06.29.10
Posted in Yoga at 11:26 am by Jennifer
I’m realizing as a Yoga and Pilates teacher, how much my students teach me about myself. I learn how to communicate better and how to reach out and connect with people to make them feel comfortable and to hold the space for them to challenge their limits and to push their comfort zones.
When teaching a new variation or a new asana I feel the same limitations, in trying to communicate the details of something new. I feel the same insecurities my students sometimes do in trying to perform to be the best that I can be. Sometimes I succeed and sometimes it doesn’t go as smoothly as planned. But I’m learning to be just as gentle on myself as I am with my students. That as a teacher I am also a student. That my abilities and my strengths are always growing and changing. I cannot get hung up on perfection, just to be my best. Because there is always that inner judge that will feel not good enough and that leaves me wanting to give up. I must hang in there and “fight” for myself, to believe in myself and to keep putting myself out there. I will grow, and and have good days and not so strong ones but that really is ok.
We teach what we most want to learn ourselves. And I am continuing to learn much more than I ever expected.
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06.09.10
Posted in Yoga at 7:11 am by Jennifer
Mommy & Me Yoga with Jennifer
Come join me in this open free style class that’s great for kids and parents, and all family members to practice together. Connect with your kids and other families. This class is all levels. Beginners, go with the flow, advanced show us what’s possible. Come with a fun childlike imagination and practice breathing (pranayama), we all need to breathe, move into fun animal and earth poses, sing songs.. “If your happy and your know it clap your hands”, and connect with other open minded yogis interested in having fun!
Every toddler needs an adult yoga buddy to participate. Both toddlers and adults should dress to move. Class geared towards toddlers but all ages of children are welcome! 6 week session starting Thursday June 17 through July 22nd meeting at 10:00-11:00 a.m..
Preregistration preferred, space is limited so enroll today by contacting Jen at (970) 412-8740 or enroll directly on-line at www.healthylifeunlimited.com under schedule click on Camps tab on the upper right side of the page.
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01.24.10
Posted in Yoga at 4:23 am by Jennifer
What a beautiful day for a yoga practice. I feel so calm even though the class I took this morning was a bit of a challenge. I am so grateful I was able to quiet my mind and open my heart so even though I felt the “discomfort” I could move right through it. Its funny how one day I’m not making the connection and some days its like “oh! I get it!” I can hear something over and over in a yoga class (or in life) and my body might not respond to the cue but then one day the teacher says it again and it clicks. That is where I am today. The mediation part of my practice “clicked”. I was able to stay in the moment. And I must have gratitude of my awareness within this moment, for tomorrow I might have the ahha moment again for this or another awareness that will deepen my practice, that today I’m not yet conscious of.
If you want to become whole,
let yourself be partial.
If you want to become straight,
let yourself be crooked.
If you want to become full,
let yourself be empty.
If you want to be reborn,
let yourself die.
If you want to be given everything,
give everything up.
- Tao Te Ching
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11.23.09
Posted in Yoga at 7:29 pm by Jennifer
My Journey to a Yoga Practice
I was drawn to yoga as a college student 13 years ago. I was in a transitional time in my life and yoga offered some sort of refuge from the stress of the unknown. On the floor of my dorm I perched a yoga book against the bed and began exploring yoga poses and what was exactly happening to me as I held each pose. Sometimes in the simplicity of a pose I would find my mind wondering or bored. Harder poses where I lacked strength or flexibility I would give up on or hold back on challenging my body. But somewhere in between the limitations of my body and the chaos of my mind I found myself coming back to the practice especially when I felt “stressed”. In the beginning just the act of shutting off the TV, turning on relaxing music, lighting a candle and maybe doing a handful of poses until I got bored or tired began to restore my mind and in turn relaxed my body. Of course I judged this effort in not being enough. I thought I “should” be doing an hour practice, I should go to more yoga classes, I should be more flexible, stronger, and whatever other “should” I come up with.
But today I realize that what I did do was nurture the seed that I planted to begin a journey towards a yoga practice that would take me deeper physically, mentally and spiritually. You have to start somewhere, and where I started didn’t have to look perfect, it didn’t have to be all or nothing. If I could continue to commit to showing up even in the simplest way everyday, I would invest in myself and I would grow.
Yoga continues to teach me to surrender my mind and body to be in the moment, to allow myself, with all of my limitations to be present, to hold the space for growth at my own pace. And just maybe today I will push past those limitations, maybe in micro movements or maybe in leaps, but all in the safety of acceptance of myself, of others and with the inner eye of awareness. Today, that is the intention of my practice and as a teacher I honor and nurture that for my students.
As we enter into the holiday season, closing out the year spending time with family and friends and begin to prepare for a new beginning in January, it becomes ever so important to make the effort and the time for a yoga practice. To quiet my mind and connect with awareness, peace, acceptance, compassion, balance, strength, and all of the themes that a yoga practice connects me to on the mat, so that I continue to carry that out to my life off of the mat.
You cannot do yoga. Yoga is your natural state. What you can do are yoga exercises, which may reveal to you where you are resisting your natural state. ~Sharon Gannon
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