Practicing

Today's Classroom

Because of yoga teacher training, I didn't have a whole lot of time to prepare for today's yoga class.

Skipped swimming yesterday, wrote a sequence then practiced it.

Practicing a sequence totally makes a difference as it allows you to see where the gaps are as far as transitions and it also allows you to see how much time the sequence is going to take and, ultimately, if the sequence is safe and makes sense.

As a trainee, there is the urge to rush through teaching but that's the opposite of what you should be doing and, as Stacy says, you also have to respect the silences.

The anatomy of sequencing made more sense to me despite having less time to write it. I intuited what pose would come next and I didn't use every pose when I taught but Stacy also told us to be okay with not using everything that we've written and, overall, it's better to have too much than not enough.

Went to Zumba today and the teacher forgot steps in several songs and that was a sign for me that stuff happens.

I've been enjoying playing my singing bowls through savasana. Felt more confident about that today too. It’s amazing what happens when you’re patient and mindful. Was glad that I set a silent alarm on my Fitbit as I'd forgotten to disable the lock screen on my iPod and, therefore, couldn't see what time it was. As a general rule, I don't want to fidget with an electronic item while trying to teach. I read, somewhere, that gadgets, especially a phone, is a reminder of busyness.

Well, Warm Up Then...

As I prepared for Zumba yesterday, went to retrieve my water bottle from the car and decided to see if my mother wanted to go to the Botanical Garden instead since we are having unseasonably warm weather. My mother enjoyed herself and quickly came up with one of her constituents (my word) that she can take on an outing to the Botanical Garden...

My favorite statue in the Linnean House surrounded by poinsettias. 

String beans?

Bells Chimes at MO Bot

Garden Glow Prop

A Caribbean Feel in the Climatron

Went to a yoga adjustment workshop after vising the garden. I was excited and terrified about the workshop but it turned out much better than I expected.

The whole yoga assist/adjustment thing is interesting because many teachers don't give adjustments anymore and most teachers only give them to students that they know very well and I can totally see why.

I like the advice of our workshop teacher, Kim. Don't give anyone any creepy, tentative assists and Stacy, our YTT trainer, has pretty much said the same thing. Their advice is to get consent, let them know what body part you'll be touching and do the assist firmly. You should also get student feedback and even when you don't get verbal feedback, you need to tune in to people's body language.

Overall, it was a great workshop with lots of good advice, including that if you don't feel called to give assists or don't feel comfortable doing it, you can totally opt out as it's not a necessary part of being a yoga teacher.

I also recalled what Stacy said about observing people practice yoga and how it's is an intimate experience. Kim asked me to get into Wide Legged Forward fold so that she could demonstrate an adjustment. I heard someone point out the position of my head and feet. One of my regular teachers came over to offer a block and experimented with putting it at different heights.

Head and Toes, not relaxing...

Kim said that she's noticed that even in savasana, the final relaxation pose, that people have a hard time letting go. As we continued to discuss, Stacy simply said It's a known issue.  All that to say, we are learning and looking at bodies and alignment and gets intimate. It totally felt like there was a hot, spotlight on me...

But it was so exciting when we talked about Pigeon pose and external and internal rotation. It was like an episode of CSI and also a reminder that none of us know all the answers.

Example of an adjustment...

At the beginning of the workshop, someone asked Kim if we were going to warm up and she asked us if we felt the need and, to someone's affirmative response, she said, Well, warm up then. Let's give it 10 minutes.  Kim is the opposite of pomp and circumstance.