It was my first month of teaching yoga, and the night before my fourth class at this particular studio. After the first class, the studio owner took me aside and offered me some feedback: speak louder, share more inspirational words with students, add music to the class and pick a theme.
I ignored the thought in my head that instantly categorised her advice as criticism. I ignored the fact that I was already doubting myself and my ability to teach. I was especially nervous about the ‘inspirational words’ aspect of teaching.
But my care and my desire to do a good job outweighs my self doubt. For the second class, I looked back at my yoga philosophy notes from my teacher training. I read about aparigraha, non-attachment, and put together a sequence and script that encouraged students to notice what objects, people and ideas they were gripping too tightly in their own lives.
For the third class, I read up on santosha, contentment. I said a few lines to encourage students to find peace in the realities of their circumstances, to be okay in the present moment, even if it wasn’t exactly how they desired things to be. Although learning about these ideas in yoga philosophy has been deeply transformative to me, it felt inauthentic trying to share them in a Ted Talk/motivational podcast style during a class. This could be due to many reasons, such as:
imposter syndrome and not feeling confident enough to teach
not feeling well educated enough to share yoga philosophy
still trying to find my ‘teacher voice’
the fact that there’s so many things to think about when teaching a yoga class, dharma talk does not yet come naturally and really just felt like an additional worry
But for the second and third classes, I incorporated the motivational talk and it went okay. When the fourth week came around and none of the yamas or niyamas stood out to me as something I felt drawn to teach. I picked asteya, which means truth. I felt particularly anxious that week, mainly over a dating situation I knew wasn’t good for me but kept pursuing at the expense of my peace.
As I lay on my bed, reading through my notes and trying to put together something meaningful to say, my worries spiraled. I was meant to be planning a class but I was filled with anxiety and fear, I was crying, checking my phone constantly for replies and questioning my self, my intentions and ability to teach or guide others.
Several hours disappeared that evening as I tried to put something together, but each line I read about asteya forced me to face myself. How could I stand in front of a class and ask them to be true to themselves when I remained in a romantic situation that was making me feel completely terrible, simply because I didn’t want to face my feelings alone? How could I tell people to be true to themselves when I was doing everything I could to avoid my own truth?
This is one of the many moments when yoga has forced me to face myself, when I have seen clearly that practice is so so much more than movement. When I am given the privilege to teach a yoga class, I’m given a unique opportunity to share the main thing I have learned through yoga, which is that in our natural state we are all love and that this natural state can be accessed through a consistent practice of meditation, asana and pranayama, through a commitment to the removal of noise, distraction and suffering that our current world facilitates.
Yoga has given me glimpses of peace (freedom from suffering) many times over. It is a container that has allowed me to develop the faith that things can be so much better. I hold it with such strong love and admiration, I really can’t imagine how I would move through the world without this ancient tradition as my anchor.
For these reasons, I feel completely overwhelmed with the pressure to share such a sacred tradition in the correct way. I feel overwhelmed with responsibility, guilt about the freedom I have to practice and teach yoga when it has been ridiculed for Indian people for decades, I worry that I could make a beginner student feel bad by cueing something they can’t do, that I could be upholding the idea that yoga is something for white, able-bodied, middle class women rather than something for everyone.
When I go into a room to teach, I am not yet embodying the role of teacher in a relaxed or present state, I am nervous, self-conscious and very intensely aware of the gap between what I know and what I am living. But I know that these complexities will continue to exist. I’m also aware that this gap is the space where the most honest teaching can grow, and while we live in a world constantly stripped of any sense of authenticity, sitting with these questions, discomforts, and messiness is one of the best things I can do.