Goal setting and Sankalpas: Going deeper

Most of us start working out for vanity goals; loose weight, drop body fat, or fit into a favorite pair of jeans. Those are great short term motivations that get us off our butts, but they loose their luster quickly. How motivated are you really going to be over the long term if your only goal is to get into a pair of easily replaceable jeans? If you're anything like me, not long.

If you talk to any sport psychologist, coach, or professional trainer, all would agree that proper goal setting is extremely important. There are innumerable studies that all point to goals enhancing performance. So you may ask, "what is proper goal setting?" Well, I'm glad you did. Let's explore.........

First understand different types of goals:

• subjective goals (have fun)
• general objective goals (loose weight)
• specific objective goals (decrease errors in game)
• outcome goals (beat other team)
• performance goals (increase MaxVO2 reps)
• process goals (improve alignment in warrior pose)

It is important to understand the type of goal because the benchmarks to obtain each are different. When you choose a subjective goal, like having fun vs. a performance goal, like increasing MaxVO2 reps, your benchmarks will be very different. With different benchmarks, comes different workouts. Knowing this at the onset is important. If on Tuesday your goal was to get out on the field, kick the ball around, and have fun with some old friend in a game of soccer (football depending upon your country of origin). Then don't get upset with yourself on Wednesday because your team lost the game. That wasn't your original goal.

The above situation reveals what happens to most of us when we start working out. We set one goal, but become upset when we have not achieved a benchmark for an entirely different type of goal. Well of course you didn't, you took no steps toward achieving the goal. So no, you will not slim down if you keep power lifting and increasing your calorie intake. No, you will not get stronger if you do Restorative Yoga. No, you will not get more flexible if you never stretch. Simple, but all true. Know your goals, set appropriate benchmarks.

Goals also require constant adjustments and re-evaluation. Once you've achieved your goal measurement, it is time to move onto another goal with different benchmarks. In this way, you are constantly staying motivated and engaged in your health and well being.

A Sankalpa, on the other hand, goes deeper than goals. It requires self study, pattern awareness, and resolve to grow as person. They are simple positive, sincere statements that express what our deeper motivation to achieve as whole person. These statements are to help remind us of our determination to move past our dysfunctions, fears, and insecurities. Utilized as an inner mantra or chant, they are the mega goal to reset "normal" perspective.

Examples:

• I listen impartially and respond compassionately.
• I accept that I am worthy.
• I create a cleaner environment.
• It calms me to expose my imperfections.
• My challenges reveal alternate options for success.
• Bathed in embodied self awareness, I speak my truth with compassion.
• Each moment I inhabit with peaceful confidence.

Repeat the sentence to yourself each day while you drive, are challenged at work or in relationship, or as part of your mediation practice; these simple statements become your new reality. Each time you repeat it, it becomes apart of your consciousness. Just as in your goal setting, Sankalpas should be changed as you embody their meaning.

If you find that you are resistant to Sankalpas, ask yourself why. Is it too "hippie woo woo"? Does it sound crazy? Or are you a little scared of deeper change? Does it sound hard?

Before your next workout, set a goal & sankalpa. Know what type of goal you set, whether it is long term or short term and then set benchmarks to measure. Repeat the sankalpa as often as you can. Begin to observe any shifts in your perspective. Experience how goal setting and sankalpa work together as you move into deeper self awareness.

Gluteus Minimus

While pouring over yoga asana books to reveal poses that involve the gluteus minimus, I found it challenging to even find that it existed. Because of its location deep to the gluteus medius, it is often left out of the picture or cut away to reveal other deeper muscles that are involved in the same actions. Most of us are completely ignorant not only to its location but to its action.



This is the smallest of the gluteal muscles (relative to gluteus maxiumus & gluteus medius). Located deep to the gluteus medius, this fan shaped muscle helps to create an interior capsule for the hip joint. As the fan opens, it attaches to the surface of the ilium between the anterior and inferior gluteal line and behind the margin of the greater sciatic notch. The muscle fiber tapers, becoming a tendon, as the fan closes in on the insertion point at the anterior greater trochanter boarder.

This muscle is involved (engages, flexes) in abduction & extension of the femur and is called upon as a synergist to assist the tensor fasciae latae when balancing on one leg. Meaning in YTU Dynamic Abductor Lifts & Moon Rises Minivini, it is engaged in both legs, never getting a break from side to side, but involved for different reasons. The anterior fibers of gluteus minimus continue to work in synergy with the tensor fasciae latae by rotating the femur inward to external rotation.

The understated muscle is an important team player that stabilizes the hips and thighs when balancing and in standing poses. Unfortunately, because of its understated presentence it is often forgotten. Its fibers can intertwine with piriformis and superior gemellus (responsible for external rotation), and the outer portion of the vastus lateralis (involved in hip flexion). With its hidden location and intertwining relationship, many of us focus our awareness to the more glamorous muscle groups with mystical mystic (aka piriformus) when we experience any rotation issue in the hips. This deep muscle cannot be ignored. If it becomes shortened and tight, it will pull the femoral head deeper into the hip socket, shortening and externally rotating the leg. If the muscle is overly relaxed or flaccid, balance will be impossible. The hip and thigh will loose control of abduction and hips would loosely swish from side to side and legs would internally rotate. So the next time you move into Triangle Pose, don’t just focus on the back leg stretching the gluteus minimus with a deep internal rotation; know that is also being toned as it engaging at its end range of flexibility to stabilize. The front leg is also stabilizing the pose as the muscle engage and fires to external rotate.

Knee Deep In It

I'm knee deep in the second half of Yoga Tune Up Teacher Training. I have tones of homework and am learning so much! I can't wait until I have the time to start sharing it with all of you. The cross over to kettlebells is beautiful and I've been playing with combo workouts. I really think it is a profound combination that will allow people to feel connected to their body's more quickly.

Stay tuned until next week.............

Thursday Sept. 3 @ 6.30pm

Subbing a Lululemon yoga class this Thursday evening. Located at the Oval on Stanford Campus, it's simple to find. Just take Palm Drive all the way to the end to the beautiful grassy area, lots of parking all around the Oval.

It should prove to be a fun class. Free to everyone and appropriate for all levels.

See you there!

Yoga Tune Up Teacher Training

This week Equinox is hosting Jill Miller and her Yoga Tune Up Certification. I am taking the certification training and loving it! She really knows her anatomy and bio-mechanics. We have been learning about proprioception and how to reprogram our neuropathways. Amazingly simple postures accessible to all people become layered with micromovements to have maxium impact. I am practicing the moves and feeling a huge shift in my ablity to engage. She is able to get us into the connective tissue, facial layers, and deep muscle tissue.

Stay tuned, I'll be pulling together classes and workshops to present the information!

Power of Desire

"As a [person's] desire is, so is his destiny. For as his desire is, so is his will; as his will is, so is his deed; and as his deed is, so are its consequences, good or bad." The Upanishads

Last week I wrote about the power of desire on the YMWB Facebook page. Desire is neither good nor bad, it is our relationship to the desire and it's motivating force. Inspired by an article I read in the Yoga Journal, I began to reflect about the nature of desire in my life. YJ pointed out how our society as a whole relates to desire through our language. If desire is perceived as "good" it is called aspiration. If desire is perceived as "bad" it is called an obsession. But whether considered good or bad is often determined by the object of desire rather than the motivation of desire. I will use weight loss for the purpose of this posting.

Why do you want to loose weight? Often we are motivated for "vanity" goals. We want to look good. It is about how we see ourselves in the mirror or how we think other people see us. Some may take this a step further, not only is it the way people see us, but how they will judge us, categorize us, and relate to us. However, these goals of vanity are short lived. When the goals are skin deep, you begin to limit your view of the world. Your lens becomes fogged, you see yourself on the surface only, you may even begin to see others through this same lens of your vanity goal. Who appears to have attained the goal, who appears to have not attained the goal. Judgement may slip in as well. Judging yourself and other having attained or not attained the goal. Your desire for weight loss will slowly take over everything you do and think (obsession). Then once the initial vanity goal is attained, how do you continue your fitness routine? The vanity goal is no longer there to strive for, now what? Some will loose interest in the fitness routine, dropping it to the side lines and slowly going back to old habits. Others who have dived into the desire of the vanity goal and who have fully identified themselves with the surface elements will find a new vanity goal to hone in on.

What if you started off by looking deeper at your desire at the onset of your fitness planning? Move past the vanity motivation in the very beginning. Set your goal, aka create the motivation for your desire to something that can be maintained with ease even when the vanity goals are long gone. Find out what your inner truth is beyond the surface reflection of the desire. Weight loss is often a benchmark and reflection of a greater goal being attained: desire for healthy lifestyle, maintain healthy blood pressure, balance the hours spent at a desk, healthy heart, connect with breath and body daily, develop concentration, learn discipline, etc. These are desires that move deeper than the skin and can be maintained when all the vanity benchmarks have met. The desire has a healthy, long term outlet.

KQED Reporting on "Power of Interval Training"

The power of interval style training has finally made it to "mainstream" reporting. This morning as I sipped my tea and ate breakfast, I listened to a report on the Health Diagnosis about interval training. Athletes have known for a long time interval training will help them get to their goals more quickly and efficiently. Science is finally expanding to move past the professional athlete and applying the same principles to the rest of us. They are finding non-athletes can benefit from this style of training as well. It's about time! That's one of the reason's I love kettlebell training. At it's very roots, it is a key tool for interval style training. That's part of why it offers such powerful results!