What Kind of Yoga is This?

"Oh, you're a yoga teacher. What kind of yoga do you teach?"

I get asked that a lot.

My yoga doesn't really have a name, nor is it any one thing -- it's hard to put into words something that is more than just physical.

To give the short answer I usually say that I teach an "alignment based flow".

But if they really wanted to sit and chat for a while, I'd tell them more:

At 90 Monkeys, our school, we teach a yoga that embraces three values:

• Longevity & Alignment

• Integrity in Community

• Life Affirming Philosophy

Our yoga focuses on good form to support longevity and sustainability in the body over time. Through intelligent alignment principles, sound biomechanics, and a workable understanding of anatomy, it offers a deep, efficacious practice to enhance the physical aspects of embodiment.

We value the power of community - one that is inclusive, honest, warm, and kind. We cherish collective support and seek to live with accountability for our energy and actions. We strive to be responsible for the earth and it's inhabitants and as such, value coming together in person (not just online!).

We start all endeavors saying yes to life -- receiving what the world presents us. We wish for humanity to love their life and appreciate the miracle of being alive. We enjoy having fun, value lineage, and believe living a conscious and skillful life is the secret to deep fulfillment.

This January we will be immersing into the worlds of this yoga path in our first ever - weekend format - 200 Hour Teacher Training in Boulder, CO. Learn more and join us!

5 Surprising Things You Can Do to Instantly be a Better Yoga Teacher

Seven years ago, if I asked the average yoga student whether they were interested in supplementing their local yoga classes with a yearly yoga retreat abroad, a big yoga conference, or a summer festival, the answer would have been a resounding “HELL, YEAH!”

Fast forward to 2018, and I’m certain that if I asked that same question to an average yoga student, I’d get a puzzled look, followed by a “No, probably not. If I taught yoga, maybe I would?”

Increasingly it seems that yoga events like weekend workshops, retreats, festivals, and conferences, which offer more in-depth opportunities to study and practice than ongoing classes, are much more highly attended by yoga teachers than yoga students.

Have you noticed this trend too?

As someone who loved attending workshops before I became a teacher, and who has witnessed non-teaching students radically change their lives after being on retreat or attending a conference, it saddens me that such a large percentage of our yoga students are not attending supplemental yoga events.

And it begs the question: why?

Let me be frank with my theory on this:

• Only a small minority of yoga teachers convey to their students that yoga is a practice rather than an activity.
• The majority are not doing this. A lot of well-meaning teachers are leading exercise classes with occasional sprinkles of feel-good, self-help sound bites, not yoga. (Before you jump on me and say that "yoga is anything you make it", please keep reading...)
• The majority of yoga teachers are not teaching their students how to embody their practice on the mat in their day-to-day lives.

I know I’m generalizing, but if this is the majority, would a student value traveling abroad to deepen their practice by doing five hours of yoga a day? Would they schlep to a ski resort in order to learn from senior teachers and keep company with other students on the spiritual path?

Probably not.

Yoga teachers, on the other hand, value supplemental yoga because their teacher trainers have taught them that yoga is more than just sweating and stretching.

Yoga teachers also know how different and incredible it is to practice yoga for more than 60 minutes - sometimes up to 3 hours on the mat.

So, how is this message not getting to our students? And why are we depriving them of this experience?

Let me be frank again.

I think it has a lot to do with the messaging propagated by well-intentioned yoga teachers on social media.

There are far too many posting things along the lines of “Yoga is anything you want it to be.” or “Yoga is what you make it".

So. much. NO.

Yoga has a history, a timeline, a lineage, and yoga is connected to a vast body of knowledge. It's way more than 'what you make it'. It's grounded and rooted in something much larger.

That doesn't mean we can't live our own version of yoga, but my hope is that we honor yoga's roots, study hard, and get time with its elders whenever we can.

And while 60 minutes is enough time to drop the occasional yoga bomb here or there (and please do!), it is not long enough to impart the depth and breadth of yoga.  

So if you teach yoga, please step up and start telling people what yoga is. It’s your dharma (duty)!
 

Here are 4 Things You Can Do to Instantly Be a Better Yoga Teacher:

1. Define yoga and share the definition at the beginning of class. Refer to the definition throughout the class. A simple way to define yoga to your students is to translate the word yoga which comes from the root “yuj” - to connect, to unite, to bring together. Then, having contemplated the definition, share what that means to you personally. Does it mean being more conscious and aware of our interconnection with nature and other beings? Does it mean being more responsible or present in our relationships? How does the practice on the mat relate to that? Can you make a link between how we place our feet on the mat to the sensitivity we bring to our relationships with loved ones?
    
2. Share the yoga teachings! Give your classes themes. Tell your yoga students about the Yamas and Niyamas. Describe the five elements and how they are part of the microcosm of the body as a reflection of the macrocosm (Dude, whoa). Break down a sutra from Patanjali. Talk about “beginner's mind.” Om with them. Translate a mantra and chant it. Discuss what it means to be present or aware. Articulate how stunning and beautiful it is that we exist (I mean, consider the breath!). Get them thinking about how we are part of something as vast as this universe - and because we know this, now we get to choose what we're going to do about that! How do we want to live a life of meaning?

3. Teach them how to be a great yoga student - Help them cultivate curiosity and a sense of wonder. Encourage them to ask questions. Pause every now and then to help them pay attention to how their body feels right after a pose. Ask them to feel. Make it safe for them to challenge you so they learn it’s OK to think for themselves. Ask them how they feel so they will be seen and heard, and then do the same for others! When they come with questions, be there for them 100% so they are rewarded for their curiosity.

4. Show them how to take their yoga off the mat - Invite them to bring what they are learning about themselves on the mat as a training camp for the real world! Invite them into a self-reflective process. Who are they when faced with challenging poses, or when they fall out of an arm balance? Do they laugh at themselves or engage in negative self-talk when they stumble? Does resistance arise for them with certain poses? When they have a breakthrough moment, are they ready to channel that success into their lives? Chances are the way they are on the mat is how they might be off the mat - do they want to work on that?

It's our responsibility as yoga teachers to convey that yoga is more than just a physical activity and that it’s more than just “what you make it”. Yoga is an embodiment of what we do on the mat, brought into a life of meaning, service, and skillful offering.

Teach this and change the world.

What Yoga Can Teach Us About Feeling Overwhelmed by Despair

“If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito.”
- the Dalai Lama

Are you feeling utterly overwhelmed by the current state of things in the USA? I'm with you.

Although yoga helps us get into a zone where all is well and where there’s light and love, you’re then meant to come back to reality, serve others, and engage in the world to make it a better place.

The word yoga means “to connect”, to connect to the world. It’s not meant to be an escape.

In other words, having a yoga practice does not make you immune to the feeling (or the reality) that we’ve taken a nosedive into a pit of darkness in just a year’s time.

That said, as dark as it has become, voices previously unheard are coming into the light.

• Women’s voices are saying #TimesUp on centuries of sexual harassment and assault.   
• Black and brown voices are saying enough is enough on racism, discrimination, and deportation. #BlackLivesMatter #Dreamers
• Children are demonstrating, lying on the ground in front of the White House to demand safety in their schools. #MarchForOurLives #NeverAgain
• A wave of women, minorities, gay, and transgender candidates were elected in states all over the country and that trend continues to grow. #BlueWave2018

Still, I am overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of abnormal, morally bankrupt, despicable, and unfathomable things going on in the White House!

I always feel better when I take action (like calling my senators), but I notice that the deluge of troubling news easily paralyzes me to the point where I will do nothing if I don’t watch out.

The onslaught of these daily issues is numbing.

Whenever I find myself becoming numb, I think of Arjuna, the main character in the great epic tale, The Bhagavad Gita, a text every serious student of yoga eventually tackles.

The story begins on a battlefield. Prince Diroydhana has rejected his cousin Yudhishthira’s final offer of peace and he and his brothers, the Panavas, including Arjuna are forced into battle.

War is unavoidable, and Arjuna is beside himself with despair because he is facing his own loved ones - cousins and uncles on the battlefield - in fratricidal armageddon.

The text explores this metaphor as the dilemma of how the world both annihilates us (because we all die) and embraces us. In Arjuna’s case, and in our own case, love puts us at the greatest risk. Ultimately the text asks us -  what are you willing to do for love?

You’re either making the world a better place or not. You can break down, do nothing, and take Xanax in a fetal position under the covers, or you’ve got the opportunity to do yoga and address the problems head on.

Yoga is how you decide you want to be in the face of this dilemma. The Bhagavad Gita is not a text about “checking out”, it’s a text about “checking in” and dealing firsthand with what is on the table.

My teacher often says, “Stop wishing the world were some way you wish it were, and start wishing the world was in some way how it could be.”

Arjuna, with the help and lengthy guidance of Krishna, takes on the dilemma, knowing that inaction is still a choice and doing nothing would be a nihilistic act that could damage generations to come. Ultimately Krishna makes his arguments but doesn’t tell him what to do. Instead he leaves him free to choose his course of action.

So when you feel depressed, immobilized, or inundated by the troubles of the world and you’re not sure which issue to pick, remember you are free to pick just one thing.  Do one thing, because action always feels better than no action at all.

Here are some resources for action you can take RIGHT NOW:

• Set up ResistBot on your phone so you can easily email your senators and make your voice heard. If you text them 'NRA' they will tell you how much money the NRA paid your elected officials and suggest action steps!
• Tune in to Resistance Live every day with my old friend, Elizabeth Cronise McLaughlin, so you know what pressing actions need to be taken.
• Donate to Swing Left to ensure that we elect candidates who are not being bought by the Koch brothers and the National Rifle Association (NRA).
• Donate to the ACLU to help ensure that voters rights are being protected.
• Donate to the Black Yoga Teacher’s Alliance to help support teachers of color through yoga education scholarships, events, and more.
• Sending a hand-written post card to your elected representatives can be very effective via CollectiveVision.Us. You can also send post cards to would-be voters.

The Unexpected Life Hack to Help You Excel in The New Year

We live in a world that’s addicted to quick solutions, easy fixes, and anything brand new.

We want to hear the most recent podcast, to have the newest iPhone, and we can “Google that s**t” to get instant answers.

In a culture of instant gratification, it’s become increasingly difficult to remember that we’re part of a world that is made up of repetition of the ‘same old - same old’. We forget that nature itself repeats itself - it’s recursive:

The sun comes up every day and then sets.

The moon cycles monthly.

The deer in my backyard mate every November and give birth the next June.

Every 365 days we celebrate the holidays and then find ourselves on January 1st planning our next year.

Here we are, welcoming another year of life, and honestly it feels new, but it also feels the same - an annual repetition.

Does that seem like a let down? Well, it could feel like a let down if, like most of us, you’re addicted to the Smart phone, your feed, or how many likes you got on your Instagram post.

So here’s the life hack.

Recognize that everything repeats itself and start getting back to craving repetition and baby steps like a child.

Remember when you were a kid (or if you have kids now you’ll totally get this) and you asked your parents to read the same bedtime story book to you every single night? You didn’t care if you heard it over and over again! And god forbid they skipped a page, you noticed and called them out on it!

I think I’ve seen The Little Mermaid and the Lion King about 50 times because my little sister wanted to watch it every single day when I was her caretaker.

Kids crave repetition. And they need it to learn and become masterful at life

When you read a book a for the second time, you are a different person than you were the first time around. That's what makes repetition interesting and not boring - it’s who you’ve become in between!

For example, it would be ridiculous to do one yoga class and then say, “Yep, I’ve mastered yoga -  been there, done that!”.  

Practice is practice - it’s not about completion and accomplishment, it’s about process and self discovery through, you guessed it, repetition.

If you’ve got a big, hairy, audacious goal (BHAG) to grow bigger this 2018, it’s important to let go of the idea that you can reach that goal quickly without serious commitment, repetition, perseverance, study, and practice.

Any BHAG I've ever reached or art form I've mastered has come about from the repetition of baby steps and chunked down daily actions.

My 500 Hour level yoga teacher training students often share that they want me to give them more new material in my trainings. While I certainly strive to share new information that they’ve never heard before, I remind them about the importance of repetition too.

To become a great yoga teacher and yogi, you have to ‘lather, rinse, and repeat’ in multiple scenarios across a timeline of study until things are so familiar they become part of you. It’s why we encourage our students to repeat the same module topics multiple times if they want to!

Once you come to terms with the fact that mastery requires repetition, you will be aligned with the recursive nature of the Universe and mastery of your goals will be right around the corner.

Rinse. Lather. Repeat.

Happy New Year, everyone!

If this resonates, leave a comment telling us about something you got really good at through repetition!

Yoga: Not for the Faint of Heart

Swimming in 31 years of notebooks from my studies of yoga. (And there are a handful missing in this picture!) 📙📘📖📕📗📓📒

In this age of social media, sweaty yoga workouts, and quick rises to fame in the yoga world, people forget that studying yoga is physical, yes, but it's also academic and it takes TIME.

There is an infinite body of knowledge to tap - so much to learn, and so much to know. No one person could ever imbibe it all!

Studying yoga was never meant to be easy. It takes perseverance, dedication, and devotion. There is no such thing as overnight success yet the benefits are worth your efforts tenfold! 

Cheers to your studies!