KaphaGirl’s First Blog Post

Some of you may know me already, as Inner Space Yoga on Twitter and Facebook. I’m the latte drinking, red velvet cake eating, fried pickle dipping yogini who makes bolsters and zafus and other yoga props. Some of you may not know that I’m also a yoga teacher, though I don’t have much time for teaching at present. I taught alignment-based yoga at our local flow studio, and flow yoga at one of our local Iyengar studios, and no one came to either class. So I elected to call it a day and concentrate on making props. I’m much better at that too, I think. I can work all night and watch “Ghost Hunters” while I work and drink espresso and sleep late every morning. It’s a good life!

So I’m blogging as “KaphaGirl.” For those of you not familiar with ayurveda, I’ve borrowed heavily from my friend Vishnu Das’ website (www.bluelotusayurveda.com) to define the word “Kapha” for you. I’m pretty sure Vishnu was holding a picture of me in his mind as he wrote this description:

People with a Kapha dosha have:

• An (insatiable) desire for sweets and cold drinks (like iced lattes!)
• Dense pads of fat
• Minds that are cloudy and foggy in the morning, which often leads to a desire for coffee as a stimulant to start the day.

Kapha peeps love:

• Sitting, sleeping, and doing nothing. All day long.

Kapha people tend to be of “larger proportion,” with a “robust” frame and “padded” joints.

Geeta Iyengar, the ultimate KaphaGirl - she's my hero!

And… (this part is my favorite!) Kapha molecules tend to stick together to form dense masses and give the body a “chubby” shape.

So, as you can probably intuit, KaphaGirls are rarely asked to grace the cover of “Yoga Journal,” or any other publications, for that matter. We have trouble finding yoga duds that fit. People raise their eyebrows when we show up at Baron Baptiste or Anna Forrest intensives. We worry about our chunky bellies showing when we’re doing inversions. We have trouble with paravritta paschimottanasana. In short, our yoga experience is a bit different from, say, PittaGirl Yoga or VataGirl Yoga. Or even KaphaGuy yoga. But while we may not have a closet full of size 2 Lululemon knickers, we do have our Kapha attributes of good humor, loyalty, a slow and steady work ethic, etc. to fall back on. And we love to meet for coffee and conversation after class!