2/3rds!!!

its really strange for me to constantly be surrounded by so many people. i'm such a loner in the real world, its almost a trial just to have to be social all of the time. i struggle with the need to find alone time, especially with the intense schedule we keep, my alone time is extremely limited. obviously, its been 2 weeks since i've written anything... not that a lot hasn't happened, as week 5 and 6 were definitely the toughest weeks for me. not physically in the yoga room, but mentally and emotionally - and physically, but i was having different issues, not related to sore muscles. 

so the room is better, we're no longer in a torture chamber. well, yes we are, i mean, thats what we paid so much money for, but at least we're not suffocating. they've installed fans (although i think it would have been a much smarter idea to place the fans closer to the floor rather than up 14 feet, as now they are just circulating hot, CO2 air...) and they're taken out a few ceiling tiles so that a little fresh oxygen can get into the room. and they make it a point to open the back doors after the standing series, an hour into class. it makes a world of difference. for the most part no-one has had to leave the room, and only a few have to sit out of any postures. at this point in the training, though, i don't think they are sitting/laying out because they are so physically drained, but more that they have minor injuries or muscular pain that they just can't mentally overcome that class. i've realized just how much it truly is a mind over matter thing. yes, i have many classes where i don't think i can physically do the posture, or i'm thinking ahead and saying to myself, "well, i made it through balancing stick, now how the hell am i going to do triangle??" - but when i can just persevere, and just do the yoga, i just do it. it gets done. and i feel great after. thats living in the moment, not having expectations, because if i expect myself to fail, to give up, to puss out.. i will. so i've started reminding myself how awesome i am :) my new yoga mantra is, "you've got this". and i do. i got a pretty bad heat rash during week 4, but it came and went, and i didn't let it affect me too badly. if i would have stressed out about it i would have only made it worse. i am so much stronger than i was before i came, in every capacity, and i am so much more dedicated to everything this yoga embodies and stands for. i didn't know how deeply this river ran. **how deep is that river? i don't want to know where it's coming from, i don't need to know where it's going to, before i place my trust in you, i just want to know how deep** its very humbling for me, as such a bikram yoga novice to be down here with 300 other trainees, most of whom have been practicing for at least a few years, some as many as 7-10. i feel so lucky that it called to me and pulled me in the right direction when it did, because i don't even know where my life would be right now if it hadn't. but there are no coincidences in life... everything happens for a reason. i am just so blessed that i fell into yoga following my breakdown, and it really, truly, saved my life. it picked me up and took me in the direction i believe i was meant to go. i didn't even know it at the time, but i was meditating daily. i couldn't have called it that, because i was unaware of what i was doing. but i already intuitively detached, in the yogic way. 

i recapped week 5 very briefly last weekend, just to myself, because i had every intention of blogging eventually, but obviously that never happened :) boss left monday, he was doing something like 15 cities over the course of 21/2 weeks, so week 5 was really just jam-packed with dialogue/posture cinic, day and night. we did 6 postures (triangle - trikanasana, standing separate leg head to knee - dandayamana bibhaktapada janushiranasa, tree/toe stand - tadasana with padangustasana, wind-removing - pavanamuktasana, cobra - bujangasana, locust - salabhasana... i just had to show off my sanskrit skills). people were freaking out because we would finish one posture in the afternoon and have to be prepared with another by the evening class. memorization is getting much easier, faster. the earlier postures in the class were really hard to memorize because we still weren't quite familiar with the wording, but now we've internalized the "bikram language" - and it really is a language of its own - that it takes less and less time to get it down. and i am so, so proud of my group 11 superstars. its so amazing to watch someone blossom and breakthrough, especially after a really rough and rocky start. the teachers started telling me that i needed to do corrections on my demonstrators at the end of week 4, and i've been working on that ever since. my demonstrators got a little out of hand during wind-removing because the teacher told them to make sure to give me something to correct, unfortunately they - all 3 - decided to do the exact opposite of every instruction that i gave - lol. so my dialogue for that posture was 50% dialogue and 50% correction. it was fun, and hilarious for all of the observers. and then the teacher said, "welcome to a beginners class! if you have a class full of first-timers, thats what its going to be like". GREAT. but i'm getting so much more comfortable with correcting, i'm actually seeing the students when i look at them. its not just a recitation or a performance, it truly is a dialogue - my words (well, bikrams words coming out of my mouth), their bodies. i dont feel like a fraud anymore - i feel like a budding teacher!! :) this past week i had the same teacher for 2 different postures, and the first time i went up for full-locust michael was asking questions like "where are you from, how long have you been practicing, why do you want to be a yoga teacher" and i told him that the yoga changed my life and i wanted to help others that were looking for that kind of help. so, of course, he wanted to know how it saved my life and i was like, "well, long story short i went through a really rough breakup and didn't know where my life was going and then i found the yoga, or the yoga found me and i never looked back". so then he wanted me to "be a bitch" so he had me dedicate my dialogue to my ex - it was pretty scary, because i really had to tap into my acting skills, he wouldn't accept the fact that i don't hold any anger or frustration anymore. i'm so over the past. but it went well, my demonstrators were a little scared. then on friday i had him again for bow and he wanted me to "dedicate to justin" again (they actually wrote that in the book!!) and i told him again that it was really hard because i'm not angry, so instead he just told me to get mad and scream profanities at my students. so bow was pretty much, "chin on the floor you little fuckers! hold your goddamn feet and kick your legs into the fucking air as hard as you fucking can!! kick harder douchebag, or i'll kick your fucking ass! get your goddamn legs up!" i was so bright red after :) he definitely succeeded in making me uncomfortable, and i'm sure thats what he set out to do, so mission accomplished. 

only 5 more postures to go, i'm certain we'll finish by the end of this coming week. i can't believe we're so far. but the weeks go by so fast, its like, "oh man, its monday!" but when its monday its practically friday. 

rajashree was here last week and gave some great lectures on yoga therapy and the amazing effect bikram yoga has on the sick and ailing. even for those with severely disabling diseases such as cancer and m.s. yoga can do wonders. i don't think that many people understand where the yoga comes from and why it was developed. in short, hatha yoga is a thousands of years old tradition in india, where health-care and medicine was not and is not readily available to the masses. hatha yoga is designed to work every organ, every system in the body in addition to the muscles/tendons/ligaments. yes, its amazing for your physical appearance, but even better for your internal organs, your cardiovascular system, digestive system, nervous system, respiratory... it goes on and on. people think that you have to be physically fit to do yoga, when, in reality, EVERYONE can and should do yoga. those that are out of shape are those who need it the most. it is "the key to the kingdom of health". and youth :) she talked a lot about spirituality and the connection between mind/body, but i won't get into that here and now. 

we got a little treat last night, the hotel put on a beach barbeque for the bikram trainees, complete with a bonfire and marshmallow roasting. it was really great, for a little while it was like we were not at bootcamp :) but its funny because as much as we would love to stay up and hang around the campfire... after a week full of class and clinic... a lot of us wanted to go to bed by 9:30!! it was still a lot of fun. danielle and i have been trying to get out of the compound on saturday nights, just to see something different. week 4 we went to hard-rock with chris, last weekend we went for sushi. this weekend we didn't do an outing, her parents are here so she's off doing something fun, and i'm still exhausted by the week... so i'm staying in. but the bbq was a welcomed retreat from reality for an evening. AND!! we watched them release the baby sea turtles back in the ocean. it was so precious. 

3 weeks to go...i can't believe it. kind of feels like just yesterday we were saying, "yay!! its week 3!" where did those 3 weeks in the middle go?!

we're halfway there...

week 4 recap:

so much happened in this past week that i almost don't even know where to start. well... let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start - sorry, got lost in the memory of musical theater for a minute. 

sooo... monday morning and it's week 4. at this point we've already done over 30 classes. in the heated dungeon. by now we should ALL be prepared to do a 90 minute class without intermission, without interruption. we should all have the strength and lung capacity to not pass out/puke/feel dizzy or light-headed. we've all been practicing for AT LEAST 6 MONTHS TO EVEN BE HERE, not to mention getting a doctors note medically waiving us from any kind of physical liability. physically, we're all strong, able-bodied adults fully capable of doing 2 90 minute classes in a room heated to 105 degrees. and yet, here it is, monday morning and we have a good number of students standing out postures, laying throughout the class, leaving the room. individually i think we all questioned why this was still happening, as we all know ourselves to be much stronger and capable of much more, but when we voiced our concerns about the heat and humidity in the room the only response we got was, "this is what you signed up for. welcome to teacher training". am on monday was pretty brutal, and many of us were sick.   a nasty cold had reared it's ugly head and when you're in such close proximity with 310 people 16 hours out of the day, its pretty inevitable that it'll spread like wildfire. so monday morning was rough for me, i had to sit out the spine strengthening series (laying on your stomach) because there was so much congestion in my chest that laying on my ribcage and compressing the lungs literally took my breath away. the inability to catch my breath had happened before, but this time i didn't get as frusterated as i had before because i factored in the cold. i didn't lay down, and i didn't leave, but i felt bad because it was the first, and only, class that mike taught. unfortunately it may have looked like i was giving up, but the inability to breath makes me rather anxious, and anxiety makes breathing even more difficult. so i had to do what i could do at that point. 

that night boss was back and it was the hardest/hottest class i've ever experienced. the heat was cranked up and the doors were shut. we were being steamed alive and people were dropping like flies left and right. at one point 4 people walked out of the room almost immediately following each other. it was almost unbelievable because you DONT leave the room when the boss is teaching. its just something you don't do. but they did. they felt that they had to, and honestly, with reason. 3/4 of the way through class, after witnessing so many people walk out, lay down, sit out he got so angry and frustrated with us that he stopped class. to lecture us a little about how we are lazy pieces of shit and how he'll never do another teacher training. that he's wasting his time with us because we can't even give him the kind of respect to not do the things that we've been doing (sitting, laying, leaving). he stopped class and didn't resume. we ended with half-tortoise and were told to reconvene in the lecture hall at 9 o'clock. chris thought that we should finish class, continuing through the finals few postures on our own, but when we tried to move onto camel we were yelled at by a visiting teacher for "not respecting his final wishes and leaving". we had no intention of being disrespectful, if anything we thought we could honor him by finishing the class, but apparently that's not how she took it. 

so we were all really anxious for lecture that night, as far as anyone knew something like that had never happened before. with trepidation we all arrived at the lecture hall, and were told by the teachers to sit quietly in our seats and reflect on the situation. they were more nervous and anxious than we all were, edgy and snapping at the students, walking around on eggshells. nobody knew what to expect. i was ready for a long ass-chewing. if the way he was when he left the room was any indication of what would happen later, i was prepared for a long night in the lecture hall. so it was a huge relief when he strolled into the room and hopped onstage with a smile and said, "why are you looking at me like i'm going to yell at you? you think i'm mad? no, i'm not mad. i'm in a good mood". he then proceeded to explain to us why were aren't pieces of chicken shit (at least not completely). how he went back to his room after leaving the yoga studio and deliberated on the situation. almost 10 people have left the training since we started, one being a former member of the coast guard, another a tri-athlete. everyone that has come to training has to be physically capable and rather at the top of their class. so why, after 3 weeks, are we still dropping like flies? why are we still feeling the need to leave the room? why are people still getting sick, running out of the room to throw up? he called around to long-time colleagues and found his answer. never before has he had a yoga room in the basement of a building. never before has there been a structure of the size and capacity as the one we are practicing in, built to hold so many people, and yet without proper ventilation. no air-circulation, and no air-flow from the outside. there are no windows in the studio, as we are underground. surrounded by mirrors, and florescent lighting overhead, its like being in an institution. for the past 3 weeks we've been practicing in a room that has been getting no direct oxygen. not only is it being pumped full of hot, heated air, but add the 70-100% humidity level of the air (it being rainy season and all), and 350 bodies on top of it... we're slowly suffocating by oxygen deprivation. hence the sickness, the light-headedness, the inability to catch the breath. there literally isn't any air to breathe and we were told, "welcome to training". THANK GOD FOR THE BOSS. none of us would have thought of that. and yet when he made mention of it, it was like a lightbulb going off in everyones heads. a weight being lifted off of everyones shoulders. we all just thought it was ourselves. our own practices. we were beating ourselves up, tearing ourselves apart on the inside because we couldn't make it through class... and it was not our fault. that was not what we paid for, what we came here to accomplish. and nobody, not the teachers, not the boss, himself, knows what we went through in that room for the first 4 weeks. because everyday was a different battle with the heat and humidity. every day there was a different "cool spot" in the room, and every day we were in there twice a day, dreading the next class. i  don't want to dread going into the studio for fear that i won't be able to breathe. again, thank god for the boss. it's being fixed. but a giant round of applause, standing ovation, HUGE pat on the back to all of my fellow trainees - the first 4 weeks were literally hell, but we made it. we're halfway there. and nobody, not the teachers practicing in the back of the room, or the teacher standing on the podium with the vents raining cool air down their heads from above, not trainees before us, or trainees to follow will know what we went through in that basement torture chamber for the first 4 weeks of our training. kudos all.

ugh... head cold.

thank god, another sunday. another week over, and another monday (and full week ahead) just around the corner. weekends go by WAY TOO FAST. but i think thats probably the general consensus the world over, not just here at teacher training. but a good way to look at it is that now we're a third of the way completed. we'll never have the first three weeks again. 

the third week was pretty bad as far as my practice goes. but we're being reminded that we're really not here to improve our practice, we're here to learn how to become the best teachers. so i don't beat myself up if i can't touch my toes (which sometimes happens in the first set, during morning class - i'm sooo stiff!!) i don't belittle myself if i have to sit and rest, or if there are certain things i just simply am unable to do. i'd rather concede and take it easy that push just a little too hard, and do some damage. i can't be good for anyone if i'm injured. and i have to remember (because bikram tells us to!!) that i am the most important person in my life, and i have to take care of myself. 

so i'm getting sick. or i AM sick, rather. there's a nasty head-cold going around, and being in such close proximity with over 300 others practically 24 hrs/day, well its rather inevitable that we're all going to have it at one point. i have it now. i'm doing everything i can to shake it out, but i don't want to take medicine... that'll just fuck me up even more. so i made some garlic/chicken-soup stuff, since garlic is a natural antibiotic (and told danielle she may not want to practice next to me tomorrow, since it'll most likely be coming out of my pores, lol). i've been popping these vitamin c gummies all day, 12x my daily dose... don't know what else to do. lots of fluids, tea, water, juice. gargling with salt water, day and night. its nasty. i'm nasty. but i don't care. this is such a humbling experience, it makes me feel like dressing up, putting make-up on, all of that is so unnecessary. i've got no-one to impress. my man is far, far away - not to mention he likes me au natural anyways :) 

the first two days this week were the worst two days i've experienced thus far during training. monday wasn't all that bad, other than my mishap in the morning class, but tuesday was utter hell. for whatever reason, be it that i didn't rehydrate enough after getting rid of so many fluids monday, or not taking in enough protein, or being low on electrolytes... or a combination of all of it - half-way through the morning class i was knocked to the ground and totally unable to get back up. i lost my hearing, started seeing the electric sparks, and had the first signs of "tunnel vision". i know those signs - i was on the verge of passing out. i got out of the posture (it wasn't even a really difficult one! i made it through triangle, and it was in standing separate head to knee) and for the rest of class i think i was only able to do single sets here and there. i didn't complete 3/4 of the spine or floor series. but i didn't leave the room. i was determined to stay on my mat and suffer in silence. i knew i could stay in the room, and if i left i'd be kicking myself in the ass because i know its not necessary. for me, at that moment. 

not to mention its the third week, and now they've cranked the heat up. why? to fuck with us. thats what they do. now its around 115, or so i've heard. i would believe it. so it literally FEELS like hell. especially in the back of the room. we're divided into our groups now, and we have to set up in the yoga room depending on where our group is assigned. monday and tuesday my group had to be in the back of the room, the last two rows. one would think that it might be cooler back there, because its closer to the doors, but one would be seriously mistaken. there is absolutely no air circulation so its stagnant and boiling. FUCKING SUCKS. i think thats another factor into why i had such shitty classes, i was seriously overheating. and then, not knowing why, i was probably freaking myself out a little, getting a little anxious, and not properly breathing. who knows. all i know is that yesterdays evening class was better than the morning. as far as my performance goes. but last night was a killer class in that the teacher just frustrates me with the amount of rambling he does. i couldn't contain myself. i couldn't breathe through it and accept what was going on. instead i was yelling and screaming in my head, "shut the fuck up! we don't fucking care!!" and at one point, laying in savasana (which is supposed to be a relaxation pose, but when its 115 in the room, i'd much rather keep my mind and body busy and just keep on with the class - really, 5 minute savasanas are bullshit), i turned to danielle and said, "i hate him. i really hate him." she laughed and was like, "me too. all i can do is laugh." i wanted to cry. then we had 3 hours of stupid and redundant lecture. oh well, tuesday is over, and it'll never be again. 

sometimes i feel bad for feeling this way, but, ya know, i'm allowed to. i know its just a low, and i'll have my highs. and for as much as i hate some of the teachers, sometimes, i always respect them. i know they're here because they really care about producing the best teachers and want us to reach our full potential. but at the same time i really think they LIKE TO FUCK WITH US. i feel like i'm joining the bikram fraternity... i though hazing was seriously looked down upon... ;)

this morning my group was in the front of the room, we had diane, the really awesome teacher from boston, and it pretty much kicked ass. aside from being stiff as hell, having a strained hamstring, locked up joints in every possible location... it was a great class.