Officially a Yogi

After two months of hard work, I am officially a Alliance Certified yoga instructor. These three hundred hours of training have filled my brain with proper allignment cues, meditation practices, massage and muscle manipulation techniques. Planning classes seems to flow naturally from within; as I've learned to focus on building the weaknesses and expanding the strengths of the class participants. So if you want to see how yoga can expand your mind, ease bodily pain, and rejuvenate your energy take some time to practice with me!

Practicum: Last Test

Just as in college, each yoga student had to prepare a final class. Each lesson was dissected by our three head teachers to ensure we had learned proper alignment, safe lesson structuring (ensuring the body is properly warmed so no injuries occur during difficult poses), and were confident in our hands on adjustments (when you manually help someone dig deeper into a posture). Needless to say this scrutiny was intimidating.

Each student had an hour to instruct their lesson and could theme it in various ways. Some individuals chose to do a prenatal class, some focused on meditation, and others focused on quick paced hatha or vinyasa yoga. I chose to do a high intensity vinyasa class. Sounds like fun right? Well when I stood up to teach, on a muggy hot Friday afternoon, the last thing it seemed everyone wanted was an energetic class. However, I was feeling confident and stuck to my plan.

After a little game of poparazzi, where you and your yoga buddy pretend to be a celebrities, everyones mood lifted. The theme of my class was lighthearteness and I traced it through the yoga class with upbeat music and tender words. The lesson went like this: Centering (focusing on breath) - Sun Salutations- Core work (crunches)- Vinyasa- Stretching- Shavasana (final resting pose). By the end everyone felt as though they conquered the afternoon. While my instructors gave me a few points of constructive criticism followed with encouraging, I was smiling from ear to ear and celebrating with a mental track of "Celebrate Good Times" for the test was finally over!

Neuroplasticity and Brain Games

Neuroplasticity sounds like a horrendous word, but stay with me here. It is the specific neuroscience study of how the brain and nervous system change in response to its enviornment. What does all that talk mean when at a yoga training? Well, it is commonly accepted that once you hit a certain age your capacity to learn is shot. Though it is true neurons in your brain can die, the synaptic connections (the pathways that send information signals to the cerebral cortex-where the brain signals the body to action) can continually be re-organized through challenging active experiences. But if you aren't challenging your mind, these connections shut down so your brain can refocus its energy elsewhere. So, when you challenge yourself to learn a language, take up a new sport, or play sudoku, you challenge your brain to re-organize itself. With these newly formed neuro connections your brain can react faster to enviornmental changes. The best connections are generally formed when we work those areas we shy away from. Such as those who avoid math at all cost, take some time to do a few multiplication or division problems (no you may not use a calculator)!

Specific activities that can help you to form these connections are:
-Completing puzzles
-Learning a new language
-Yoga!
-Lifting weights
-Sudoku
-Scrabble
-Reading
-Crossword puzzles
-Brain games on http://www.lumosity.com/

Your two challenges for today are to find a new activity that will challenge your brain and to answer this riddle: What happens once in a month, twice in a millenium, and never in a billion years?

Yoga inspiration

How do I get through two, sometimes three asana (posture) classes a day? One name can answer this question: Luca. Aged to perfection at 4 years, this half French half Thai little tyke always brings a smile to my face whenever he darts into the room. His giggle is infectious and we have lots of fun together. His energy is what helps me get through yoga in the hot Thai afternoon.