500 Hour Yoga Teacher Training

On the last day of our 200 hour yoga teacher training, the owner of Lotus House of Yoga talked to us about the next level of training, the 500 hour yoga teacher training. This training would be an additional 300 hours of training. While the 200 hour training is seen as the "undergrad" level of training, so to speak, the 500 hour is the "masters" level.

It's a very small monetary commitment to sign up for the training, and then the weekend trainings are workshop based and pay as you go. While I don't ever intend on teaching yoga full-time, this really appealed to me. When I'm excited and passionate about something, I want to learn everything I possibly can about it! I decided I'd sign up in early 2016, and set aside the money I make teaching to pay for the workshops as they come up.

The workshops are primarily in Omaha and Lincoln, and there are quite a few of my classmates that are planning to do the 500 hour as well, so we could certainly carpool and share lodging when I'm down there, which will be great.

Recently my yoga studio announced that they are bringing up instructors to Sioux Falls for trainings, each of the weekends totally 25 hours toward my 500 hour certification. When I told Kyle about it,  he asked if I wanted the workshops for my wedding present. YES!

So in almost a month, I'll be starting my 500 hour training, and I'm so excited!

Weekly Training Recap

Monday I started the day with a BarreAmped class with a new-to-me instructor. 

Tuesday I worked late due to an event, so I got to attend one of my favorite instructor's power vinyasa class in the morning. 

Wednesday I took a rest day and Thursday I went to a yoga sculpt class with my favorite sculpt class. I was lucky that my co-worker Emily wanted to give sculpt a try so I had a buddy! Yay buddies! 

Friday it was straight from work to yoga teacher training which started with my first experience with Astanga yoga. We practiced for 90 minutes with the room set up like a traditional astanga studio with two lanes facing inward with an empty lane in between us. We got to listen to the sanskrit counting and poses that we had been instructed to memorize for this weekend. Eeps.

Saturday morning we kicked off the teacher training by doing a 1 hour inversion class. I'm not very confident in my inversion practice so it was great to learn some proper technique and alignment as well as some exercises to get me flipping upside down! I also got to practice with one of my favorite pug owners Mary! She's an awesome yogi, so hopefully we get to play around more frequently! Pug yogi in the dog park has been thrown out... .somewhat seriously. :)

Sunday morning we started our session with a 30 minute yoga session where we focused on deep stretching. It may have been an "easy" flow but my arms were so dead that downward facing dog made me feel like my arms were going to fall off. :/ Throughout the day we practiced tons of Sun A and B salutations, so I feel like I have a few hours of yoga in on Sunday.