Saunas have always struck me as a place of indulgence for the rich and retired. I was of the opinion that my usual workout routine contained plenty of sweating without having to malinger in a hot box with naked strangers. I had always preferred to spend every precious moment I had at the gym sweating on the Stairmaster, pushing around heavy weights or begrudgingly stretching.

Then I got laid off from my day job and my schedule went from externally frantic and impacted to internally frantic and wide open. I used some of my freed up time and energy to set new fitness goals, develop more targeted workouts and explore aspects of the gym I had previously ignored, including the sauna. One day after riding the bike and working the heck out of my lower body, instead of heading straight for the showers I detoured into the sauna. I put down my towel, laid myself out and waited for something to happen.

At first it felt odd to be lying down and doing nothing at the gym, usually such a physically busy place. I stared up at the criss-crossed boards that made up the ceiling and tried to relax. After a moment, I could feel the heat beginning to penetrate my body, causing my skin to tingle and flush. I could feel the heat like a persistent lover determinedly making its way inward, working its way toward my tired muscles. I became hyper aware of the feel of my skin and the interesting feeling of my body interacting with the hotness. Another woman was having her own sauna experience on a bench across from me, but we did not speak. The heat and quiet wrapped themselves around me and I closed my eyes.

In this busy, fast paced world who doesn’t appreciate a little help to enter into a calmer state of mind? The sauna can be a meditative shoehorn to ease you into a more relaxed place and like the labyrinth, (see November 9th entry) is another useful tool. There are no reading materials, I PODS, computers or idle chatter in the sauna and we are relieved of the modern stimulates that keep us wired and given a rare opportunity to tune into our physical selves at rest. So often at the gym, and in life, its push!, push!, push! We feel the burn and then do five more reps, come to the point of mild discomfort and then hold the stretch, force out ten more minutes of aching lungs on the treadmill. No wonder so many people consider the gym a house of horrors.

The sauna does not allow pushing or competing and is great for balancing the more active parts of a workout. Spending time in the sauna can be a great transition from the charged effort of a workout to a more mellow post workout state of being. The process is cleansing for the entire body and a great relaxation technique.

On my way home that first day I experienced a warm, full-body glow. My skin seemed to be breathing on its own and I felt light from the inside out. Ahhh…the relaxers high! I am now a dedicated sauna convert and it has become my reward at the end of every workout.

The sauna is a five to ten minute gift of mental and physical health that you can easily give yourself. Don’t wait until you’re old, well married or unemployed to reap the rewards that the sauna has to offer. You could be a few minutes away from heaven in your own body.

The benefits of meditation are remarkable and continue to be documented. The practice has been shown to reverse heart disease, enhance the immune system, reduce pain and create feelings of calm and general grooviness. The problem is that sitting meditation requires the ability to sit still; which for many people can be a real obstacle to success. If you are stressed out and haven’t found a regular relaxation practice that works for you, perhaps a journey into the labyrinth is just what you need.

I had my first labyrinth experience on a breezy afternoon in San Francisco’s Duboce Park, making sure I was nice and pre-stressed by illegally parking to get there. Labyrinths have been used as a meditative tool by many cultures including Celtic, Mayan, Greek and Native American since prehistoric times. I already felt more connected to humankind as I thought about the mega stresses that people were dealing with thousands of years ago and was impressed that such varied cultures had caught onto this practice.

Labyrinths are often confused with mazes, but there are a couple of key differences. A labyrinth has only one winding path, you can’t get lost (physically anyway) and there are no minotaurs waiting to eat you. Also, labyrinths are flat and the path is never concealed. They can be made of almost any material but the most common are stone, masonry, tile or canvas. The labyrinth at Duboce Park is sandblasted into the concrete and includes a table-top finger labyrinth for the vision impaired. The typical practice is to walk from the outside to the center, pause for contemplation and then retrace the path back to the beginning.

The labyrinth adds some action to the quiet and focus of meditation and asks you to observe yourself on the journey. There are lots of different ways to approach the process of walking a labyrinth, from focusing on your breath, the feel of your feet (bare or not) on the path, your God or something else in your life that needs attention. You can see the labyrinth as a metaphor for the many journeys of life and also as adding some helpful structure to your meditative practice.

After my walk I felt calmer, more connected to my own body and more in the moment. I wonder what that the labyrinth has in store for you?

All stressed out with no where to go? To find a labyrinth near you visit the world wide labyrinth location.

http://wwll.veriditas.labyrinthsociety.org/

More information on walking Meditation (no labyrinth required)

www.wildmind.org/walking/introduction.com

Online labyrinth tool (no walking required)

http://www.gracecathedral.org/labyrinth/interactions/index.shtml#

Yoga is supposed to make you feel good. It is supposed to clear out tension blockades, release energy to flow like fresh mountain spring water and open up, relax and harmonize the body. It is true that the practice of yoga can accomplish corporeal and spiritual magic, but if the yogis around me have their feet twice wrapped around their heads while I struggle to bend over, angst becomes the order of my day.

Yoga is not supposed to be a competitive sport (though I have heard of yoga competitions).  If only taking off my westernized, capitalistic view point was as easy as taking off my shoes and socks at the studio door. I bring my perspective with me and it causes me to suffer and because they keep reminding you to be in the present moment, I am much more aware of this suffering then I would usually be. From my vantage, most of the people in my yoga classes are “better” then me. They are more flexible and more balanced. They can do the poses as shown without the support of the three bricks, two blankets, a strap and a crane. I know that I should love and honor my body where it is at, but it is difficult when it appears that the bodies around me are in better places. Sometimes the flexy bodied people make inane comments and then I feel a bit better. “They may be more flexible, but they are a bit idiotic.” It is a small and dark comfort.

I see them in headstands, their bodies taut and balanced, their shoulders limber and strong and I try not to hate them. I resist the childish urge to knock them over like a stack of blocks. I try to distract myself with sexy thoughts of the instructor, something I am an experienced expert at. Sadly even that leads to pain as I realize that a yoga instructor would want to have superhuman, inverted, levitating yoga sex. I probably wouldn’t be up for it and who wants all those yoga blocks in bed anyway?

And then, when I have myself worked up into a respectable tizzy I remember who I should really be comparing myself to; my neurotic family. They are charming folk, all of them, and they can’t help it if they make more money then me, drive nicer cars, vote Republican and only recycle if a hippy stars knowing on their legs. All of them, with the exception of my 2-year old nephew, are stiffer then me. They have superbly tight and knotty hips and hamstrings and practically have to UPS their socks to their feet in the morning. They have more energy blockages then the 405 Freeway at 7:30. My father who has taken up yoga in his 60’s cannot sit in simple cross legged pose without several assistive devices.

When you are dating someone you can look at their parents to see what you might be waking up to in 25 years. In this way I look at the members of my family, particularly the older ones, to see the conditions and maladies that I want desperately to avoid. I’d like to avoid osteoporosis, limited movement, pain and the inability to have a conversation without quoting conservative talk radio. I try to keep my eye (both inner and outer) on this prize as I twist and strain and attempt to transform my body into a flexible, harmonious playground.

I know, I know, I’m not supposed to compare myself to other people, even my own family, but I consider this a stepping stone on the long path to enlightenment. I often dedicate my practice to my older self. The self that I hope will be more enlightened, agile, and active for a very long time to come.

It’s summertime and the livin’ is easy. Or is it? Seems like unless you are twelve years old, trying to get that easy summer feeling leads to additional stress and schedule clutter. You still have all your usual obligations; household, family, work, nutrition, etc. and now you are supposed to be having a bunch of active fun in the sun? Who has the time?

Meal preparation is one great place to shave time off your usual life maintenance regime. The following breakfast idea takes only a couple of minutes to prepare, capitalizes on the summer bounty of fresh anti-oxidizing fruit and is really, really delicious. To get that summer feeling I suggest putting it all together while wearing roller blades and a bikini. This is not a low calorie meal, but you have a long and active day ahead of you and you are going to need your energy.

What you need:

A freshly made apple pie (preferably with no sugar added). You can score one of these in the bakery department of any descent market for $12 to $15. For a lower-carb version you can use sugar-free chunky apple sauce.

A big carton of cancer fighting wonder balls (aka blueberries).

Non or low fat milk (dairy, soy or protein source of your choice)

(Makes 4-8 servings)

Cut a wedge of pie. Throw it in a bowl and heat in the microwave for 90 seconds. You can use the oven if you don’t like microwaves. Next dump a pile of blueberries on your pie. You are shooting for a two-blue berries to one bite ratio.  Boost your protein intake with a nice, cold glass of milk. Make your blue berry wrangling easier by eating with a spoon.

Enjoy your bountiful breakfast!

By nature I am taut beast and inhabit a body that without vigilant lengthening likes to bunch up. Despite this fact, I have never found a flexibility program that I could stick too for more than a week. The issue became even more pressing a few years back when I hit thirty and began noticing that I was waking up stiff; even when I hadn’t done an outrageous workout the day before. With the help of denial, one of my top three coping mechanisms, I learned to live with being a grumpy 80-year-old man for the first 15 minutes of the day.

In my quest to loosen the heck up I tried yoga, but could never get into the groove of it. I found it difficult to surrender such large chunks of time to something that didn’t involve a ball or any opportunities for high-fives and beer. The type of people who tend to gravitate to yoga also irritated me and made me feel even more tense. I wanted to wrap their hemp, patchouli smelling yoga mats around their beatific faces and squeeze with all the power of my mighty and stiff muscles. I’m still looking for a beginning yoga class specifically designed for people who hate people who like yoga.

My other strategy was to buy stretching books and leave them by my bed. This hasn’t worked very well either, though I always have something flat to write on in a pinch. One of my pet peeves with stretching manuals is that nobody in them really needs to stretch. Every model pictured is already human taffy and probably would remain more flexible then me for the rest of their days if they never did another downward dog (or “bend and grunt” as I like to call it).

I think learning to incorporate stretching and flexibility into your life is something like quitting smoking, you have to try a bunch of times before you get it right. You also have to do it long enough to get results, which for me include a springy, light feeling that I don’t get with other kinds of workouts. It is also good to know that before I plop my rump down at the computer for the first part of my day that I have taken steps to avoid turning into a human question mark.

Recently I have hit upon a stretching routine that is actually working for me and I want to share it with all my comrades in pre-rigamortis. Stay tuned for “Straight, Supple and Feeling Fine” and sit up straight!

If Martha Stewart and Lance Armstrong had a love child her lunch box would be packed with organic fruit, nutritious homemade energy bars and little notes with sayings like “We love you best when you succeed.” For the rest of us there are “You Bars”; nutrition bars created just for you by super-fit parental types (who would definitely love you unconditionally if they met you). These healthy snacks are a great idea for anyone who is trying to eat right and get it all done.

Most people are looking for Strong man nutrition on a 98-pound weakling budget. I was pleased to discover that these custom nutrition bars are quite reasonable and cost only a little more than their disgusting mass produced counterparts; those sad excuses for food that we have all eaten in starved desperation, made and wrapped by automatons that don’t care if you ever have another bowel movement. 

To start your personal nutrition revolution log on to Youbar.com and select “Build-a-bar”. There you will find a virtual cornucopia of wholesome ingredients, from organic acai powder to Ghirardelli Semisweet Chocolate Chips, all vying to be part of your creation. If this seems overwhelming don’t fret, there are suggestions to guide you along the way. The good folks at “You Bar” are so confident that you will love your bars, they will send you a different box for free if you aren’t happy.

Don’t forget to give your bar a name. I suggest “Go to the gym slacker!”, “Muscle To Be” or “Kick Some Ass!”

To wrap it up, there is no good reason to ever gag down another gross, hyper- processed nutrition bar. Take control of your nutritional destiny! It’s all about You!

www.youbars.com/