My Yoga Journey

​My Yoga Journey
 
I don’t remember when I first heard about yoga, but it isn’t in any childhood memory.  I grew up in a small West Texas town, and the only sport anyone cared about was football.  You know, Friday Night Football?  Yeah, that!
 
So I was an adult by the time I have any memory of hearing about yoga.  From the beginning, it seemed mysterious….and intimidating.  It seemed more like an art form than an activity for any regular Joe.  And I am not and never have been athletic, so most anything that looked like exercise, I avoided. 
 
As I matured, yoga seemed to be gaining in popularity so there was more exposure on TV and in the media.  All of those who “did” yoga seemed to be thin and bendy.  It appeared to me that they all had excellent balance and strength, so it still didn’t look like anything I could or would do. 
 
Later in life, yoga became much more accessible so I signed up for classes here and there.  When I moved to a large city that had a reputation for being cool and hip, yoga was everywhere.  I tried a few classes, but always left feeling like everyone knew something I didn’t know.  It was more than feeling unable to “do it”, but I always felt defeated.  In this town, yoga was more like a religion and I just didn’t get it. 
 
I always wished I could find a class and a teacher that would take a personal interest in me as a student and tell me the secret.  More and more I found classes that were less intimidating, but still, felt something was missing.  I opened a wellness center and had various types of yoga and various teachers visit.  Some I loved and some were just “eh”.  Enter Covid lockdowns….
 
While we were locked down, all yoga schools went virtual!  PERFECT!  So I researched various school and signed up to get my certification.  Through that process (which is still ongoing), I learned more about various types of yoga and various styles of teaching.  Of course all of my judgement were more about me than the classes I took in the past.  But I learned to have compassion for myself and to honor my journey.  I decided to BE the teacher I always wanted.  Although my “style” is still developing, my mission is to provide the type of instruction I was always looking for. 
 
My yoga classes are a combination of Pilates and various types of yoga.  Yin, Vinyasa and Restorative yoga all find their way into many of my classes.  I also understand that the teachers I had in the past were perhaps finding their style.  It is harder to plan and execute a class than I would have ever guessed, and that being said, I had some great teacher.  Until the student is ready, no teacher will ever appear.