Moving slowly from pose to pose can prove to be a challenge on a number of fronts.  How long do you hold each pose?  Five seconds?  Ten?  Twenty or even thirty?  Before I took my trip through the Dark Side, I was holding my poses for about 20 seconds each.  Now, I am just grateful that I can move at all.  My afternoon practice is much different than it was earlier this week.  Instead of slowing my practice through holding poses, I move very slowly from pose to pose.  Of course, as my range of motion is quite limited still, the range of poses I use is also quite limited.  Thankfully, I just happened to read a book that had a full chair yoga practice!  I am happy to say that I am seeing marked improvement each day.  Yesterday sitting for any length of time left me extremely stiff and I was taking nearly a full minute or more to stand after sitting for more than about 10 minutes.  Today, I can stand with barely a twinge although it still takes me a minute or two of walking to loosen up to where there are no muscle spasms.  I’m not sure what condition I’ll be in come Saturday so I’m thinking I’ll be doing much more talking and very few postures during the sessions.

One very good thing about this whole back strain is that I have a great chance to revisit that aphorism that is often attributed to Buddha:  You begin where you are.

Namasté