains of sleep-deprived, high intensity effort.   already, at age 6, Dewa knows that our bodies must now and again roll through the rough patches of fever, chills, and various modalities of throwing off, up, and out bodily fluids of categorically diverse compositions.  “Sickness makes us stronger,” she echoes one of our wholeness parenting affirmations.  never vaccinated, Dewa has only been sick a handful of times and when she does get an immune-boosting opportunity (another WF lingo for ‘illness’),  she is like an advanced yogic master who processes all obstacles at the speed of Enlightenment.  by 8am,  Dewa’s sense of humor and chi were returning, “Daddy?  Today? I am a Catepillar!”   

to explore the Path of WF requires truly simple,  yet incredibly difficult, qualities not found in the common exercise or wellness paths.  perhaps the most significant inner quality we must embrace is humility,  for a WF lifestyle is an ongoing act of ego-demolishing humbleness which is a training effect from constantly attacking our weaknesses, negative tendencies, and lazy habits which is the hallmark of WF.   most Paths, most personal trainers, pamper their students strengths so the ‘client’ feels good about themselves (however, it’s not their Higher Self) and continue paying money to get ‘better.’

thing is,  the genuine Path of Self Transformation requires holding up a non-stop Mirror in front of our weaknesses. that is what WF does on both macro and meso and micro Levels.   An example from within the intradisciplines of WF:

* Nutrition:  eating with chopsticks using our non-Dominant hand.   this slows down ‘what we are good at’ (lunging for our food, eating way too fast and mechanically instead of eating slowly, giving our apestat time to feel fullness, and arousing gratitude).

* Yoga: HP Prop Workout…a non-stop, in-your-face confrontation with our ego…even the first 20 minutes of the core-work will make most run for egoic cover…at my last PROP Class, here in Durango,  3 students left before the 90-minute Zen bell rang the finish.   it’s super tough to force the ego to shut up and focus on the Hum Sah Mantra as the high-intensity functional fitness parade of asana’s roll by, saturated by sweat. yet, this is precisely what yoga is all about;  a radical Path of Self Transformation through overcoming our imbalances and weaknesses…

* Cardio:  if you are good on a bike?  get your ass of the bike and run, ski, skate…if you are good at sprinting?  run a marathon.

* Strength:  find your weakest bodyparts,  your most flawed physique component and dive in there.  i know guys that can squat 1,000 lbs, yet sprain their ankles stepping laterally because they are so strength-specificially out of balance.  it’s kinda like cyclists who have enormous hip flexor/quad strength and yet their hamstrings are like stringy Silly-Putty creating an injury-prone, performance de-hancing future.

* Meditation:  given the agile nature of our mind,  this is the one Discipline of WF in which nearly all of us instantly find great challenge as we begin to un-murk the sloppiness of of our sustained concentration skills.  WF has created an enormous quiver of mental training arrows that can be shot with Arjuna-like accuracy…the key once again, is to c(om)mit to a style of Meditation at which you balk…

in fact,

defining WF is easy;    just challenge what you suck at and you’ll quickly find the Buddha Realm of WF.  

Doing this?   Forces us into a true Warrior mode; which is to be

Clear, Still, Strong, and Elegant in the face of Difficulty…like Dewa, last night.

* to my chronic question, “how you doing, baby girl?” after each of her dry heaves,  she only replied, “I’m fine, Daddy,”)