Some experiences change you forever. And certainly, that is what teacher training did for me. Deciding to do a teacher training straight out of a university degree – which left me physically, mentally, spiritually exhausted, but also with very little prospects of getting an academic job in my niche subject – was the biggest leap of faith I had taken until that moment in my life. It is also the single best decision I have ever made; and here’s why.
The knowledge
Chances are that if you are considering doing a teacher training it’s because you already practise Yoga and you love it. But how do you know if you want to teach it? I already knew I loved to teach because I come from a long family line of educators, and because I had had the opportunity to teach other disciplines before. What I yearned to discover was whether I would enjoy teaching Yoga and turning my passion into a ‘job’. My experience led me to a resounding ‘YES!’ to all of it (practice, studying, covering classes, working and teaching in studios); what I also learned is that whether you already know that you want to become a Yoga teacher or not, dedicating 200+ hours to learning about the origins of Yoga, its philosophy, anatomy and movement, the subtle body, energetics, the body’s bio-mechanics, and most of all, truly gifting yourself the opportunity of embracing an experience that will nurture your body as well as your soul, is well worth the hours and the money.
The practice
A good 70 hours into my teacher training experience, I distinctly remember how I felt my body breaking down a little. I was experiencing a level of physical tiredness I had not known before – it was a strange combination between feeling sore, euphoric and slightly hungover. In truth, what was happening was that my body as well as my soul, were reaching new levels of wisdom. I was slowly becoming more open to my abilities as well as my limitations; I was learning to listen to my body’s edge and deeper still to the voice deep inside of me that was saying ‘this is it, this is it, this is it…’. And don’t they say that in order to have a breakthrough, one has to break through?
The mission
Today, every day that I am a teacher, I pray that I can practise my mentor Alessandro’s words: ‘Today, how can I get out of my own way, so that I can better serve others?’, which I can’t help but to associate to the peace prayer of St Francis, which starts with ‘Lord, make me an instrument of your peace…’. Because ultimately, teacher training placed me right at the core of where I needed to be; sharing a space with like-minded souls who are on a quest of self-discovery and service. The mantras we sang together every day, the hours moving and teaching each other, practicing kindness and compassion with one another’s struggles and insights, supporting each other through our growth and discovering how we each want to show up in the world made me wish all of life was like this, always. And so why not do a teacher training for the more universal mission of discovering that we are loving, compassionate and nurturing souls having a human experience; for the world to manifest as the beautiful place that it already is? Could all teacher training simply be part of our life training? And wouldn’t that just be Yoga?
By Sarah Puello
263 Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 7HN
