sendings

I quit teaching yoga because the COVID-19 pandemic began, and everything got cancelled. I had been feeling for a few months though, that despite my completed yoga teaching training, I was missing something.

The more I learned about yoga and the instruction thereof, the more I realized the vast amount of information about the practice I didn't have. Such a realization can be exciting – so much to learn! So much opportunity! For me, at the time, I mostly felt overwhelmed. I wasn't sure how I would ever devote so much time to studying. Given my pay at the time for a scant one or two classes a week, I didn't think I could swing that amount of study and also do my primary paid work. Mostly, I had started to feel a looming sense that I was doing a disservice to my students, rather than offering something helpful.

Was I appropriating an entire culture? Was I creating too much risk of injury? Was I offering enough guidance such that folks of all abilities could participate? Was I simply regurgitating the ideas and the movements I'd learned elsewhere?

Honestly, the pause of in-person fitness classes gave me an out. It allowed me the space to wrestle with these questions, at least in part, without continuing on the path of least resistance. I came to conclude, both because I'd alighted upon some answers and because some answers were still out of reach, that teaching yoga is unlikely to be in my future. Never say never, sure, but the path for me to teach asanas (yoga postures) again is a very narrow one.

Some of the answers that I came up with drew me away from teaching yoga even while being rooted in yogic philosophy. I want to be able to draw people towards a unified ethic of mind and body, towards the idea that we aren't just brains floating through space. I want to teach people ways to move their body with gentleness and with purpose. I believe firmly that yoga isn't a fitness modality. It's simply that a very narrow Westernized view reduced the fullness of the practice to the more easily consumable – and sellable – part. And I think I can better serve people when I'm in a gym, chipping away at mainstream ideals.

I'm coming back to fitness instruction now, and there are a few things that are different. I've taken the time to invest in more education. I've grown comfortable wearing an N95 face mask while working out, often as the only masked person in any given space. I can't do this work if I get Long COVID, and I don't want to take the risk. One less person participating in transmission chains can make a difference.

As ever, I remain concerned for students first. How do I teach effectively while doing my best to prevent injury? How do I confidently share my expertise, while allowing for all I don't know? While allowing for students to be the experts in their own bodies? These questions bogged down my yoga practice, but I'd like to let these questions drive my fitness instruction this time. And in true yoga fashion, it's time to begin again.