The Beginner.

The intermediate student thinks they know something; the beginner and the advanced know they know nothing.

My theme for my gentle yoga class today was loosely adapted from this article, which I enjoyed this morning during my daily meditation and reflection. 

     I took an interesting beginner yoga classer today. Due to swim team practice I can no longer take one of my favorite power flow classes, my 9:30 75 minute Monday morning class with Adriana. So, I adapted. It had been a physically demanding weekend ~ a 6 mile run and 90 minute vinyasa practice Saturday, and teaching 2 classes and walking 18 on Sunday. An 8:30 beginner class followed by a session with the foam roller and sauna sounded just right. It was an interesting class. The deeper I get into my yoga practice the more I appreciate beginner classes. I find that I always, ALWAYS learn something new, or am given an opportunity to look at something in a new light. Today it was thinking about transforming mountain pose alignment into triangle. Its hard to explain and would be quite wordy, but I appreciated the new approach to something that I understood, but had never thought of in quite that way. My Mom and two good family friends (in their early 60's) were in the class as well, and afterwards I was interested to hear their feedback on their experience of the class. They are all relative beginners, though in the past year they have been taking yoga at least once or twice a week. I appreciated hearing what they did, and did not like about the class. It was approached quite differently than I approach my beginner classes (very classically, a lot of explanation, much of which was quite involved, and poses were held for what I thought was longer than usual for most beginners bodies). The beauty of yoga, though, is that there is a teaching style that is going to appeal to everyone. There is a teacher who is going to appeal to everyone. Sue (my mentor) seems handpicked for me. That said, there are many people who will pointedly avoid her classes ~ whether it be her strong personality or her strong practice ~ everyone has unique needs and meshes energetically in different ways. Thats life. Speaking of Sue, I feel like I summoned her by writing about how much I missed her, because I was lucky enough to spend the evening with her tonight! We continue to talk about the possibility of opening a studio together (in addition to her knowledge base, her client base is ridiculous, she would be an incredible partner), she told me about a place that might be a good spot, parking, borough proximity, two stories…..I'm going to call the landlord tomorrow and get more details. I don't know that I am anywhere close to being ready to take a step like that but it never hurts to gather information and be aware of what is out there. 

      My 12:30 class was really enjoyable and seems to be building, which surprises me in the heart of summer. I had 16 yesterday. My pregnant mom is due in just 5 weeks, and having gone 3 weeks early with her first her time is drawing near. I love my Monday class, they feel like my home ~ my first little circle of true students. We have a good time and I am so grateful for them. 

     After that the kids and I were off for a bit of a run and a bike ride. THIS IS MAJOR. No more running stroller. I'm going to list the BOB and sell it ~ serious end of an era here folks. The kids rode 5 while I ran with them on the beautiful CVT, shady and lovely and flat and just perfect. 

We followed that up with handstands (me) and headstands (kids) and ice cream (all of us). 

I have a huge match tomorrow for the ladies handicap match play championship. All I know is that I am playing someone with a higher handicap than I have, so I'm giving strokes. Its single elimination play, so I have to win. Nervous! I'm teaching 10 TEN times next week, thats like, almost an actual j.ob. Really looking forward to it……but one of those classes is a kids yoga class. This is going to be interesting for two reasons: 1. My kids can come. and 2. I
have not done that before, so I'm going to have to work on that all weekend. Of course I do yoga with my kids all the time, but OPK? Whole new story. I'm going to have to look up some stuff. Any resources or recommendations anyone? Music that would be fun for kids yoga? For some reason I keep thinking reggae. 

I love being a beginner in yoga. My knowledge of yoga barely scratches the surface of what there is to know about yoga. 

I do hope, however, that I do not play like a beginner tomorrow in golf. Golf + beginner + important match = very bad.

So, newfound awesome athletic outlet with kids, just in time for the summer where I've chosen (again) to keep the kids camp free. (that could be an entire blog post right there) ~ I now have a way to get in an outdoor workout with all three kids due to this newfound bike ride/run thing.  Also new to the agenda, and actual paying kids yoga class where I get to be paid to teach my kids (and other kids) yoga.

Anyone else have any creative ways that they like to workout with their kids?
Also, any happy music suggestions for kids yoga music?
Thanks!!!