Saturday, November 7, 2009

Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed

"Approach everything you do with excitement and enthusiasm." --Vishvaji

I am ridiculously excited. I am wicked enthusiastic. Because I may get a chance, as a teacher, to share everything I love about yoga with my students.

At the ashram, I got a glimpse into how I felt about teaching yoga. Part of the training involved teaching 80-minute classes with a partner, each partner taking half of the class. And if I wasn't sure of my becoming-a-yoga-teacher feelings before the training, it took only those few experiences to show me how much I love it. As a teacher, you get a chance to use your creativity and your passion to transmit the benefits of yoga to students. What is amazing about the whole experience is that a teacher is not forcing any realizations upon the student, but is simply opening a channel for the student to make their own self inquiry.

I don't know if it's what I want to do as a career, but I do want to teach yoga no matter what form it takes in my life. If it's just teaching family and friends, or teaching a free community based class, or having a weekly class at a studio, I'll still get to be teaching. And that thought makes me feel all bubbly and delicious and content.

One step at a time, though. I'm trying to take everything I learned at the ashram--the training, the lifestyle, the philosophy--gradually enough to really use it all with honesty in my life. I don't want to be the bright-eyed little girl who sees one things that's beautiful and can't let it go, that can't understand that there is an infinite selection of beautiful in the world. The ashram environment was amazingly conducive to living in a beautiful way, but I can only adapt from what I learned, not recreate the experience.

Am I making any sense?

Baby steps, Po. Baby steps.

I set three goals for myself when I left India: to treat my body and mind as things of value, to have a daily yoga practice, and to approach life with equanimity. And as I'm writing this I'm going to add a fourth: to forgive myself if I screw up a bit.

Though these give me a focus for now, I have heaps of other big ideas about the way I want to live. But like I said before, if I do this, I want to do it right. A complete revamp of my life, I feel, would have great potential for me to become a hypocrite. I want to digest all of this slowly so I can know the choices I make have been made with integrity, not with whim.

Anyway.

On a different note, I've had some of you ask me about sitting down to talk about some of this stuff, to which I say "call me! email me! show up on my front doorstep I'll make cookies!"

Lots of love.

5 comments:

Marisa said...

I understand. It is a LOT to process and integrate. My own practice has waxed and waned over the years. However, when I need to feel centered and peaceful, it is one of the first things I return to. I would show up at your doorstep to discuss this further, but I don't know where it is! :)

Anonymous said...

Oh i'm so pleased that you've just put into words all the whirl-wind thoughts and feelings that have been floating around somewhere near me (don't know which chakras in particular have been affected!). But thanks for doing the hard work of making it make sense! I feel calmer now. Miss you lots honey but the internet is an amazing invention (perhaps one of the beauties that you talk of) and I'll definitely be in touch plenty. Lots of love x

Sherina said...

oh- that was Sherina! x

Po said...

You all are wonderful :)

Caitlin said...

Hi Po, this is Joe. . .you know, Caitlin Joseph! Andy told me that you were doing your yoga certification in India and I'm glad I came across your blog! I'm working on my certification right now and I read an article by Desikachar that talked about how it can be hard to take classes in India because you are out of your own life so much so it can be difficult to translate all the lessons into your daily life when you get back to it. But I think if you keep taking classes at home and reading and meditating it can work! Congrats! I'm glad you found a love of teaching!