Tag: sadie nardini

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Yoga Practice Class #2

heather

I taught my second community (aka free) class at Indigo on 5/20.  Here are my notes for the class, so you can get a general idea of what I covered.

Calming, evening class

Sorry for the poor quality of the picture, but if I wait to get a better scan, I’ll never end up making this post. 🙂

I wanted to design a class that would be relaxing, help people to sleep well, and that would target some common areas of pain for people – shoulders & wrists.  I think that’s probably too many things to focus on in one class, but I’m new and learning, so why not try it and see if it works, right?  Right??

I started out the class the same way that Max Strom started out our day-long intensive at the Dubuque Yoga Fest – with chest breathing in the easy-cross-leg position, a gentle twist, and then chest breathing in horse stance.  I made some (what I considered to be) hilarious quip about horse stance being named such because it looks as if you are riding a horse.  The class indulgently smiled at me.  Yoga students are so nice.

I did far fewer sun salutations than I did during my first class. I filled the void with more therapeutic moves – wrist stretches, twists, lots of child’s poses. I also kept reminding people to relax their faces – especially the furrow between the eyes (my furrow is over-developed and needs massive amounts of work!). I also encouraged them to put that slight Mona Lisa smile on their face.

Then I closed the class with a gratitude meditation. I encouraged people to think about someone indispensable to their joy and happiness.  I asked them to steep their bodies in that positive emotion during the 5-7 minute savasana.  As savasana wound down, I walked around and put a little card on everyone’s mat.  I spent 5 minutes that morning cutting up watercolor paper and writing “GRATITUDE” on the slips of paper in purple ink. Next to the word, I drew a little smiley face. 🙂  When I closed the class, I told them they could take the cards as a reminder to focus on the things they are grateful and to keep smiling.

I stole/borrowed that idea from Sadie Nardini.  She said she gave Hersey’s Kisses or other little treats to her students to show how appreciative she was that they came to her class and enabled her to live her dream. I really liked that idea.  Plus I have  shit ton of art supplies because, you know, some day I’m going to become an artist.  This was a good reason to use some of them up.

The class of 14 was over 30% filled with my friends and loved-ones, which really helped keep me calm.  But even people who are not beholden to love and support me really seemed to enjoy the class.  As people were walking out, everyone was smiling and chatting.  It made me SO happy that I was able to help a few people become a little happier for an evening.

So, again, I totally loved teaching again.  Shannon said something today that really rang true to me. He said that teaching is a meditation. And I can totally see that. You can’t focus on anything else. You need to stay in the moment and focused.

My next community class isn’t until 6/17, but on the 11th I’m teaching a group of friends after work, and then in late June I’m teaching a lunchtime yoga class at work. I’ve received clearance from HR to officially teach a class at work, but I’m doing a practice session with my close work-friends first. If that goes well, I’ll send an invite out to our whole branch and see who shows up.  I’m really nervous about that one though – teaching yoga to people I kind of know and who I want to think well of me is intimidating!  All these people know the work/Project Manager/Business Analyst -Heather. Not the yoga-Heather who measures chakras and has been annoying all her office-mates with YTT news over the past 6 months.

Speaking of which, YTT is drawing to a close. Our last day together is the 17th. I am SO SAD it’s ending.  But I’m so happy I experienced it.  I am so happy I signed up for this class.

Well, that’s it for the night. It’s time for me to crash.  As always, thank you for reading! If you’re a fellow yoga-lover or teacher, please let me know what you love and/or hate in classes that you take or teach.

Take care!

Books, Health & Fitness, Yoga

Teaching my first public class & a list of recommended reading

heather

Last night I taught my first public class through Indigo, the studio where I am doing Yoga Teacher Training.  When we first started YTT, I honestly could not imagine myself teaching. It seemed completely overwhelming and nerve-racking.  All those eyes, looking at you,waiting for you to tell them what to do, trusting you to make them feel better and not hurt them, watching, waiting…  It seemed so intimidating.

And then we did our first adjustments to our fellow students – how could I get comfortable touching people I don’t even know???  And then we taught our first Sun Salutation to 5 other classmates.  I couldn’t even remember how to do a Sun Saluation.  Mind. Blank.  Then we took turns teaching ONE asana at a time to a group of beginner students.  I think my first pose was side plank.  Super easy asana, but Shannon had to give me little cues to get me started.  All that is to say, it was hard to imagine myself standing up in front of 15 people teaching a sequence of several asanas.

But I did it.

And it was awesome.

The class went really well!  I followed the template that I posted yesterday.  Overall the sequence flowed fairly well. I left out a couple of asanas in the interests of time.  I had 3 friends who attended the class, and I’m going to follow up with them today to see what they thought of the pacing, the volume of my voice, the clarity of my instructions, and the difficulty (or easiness!) of the class.  Immediately after the class a few students said thank you and that they thought it was a good class.  Hopefully they really felt that way!

I’m so glad that I entered this YTT program. I have learned so much, and it’s helped me to see that I am capable of more than I thought.  I haven’t reach my peak yet at 38. ;P

I think I promised a list of recommended reading from the Dubuque Yoga Conference, so here is that list.  Man, I wish I had more time to read!!!

And that’s it for this morning!  Thank you for reading today. If you read any of these books, or check out any of these resources, let me know what you think.  Have a great day!

Health & Fitness

Dubuque Yoga Festival – The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

heather

Who am I kidding??  There was no bad OR ugly.  It was just good.  Great, even.  Amazing.  Awesome.  Just really, really bonkers good. Since I’m running out of adjectives, I will start from the beginning.

This was the inaugural year for the Dubuque Yoga Festival.  The organizers, Scott and Julia Theisen, are the owners of Body and Soul in Dubuque, IA.  They did an absolutely amazing job.  I mean, I’ve never been to a yoga festival before, so I can’t compare it to other yoga festivals, but I can compare it to other conferences and conventions I’ve attended.  The organizers did a great job of, well, organizing!  The rooms were clearly laid  out, the agenda was clear, the programming was fantastic, the lunches on Friday and Saturday were thoughtfully planned,  and the entertainment on Friday night was very fun and engaging.

I attended all 3 days of the festival.  On Friday I spent the day with Max Strom learning about “Inner Axis Essentials.”  I took TWELVE pages of notes on his class.  Friday night we went to the evening ceremony which consisted of a keynote address from Sadie Nardini, a yoga/dance/costume runway show that was super colorful, very beautiful, and perfectly done, and a group dance done by people who just oozed rhythm. They were mesmerizing to watch.  They cast on a spell on me to the point that I actually got up and danced some crazy line dance with the rest of the crowd.  I did not do it WELL, mind you, but I did it. 🙂  It was super fun.

I started Saturday by attending a Kundalini Yoga session at 5AM.  It begin with a 20 minute chant, followed by a 30 minute asana practice, and closed by several other chants. It was interesting to attend, but once was enough for me! Saturday I took a class from Sadie on creating your best yoga class ever.  Then I attended a class  on Raise Your Vibration (using Kundalini yoga) during which I shook out all my bad energy by dancing like I have not since I went to a rave in high school.  Saturday afternoon I took another Sadie class, Learning to Fly.  She helps you use physics to do inversions – bending the elbows and pushing the hands into the earth to push the body up into the air.  I was EXHAUSTED by the end of the two hours, but I had 2 or 3 moments of clarity where I felt the lift of flight.  I practiced her techniques a bit more this morning and was able to hold my crow for longer than I ever have before.  With more practice, I think I will eventually be able to float. 🙂

We closed out the day by attending a gong ceremony.  What is a gong ceremony, you may ask?  Well, let me tell you!  The attendees circled their mats around 4 or 5 humongous gongs and several crystal bowls.  After an introduction encouraging us to close our eyes and meditate on the sound, we laid back on our mats and were submerged in rolling waves of sound. You could feel the sounds crest and fall over you.  It was unlike anything I’ve experienced.  We were there for an hour, but I think 30 minutes would have been just right.  By the end of the hour, I was very uncomfortable from laying on the hard floor, so my mind kept wandering off the sounds.  However, if you ever get a chance to go to a gong ceremony, DO IT!!

By the time the ceremony was completed, we were utterly exhausted and hungry.  We went to a delicious Ukrainian restaurant, Europa Cafe.  After eating lots of delicious food, we retired to the hotel to watch Mean Girls.  Don’t judge!!

Sunday morning we got coffee and breakfast at a great spot, Jitters Cafe.  They only had breakfast paninis.  When I asked if they had gluten-free bread for the panini, they said, no, but they could add the panini fixings to a spring green salad for me.  Perfect!! It was so tasty.  After breakfast I went to a session on balancing chakras. WHOLE LEE COW.  She showed us how you can measure someone’s chakras by dangling a necklace with a heavy fob on the end over the chakra.  Depending how how it spins and what direction it spins, you can tell the state of that chakra.  I was watching the teacher’s arm very closely to see if she was moving the necklace and causing it to spin. It really didn’t look like it.  I want to try it.  I need to do more research on chakras and see what science there is behind it. Truthfully it kind of freaked me out – not in a way that I was scared of it, just in the way that I felt as if I was seeing magic. 🙂

After that session, I was supposed to go to Sadie’s Core Transformation class.  But I still felt rather wrecked from the Learning to Fly class. I thought that Max Strom was teaching a chest and shoulders class at the same time, so I decided to go to that instead.  Well, once he started talking, I realized that I was sitting in a workshop on forgiveness!  There was no yoga to be had!  I considered slipping out the back to go to Sadie’s class instead, but that seemed really rude.  Plus the room had a huge wall of windows overlooking the tree-lined bluffs along the Mississippi. It was a beautiful room, and a wise man with lots to teach was speaking. I better stay.  I am so glad I did!  The workshop helped me realize that I am holding on to some things that I did not realize.  I got shit to work on.  That is FO SHO.

The day closed at 12:30 with a ceremony that involved us all sitting in a big room holding hands, sending positive energy to the person next to us, and then sending love to the whole universe.  Yes, yes. I know it sounds hippy dippy.  But man, was it so nice to be around that kind of genuine positivity for 3 days.  Everyone was happy, smiling, helpful, and glad to be in that space and time.  I absolutely loved it.

I will write more about what I learned in the upcoming days.  This blog post is already getting too long.

Oh!  Shoot. I wanted to give some words of advice for others who may be attending their first yoga festival.  BRING SOMETHING TO SIT ON!!  Sitting cross-legged on your mat for 3 days gets to be very uncomfortable. Pack a meditation cushion or yoga block or something.   Also, bring snacks!  None were available around the festival.  And dress in layers.  The conference rooms were wicked cold.  Several attendees brought blankets with them, and they were smart to do so.  And socks.  For the love of God, bring socks.

Ok, now I’m really done.  How about you?  Have you ever been to a yoga festival? Is this what they are usually like?

Take care and talk to you soon!