Teacher Training Day One: Welcome to Teacher Training, Now You're a Vegan

I arrived on my first day of yoga teacher training bright eyed and clad in lululemon- ready to dive into the depths of yoga knowledge in front of me.

Maybe I should back up, "how did I end up here?" you may ask. Aren't you in law school and doing a million other activities? Uh, yes, I just like to overwhelm myself with activities.

The truth is I've been thinking about getting certified for years. Recently I've felt a greater push towards getting certified. So, I went to Wanderlust in Vermont with my lovely girls Lara and Molly and when I came back I knew the time had come to finally get certified.

Then like magic Fred Busch's website appeared on my iPhone beckoning me to come and sweat my asana off. I skipped out of work early and strutted in stilettos into Fred's studio clad in a suit, I did not appear to be yoga ready. But, I was and I am, and so days later I arrived at my first day of teacher training.

I took two classes taught by other instructors before training even began. Now, this is hot yoga. My first yoga class I ever took at age 15 was Bikram. I've done hot yoga. I ran a studio that had hot yoga. I have never been this hot in my life. I sweated my asana off to say the least.

Day one of training was a flood of information. Asanas to learn. IN SANSKRIT. Homework. Every day. So much yoga to do. And now I'm a vegan.

You ask: Rachel, when did you decide to do that!?!

Answer: I reference October 2010 for 6 weeks while living in Alaska I was a vegan. I also had time there. Like, tons of time. I cooked. Lots. I made incredible gourmet vegan meals three times a day. I actually made my own salad dressing and bottled it. I made kick ass vegan cupcakes. Now flash forward to July 2012. I work 50 hours a week, as an intern, an unpaid intern. Then I teach spin. And I practice yoga. Plus yoga teacher training. Aaaaand I occasionally try to see my boyfriend.  Allegedly I have a family, I don't see them very frequently, they may or may not live down the street. So time to cook vegan meals- not so much. I'm essentially a vegetarian, but I have a confession. I love cheese. A lot. Veganism is hard for me. Thus, you can imagine my shock when I was informed that I am now a vegan. At least for the foreseeable future.

A new pintrest board was immediately created. Recipes are being pinned furiously, feel free to make suggestions.

Other important life changes from day one, I was also informed that I have officially had my last day off of yoga. For the rest of my life. I'm obviously happier about doing the yoga everyday than being a vegan.

And lastly- I'm not allowed to complain. For the rest of training. Sooooo my sarcastic jewyness is not appreciated.

So, none of the above was complaining. The reality is I am so grateful that I have this opportunity. I am the luckiest girl in the world and I know it. I have a loooooong road ahead of me, and you're all coming along with me :)

Keeping it sweaty,
Rach

Day Two Teacher Training: Talk Less, Say More

I started on my mat at 10:30am. Not an unbearable time by any means. I actually had a great morning, work up with my puppy and my boyfriend. Had a little family breakfast. Picked up my new yogini friend Tara, and headed to class.

And then we started our practice with Gaby. Gaby looks like a nice girl. She has a sweet smile and a hug to greet you with. She has an awesome yoga voice. She doesn't annoy you with fake soothing, she's genuine in every word she says.

She was out to kill yesterday. I have LITERALLY never sweated so much in my life. I had to walk out at one point, just to breathe some not hot air. I took that as an opportunity to look in the mirror (p.s. never look in the mirror in the middle of a hot yoga class, you will not be happy with what is looking back at you). I looked like a drowned rat.

You see friends, I set mat up right in front of the heater, a mistake I will never make again. It was sweltering. I sweat buckets. And you know what, so did everyone in the room. I was a little miserable. In my head I complained (Fred, if you're reading this, don't kill me).

Then I surrendered, I was so exhausted I just stopped being able to resist. It's something I'm not particularly good at, but it's part of my mantra and I'm working on it. And when I surrendered, when I stopped fighting the heat and the pain and fatigue, I got strong. It wasn't so hard anymore. I went back and finished the last 20 minutes, still sweating my asana off, but feeling pretty kick ass.

Then after sweating for 90 minutes I got to start the real deal- I had 4 hours of teacher training ahead of me.

No one will be surprised by my next admission. I talk too much. In general, in specific, just always, I talk way too much. It's like a genetic disease, everyone in my family talks. Or perhaps it's a gift. Certainly it's lead to a career path that allows me to speak exorbitant amounts in front of a captured captive group of defendants audience.

I learned on day two of training that my propensity for verbosity isn't always a blessing. One of our tasks was to teach portions of a class to each other. This is something I feel super comfortable doing, I taught yoga for almost 2 years in college to 6th grade boys in and I teach spin every week now. On top of that I was an elementary school teacher for a year. I spend all day talking in court! On the record! In front of scary people that I'm trying to impress!

And therein lies the lesson: I talk too much. Pablo taught our teacher training yesterday, and as he came around to observe us, he gave me some much needed correction. I needed to use fewer words to explain more information.

"When someone only has three breaths in a pose you can't be saying all that crazy shit," he explained, "get to the point, just tell them where they're going." Harsh? Yea. Correct? Hell yea.

So it's a lesson I'm taking off the mat and into the world with me. Less filler words, less mindless jabbering, more meaning.

Namaste,
Rachel