This past October I began Ashtanga yoga through Down Under Yoga’s Mysore Program. There’s a methodology to Ashtanga that I respect. Showing up to a room at 6AM every morning to start practicing a sequence that is incrementally taught to you sounds like a very appealing and rewarding process, and in the ongoing months, I’ve found it to be so.

That is, when I show up.

There’s the problem, though. I like the idea of showing up, and learning the entirety of primary series; but I also like my sleep. Tie into that the cumulative dissapointment seen in my teacher’s face after they haven’t seen me for a week, well; I’ve been having a hard time keeping up with it. I like the practice after I do it, but sleepy-brain me wants to stay in bed, and late-night me wants to stay up to midnight; which is not conducive to waking at 6. So, there it is. In order to keep this going I need to sleep at a reasonable time, but there are too many night-time things calling for my attention.

For now, I’m relagating myself to my bedroom, where I don’t have all the time-constraints of getting to Brookline and back before I get ready for my day; and it’s been working so far. My hope is to continue this for the rest of the week and get back to Brookline next week, in part so that I can save some face from my teacher, who is already one nod from ignoring me completely.