Yoga Teacher Training with Laurel

Dear Laurel and my fellow 500 YTTs,

After our session last Saturday I was thinking about a metaphor for how I felt. Cooking is a big part of my life so I naturally thought about how I feel when I know I have to cook dinner. If the fridge is full when I open it, I get inspired; but if it is empty my brain goes into spasm (just like overworked back muscles). A day of being in your company does for my yoga what a full fridge does for my cooking!

Naturally, cooking for foodies is harder than cooking for people who don’t know the difference. It’s also a challenge to cook for people you don’t know. I never feel stressed cooking for my family or best buddies (some of who are crazy foodies). I know that they love me whether my meal is great or not. They are the kind of guests that bring a dish and ask to help out, or share how they make something I’ve got simmering, inspiring me to experiment the next time I make that dish.

Saturday I felt nervous about teaching. In my opinion you guys are yogadies (foodies) so there is the pressure to perform, and whats more I don’t know you very well! How could I relax and have fun? I realize that I have to get to know you better and that takes time; and that I have to let go of what you think of me as a teacher, but that takes confidence, the very confidence I am trying to get by doing this 500 hour training!

As a freshman in college I used to get really nervous about exams. Then, my sophomore year, I met a friend who taught me how to organize a study group. Frequently for midterms a professor would give the class 5 possible essay questions (one of which would appear on the test). As a freshman I would have stayed up to the wee hours several nights in a row writing all 5 myself. As a sophomore I would get 4 classmates together and divide the questions, planning to meet the next night w/ 4 photocopies of each assigned essay to share. Then all we had to do was memorize. It worked like a dream. That’s kind of how I see our group. We haven’t had time to get to know each other but we’ve got a tough class to pass. We can go off on our own and even compete against each other or work smart by sharing. This saves time and effort and you actually end up learning more since people tend to have different strengths and weaknesses.

Now, you are getting to know me….I like to eat, I like to cheat, and I like to sleep….. ( I’d rather not say “cheat” but it rhymes better than “share”) Over time I hope to become a friend to each of you. I hope that some of my favorite dishes might become yours, and that yours might become mine. I hope that you may take my favorite dishes and make them better. I hope I can do the same. All the while having a good time.

Looking ahead to the next two years I know that we will share a lot together and along the way we will all become better cooks. And that’s important because it is the food which initially brings people to our table, but it is the company, conversation and sharing, the real pleasures of the table, that will make them stay.

Namaste,
Maria