YOGA TEACHER TRAINING

Yoga teacher training is not the peaceful, zen inspiring experience people seem to perceive it to be, at least that's not how it went down for me. I hated it, maybe hate is a strong word but I definitely didn't love it.

People say, well you got to do yoga every day, what is there not to love? I genuinely started to believe that it was developed to be used as some sort of torture device, my body hurt ALL the time, there is such thing as too much yoga, I assure you. Although that aside for me it wasn't such a test on my physical fitness but more of a challenge mentally and emotionally. You live and breathe the same routine everyday, you get up and do the same 2hr practice every morning, you spend all day every day with the same people. It was tough, but also eye opening and so humbling.

As much as the people that you're living with drive you insane and don't abide by your on internal rules you see them on their spiritual journeys. You realise that not everything is about you, that everyone is going through their own internal battle so it is important to be kind. This is easier said than done, especially when sleep deprived, frazzled and homesick, other people's feeling are not at the top of your priority list. But it opened my heart, these girls who I spent every waking minute with acted as mirrors. I both grew to hate and love them. It was all too much but at the same time we were a group all going through this together.

It opened my eyes to the world of perception. How we perceive ourselves, how we want to be see and how we see others and at the end of the day its all just an illusion. I work so hard to keep up appearances, to give the illusion of this girl who has her shit together. Every time I would judge someone or label them as needy, aloof or selfish I was only describing things within me. My judgments put me on my guard because what I point out in others I believe to be true of myself I don't want people to find out. This becomes magnified when you're in the living situation we were in for 3 weeks. You can't get away from it, you're frazzled, you've started hating your yoga practice or even yoga all together, you start craving your creature comforts and change of routine. It's so easy to just project it onto someone else and blame them for not being who you want them to be in that moment, for not unloading the dishwasher or taking the bin out. For talking too much or laughing to loud, for asking too many questions or being the one who asks the stupid ones.

I felt vulnerable. I felt afraid a lot of the time. It fed my lack of feeling worthy enough, there were moments I would sit in lesson thinking I bet my yoga teacher thinks I'm such an idiot for asking these questions or why did I just say that or the most common is that people think I'm annoying, needy or a drama queen (goes back to my early point about judging others). I wanted to be seen at the same time I wanted to be invisible. It was a difficult space for me to sit and I had to sit with it, we did so much yoga a meditation there wasn't the option of running away from myself.

This was so much more than just a yoga teacher training for me. I embarked on this whole new journey where things shifted for me, I shed a burden every week, I was able to let go of stuff that I was only holding onto for their familiarity.

It made me think about where I was last year and about things that used to worry me so much and I was able to let go of them so that they no longer consume my mind and my time. The things I never thought I could accomplish (this course) but did. All of those things are worth being grateful for, and that after everything that has happened and everything that will happen I will be OK. It gave me faith, it reminded me why I do what I do and it encouraged me to come home to myself, my real self not this person I want the world to believe I am but the person I actually am.

https://www.myyogapeople.com/