Wholistic Fitness

If anything eats away at and destroys pliable, “juicy”, strong, adaptable, and downright sexy musculature (Can you say, “Muscle Booty”?) …it’s chronic anxiety.

Stress.

Of course, this thing termed, “stress” is as insidious as anything ether can produce. Stress – and the muck of contemporary maladies which now spring forth from it – is borne from spiritual ignorance (avidya). Stress is a spiritual, not biomechanical nor physiological, breakdown. And, what we need to combat the Stress Syndrome raging across Turtle Island like an unchecked spiritual wildfire is more Dharma Teachers. Instead, we rely upon physicians-turned-pill-dispensers and an idiotic array of business mongers that convince us that if we find our legs ‘twitching involuntarily from stress,’ while we sit upon our asses and watch some stupid TV show, well, guess what? All we need is to buy their fucking pill for $89/month. God Bless Us. Where DID our common sense go? Our Intuitive Wisdom? Oh, that’s right, into the iPod (the “i” stands for Ignorance).

Hear ye, Hear ye:
Chronic anxiety and Stress are merely training effects from ‘buying into” the illusion of the wealth of the Outer World; chasing, basically, after that which is not Real.
Stress is a training effect from grasping instead of concentrating.
Like right now,
are you feeling all fidgety, as in, “Oh god, i don’t have time for another Coach Ilg On His Soapbox Lecture About What Is Wrong With My Practice.”

Well, you DO have time.
So Listen up, cuz i gotta Coach you on how to Remember How To Let Go!

It is our Muscles which are the recipient of and contain every ounce, every smidgen of all our of little neurotic pulses which accumulate each UnConscious Moment. (For Cure: see WF Lifestyle Principle #1).

It is Avidya that transforms our naturally supple neural conduits (just watch an infant in a crib) into the biologic equivalent of barbed wire that slowly straggles us from the inside out. Withered nerves from being constantly turned ‘on’ from chronic anxiety yet serving no practical or functional purpose, just fries us from deep inside. i see this degenerative training effect in your eyes, in your posture, in your skin tone, your shallow chest breathing, i see it in your lack of balanced, cat-like muscularity.

What once was a system of tiny rivers of Divine luminescence that afforded these containers of water (our human body) our movement and consciousness, through a lack of meditation and a fiercely loving Dharma Teacher in our life turns into cancer-carrying physiologic avenues of cellular degeneration. I have Taught you many, many powerful Tools throughout the years to keep your “container of water” fluid, powerful, and absolutely Divinely Sacred and fun to “swim” in. Yet, my Coaching often falls on willpowers as dilute as inkblots.

It is avidya that transforms sexy, smooth, powerful, and peaceful muscles into monsters of tightness and pain. Stress replaces joyful, supple Spaciousness with suffocating grips and locks and pressure. I give you Herman Hesse;
“There is no reality except the one contained within us. That is why so many people live such an unreal life. They take the images outside of them for reality and never allow the world within to assert itself.”

It is funny, yet sadly true, that in our lifestyle sciences, we have arrived at a point whereupon we must actually ‘plot in’ specific periods for ‘remembering how to let go.”

Perhaps, that is what Sunday’s are for…?

Just when Ananda and i thought that we would have to be content to return to LA for our killer live music hits (1)…

Flagstaff goes and builds this (thanks, Brahman!):

the grand opening has even HAPPENED YET…
check it out at:
http://www.pinemountainamphitheater.com/
(oh, i guess i should mention that there is a fantastic 6-mile mountain bike singletrack that encircles this venue! Ananda and i just cranked last week…Flag does know where her priorities are, baby!)

Now, the only thing BETTER than having a new outdoor concert venue just minutes from your home to remember how to “just let go?”….

well, it’s when the
local Event Coordinator bro whom you were just scoring telemark skiing runs with the other week goes and scores friggin’ LOS LOBOS to “unofficially open” the new venue! God i love the Abundance of the Spiritual Path!

i have ALWAYS wanted to dance to this AMAZINGLY VERSATILE band live, especially when they played their #1 hit; La Bamba(2)…and yesterday, it came true, just a few minutes outside our home!

“Para bailar la bamba se necesita una poca de gracia
Una poca de gracia pa mi pa ti
Ay y arriba y arriba
Y arriba y arriba y arriba ire
Yo no soy marinero
Yo no soy marinero, soy capitan,
Soy capitan, soy capitan.

Bamba, bamba, bamba, bamba
Bamba, bamba
Bamba.”

okay, okay, so then, just as happy as two Larks at a double header baseball game, we leave Los Lobos, i come back to the Temple H(om)e during a Scintillating Rainstorm!!!sooooo beautiful…
and i see that “my” Colorado Avalanche sent the lil’ ol Dallas Stars back to their lowlands and humidity for another off season…
hmmm, b’bye Stars!!!!!!!
geez, i’ve been telling you guys for years now…if God wanted Texans to win a Stanley Cup,
He woulda given you all some ice!
i know that ONCE AGAIN “Cool Joe” Sakic of Colorado (3) scored the OT goal…
man, i tell you..Joe Sakic is DA MAN, baby!
if i do not make Enlightenment in this lifetime
i have but one wish;
to re-incarnate as close to Joe Sakic as possible
or
at least have his wrist shot…
or
well, hell, can i at least LOOK like him??!!

Finally, congats to Durango, Colorado bro, Tom Danielson who got second to other American and former MTB pro; Floyd Landis (who used to race MTB’s in Durango also) at the Tour Of Georgia.

Livin’, Trainin’ Practicin’ and Rockin’ in the land of the Free…

no STRESS, baby…Learn to Let Go and let GO(o)D!!!!!

consider it a Coach Ilg direct order!

God Bless America…
(and yes, of course…bless even the Dallas Stars)…

Namaste,

coach ilg (4)

***

(1) wanna visit our favorite live music hang out in LA is just minutes away from our North Hollywood apartment?
http://losangeles.citysearch.com/profile/321795#editorialreview

(2) In 1987 Los Lobos found unprecedented commercial success after director Luis Valdez — founder of the Hispanic theater troupe El Teatro Campesino and author of the breakthrough East L.A. historical drama “Zoot Suit” — asked the band to supply the soundtrack for “La Bamba,” his feature about the life and tragic death of Ritchie Valens, the first Hispanic rock ‘n’ roll star. The film became a surprise box-office smash, but the soundtrack album was an even bigger hit, selling two million copies; the Lobos’ version of the title track (which Valens himself had adapted from a traditional Mexican “huapango”) reached No. 1 on the “Billboard” Hot 100 Singles chart (trumping Valens’ original, which only went as high as No. 22 in 1958)

(3) Sakic’s goal, the most among active NHL players, came with only two seconds left in the middle period, when he pushed a bouncing puck through Turco’s legs…oh, did i mention that our Colorado goaltender, Jose Theodore, played only FIVE games for Colorado in the regular season? You GO Theodore!!!!!

(4) for those of you new to Direct Lines, our Coach has a certain…uh, Gemini Trait when it comes to ice hockey. It was his first sport as a child and his team won a State Championship in hockey. MUCH later in life, Coach Ilg was the Online Coach of 1993-94 – Stanley Cup MVP Mike Richter of the N.Y. Rangers