Once at a meeting with like-minded people he witnessed a demonstration of poses. A slender middle-aged man, spreading his arms and legs apart, slowly, very slowly, made bends to the side, touching the floor with his palm. It was Triconasana - one of the postures of Hatha Yoga. I was struck not so much by the pose itself, but by the technique of execution. Too unusual was precisely this smoothness of movement, as in slow motion. I felt some kind of excitement and even emotional trepidation, which happens when you become an unwitting witness to something mysterious and exciting. Departed under a strong impression. I wanted to get home faster and try everything myself. He began to work out poses in front of the mirror. In the future, I became convinced of the benefits of such self-training, which allows you to adjust the position of the body, comparing them with those engraved in memory. This markedly accelerated the development of exercises.
The balance poses were difficult, especially the “tree” pose. The untrainedness of the vestibular apparatus and the enslavement of the knee joints affected. But the greater was the joy of the first small victories. Surprisingly very quickly, literally in two weeks, the ability to keep balance, standing on one leg, came. “Lotus” turned out to be a tough nut, and I decided that it was not for me yet. He trained daily for about an hour. I don’t know what made me break so mercilessly. At first, there was no flexibility at all. Could not, sitting on a chair, cross his legs — it was inconvenient. Bending from a standing position, he freely did not reach the floor with his hands. It was necessary to make an effort, to bend jerkily. There was no need to talk about lateral inclinations and twisting of the spine. He performed various lightweight poses and several basic ones. And still felt the effect. Drowsiness disappeared. I started to keep up with everything. I compared my previous state with a new one: activity increased three times. Six months of regular training turned me into a big change. But these months were not easy. Two workouts a day: in the morning 25-30 minutes and in the evening about an hour. He remained at work and managed to work out before lectures at the university. On Sunday, he devoted another 2-3 hours to this. According to my current concepts, 1.5 hours a day is not so much. But then for a physically unprepared young man who appreciates a feast and a party with girls, it was a lot. He was usually engaged in swimming trunks alone, because at first he sweated a lot. After about a year, sweating stopped. Overweight came off.
Interestingly, the annual period of "entry" into yoga and similar phenomena (loss of appetite, sweating) were characteristic of many. But it was still far from perfect well-being. I had to go through many different deviations in the state of health before it stabilized. Deviations began when he began to master potent poses, such as “snake”, “bow”, “grasshopper”, “peacock”. It suddenly began to ache in the region of the heart and sharp turns caused pain, then noticed changes in posture, then it was tormented by insomnia, severe mood swings, general tone, sexual activity. I did not immediately understand that all this is the result of inaccurate exercise. At that time, none of us really knew the intricacies of many asanas, and they were not described in the books at hand. I had to apply the exclusion method: some of the exercises of the complex were temporarily not performed and watched over my health. It was possible to establish a number of technical requirements for the implementation of the poses. For example, if the pose of the "snake" is done with raised shoulders, "failing", then this is fixed in posture. The same with the head. It turns out that you can’t pull it too forward, but, on the contrary, you need to throw it as far back as possible. In the “snake” position, the buttocks are involuntarily tensed, which with weak, untrained muscles of the perineum can lead to the appearance of hemorrhoid cones. So I realized that you should relax everything that is not involved in maintaining the muscle posture. When I began to comply with this rule, many disorders in well-being ceased to bother. I recall the yoga enthusiasts that fate faced, and I am bitterly aware that very few managed to overcome the first difficulties characteristic of independent development of Hatha Yoga from textbooks. Everything is written there correctly, but very often without taking into account the difference between the consciousness of the modern European and the state of mind inherent in the people of the East. Therefore, the European does not perceive much. He begins to experiment, to invent the written. Hence the mistakes, breakdowns and, ultimately, the abandonment of attempts to master Hatha Yoga.
Now I understand that my involvement in yoga was one-sided. I eagerly absorbed any information about yoga gymnastics and immediately tried it on myself. But he did not perceive any other “exotic” and quite belligerently. Experiments with nutrition and starvation seemed absolutely incomprehensible. “What does this have to do with yoga?” “It was thought then.” The body itself will take everything that it needs from food, and these restrictions are useless: refusal of meat, nutrition from sprouted wheat, etc. ”
