" SPLITTER!"
Monty Python's The Life of Brian
Watching the above video I can't help hearing them talking about the different versions of Ashtanga, Vinyasa flow, Power yoga core plus max Zero flow, etc. rather than the PFJ
Now I'd always thought that splitting the practice referred to doing one series plus part of the next, so all of Primary say, plus 2nd up to Kapotasana (thus splitting the 2nd series). But NO, according to Mr Sweeney it means splitting your practice by practicing Intermediate series Sunday to Thursday, then Primary on Friday, Saturday being your rest day, thus 'splitting' your practice over the week between two or more series.
Supposedly each series is associated with particular day,
Friday= Primary series
Saturday= Rest day
Sunday= Intermediate / 2nd Series
Monday=Advanced A / 3rd Series
Tuesday= Advanced B / 4th Series
Wednesday= Advanced C / 5th series
Thursday=Advanced D / 6th Series
This just means that when you progress to the next series the previous series gets practiced once a week on it's associated day
If you move on to 3rd series/ Advanced A, then, you would supposedly practice 3rd (your new series) Mon-Thurs, Primary would be practiced on Friday only , rest on Saturday, Intermediate practiced on it's associated day Sunday, then it's back to 3rd again on Monday.
Source: Ashtanga Yoga As it is. Matthew Sweeney
As I think I mentioned yesterday, although I've been practicing Intermediate since the beginning of the year, I've tended to practice it about three days a week. This would be on my day off, Sunday and one evening. This was partly due to having the room temperature too high and being in no fit state to go to work afterwards and also because I tended to spend too long on some of the intermediate asana, extra attempts, working them out etc.
Last month I took a break from Intermediate altogether due to a minor twinge in my back but started back up with it on Sunday. I sorted out the whole temperature issue and am now practising at a more comfortable 26C and going straight through the practice, staying pretty much on the breath and enabling me to complete 2nd in about the same time as my Primary. Which means I can practice Intermediate before work.
So I'd practiced Intermediate, Sunday to Wednesday and had planned on doing Primary this morning, until I came across the above info from Sweeney. Seeing as I'd been doing 2nd all week anyway, I thought I might as well embrace the split and do Intermediate today as well and then do Primary tomorrow.
So that's it, I'm a SPLITTER" and have, officially, moved over to Intermediate. No big drama about it, or angst about how much I'm going to miss Primary (trying not to think about it actually, I LOVE primary, especially now), it's just kind of happened.
Matthew Sweeney is hosting a weekend workshop at Yoga Place on: Friday 29th, Saturday 30th and Sunday 31st May 2009.
http://www.yogaplace.co.uk/index.php?id=32
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7 comments:
hi Grimmly
i like your post. i think i may adapt my intended practice accordingly. maybe i'll really just do 3rd on Fridays and 2nd on Sundays and foray into 3rd mon-thurs. that would be my adaptation. i don't intend to go beyond 3rd.
cheers,
Arturo
The Monty Python clip is brilliant!
I like to practice my 5th series on Sundays. ha ha ha!!
Don't see myself going beyond Advanced A either Arturo (4th just doesn't interest me). I'm looking forward to practicing 2 days each of Primary, 2nd and 3rd one day seems like it would be a nice balance. I think I read on Tim Miller's site that SKPJ taught him 1st 2nd and half of third over four months or so. good luck with your 3rd. Though it would be nice to have Liz teach us her 5th.
I am like so afraid of "losing" my primary, I feel like I would never be a splitter ...
Hi Grimmly,
This is what splitting means:
When you are being taught Mysore style, you start adding poses of Second series after your primary. So you do Primary up to Setu Bandasana and then do Pasasana and then backbends, or Primary, Pasasana, Krounchasana and then backbends, etc...Then, when you get to (most often) doing all of Primary and Second series up to Pincha Mayurasana, your teacher tells you to split.
This means that from then on, you go straight into Pasasana from the standing poses (Purvottanasana) instead of doing Primary beforehand. That's why they call it splitting, because you are cutting your practice into two parts, and from there on you will only do Primary on Fridays.
Cheers
V.
Vanessa, that's what I thought splitting meant too... but I figure Grimmly is a renegade anyway, he can do anything he wants! ha ha ha!!! Grimmly, you're my hero.
I will pass on my yoga powers if you can manage a trip to Austin, Tx. hee hee.
(I'm still thinking about how you wrote that you don't see yourself being able to jump through with straight legs... I know you can. If you care to... maybe you're bored with that for now!)
Thanks V, think you made it clearer than I did. Liz I think V and I are in agreement with Sweeney ie. The split being the splitting your practice between two or more series, 2nd on Sunday to Thursday for me with primary on Friday.
I USED to think it was about doing Primary plus some of 2nd. or 2nd plus some of 3rd.
I did go about moving on to intermediate differently than V outlines though. I went for chunks rather than individual asanas.
I've been wanting to do a post on moving to Intermediate for the last couple of weeks but it's a big topic and one that interests me a lot, i just can't bring myself to start it. I need to look back over the posts from December and all those comments, got quite heated I seem to remember. Maybe Sunday.
Will have to come back to straight leg jump through wont I....it's wiley.
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