This weekend yoga teacher training happened. It was super interesting, demanding and disorienting, as usual, because I'm off my regular schedule — little exercise and no meal planning etc.
I managed to turn in all of my assignments that were due. I also started a required Iyengar yoga series this past week and I've made it to the Sunday Evening Meditation class for the past three weeks. I am really liking the meditation class.
On tap for this weekend's training session was Trauma-Informed Yoga and Social Justice -- two heavy topics.
Four black yoga teachers, who recently formed a group, came to lead us in a yoga practice and also talked to us about social justice. In their presentation, they used a quote from James Baldwin's essay, Stranger in the Village, where he talked about no one in Switzerland having seen a Negro and the group likened it to the scarcity of Black people in some yoga studios.
Our other two speakers talked about being allies to marginalized communities. Loved this quote that they used in their presentation.
I am, in many ways, off my "game" -- lots of irons in the fire right now.
I hadn't ever thought about yoga in connection with trauma or social justice; I tend to think about it as an exercise class white ladies do in Lululemon clothes. Of course it makes sense, once I think about it for two seconds.
ReplyDeleteI like the Talmud quote. It really clarifies the ways in which we are all responsible and the ways we are not. When you feel responsible for things beyond your control, you can easily give up. It reminds us to do the things that are ARE in our control.
Keeping my fingers crossed that spam protection will let me post...
There are some teachers who pass out yoga consent chips, others who verbally ask before assisting and some who don’t offer assist.
ReplyDeleteWe talked a lot about appropriate language too...
Also, Blogger has erased my comment several times. 😳
I've learned a LOT about yoga from reading your blog. There's so much more there than I ever realized.
ReplyDeleteI've been listening to this podcast called Unladylike, and a recent episode was about a sexual assault nurse examiner, who does what is typically called a "rape kit" with assault survivors, and she talked about immediately restoring consent to the victims. Without a trained SANE, so much happens/is done to people that is like a continuation of the violation.
It was a good episode. Rage-inducing sometimes, but really good.
I will check out Unladylike...
ReplyDeleteIt's so weird; I never saw myself as knowing unique things about yoga until I got into the training...