Unexpected ~

It's Thursday morning, the first day following the end of teacher training 2.  I am in a tired but quiet place and for that I am grateful.  It feels sort of the like the calm after the storm.  I feel some relief but am also still feeling a bit thrown by my experience.  I am not even sure if it is a good idea for me to write and try to process some of the last 6 days or not, but I feel the desire to write so will write.

It is now Saturday morning and I still feel zapped energetically.  I have a lot on my mind.  I have spent the last few days trying to understand my experience during this last teacher training. I still don't know what to make of it all.

The good news is I did learn a lot and the people who made up the group of 50 are really beautiful people.  I was in good company and that is one of my favorite parts of teacher trainings, immersions and workshops.  Usually, though I leave these events feeling inspired, energized, uplifted.  I feel the exact opposite.  I am not even sure when, why or how things went downhill for me.  I began the TT with a cold but in good spirits and with high hopes of this being something to recharge me in some way.  I feel depleted and uninspired.  I feel bummed and am having trouble turning that around.

Yes, the TT was challenging in a way that I did not expect it to be.  I knew there would be a lot to learn and that there would be a fair amount of things that I had forgotten or  that I have not really learned and that there would be a lot for me to improve upon.  However,  I felt that I was in a decent place simply because of all the years I have put into this and because I have a fair amount of teaching experience under my belt.

I found the TT to be kind of painful.  The first day was great with some movement in the morning, yoga,  conversation and some really useful and valuable exercises in looking for the good.  The second day was pretty good.  Each person had to get up in front of the group and teach a pose.  The next few days were the same... A full class was put up on the white board and each person had to put their name next to a pose to either demo, re-demo and teach, and refine.  The entire morning was spent doing that.  Meaning 3 painfully slow hours of this major intensity and discomfort.  Really, for me those days are a blur and don't even know if that happened 3 days in a row or 4.

I felt a lot of anxiety in the room, in myself, and in the process.  I do understand and appreciate the value of being challenged but am not sure that I agree with this teaching approach.  I do not feel that I learned very much during this portion of the training because my mind was not in a receptive state.  And I guess, on some level,  I feel that I am constantly challenged everyday in my personal life, so to be challenged in yet another arena is just draining for me.  I don't have the energy or desire for more difficulty.  In fact, what I am really after is a break from the hard stuff.  I know life is hard and the path is hard, but I don't agree that it always meant to be that way.  If you are always expecting life and the path to be hard, are you not then going to create that?  Why can't the work you put in create the opposite?

Back to the training... For me day 4 or 5, I can't remember, was great,  with groups of 10 and drills to work on in the morning and the afternoon sessions focusing on hands on adjustments.  It was a relief  to change things and it felt good to actually learn and practice at the same time.  It made a big difference to work in that way for me because everyone was more relaxed and receptive. The energy was totally different and that made a big difference to me.  It was like finally... I am learning something and doing something.

You see, I am someone who happens to be unusually sensitive to the energy of others and filtering that energy is something I am still learning to do well.  I have come a long way but need to strengthen my boundaries and improve my ability to deal with these things.  After this experience,  I do see where I can and need to improve as a teacher and student.  That is good. However,  I do not want to discount what I am doing well and that whatever it is I am doing in my teaching is working.

I regularly get positive feedback from my students, and I feel good about what I have to offer as a teacher.  That being said,  I know there is a ton of room for improvement.

 I feel like I am in such a strange place following this training.  I am trying to figure out what of this experience is mine and what of it is what it is.  It makes me wonder if life is leading me another way.  I don't know. I have a lot of questions. Do I want to continue on to do TT3 or not?  Why do I want to be certified? What is it that I want to do with my certification?  Do I want that piece of paper for the credibility and confidence it gives?  Is this the direction I want to go?   I have always had ups and downs with the process of certification because every year it gets harder and the requirements change.


I don't ask for much and maybe I should.  I sort of feel that if I am going to get through the certification process,  I will have to do it on my own and just hope for the best.  I am inclined to think that is just the way it is.  It seems all my teachers are too busy and overwhelmed with travel and work to be available.  I do understand the need to nurture oneself and think that is important.  I understand that the energy this work requires means each person must give themselves extreme care if they are to be of service in the way they are.

This conversation could go on and on, and probably will, but for now I will end this here.  If anyone out there has some sage advice to share, please do so.

For now,  I feel the need to step back from all of this, go in and sit with things.  Maybe teaching my class tomorrow morning will set me right.  I hope that is the case because this week of teaching has not been easy or fluid.  I guess we will see what happens...

Confused but Hopeful,
Marcia