Meet Jane, future teacher, awesome yogi!

June 21, 2012

So I am doing it. I am in. The check has been cashed. Airfare purchased. Here I come Bikram… Me and 400 plus other yogis in a Radisson Hotel at the Los Angeles airport for 9 weeks this Fall.  Bikram Yoga Teacher Training Fall 2012… Holy crap.

It is kind of funny how this idea came to me. First it started as a deeply unconscious thing: I would come home from yoga and think about what the teacher had said about their training experience. Running it over and over in my head, but not really apply it to my own life. It didn’t take long before the idea of teaching became a day dream: something I was allowed to think about but never thought I would actually do. And then it happened. We took a trip to Vail and it was 80 degrees. Not really ideal for skiing. My husband Brooks decided to join me at my Bikram class since skiing seemed out of the question. After the class was over, he turned to me and said how much he loved the class. Instantly, Bikram yoga started to become a daily topic of conversation. As we talked more and more, it became clear that this was it: the thing I had been looking for in my life for so many years. Deciding to go for the teacher training was almost not even a decision as much as it was a natural evolution. It was somehow always there and one day, I finally saw it.

I am spending my days preparing for this new journey in many ways.

1. I practice Bikram 5-7 times a week. I will start to practice a bit more once mid-summer comes in order to prepare myself for two classes a day for nine weeks. I practice at Bikram Yoga Chadds Ford, Pa with the wonderful and talented teachers Megan van Riet and Heather Dunghe, co-owners of the studio. This is a fantastic studio with a great family of yogis including teachers Carolyn Jensen, Chris Fluck and Chris Robyn.

2. I am learning the art of memorization.  I need to memorize 47 single spaced pages of dialog for the training, a task that many people save for their time at training. Since I am unemployed and my teachers are willing to coach me this summer, I have jumped in and hope to get through as much of the dialog as possible before September comes. Memorization is a crazy thing. At first, I could not retain more than 7-8 lines at a time. I really thought there might be something wrong with me! But I soon discovered that I am able to remember words when I listen to them over and over as opposed to reading them over and over. I guess that makes sense… I do have a good memory for song lyrics! So far I have memorized the first three postures…

3. I am trying to complete the to-do list for our home before I leave on September 16th. The heating guys are here as I write installing a new heating/cooling system. In fact, I would have gotten through a good part of the forth posture today if the heating guys weren’t so distracting. Why complete this list before I go? It is a good question, especially since I have adopted my new no-stress lifestyle… I guess it’s the architect in me? Maybe it is because I always seem to do things in threes? Because Bikram yoga isn’t challenge enough? Maybe it is because I actually think there are more hours in the day then there actually are…

In 87 days I will enter into one of the biggest challenges I have ever taken on, (and I have a masters in architecture!) but somehow it feels totally different than the challenges of the past. I feel completely calm and relaxed about the idea of doing this program. In the past, I would over-think something like this to the point of extreme stress. Sure, it will stink to leave my husband for nine weeks. Sure, it will be really odd to go to LA for nine weeks and not leave the airport for the majority of the time. And don’t even get me started about the fact that they don’t feed us… but it’s yoga. Nine weeks of yoga is also the most indulgent thing I have ever done…so who could argue with that? I can only wonder why it took until I was 39 years old to realize that I could do something that I love for a living. How exciting!

We think it’s REALLY exciting. Follow Jane’s journey on her blog. And make sure to take her first class at Bikram Yoga Chadds Ford, when she returns from training in November. See you there!