Yoga Teacher Training Weekend One

On March 13th, I began my first night of yoga teacher training. A group of 20+ women met at my favorite yoga studio at 5:30pm for a great end of the week power vinyasa class. The instructor is the owner of Lotus House of Yoga studio of Lincoln and Omaha, and she's amazing. It was the first class I've taken from MC Sweet, and it won't be the last (spoiler alert: two more throughout the weekend!).

After we got our sweat on, we sat in a giant yogi circle and shared information about ourselves and delved into some historical information about yoga's origins. While being a self-proclaimed nerd, I must confess: I hate history. But MC is such a great teacher and storyteller that I was super engaged and enamored.

When training was over at 9pm, I hurried off to pick up some dinner as I rushed straight from an 8:30-5pm work shift, straight to teacher training and was s-t-a-r-v-i-n-g.  Mental note: pack snacks! A beer was the perfect assistant to winding down for the night before we started again the next morning!

Saturday morning started with a power vinyasa flow class open to any yogis in town, and we packed the studio FULL. It was one of the hardest classes I've taken, but it was awesome. The class was focused on the sun, and it was great to enjoy it (=suffer through it? jk) while the sun was streaming through the windows on us. 

After class we broke down a couple of basic poses--plank, downward facing down, and half lift, and we all realized that we're doing everything wrong. WELCOME TO YOGA TEACHER TRAINING, GUYS! It just goes to show that that's why it's called a practice--always room for improvement!

Saturday afternoon was more background information as well as some introduction to sanskrit. Eeps!

Sunday we started with a one hour power vinyasa flow class, and my co-worker Emily got to attend along side of me. The class was milder than Saturday's but we focused on moving very slowly during different poses and also did some intense core work right off of the bat so my abs were screaming for daaaaays.

Once we got back in the studio for training, MC asked us to grab spirit animal cards and share them with the group. I drew the stag card and was stoked because...'arry Pottah.... duh. 

I joked that I hoped there was a pug card, and that surely if there were one, I would've drawn it. And then I jokingly searching pug spirit animal information online after class and came up with this information: 

If Pug is your Animal Totem;

You are attentive to your close family members, have a great deal of charm and are very playful by nature. You enjoy quiet solitude but are also very sociable. You are very clever with problem solving, embrace change quickly and wholeheartedly, and accept things easily for what they are. You have a keen and happy go lucky attitude toward life in general and are an animated story teller. Often you will have friends on the edge of their seat with your tales.

Uh..... spot on? Holy heck.

One of the most profound moments of the weekend was when MC spoke to us about anxiety and depression. She stated that if you have issues with anxiety (hello, hi, I'm Jeri, I worry about how much I worry....) you are likely spending too much time focusing on the future, and if you have issues with depression, you are devoting too much energy focusing on the past. And one of the ways to ease either or both of these sensations is to focus on the present. 

This seems like the most simple explanation I've ever heard, but it was so profound my brain practically splattered on the walls of the yoga studio right then and there.

When I had done my introduction on Friday night, I stated that one of my goals as a person was to be more in the moment, and present, so once MC shared this information, I knew I had to pick up a new mantra band.... be present.

The weekend was amazing, and eye opening, and potentially life changing as silly as that may sound based on the minimal recap. But I'm so thankful I decided to make the leap to do this!

Namaste.