Locking The Knee

I really don’t enjoy Bon Jovi’s music that much, but when 400+ people are singing a Bon Jovi song all at the same time it’s pretty cool and I was singing along loudly. That’s how we started our Wednesday morning class, it’ was our official half way point in training. Everyone is working so very hard in all aspects of the training, weather it be class or posture clinics. You can really see the love and dedication for the yoga. I feel honored to be a part of all of this. By now everyone has really got a routine going and I can see people starting to transform into teachers. Everyone is starting to develop an awareness and a confidence that YES – I am a Bikram Yoga Teacher.

Bikram is Back – “I Don’t Want Chicken Shit In My Class”
Throughout the training, Bikram comes and goes as he travels a lot. The energy level around training increases when Bikram is here. Classes with Bikram are long (sometimes 2 hours)  and somewhat intimidating. If he doesn’t see that you’re doing the poses properly he will stop class and make you do the pose until he is satisfied. It makes a lot of sense actually, how are we going to teach a pose if we don’t know how to do it properly? Lately I have not been able to most of the standing series. I messed up my knee somehow, I have no idea how. There wasn’t any particular moment where I felt any sharp pain. I just woke up on Sunday morning and my knee was clicking and popping and was really swollen. Now it hurts to place weight on my knee. I have been so worried that Bikram was going to call me out as I stand there while everyone else does the postures. He never said a word to me, I think he saw that I had an injury and was doing my best. So after every class I’ve been icing my knee and propping it up to reduce swelling. The nurse tells me that I just have to stay careful until the end of training. It’s somewhat depressing, but I’m thinking that this knee injury will help me become a better teacher. By experiencing and dealing with my knee injury I can help my students as I might have a better idea what they are going through. I guess it’s all about the way I look at the situation that matters. I’m trying to view the injury as a learning experience and make it part of my teacher training.

Bikram taught two times this week, Jim Kallet taught one, and Emmy always teaches Thursday morning. All the other classes were taught by visiting instructors. This week the heat in the room went up. Lately the heat has been pretty good, but classes this week were hot and the one on Friday night with Jim was blazing. People were melting and the energy in the class was all over the place. I think that it was difficult because it was Friday and everyone has worked so hard this week. Monday’s class was taught by a very flamboyant John Salvatore. He is part of the Jersey Boys cast and does shows at The Palazzo in Las Vegas. He had a great ending to his class:

‎”Watch your thoughts because they become your words; watch your words because they become your actions; watch your actions because they become your habits; watch your habits because they become your character; watch your character because it becomes your destiny.”

Other great classes this week were taught by Julina Olmstead and a staff member here at training named Balwan. Juliana taught full jam packed verbatim dialogue class. We could hear the smile in her voice. It was such a treat to take her class as I’ve been following her on her blog for such a long time. Balwan is a favorite around here at training. He has an honest and pure nature about him and he is always smiling. After the deep backbend, camel pose, he said “This is the feeling you get when you are falling in love with yourself”. The moment’s after camel pose can be quite intense and this is a great way of looking at those emotions that come up after camel pose.

My New Family – “I Got Friends in Low Places”
Just like Bon Jovi, I really don’t enjoy Garth Brook’s music that much either, but I thought the line from his song seemed appropriate. All the trainee’s have been broken into groups for posture clinics I’m really starting to get to know people better and I’m building new friendships. The coolest thing is that most of the people I’m getting to know are either from another state, or another country. Now that I’m getting certified, I can go anywhere in the world and teach a class as long as they are teaching in English. I am now part of the Bikram family of teachers, and no matter when a person has graduated, I can share a bond with them that is this teacher training experience. This week I designed the t-shirt for the training. Bikram is famous for saying that his yoga makes you “stress proof, money proof, fire proof, bullet proof, all proof”. So with the help of one of the staff members, Jessica, we created this shirt below.

Teacher Training T-Shirt Design

So here are a few photos of some of my new friends. These are just the few that I’ve been able to get photos with, and I’m planning on getting photos of more of them. Even after being here five weeks I’m still meeting and bonding with new people. As promised, I’ve included a photo of Toby, my room mate. He is really dedicated to this training and lately he gets up at 6:00 every morning to learn the dialogue. Next photo is Andrea, my friend from Hungary. The other day I had to deliver my posture with two huge sopping bags in my hands. The leads do things like this all the time to help people overcome some sort of problem with delivering the dialogue. They were trying to get me to use my voice in a more powerful way and by restricting my hands I could not make any gestures. Anyway, Andrea was demonstrating and kept laughing at me with the bags in my hands. It was so hard to get the dialogue out. My friend Shelly is from Houston, and we talk a lot about Texas food – BBQ, Chips and Queso, Tex-Mex. We’re really missing the hometown food favorites. She is a very practical person and we’ve had many conversations about the logistics of the training and why they have structured the training like it is. My new friend Kyra is one of the bendiest people here at training. The first week we were here Bikram asked her to come up on stage and demonstrate her back bend. He had her touching the floor behind her – amazing. My friend Vicky is from Canada and she is built like a rock, but she is one of the sweetest people I’ve met here at training. Lucille Allen is a wonderful friend of mine from Bikram Yoga Mobile. I’ve been helping Lucille with her marketing for a very long time but I’ve never met her face to face. My new friend Adam is planning on working at Bikram headquarters after training is done. He is helping me get some information about Yoga for autistic children. One of the students at my home studio has a child with autism and I promised I’d try to find out if there was any information on how yoga might help with the disorder. Jessica is a staff member here at training and has helped me out of the room several times, she has seen me at my worst. The last photo is of Lisa from Germany. She is actually the first person I met here at training. I was sitting down stairs eating and there were no seats available so I offered a chair by me. Lisa is very sweet and has the best laugh ever.

My Roommate Toby from Europe

Andrea from Hungary

Shelly from Houston, Texas

Kyra from Baltimore, Maryland

Vicky from Winnipeg, Manitoba

Lucille from Bikram Yoga Mobile

Adam from Edmonton, Alberta

Staff Member Jessica from Kansas

Lisa from Germany

This entry was posted on Sunday, October 23rd, 2011 at 5:51 pm and is filed under Bikram Yoga Teacher Training. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.