Teaching Again--hooray!

I am teaching tonight at 6:30 and I am so excited! Yesterday I was wishing I could teach that very night. I have my Barkan notebook with me so I can study a bit this afternoon. I'm going to focus on two things--directing the energy with my voice (that's for me) and in terms of the words I say, I want to talk about breath a lot. (I know, really original--but MUY IMPORTANTE!) I know I'll have at least one beginner, as my friend H. is planning to come, and that's a good basic concept for beginners and regulars to hear. Over and over. I know it sounds so simple but I need to hear it over and over in my own practice. I can't tell you how many times I find myself in Triangle, about to bust a gasket, and realize I'm holding my breath. Hello! I often think to myself that much of a yoga teacher's job is to say "Breathe!" I say it a lot when I can't think what to say next. It's never wrong.

My mom has been taking a gentle yoga class from the woman who's also her massage therapist. She and her friend Anita were the only two at the class yesterday so they got pretty much a private session. My mom was excited to tell me she got into downward dog. ("I didn't think I could do that!" she said.) I am so proud of her! I hope to teach her a yoga class while she's here next week.

Someone asked how the Barkan Method is different from Bikram, other than the sequence. First, the class starts with one set of pranayama deep breathing, not two. I cannot say this has improved my equanimity with the second set of pranayama when I now take a Bikram class--it has always chapped my hide. (By the second set I'm thinking: Let's get to the good stuff, the asanas! TOMMY WANT WINGY!) In general, I would say there's more flexibility/freedom in how the teacher can structure the class. There are never two sets of every single pose, so there are more poses. And first sets of certain poses are variations of the pose that sort of warm you up for the full expression of the pose in the second set. The flexibility allows the teacher, if she or he chooses, to do single sets of most standing poses in order to do, for example, a bunch of hip openers in the last part of class. Or backbends. I find it's a great combination of "structure and freedom" as Jimmy says--over a period of time going to the class, you are really advancing in and refining certain postures, but as it's a little different each time and you DON'T usually do all the same poses two classes in a row, it keeps you on your toes if you'll forgive a yoga pun, and tunes up strength and balance in different areas. There's also more of an emphasis on modifications/injury rehabilitation Barkan.

I have been trying to go to yoga class no less frequently than every other day. I miss going twice a day and every day! But it hasn't worked with my work schedule in the last week or so. I'd love to go every weekday at 4:30 so I can do Bikram MWF and Power Vinyasa TTh. That Power Vinyasa kicks my hiney. Hoo boy.

Over the past few weeks, it has been so neat getting emails from the people with whom I went through training. One has bought a studio, some are opening new studios, or they're moving, they've had to take over a class unexpectedly midway through because the teacher was sick to her stomach, they've had a student loudly proclaim "Wow! That was like an orgasm!" in the middle of class. And they're always positive and encouraging--I'm very blessed to have a virtual community like that.

Today I'm having lunch with a Barkan brother and sister--a woman who went through training with me, and her fiance, who had gone through two years before and looked after the heaters, the microphone system, and lots of other operational things during our training. I think of them as the Yoga Lovebirds--they are so sweet! They have applied for a business visa to go to New Zealand and open a yoga studio there. The woman, C, also teaches Yin Yoga, which I am really intrigued to experience. There's a studio on my way to work that offers it, so I'm hoping to take a class in the morning next week. (Yin Yoga is a style of yoga developed by Paul Grilley that holds one gentle pose at a time for between three minutes and ten minutes! Really gets into the connective tissue.) The Lovebirds are also coming to my 6:30 class--I have a big cheering section today!