Yoga Keeps Expanding

It doesn't look like yoga's going away. I think some people thought yoga was a fad and would be gone in a few years but it looks as though yoga is here to stay.

You can take yoga classes in yoga studios. You can go to ashrams for deeper stays. You can take yoga vacations! You can go to your gym or community centers. Workplaces offer yoga classes on site. I teach yoga in an apartment building for the residents for heaven's sake. Yoga is online, in books, on your phone, on tv, and we even have yoga apps! (See the list on the right in my blog. We've had them for years.)

How yoga is growing is a lot like yoga. Yoga expands us as people. Some of us get stretchier and maybe a bit taller through asana practice. But as you know if you read my blog, that is hardly all of yoga. A holistic yoga practice will allow you to expand in your life, taking in more and more of what life's experiences have to offer without being thrown by them. Yoga expanding has us explore our comfort zones and keep moving the edges a bit further out every time.

It looks like yoga is doing that all by itself, using us as its prana or something. It's like people are the prana for the yoga. I'm just making that up, but it seems to fit the way I'm positioning yoga at the moment. Yoga can take more and more people to deeper and deeper places.

The form yoga takes might keep shifting as less-common facets of yoga are presented for our practice and review, but clearly it has taken root in our culture and it isn't leaving anytime soon.

Namaste.

(The picture is from the other night at Nuit Blanche in Ottawa. I don't know if the flower petals were part of an installation or not, but they were there on the ground then the wind started to carry them away.)

Amazing Little Bose Speakers for Yoga Teachers - updated!

I was looking for a more portable speaker system recently after wearing out my Logitech speakers and dealing with bluetooth pairing issues on a replacement system. I considered getting a Bose system that would be portable and charge my phone and then I saw this little set. I don't really need a system that will charge my phone...

It's so small that it fits into my purse! And the sound is amazing. But the best part for me is that it starts playing right away and I don't have to wait for it to sync up. This is important for me as a yoga teacher because sometimes I'm setting these things up in front of other people and I want it to all go smoothly. I don't want to waste time in my class fiddling with the equipment and I can't always be there setting up before my students get there - a home yoga class for instance.

So if you're looking for something powerful but light and relatively affordable, I highly recommend these speakers. I didn't get the case that comes separately but I'm reconsidering. I don't want it getting banged up while I go from class to class.

If you decide to buy them and you click on the link on my site, I get a tiny commission. So thank you in advance :)
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Update. I still really do recommend the speakers, however, if you're in Canada, Amazon shows you the price in CAD and for me to get the credit, you'd need to buy the speakers from Amazon.com, but seeing as how you're in Canada, you'll be redirected to Amazon.ca, in which case I won't get the commission. Basically, I'd need to set up two little accounts - one for Canadian readers and one for American. So selling things via Amazon is not really workable at the moment :) Thought I'd give it a try!

Yoga Teacher as Mother (First Day of School Again)

Today I walked my daughter as far as she'd let me to school. She's so big and so mature and yet she's still a kid, who's learning and growing and who gets nervous on the first day back. Taking her, at her request, as far as she needed me, is my job. In so many ways, that's my job all around.

Taking people, at their request, as far as they need me to.

It touches me to see her vulnerability as well as her excitement. It's an honour to be allowed in to someone's life while they deal with something. No advice needed. No pushing or cajoling. Just being there.

Breathe.

Office Hours or Adminstrationasana

As a yoga teacher it can be easy to avoid administrative tasks. "I am a yoga teacher." But really I'm not just a yoga teacher, I'm self-employed. That involves doing administrative tasks like planning classes, setting up trainings, finding spaces, invoicing clients, paying taxes and other things that don't feel like teaching yoga.

Over the years I've found different ways to get some of the tasks done but I've never really dedicated myself to those tasks. As a result, I may be a good yoga teacher, but sometimes business is "bad." There's nothing wrong at all with the business part of business! I just tend to avoid it.

I'm sitting at the Hub, which is a space where people go to work. People like me, who either work from home or a coffee shop or not at all. And I'm thinking about committing to some office hours. I'm thinking about sitting in an office, that's not at my house, where I will go to get work done. Not yoga poses. Not meditation. But work. Or administration and content creation and blog writing and keeping up with emails and being disciplined about all of that. Feels like it's time for that kind of change.

Where Do Yoga Teachers Go When They're Not Teaching?

Where do yoga teachers go when they're not teaching yoga? It's a real question. I can tell you where I go, but I know there aren't many other yoga teachers there.

In the past, I've been so busy that I was usually running from class to class and in the middle, I'd be at home, taking care of things at home. I only encountered other yoga teachers by appointment.

Lately it's been bugging me though that I don't have access to other yoga teachers or students for that matter, outside of a traditional yoga class and I'd like to see if that could change.

When I was down at Kripalu again recently, I bumped into some of my old yoga people in the halls and in the cafe and had a chance to informally chat. I saw that some of them would use that cafe space as a place to get work done. It seemed like the distractions were not unwelcome and the surroundings were certainly supportive.

On the same trip in April, I revisited a coworking space in New Haven, CT, which has grown for a third time in four years and has a wonderful, creative vibe to it.

Could these things be blended? Could a coworking space for yoga teachers be created? Would anyone use it besides me?

If you're not familiar with the concept of coworking, you can just google it for way more, but in short, it's a space for people who may normally be working out of their homes or coffee shops in the area, but who would like to be with other people, maybe of a similar ilk, to work near and possibly with, if the projects warrant.

It's like an office for the office-less.

I've worked from home for a decade. It's been great. I've accomplished a lot. But I would like to see other people. I would like to make myself available to other yoga teachers and have other creative people around to help me, too.

Ottawa does have a couple of coworking spaces and they're great, but they're not specifically for yoga teachers - there's no space to do yoga R & D. I have felt out of place at the Hub and paying to park and getting on a slow elevator cut down my time there. Plus, as a yoga teacher, getting in and out of a space quickly matters to me as I do have to get to other classes.

It also occurs to me that most of the people who are yoga teachers in the city are women. Of course there are male teachers but the majority of people teaching and practising yoga are women. The spaces I've seen for coworking aren't unwelcome to women, they just seem to be populated with men. I'd like to walk into a place where I'm not unusual, but the targeted clientele.

I'm sort of rambling here, but I'm trying to express a feeling or an idea that's inside of me and I would like to be able to walk into it outside of me.

I've started looking at various spaces, trying to get a sense of how much space I'd need to do this. I've started meeting with people who can help see if there's community funding available (in fact, I'll be at City Hall later this morning). I've spoken to a few yoga teachers to see if this idea would be of interest. I've even checked in with a yoga studio owner to see if she would find this valuable. Everybody has said they like it. Now will they become members and actually support it...?

I love asking myself the question "if money weren't an obstacle, what would you do?" And I would definitely do this project. That being said, there's this money thing that's required to pay landlords, which would be the bulk of the cost. How small a space could I start with? How big would it need to be to be able to accommodate the right blend of spaces inside the space so there could be a focused work area, a space where you can chat, plus a space to practise in?

Which other communities of people would find this attractive? Would artists want to come out of their homes and work around other people? Would massage therapists need a place to land? Again, I'm just asking some questions to see if I'm alone or if there are other people out there...

A Blast from the Past and Mentorship

One of the programs I lead with Kat Mills is a mentorship program for yoga teachers. This course could be part of a 500 YTT program or just by itself. We meet in a big group and have phone calls in between and also one of us will visit the teacher's yoga class and give support and feedback.

Today I'm going to visit one of my participants' classes. This isn't an ordinary class I'm going to observe, but it's the class that I used to lead for 10-11 years! Since deciding to stop teaching on Sundays for a variety of reasons, I haven't gone back to that class. I've missed it for sure. I can still feel it in my bones every Sunday morning.

So I'm excited and a bit nervous honestly to turn up in that class. I know a lot has changed already - the room it was held in changed, and the teacher changed obviously! I know a bit of what to expect but not all - which of course, is a good thing.

Somehow it feels like either coming full-circle, or maybe more like a spiral. I remember my mentor coming to observe my class a decade ago. That same class. Again, it was in a different room, but at the same studio, same time, and probably some of the same students.

On another note, even though I can feel that old yoga class in my system, I've gotten pretty used to not getting up and out the door by 8:30 in the morning on Sundays, so I notice a little resistance this cold, slushy morning to getting my butt in gear!

If you are a yoga teacher reading this and would like to participate in the Mentorship Program, get in touch. We meet one Tuesday afternoon a month from 2:30-4:30. Our next session is November 19 with Ian Fraser as our special guest. December's special guest is Catriona Leger, a director and theatre professor. Cost is $50 for non-registrants and $25 if you're registered in the Mentorship course. Again, for more info, just get in touch with me.

(Those pictures are from 2001 or 2002 in the Crystal Room at Rama Lotus, where the Sunday morning class used to be held.)

---- Update ----
Lesley did great. There were some regulars at the class and it felt like a bit of a reunion for me. I'll go back to the class - next time as a student!

Yoga Teachers and Power

I read the news this morning with surprise. John Friend admitted having consenting sexual relationships with his staff and students, some of who were married, in addition to some other allegations.

It brings me right back to October 1994 when I was sitting in the Main Chapel at Kripalu listening to my guru admit to similar offences. It was offensive for sure. We knew he was human, but how much of a dog he'd been came to a surprise to many of us. Had he admitted it earlier, had he worked with us to deal with it, if, if, if - well then maybe it wouldn't have been so bad. But that's not what happened.

A couple of weeks ago in the teacher training program I'm a part of, we talked about how so many of the popular teachers (gurus) fall. They do really bad stuff. Not just small infidelities or thefts, but big-deal, heart-breaking, life-altering actions that bring them down and take the confidence and trust of their followers with them.

It's of course a good reminder to not put people up on pedestals. It seems like the air up there is too thin and their minds go crazy so they behave horribly. Power corrupts. It just does. On a plus side, it gives people a chance to really let go of their teacher in case they weren't doing that on their own. The true teacher is inside - even the power-drunk teachers tell us that - and there's nothing quite like the lies of your beloved teacher to set you spinning off on your own. That doesn't take away the sting of being lied to, however. Someone who's supposed to be practising ahimsa and satya even before they start their asanas - someone who should definitely know better - that kind of betrayal is worse.

John Friend says he hopes his behaviour doesn't take away from the teachings of Anusara Yoga. That's where I have trouble. When I listen to Swami Rama videos, or read Swami Shyam's stuff, it turns me off. If the teachings are true, then why didn't they work on the teachers sharing them? Can't a teacher only take you as far as they've gone themselves? It's a hurdle I always have to cross over when reviewing the teachers who in retrospect were doing really awful things - remembering what these people did doesn't open my heart but the teachings are asking me to. That doesn't feel safe to me. A few summers ago at a meditation retreat at Omega, one of the teachers said that when you're looking for a surgeon to work on your body, you don't really care if he cheated on his wife, but with our spiritual teachers, how they live their personal lives does matter.

I'm not settled either way. I appreciate the teachings, I appreciate these teachers' humanity, I appreciate my own and my friends' humanity as well. However, like having someone working for you who's stealing from you, these guys and what they're offering really may have to go.

Confusion - Fibroids - TMI

I'm confused. I have had conflicting advice about which medication I should be taking and I don't know where to turn for information. I will be getting back in touch with my specialist but an appointment isn't that easy to get and the wait is long once you get one and I just want to know if I'm doing the right thing or not. I'll get unconfused, or I'll just continue along this way, but that's where I'm at. The details aren't that important but they include things like the medication that was supposed to send me into menopause didn't exactly do the job and I'm wondering now what.

In the meantime I've been contemplating my body and how it houses me and and how it really just runs itself provided I do certain things and I'm so grateful. It's confusing to think there's this big thing going on inside I can't see or really feel and it makes me feel so out of touch. Like there's a stereotypical teenager in my uterus doing her own thing and not reaching out except once a month to make a scene and then return to her room leaving me to wonder what in the world is going on.

When I asked my GP why people are saying I need a hysterectomy when all of these new-fangled surgical options are available, he described to me how the fibroids are growing. Basically they're "intramural" and the big one is incorporated into my uterus - it's not on it or something they could cut off. It's integrated and to get it out means taking out my uterus, too. So supposedly I can have this operation and continue to ovulate each month, although my mom kindly pointed out, "sometimes people go into menopause from the surgery even if their ovaries are left." Great. Not that menopause is that bad, but I was kind of looking forward to continuing to have my cycle even without menstruating. Who knows.

That brings me to menstruating. So I was getting ready to say goodbye to my period, having my final mixed feelings about it all, really noticing the blood (I'll spare you all the rest, just know I was really paying attention), and like the patient who doesn't die when pulled off the life support, my medication didn't do the trick and I had another opportunity to possibly say my last goodbyes to my period. By the time it finally goes I will have said goodbye a whole bunch. Like standing in the yard waving to family members in the car who drive off, only to come back 5 minutes later because they remember they forgot something, the goodbye I'm having has lost its initial dramatic feel and will be a simple nod by the time it finally gets on its way.

I could not have this operation. It's not life-threatening. But like going to Montreal, I could walk. Thanks to modern technology and cars and whatnot, I drive to Montreal. There are consequences and there's a price I have to pay to participate in this culture. Same thing. I could wait for my body to stop making fibroids, but there's another 10 years or so left of that, and while that's all going on, travel is difficult, teaching yoga for more than an hour is difficult at times, it's hard to plan, and my energy is wild. I could put up with it, keep looking for natural solutions and new yoga poses to do the trick, just do "watchful waiting" as it's described in the reading material. Or I could have it taken out, heal up, and be on my way. Everyone I've spoken to who has had this operation is happy about it. Even my 94-year old grandmother said she's glad she did it. Maybe I will be too.

Last Sunday

For at least 4 months, this is the last Sunday I'll be teaching yoga in the morning. I will still be a part of the teacher training, and the workshops I'm offering will still happen, so I will still be teaching, just not every week like I've been doing for 10 years. It has been my discipline to teach on Friday nights and Sunday mornings and has given me so many opportunities to practice the yamas and niyamas, in particular brahmacharya, santosha, and tapas.

It takes something to get up and get to a yoga class on Sunday morning (any time really), but the people that make it out to a Sunday class are special. I've often said that if I weren't teaching that class I wouldn't be at it, and I don't expect you'll see me hanging out in the back of that class once I'm no longer leading it.

Back to those yamas and niyamas I mentioned. Brahmacharya to me is moderation, but in particular, don't do things that make you intoxicated because there will be a period afterwards where you won't be present as you deal with processing the excess, i.e., the hangover. Weekends are often when our culture allows people to let loose and get intoxicated and recover from the week they've just had. I've heard more than one person on Sunday morning say how hungover they were! As the teacher, it doesn't work for me to be hungover and teach, it just doesn't. So although I may enjoy myself on Saturday night, I've always got to be moderate and manage my time so I am ready on Sunday morning. It's not really a problem at all or I wouldn't have managed for a decade, but it's something I look at once in a while.

Santosha is being content with what is. This morning, for instance, I have a cold. I haven't had a summer cold in years it seems like, but this weekend I came down with a cold and I have to get up and teach. I'm really okay with that. But the nature of my job is that it doesn't come with sick days. If you don't work, you don't get paid and that's how it goes. Sometimes you can find a sub and sometimes you can sub other peoples' classes to make up for it, but often you just lose the class. So arriving to class content and even happy to be there is a practice too.

Tapas is heat or a burning enthusiasm. For me that's getting up early enough before leaving the house that I can write, take care of my own stuff, and be on time, ready to go, bringing forth energy to share with people to help make them getting up and to class worth it! Sometimes I joke about how great it is that people are in class because just think about what other people are doing - sleeping in, having a coffee in bed, reading the paper - and here we are doing great work on the mat. Again, it takes something from the people showing up that is not always a common trait - it's special to get up and practice tapas - and on Sunday morning our class usually does involve some heat and people are sweating well before the end in general.

Sunday morning classes have been an important time in my life - it shaped when I saw my daughter over the years - it complicated new relationships - it anchored my life in a way. After a decade or so of being tethered to my practice of teaching yoga each Sunday, I'm going to let Sundays go free and see where they take me for the next few months.

Making Changes

After giving it some thought, I'm going to stop teaching my drop-in classes for the next few months, or the next session at Rama Lotus. It feels a bit radical but also so right. There is a lot behind the choice to pause, including what I've written in the last number of posts.

Starting in September, I won't be teaching any public drop-in classes. I will still be teaching on the teacher training team and leading workshops and teaching all of my regular non-public classes.

The major thing that not teaching every Friday night and Sunday morning brings me is, can you guess? Weekends! I will have a weekend in my life after 10 years of being committed each one. I'm hoping this will bring me opportunities to use my energy differently and look at healing my body, which is all good and serious, but what I'm really excited about at the moment is sleeping in! Going away overnight! Taking a workshop! Staying home!

I could go on and justify why the drop-in model is also tiring for me as a teacher, but that doesn't matter. I'm going to be on pause. Gratefully, the centre where I teach has said I can be off the schedule and I'll get my classes back in the next round. I may really miss teaching those times. It has been a part of my life for about a quarter of it and I didn't complain about the weekends. I enjoy this hour on Sunday morning. I love seeing who shows up. I love teaching Friday nights to help people unwind from their work week and set them up for a great weekend.

Given what I've got going on health-wise though, teaching 90-minute classes straight through isn't always workable, let's say. I sometimes need a break in that time and it is awkward to leave a class in the middle of it, at least the way I have been teaching my classes up until now. Maybe that will change and I'll build in a natural break. Or maybe I'll have my uterus taken out and I won't ever need to have that break again. I'll keep you posted.

Staying Fresh as a Yoga Teacher

Lately I've run into a number of old students from the Yoga Teacher Training programs I've taught in over the years and they've mentioned that they could use some support staying fresh as a yoga teacher. Just like how the obstacles on the path of yoga are the same as the obstacles on the path to anything you want to do, staying fresh as a yoga teacher is the same as staying fresh at anything you want to do.

A few years ago I was on the Omega Institute campus talking to old friends one who was a writer and the other a midwife. The writer said, "if I have to write one more course description..." The midwife said, "if I have to say 'push, push' again..." and I was saying, "if I have to say, 'inhale arms up' one more time..." And we all laughed at how we were in the same place but in different professions.

It happens to a lot of people - when you've been at the same job for over 10 years or however long until you feel that way - you get tired of doing it. Sometimes it's just the natural process of getting older. We struggle when we're young to settle into a routine and sometimes after awhile we feel constrained by it.

What to do?

You could quit. It's at that point some people quit their jobs and find something else to do. There are pros and cons to that. If you aren't dealing with whatever are the underlying issues to your frustration, you'll run right into that again after you've been in your new job after some time.

You could take a break. Sometimes going on vacation or trying something else new will refresh you. If you haven't had a holiday in a long time, build in a break for yourself. The particular summer I'm referring to at the top of this post was one where my holiday was a working holiday. I taught more yoga while I was away and at earlier hours than I did at home. I didn't occur as a holiday at all!

You could do nothing. Just knowing there are days when you will struggle to find inspiration to do your job can help make it normal and just like the passing weather, you can rest assured it will change again.

Another thing you could do is dig even deeper into your profession. Rather than going away from it, you could get right back in there. Study more. Take new courses, get a mentor, and remind yourself of what fired you up in the first place to become a yoga teacher, writer, midwife, or whatever.

Nurturing yourself, connecting with others, exploring your profession - these are some of the ways you can stay fresh as a teacher.

Do any of you have ways that you stay fresh as a yoga teacher or other profession? I'd love to hear your comments.

At that Invisible Place

I’ve gone invisible. I haven’t been blogging for a number of reasons, but the biggest one is that there’s a health issue that’s been going on for sometime that’s started to make me feel like my body’s out of control. As a yoga teacher to have my body feel like it’s out of control is extra scary – isn’t part of my job to be healthy? So what happens to me if my body breaks down? Can I teach? Do I have a job?

The way I teach right now, the answer is pretty much no, I don't have a job. I teach to people as a contractor, so if I don't show up, I don't get paid. I don't make money for workshops I design and have others lead, I only earn money if I'm on site. That has always felt honest to me, but with the health stuff coming up, it feels pretty risky. If I have to take a week off, there's no money coming in, and no promise that I'll get my classes back or my workshop spots back or anything like that. That's one of the aspects of being self-employed in the service industry that's unripe and makes me understand while people do form unions and create safety nets, but it's also one of the things I have appreciated about it from an entrepreneurial point of view.

Being a full time yoga teacher, able to teach classes regularly, take the time to design course materials for workshops and trainings, and be available for student's correspondence, means I don't have another job. Lots of yoga teachers work full-time at jobs and then teach yoga on the side and I would recommend that's how people for sure start out because earning enough as a teacher to not only be paid for your time but enough that you can save to have benefits or savings or take a vacation, is unusual. Lots of us live simply so we are willing to earn what seems like a lot of money per class at times, but when weighed out over time, isn't very much at all. We don't teach yoga for the money, let's put it that way. Or what seems like a great income when you and your family are healthy may not be there when you get sick or need to take extra time away with your family.

So hopefully we yoga teachers will stay healthy long enough to share yoga with people who want to learn. And over the past year I took on a project to earn money for myself and other yoga teachers as an alternate source of income and another way to provide teachings of yoga (that's the company, Capital Yoga Publishing). It's still a baby and won't pay for my vacation anytime soon, but it's a start.

The invisible place is being a woman in my 40s who's now for sure out of my youth. My periods have gotten heavier and way longer. As a result, I have low iron and I'm afraid to check again because I must be anemic by now. I've seen my doctor, I've tried hormone replacement, and I'm waiting now to see a specialist. My energy is zapped, I'm numb in parts and even though I practice yoga like I used to, I feel nervous and not sure if I'll have the energy to do everything I've got planned for my day. When I'm on the spot, leading a class for 90 minutes, sometimes I'm not sure I'm going to make it through the whole class without having to run out to the washroom to deal with the menstrual flow. Sometimes I've had to leave the class and run out and come back. Yoga is also taught these days in tight pants. They're comfortable but often revealing, so to wear enough support means having it show through the clothes, which can feel awkward. The whole thing feels awkward. I'm in a place at the moment where I would welcome menopause. My period keeps me up at night many nights and I've been having it for well over a month.

This doesn't happen to most women in their 40s. It won't happen to many people but apparently it runs in my family and I'm not sure how to handle it. It's scary on a physical level and if I had the kind of job where I could just excuse myself briefly and that was normal, maybe work life would be okay. But as it is, I'm on, eyes are on me, and it's tricky.

One of the courses I teach that's been actually something that has made teaching through this change in my body is the teacher training. The groups can be working together and if I have to go to the washroom every half an hour it's not a big deal. Sadly, I won't be teaching the training in the summer as I had expected. The centre where I teach is also feeling scared and wants to broaden their safety net of teachers. So they've decided to have someone else lead the summer program and I'll be back on for the fall they've said. This is motivating me to move my teachings in a direction where I can lead more groups the way I'd grown to love in the teacher training format and not have a centre decide if I'm teaching or not. It's going to take some time to develop ways to be an independent teacher, especially a way to market and advertise courses, but I think I owe it to myself to create work in my field as a yoga teacher, that's more secure or feels more that way. Obviously no one's secure and things can change at any time, but at least making a plan for it seems like a good idea.

Beginners are Tough

I warn people during the teacher training that leading to beginners is harder than they think. Leading a beginning yoga class takes some skill and understanding that leading to people already used to a yoga practice takes to a different degree. At first it seems counter-intuitive - beginners can't "do" as much because they have a lot to learn, so it'll be easier. It's not. Trust me.

Let's look at a beginners class...

People coming to a beginning yoga class often have not done yoga before (there are lots of exceptions as I have had the same people coming to my beginning yoga class for years) and so they are coming for a reason. Do they have a physical issue they want to correct? Did someone recommend yoga? Chances are they're coming because there's something wrong and they want to fix it. They've heard about yoga (who hasn't?) and they want to give it a try.

So the teacher is going to need to be familiar with typical issues people come in with - sore backs, being overweight, tight hips, lack of sleep, arthritis, injuries, knee pain - etc. And the teacher has got to be willing to NOT deal with those things. Be aware of them but not treat them. Everybody wants a simple exercise that they can do that will help their back, neck, belly fat, whatever. It does NOT exist and the teacher needs to resist the urge to fix people. We need to be prepared however, to accommodate their situation with alternate moves so they can get themselves into the poses without further injuring themselves.

Then we have to deal with the fact that people in beginners classes have not already been doing yoga in general (see above for exceptions). People who are not already in a habit are going to possibly be harder to "convert" to a new habit than people who are already in a stream of doing that thing. Same is true for getting books read or other habits in place - how many books do you have on your shelves that you started reading but didn't get through? It really takes something powerful to get people to keep coming back to yoga.

If you've got people in your class with pain and they start a yoga class, chances are they are going to start feeling more of their pain at the beginning and this can be an unpleasant process. As people get more aware of their bodies, they get aware of the discomfort they're in and to get over that and be willing to be faced with it weekly or however often the class is, and it's tricky.

Sometimes people are super-motivated to come to class because they've had a huge change in their lives like being diagnosed with cancer or is losing someone close to them and they will do anything to relax and try to line things up because there's a lot at stake. So they're serious, they don't want to mess around and they don't feel they have time to lose. Those guys need to be handled so gently and offered such a big space to relax and be - holding space for people while they're grieving is a tall order. Once you're trained in doing it it's an immense privilege, but along the way, the yoga teacher can come face-to-face with her own inadequacies and unresolved fears and grief, too.

Moving along...

Beginning yoga students tend to do what you tell them to do as best they can and will try to copy the teacher. If you're a new yoga teacher there's a good chance you like yoga, you're "good at" yoga and you've been doing yoga lots longer than your students. If you go up to the front to demonstrate your full version of the pose, your students are going to knock themselves out trying to follow you. It takes something for the teacher to be aware of her full expression of the pose and resist the urge to go there while guiding her students. It's one thing to inspire and motivate them, but the line is so fine as not only will your students possibly hurt themselves copying your form, they'll think they're supposed to look like you, the teacher, and they're not. They're supposed to look just as they are.

I had an experience this summer while I was at Omega where a famous workshop presenter buckled under the pressure of leading to a diverse group. Her workshop basically fell apart and I was called in to help pick up the slack in the yoga teaching area. When I asked her what happened, she said that the group had so many different expectations and were at all different levels and she didn't know what to do with them. "That's my speciality," I told her as I took her group off of her hands and led the last couple of days' yoga classes. At that moment I realized that even though I'm not the fittest, stretchiest, hottest yoga teacher around, the experience I have from being with beginners wherever they are at has translated into a skill that is useful to me everyday when I teach.

Inside Out (Pose)

Yoga practice is practice. "Practice for what?" you may wonder. Well, it's practice for your life. Life that looks like a variety of things.

The other day, life looked like me wearing my shirt inside out while I was leading a yoga class.

I noticed that I was doing shirt-on-inside-out-asasana and I paused to myself. I kept leading the class and considered my situation. "Hmm. I notice my shirt is on inside out. The tag is out. I'm definitely wearing this shirt on inside out. I am distracted by this. Do I tell my class what I'm dealing with here? No, that would draw attention to something that has nothing to do with this class. Most people probably haven't even noticed. Who cares? Maybe I could get them to look away and do a quick change. Hmm, no, it would be too easy to get caught in a bra. I'd be okay, but that just wouldn't be right. Wow. It's finally come to this. I'm wearing my clothes on backwards."

The whole thing lasted a few minutes as I breathed through the sensations and then they passed. I didn't care anymore and I didn't comment and nothing happened and even me being mortified by it passed quickly. I did take the earliest opportunity to switch my shirt around though.

So "shirt-on-inside-out-pose" wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to be at the beginning. Other poses have shown up to be trickier. But it's the yoga practice on the mat that prepares me for the spontaneous yoga poses that life offers me.

Teaching Yoga is a Present

Teaching yoga is a great way to stay present. It's its own practice, just like being in the mat in the poses is a practice, leading a group in yoga practice is a practice too.

When I'm teaching I'm often get distracted but I have to come right back to the present moment or else I'd fall off the edge. So even though I can go off in my mind a little bit, it's only a very little bit or else I couldn't carry the class. The work that it takes to keep coming back, to know which side we're on, which pose we're doing, what time it is, and all of that, keeps me focused on the present moment. And that is such a gift. Having a practice that brings me present is my present!

New Shoes

I made a spontaneous purchase this evening. I bought new shoes. Okay they're not really shoes, they're sandals. They're high heeled sandals. Completely not practical. Remi thought they were excellent and has already asked to wear them.

Here's another thing on the list of yoga teacher expectations - they don't wear impractical shoes. Their shoes are comfortable. Let me tell you, these high heels are comfortable! I was talking with one of my yoga teacher friends about shoes, well, we've talked about it on many occasions, including stopping being yoga teachers and opening a shoe store instead, and she misses the fancy footwear that came with her old job. I never had a job that required or accepted high heels for most of my life. I just haven't taken them up. Tonight's the night.

Not only are they impractical, they are expensive. Good. That makes this even more memorable. It was a treat to myself. Being 42 and getting some luxurious footwear. And now that I'm even taller I can just go ahead and keep on growing. Why stop at 5'3.5"? I think I could end up at 5'6" in these babies.

Wearing high heels requires different pants. (It's about time I get some new pants to be honest.) These sandals won't go with most of my clothes - I don't think - but I really don't know. I think I'm going to need to build a wardrobe around my new shoes. Help. Help me. Please! Friends, please assist me in figuring out what to wear with casual high heels. Your input is welcome.