In teacher’s training we had to teach a certain number of classes to graduate. Of course, my teacher and fellow students all attended. I was very used to getting feedback and having my mentor in the room. When I graduated I took over a Sunday morning timeslot that I’ve been teaching for several years now.

One morning my teacher showed up. This was unusual, as Sundays are her one definite day off a week. She told me she was going to take class with me. Internally I gave a little “yay” and kept checking in students. From time to time other teachers from the studio take class with me and there is a certain amount of fun and camaraderie when you have your peers in class. I always enjoy it.

I rarely get butterflies before I teach anymore. As I was walking into the room, I saw my teacher and immediately was thrown back to teacher training. I broke out in a cold sweat, got butterflies and couldn’t really remember what I had planned.

This was an excellent lesson for me because guess what …. she just did the class. I would teach a flow and she would do it, just like everyone else.   Plus I think it bumped up my regular students game a little bit, to have the studio owner in class with them.

Over the years I’ve run into people in class that I would rather not see or teach, who made me nervous or anxious for one reason or another.   I actually found it more difficult as a student to know that person was in the room with me.  As a teacher although there may be a student, or an incident, or something you bring into the classroom with you that is distracting, there are things that you have to work beyond in order to give a good class.

As yoga teachers no matter what our certification may be, we will always have teachers. I am lucky enough to have my teacher right down the street and can access her wisdom often (and I do!) Having her in class was a special treat and next time it happens, I’m going to take that deep calming breath, remember she’s there as a student and enjoy the heck out of teaching her!

And when there is someone or something in class that throws me out of teaching mode I’m going to take that deep calming breath and go about teaching class.

Well, this is interesting.

A veteran of neck and shoulder problems, I woke up Monday morning (Super Bowl Monday) not with a hangover, but with a stiff, sore low back. Assuming it was muscular, I stretched, showered and went about my day.

Tuesday I felt ok, still not right . I attended a Yin yoga class in the afternoon and felt mentally refreshed, still stiff and sore but no pains, no numbness or tingling, still assuming its muscular.

Wednesday … I could sit for long periods of time, I could stand, I could walk but any transition … from chair to standing or in or out of the car, for instance, was horribly painful. Then, for instance, once I stood up, I’d take 4-8 steps and my low back would seize up. I mean take your breath away pain, but just for a few moments.

Thursday morning I went to put my dog’s bowl on the floor for breakfast and ended up frozen on the floor. I took the day off and went to get evaluated, told I “may” (no tests have been done, this is just someone’s experience talking) have bulged a disc in my low back. The pain and discomfort was now also in my right hip & flexors, making movement very difficult. After some treatment I was told to go home and take it easy, treat conservatively and visit my doctor on Monday if I didn’t feel a whole lot better.

Immediately I started thinking of the things I could do at home if I were basically confined to my house for 2-3 days. Laundry, organizing, some light cleaning, a work project I could bring home and do.

Um, no. Apparently rest and conservative care means no matter how much laundry or how dirty the floors are they wait. No lifting, minimal bending, no twisting. I was told not to even try to go into child’s pose for awhile, THAT’s how stiff and sore my low back is.

OK, I’m a yogi. I take class regularly and tune out everything else and am present in the moment. I teach and am totally present in the moment. So why am I having such a difficult time letting go at home? Shouldn’t I be able to just let go of my personal to-do list and relax in order to heal?

I should. My “regular” life, both professionally and personally, keep me moving at such a pace that I have trouble shutting off at home. I am coming to learn that I do not let go at home as I do in the yoga room.

Whenever I walk up the stairs to the studio I learn and teach at, I begin to feel a sense of peace, relaxation and realization that I’m about to do something I love. If my mind is at full steam, its at 3/4 or 1/2 steam by the time I sit down. Usually by the time we are done with warmups and breathing I’m there. On the occasions it takes me longer I still almost always get there by the end of class.

Its like my body and mind have become addicted to certain words and places to let go. So now I have to strengthen my practice and bring it more into my “regular” life. I didn’t realize that I had such a divide between my yogic life and everything else. I thought I had gotten pretty good about bringing yoga outside of the studio. I have learned today that I am very very wrong.

I will relax, I will let go. It sounds almost like I’m commanding myself. I will be trying for the next few days to be quiet with my body on purpose, not just because its exhausted. In order to help myself I have to, and I know its not just me that has this issue.

I’ve had more than one student race into class at the last moment then watched them struggle for a few moments to be present and relax. Then once class is over they start checking their phones and I can see tension and that sensation of being wired creeping back in. All of our lives are busy and full of schedules, anxiety, stress. Give yourself permission. The laundry really will wait. Even if you just take 5-15 minutes a couple of times a day to sit still and let your mind and body relax and let go, you will notice a difference. This is not necessarily time for asana practice or even meditation. This is resting, effortless, just being a lump on a log time. Don’t let an injury force you into sitting still.

I used to be a far more regimented person than I am now. Some of that was by virtue of being a single mother, raising a daughter who liked to go places and do things while working a demanding full-time plus job. It’s pretty hard to not plan out your day under those circumstances.

Once my daughter left home I continued with a pretty strong routine. It was comforting and frankly, kept me from becoming a complete couch potato.

Then I delved farther into yoga and once I discovered vinyasa, I started to realize just how tightly wrapped I am, and how much anxiety it would cause me to deviate from schedule or alter my routine.  At some point, I stopped wearing a watch.  I found I was checking it far too often during the day, and I came to believe it was creating stress for me.  Am I on time?  Am I spending too long on this project?  I stopped wearing a watch and the first few days were a withdrawal.  Then it became ok.

I had always been an anxious traveler; through yoga I came to realize some of that was my need to stick to schedule which, let’s say when traveling from Florida to Ohio at Christmas with a blizzard around the corner, is just not reasonable.   For many reasons, sticking to a schedule when traveling is just not always feasible, and I started to let go of some of that stress too.

I’ve come to realize over time just how rigid my life and thinking used to be. Everytime I push the corners a little bit, it becomes clear to me how small that box was. I have less self-induced anxiety. I have alot more boundaries to push and I’m finding I trip over them every day; some days I can move past them and other days I can’t but I still know where to find them for another day.

2010 was a very quick year! The fall kind of snuck up on me, then it was somehow Thanksgiving, Christmas flew by and here we are on New Year’s Eve.

2010 was kind of a messy year in my yoga practice. I started the year with all good intentions of becoming stronger and working on more advanced balances and asanas and I just kept hurting myself. Lesson number 1 – just because you can get into a position doesn’t necessarily mean you should be there.

Sometimes we let ego or ambition get too far ahead of us and force the body into a position it really doesn’t want to be in. But there’s no softening, no acceptance by the body. Not unlike fitting a round peg into a square hole, something’s gonna give. Lesson number two: backing off from time to time is not a bad thing.

Because I can only get to class usually twice a week, I try to get to one low to the mat class and one active class. Besides working above my level, the active classes also give me the opportunity to learn new flows I can incorporate into my classes. But sometimes I’ve found myself trying to force my body into a position it did not want to be in. I could feel the creaking and pulling and while I felt some softening, there wasn’t enough give to really feel confident in the position.

Bottom line for this year is that I intend to try to hurt myself less. I’m going to work more on proper alignment and technique, as well as building strength, before charging into the really fun looking stuff that looks light and carefree, but I haven’t found the lightness yet. I’m going to work on finding the lightness too.

Those are my yoga resolutions for 2011. I’m hoping that by taking the more passive approach, things will come with less challenge.

Religion is always a difficult subject. Wars have been fought over religion and religious freedoms. Everyone believes their religion is the “right” one and some are zealous about it.

Many people who practice yoga have entwined their spiritual life with their yoga practice. Many practice simply hatha yoga. Lots of us have a belief system but enjoy the spiritual aspect of yoga as well. The bottom line is that you can fit yoga and your spiritual life together easily.

I’ve had people tell me they’ve left yoga classes because the teachers have concentrated on the spiritual aspect too much. I think it’s fair to say that a teacher is going to teach what he or she is comfortable with and sometimes that will include spirituality, sometimes with chants and music, sometimes with readings from sacred scriptures, even just opening or closing with a prayer. As a student, you have to do what you are comfortable with and if you are rehabilitating an injury, you may not want any deities with your yoga. That’s fair and certainly doable.

If you are uncomfortable with the way a teacher handles the spiritual aspects of class, don’t be embarrassed to ask a teacher if that was a special class, or if there is always an emphasis on the spiritual side of the practice. That should guide you as to whether or not you want to return to that class.

I’ve also had students tell me they felt uncomfortable with chanting. I’ve always given the same advice: if you attend a class where the teacher chants, and you’re not sure what it means or uncomfortable with it because of your own belief system, simply recite one of your prayers in your mind.

Yoga not only makes you flexible, it is flexible. It can be strenuous or gentle. It can flow or be in a very hot room. There is spirituality behind yoga, but you only have to include only what makes you comfortable in your own practice. I’m not going to pretend I’m any kind of expert on any religion, but I do know that once you open your mind to a yoga practice, balancing the spiritual side can be equally challenging. But as with so many other things, if you really want to do it, you will find a way, and not use religion as a reason not to practice yoga.

Odd title for a yoga blog, you may be thinking.  Do I need a hammer, saw or screwdriver to do yoga?  Does she want me to do something to the “tool” down the street whose dog barks at 2:00 a.m.?   No and no.

In yoga, we learn lots of tools for dealing with everything from headache to stress (both physical and mental) to a stuffy nose to a lack of focus.  There are certainly people out there who think of yoga as mainly affecting the physical body, but between mediation, breathing, and kriyas, there are lots of other things that we learn that help us through our day to day life with less difficulty.  But even the most diligent yogi will forget from time to time.  You may be under alot of stress, suffering from hot flashes or a really tight low back.  Yoga can give you the ability to handle all those issues, and many more.

After a recent gynecological surgery, I started experiencing hot flashes – YAY! – super fun and just as miserable as everyone has told me they would be.  I know from my reading that breathing will help curb hot flashes.  But did I remember that the first time I had a hot flash?  Nope.  For the first week or two, I just suffered through not remembering that I already had the ability to help myself.

From About.com:  “Deep breathing techniques can shorten hot flashes and make them milder. Teach yourself to start slow, deep breaths as soon as you feel a flash coming on. Take as deep a breath as you can, and hold it a moment before letting it out slowly. Expanding your rib cage can help trigger the parasympathetic nervous system, which calms you down and helps regulate temperature.

If you practice deep breathing techniques, like yoga breathing or Pilates breathing, before you actually need them, they will come more naturally during the stress and embarrassment of a hot flash episode. Train ahead of time, and then breathe through the heat. Relax, and let your breath shorten the flash.”

Let your breath shorten the flash … how many times in a yoga class have you heard your instructor talk about the breath …. hundreds.  Are you ever stuck in traffic or confronted with a whiney child and you take a deep breath in and out (perhaps more than once).  Your body is calming itself.  There are multiple types of breathing in yoga that can be used as tools to get you through a variety of situations, both physical and mental.

But here’s the thing – in the “heat” of the moment (no pun intended after all that hot flash talk) you may forget that you have all this information and knowledge at your fingertips.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve experienced a stomach ache, cramps, or headache and contacted one of my teachers for assistance.  Most of the time when I get their feedback, in my head I’m thinking “Of course, I knew that.  Why didn’t I think of that?”

This is by no means meant to be an expansive treatise on the different aspects of yoga and how they can help you get through your day to day life, other than toning, strengthening and stretching the physical body.  This is simply meant to remind you – if you’ve ever taken a pranayama (breathing) workshop or meditation or you have experienced several different kriyas, don’t forget them.  Use them in your day to day life.  Spend five minutes in the morning and evening in a quiet, contemplative meditation and see just how that one ten-minute a day change can positively affect your life.  And don’t forget to use your tools!

Recently I abused my body in a workshop and ended up with a very sore, tight left shoulder/neck. I was very uncomfortable, but then began to experience some numbness and tingling in my fingerpads and extreme sensitivity in my wrist and elbow. This made me very nervous. Having been a personal injury paralegal for a number of years, I knew that numbness and tingling and sensitive nerves was not a good thing.

In the meantime I tried to continue my practice. In the first days I felt confident that it was just my normal shoulder crud with additional soreness from overuse. I got a couple of massages, which helped, but it got to the point where I couldn’t raise my arm beyond 45 degrees without serious pain and cracking. So I thought I might actually rest it for a bit, and alternate ice and heat (and Toast), along with some prescription ibuprofen. That seemed to help some. But I couldn’t help but notice that the Toast was losing it’s heat or that the pain and discomfort was getting worse and less predictable.

At this point at a previously scheduled doctor’s appointment, I mentioned it to my doctor. He immediately scheduled me for a nerve conduction study and EMG both of which were normal, thank goodness. I’ve been told to take it easy and have a follow up in six weeks. Muscle relaxers have worked wonders.

Once I accepted that my shoulder was not going to loosen up after a few days, I began to focus on the gentler side of my practice. When I attended class I only took the simplest form of each asana, but really worked on my form and breath. I couldn’t do much with the shoulder, it was really locked up, so just did what I could and really didn’t push to my edge, but I did try to work as hard as I could within my restrictions.

Now that my shoulder seems to be substantially better, I know that I have to accept my limitations. I can’t just try to power through. I have to take a step back and work on some basics before I can move forward again. But for every step back, I like to think I will take several steps forward.

If you will allow it, the effect of yoga on your mood can be profound. I’ve seen it, and I’ve experienced it, but since everything begins with the individual, the individual must allow it to happen.

Look, you can come to a yoga class with an open heart and mind and be open to whatever experience may come your way. Or you can be dragged unwillingly to a yoga class, with a closed mind or preconceived notions, and get absolutely nothing out of it.

So a definite prerequisite to the effects of yoga on you would be taking your yoga when you are ready. When you can leave any judgment at the door, you can open yourself to the experience.

We’ve all gone into class before in a bad mood. Whether it’s been a rough day, you don’t feel great, something is weighing on your mind, or you just feel sad, there are plenty of times and reasons that you enter class not in the best frame of mind. In that position, if you can be open to the class, listen to your teacher’s words without thinking too much, without being overanalytical or trying to think ahead. Be present in that time, that space, that moment. Try to use your breath to focus so that you can let the monkey mind quiet. Just let yourself go.

When you finish the class, examine your mood. You will invariably find that it’s lighter, that your chest feels less tight, your mind clearer and your focus more clear. You may even be able to solve a problem or two without the constant chatter of an unquiet mind.

I have experienced this progression as a student. I am privileged to see this progression in other students when I teach. When someone comes to class distracted, anxious or otherwise out of sorts, I can see clearly as the class goes on how the yoga effects the student. I can see breathing become more even … relaxation and grace creep into their muscles … faces smooth out … it is truly a privilege to witness, and more or less instant gratification for both me and the student.

This is when I know my offering of yoga is complete, when someone’s mood and point of view have changed so dramatically.

Imagine how nice it would be to start off your day that way. I’m a morning class person, so come visit me Sundays at 9:30 a.m. and Tuesdays at 6:30 a.m.

The light in me bows to the light in you. Namaste.

Body image and eating disorders are topics that are close to my heart.  My sister is a specialist in eating disorders.  As my daughter was growing up, there were far too many of her friends that had either obvious symptoms of an eating disorder or a clear eating disorder.  It’s scary.

As an American woman, I’ve been bombarded with images of what my body should look like my entire life.  While those images have changed slightly over the years, they are usually an unattainable figure of thinness, often assisted by editing and PhotoShop, that have warped our ideas of what a woman should look like.

Lots and lots of female yoga teachers are tiny.  When you see pictures of female master teachers, often the first thing you think is – look at those abs, those arms.  How long do I have to practice to look like that?  Often we overlook what is being done and focus on the body.

Practicing and teaching yoga has changed that perspective.  Do I still look at my teacher’s arms and think “someday”?  Sure I do.  But first I look at see what her arms are doing.  If she’s doing handstands, I look to see what she’s doing that I’m not.  If she’s in a one-armed balance posture, I pull into my core and try really hard to get there.  Yoga has taught me to look beyond the body and look at what the body can do.  My body has grown so much stronger and more flexible over the years that it is hard not to want to translate that into how my body looks.  I work very hard to mentally take that focus off the way a woman looks, but to consider whether that woman looks healthy and strong.

Yoga can change your perspective for the better, and one of the ways it does is by giving you confidence in your body.  When you have confidence, you feel far less pressure to conform to what the media would like us to believe is the optimum body type.  Allow yourself that privilege.

Today, Thanksgiving, I have given thanks for everything from my wonderful family and friends to the yummy pumpkin pie with homemade whipped cream. Like many of us, I have more to be thankful for than not.

I am thankful for my yoga practice, which brings such joy and peace to my life. I am thankful for my teacher and mentor, Angel, who continuously challenges and encourages my practice. I am thankful that I found yoga and that it has turned into such a significant part of my life.

Yoga has touched every aspect of my life, from my point of view (much more optimistic than I used to be) to my physicality and focus.

Today of all days remember every little thing you have in your life to be thankful for, and hold those things close to your heart until next Thanksgiving. Namaste