Back in the US and teaching up a storm :)

I'm finally back in SF and am a weird mixture of happy to be home (I'm obsessed with this city and everything that goes with it) and sad that my amazing adventure has come to an end. I spent so long looking forward to it, planning for it and being over the moon excited about it and it feels surreal that it is finally finished. I made life long friends, had incredible experiences, faced my fear of traveling alone (and LOVED it) and had the privilege of doing something that many people never get to do. I am so grateful for the experience and can often be found daydreaming of any given day from October 2016 :)

Now that I'm home, I've been teaching a lot and have been loving sharing my yoga knowledge with friends, neighbors and family. I'm chatting with a few startups about teaching lessons to their employees and am bringing on new private clients as well. 

I am so thrilled with my new yoga life and am so happy that I made the leap. Pretty great feelings to start 2017 with :)

 

Private class for some Miami Cuties

Private class for some Miami Cuties

Such a better style 1 on 1 meeting than I used to have :)

Such a better style 1 on 1 meeting than I used to have :)

Exam time and a little friend schmoopyness

The final exam is today - which also means that today is the last day of class...which also means that I'm probably crying in a corner somewhere. Not because I'm scared of the test or nervous that I won't pass... I actually feel super prepared. I'm just devastated that this amazing experience is about to be over.

I had been looking forward to this adventure for such a long time and now that it is coming to an end, I'm just. so. sad. 

I've said it before and I'll say it again... this course was amazing and I learned an invaluable new skill to go with my new yoga life, but, the people are the real gems of this whole shebang.

Our group, teachers included, are all just a special piece of wonderful and I'm so grateful to have shared my time here with them and most importantly, to have made life long friends.

I mean, just look at these cuties :)

I'll update later as to the results of the final exam. Cross your fingers!

 

The most beautiful studio in the world

The studio that I practice at at home in SF is lovely. It is small, cozy, calming and right on the corner of my street. I love it. I love my time there. It makes me so happy.

Welllll... I used to love it. Unfortunately, I'm never going to be able to go there again. I don't know where I'm going to be able to practice yoga now that I've practiced here (see photo below.) We practiced at the most beautiful  studio ever today. Ocean front, waves crashing on rocks, beautiful beach and our studio. I mean. It was remarkable. And now.... every other studio will just be a let down. 

If any billionaires have a few extra bucks to shoot my way to build an oceanfront (enclosed so we don't freeze) shala in SF, I'd greatly appreciate it :) 

Sore back... and Corey to the Rescue

After 3 weeks of doing yoga every day, we are all feeling pretty sore. There are sore knees, wrists, elbows... you name it, we got it. My back has been killing me for the last week and I just chalked it up to me swapping from doing yoga 3 days a week in real life to my current life of 3 practices a day... 3 way more intense practices than my normal 55 minute routine at Moxie Yoga in SF :) 

Turns out, my issue is a bit different from just being overworked. After enlisting Corey (my teacher) for some help during a back bend workshop, I finally realized why I'm in so much pain. I have been doing backbends wrong all my life and all of those poor practices finally cumulated into a very painful, very annoying injury. 

When you do a proper back bend, like in Wheel pose, you are supposed to support a lot of your weight with your shoulders and distribute the bend throughout your whole back so no one part of it gets overly bent or tweaked. My back naturally slopes a bit more in the part of my spine just above my butt... which is great for a Beyoncé bootie but also makes me naturally more prone to over bending my back in that area, which I now realize I've been doing. 

Once corey showed me how to properly adjust my back bend, it was honestly as if I was seeing color for the first time ever. It was so amazingly easy to come up into a back bend - I felt like I could hold it for hours... before I would struggle to stay up for more than a few seconds. 

The most helpful tips he gave me were to keep my knees pointed forward and not have my feel too far apart. Also, to make sure to internally rotate my arms as I'm lifting up and point my pinkies away from my head a bit. By taking all of Corey's advice, I was able to reduce the compression happening in my lower back which in turn took away back pain during & after my practice and just felt all around better. 

I found a cute photo on an awesome site called Yoga By Candace which perfectly shows what I was trying to describe above. Hopefully this helps your future back bends :) 

I'm still fairly sore from the incorrect way I had been doing backbends, so as usual, I'm off to lather on pounds of Tiger Balm :)

 

 

Food, massages and smiles

These are the things that Thailand just knocks out of the park.... maybe better than any other country ever. 

The food here is magic. Salty, sweet, sour, spicy and just 100% delicious. I have been eating only thai food for breakfast, lunch and dinner while here and I can't think of one thing that I've hated. Of course I've liked some things more than others but as a whole - everything has been remarkably delicious. I'm giving most of the credit to their egregious use of fish sauce... how a sauce made from decomposed fish makes everything taste magical is a mystery to me, but it does and I love whoever came up with the concept in the first place. 

The massages... omg the amazingly perfect massages. I got the best massage of my life the other day for $11 USD. ELEVEN DOLLARS. Granted, anyone massaging me after 20 days straight of hard core yoga would feel like a dream, but this guy was good. Thai massages are part massage and part body contortion - at times you feel like you could immediately join cirque du soleil with the poses they force your body into but somehow it works and you end up feeling just perfect as a result. They also always end the massage with a quick tiger balm application to your neck - there is literally nothing better.

Now for the people. The people in Thailand are the most lovely, warmest humans I've ever encountered. They are so sweet, kind and just all around nice. It's like if you are always having your best day ever and feeling super helpful and in love and the world is full of rainbows, butterflies and unicorns. That is the state of being that Thai people spend their days in. It is remarkable. My friend, Brenda, told me this before I left on my trip, but I didn't really get it until I arrived. There really is a warmth to this culture that is beyond what I've experienced before.

I totally get why expats are drawn to this place. Above and beyond how cheap it is to live - it's just a happy, beautiful, lovely place to spend your time. 

I love it here :)

Test time againnnn

We have our second test of the course today... again on Sanskrit words and again, it seems close to impossible. A lot of the asanas (poses) have fairly similar looks to them but their names range from Trianga mukaikapada paschimottanasana, karna pidasana to ubhaya padangustasana......... I mean, wtf. 

I would have appreciated a few less letters in each sanskrit word. Theres no need for 10 constants in one word. NO NEED. 

Luckily, one of my lovely friends here, Jordan, made up some hilarious sayings to go with each pose and we spend the night last night yelling and acting each one out like crazy people to help us remember :) It was awesome and I think we may have actually gotten it... maybe ;)

A man named Claus

Welp, a random man has moved into our dorm. 

Let me explain. We are staying at a little boutique resort on the island of Koh Phangan. It's a lovely little jungle place to stay with varying levels of accommodations. There are different bungalow options (ranging from 500-1000 baht a night) and then there is a dorm like set up above the restaurant (around 200 baht per night.) *35 Baht = ~ $1 USD 

Long story short - this place is super inexpensive, no matter which way you slice it. 

Anyway, a part of All Yoga Thailand, the first 10 people who sign up for the program get a free stay in the dorm - which is awesome. It allows people to save money, makes the program more accessible to a wider range of people and is just a nice little perk for signing up early. As cheap as this place is, staying free in the dorm saves you around $400-$700. That is a huge amount of money if you are planning to keep traveling around or need a plane ticket home or maybe just want to spend a ridiculous of money on sweet Thai massages and fake Nike gear at the night markets :) 

I was one of the people who got the free stay in the dorms. I was SO excited about this and thankful because I was feeling super guilty about taking this amazing journey by myself and spending all of this time and money on an amazing trip without Dave - who is at home, working, being responsible, taking care of our life and loving our sweet pup while I'm just out here ohming and downward dogging my way through Thailand. 

I'm also more needy than most and wanted to be around my fellow yogis. If you know me, you know that I don't like to be alone... I generally fill my downtime with friends, family or at the very least hanging out in a park surrounded by people - even if we aren't talking, I just really like to be around others. I'm a weird extrovert... I know. Also, this is the first time I've ever traveled alone for real and wasn't sure I would feel safe or happy in a bungalow by myself.

The dorm has proven to be an awesome experience... It's clean, safe, there are a bunch of other All Yoga people in here and, until a few days ago, it was just us up here... until a German hippie named Claus moved in.

It all happened super under the radar. We came back from our morning yoga session to find one of the empty dorm beds not so empty anymore... there were clothes, random sarongs, flip flops, a little boom box and an odd assortment of nuts and shells on the floor next to a bed a few down from mine. Although it shouldn't have, it sort of took us all by surprise. Of course the resort would want to fill the extra beds not taken by the students, of course All Yoga Thailand didn't reserve all of the beds, but since we had been the only people up here for 2 weeks straight, I guess we didn't expect to find a half naked, rather large man as our new roommate. 

Although he wears little more than a sarong and flip flops, Claus has turned out to be really very nice. He happily greets us each morning with a "hello yoga people" and a smile and then wanders off to do whatever it is that he does all day. Today we talked about how crazy American politics are and how German politics aren't much better... which is why he lives in Sumatra on the top of a mountain by a lake. He also told me that some sort of energy wave is coming and how we should all do lots of breathing exercises to avoid going insane... I literally had no idea what he was talking about, but thanked him for the advice anyway :)

As nice as Claus is, I think I'm going to move out of here tomorrow and into a bungalow with Nina, one of my friends here. To save money, she had been looking for someone to split her bungalow with her and I think I'm going to choose a lovely girl from Paris to be my roomie rather than the large man from Germany talking about cosmic energy waves. The cost will only be $100 for the whole time in Nina's bungalow for me and I've paid zero dollars thus far on my accommodations, soooo, I think I have to do it :)

Also, as I am typing this a random cat just wandered up and into the dorm. He just came right up the stairs and was walking around meowing at 11:15pm while everyone was sleeping. Lol. I really hope someone else heard/saw me chasing it around while trying not to disturb Claus from whatever psychedelic dream is gracing his subconscious tonight :) 

Jungle Lullaby

When I said we were living in a jungle, I wasn't kidding. Take a listen to our nightly soundtrack...

Click for the cacophony of sounds that the Thai jungle is assaulting us with right now

Honestly to god, the sounds that these animals produce are ridiculous, amazing and intensely annoying all at once. There are frogs, bugs, toads, geckos, among other things I'm sure. Side note, who even knew that geckos made noise?  Well, they do... loud loud croaks, chirps and like laughing type sounds. CLICK to take a listen to a gecko chatting... it's crazy. One of my friends here has a Tokay Gecko behind her bed... legend has it that they are descended from dragons and have magical powers... yada yada, my friend is basically the Khaleesi.

I've been wearing ear plugs and thought that after living in a city all my adult life, I'd get used to the noise, and I have, but tonight... it is just freaking ridiculous. The animals are having a rave outside.... think like, a very meth-y / MDMA rave. This shit is loud.

On top of the animal and bug noises, we have a CRAZY thunder and lighting storm going on. The rain and thunder is just as loud as the frogs and bugs, so maybe they'll drown themselves out?!?

So far it just sounds like a competition of who can make the most annoying sound in the world (CLICK). 

More and More Teaching & A Lovely Day Off

All of us keep chatting about how we are amazed at how quickly we are picking up the ability to teach yoga... it seemed so daunting when we first got here - I honestly couldn't fathom leading a class, but a bit less than 2 weeks into the course and we are totally getting it. 

We are now all teaching part of every practice and are guiding ourselves through self-practice everyday, which is actually really awesome. While we are all practicing, there are 3 of us chosen to walk around and essentially be student teachers. This is a way for all of us to individually experience giving adjustments to students, and guiding a yoga practice before we actually have to do it for real. It is awesome. Each student teacher is paired with one of our yoga teachers to absorb as much of their techniques/tips/tricks as possible. My student teaching day isn't until the 20th - I can't wait :)

Today was our second day off since arriving (every Saturday we get a free day) and it was SO needed. All of our bodies are just shot from doing crazy amounts of yoga every day. Originally I had planned to hang out at the beach, maybe get a massage and just be totally lazy..... but, somehow I was talked into going hiking. This hike was billed as a "sort of difficult but not really" hike to the next town over... our friend, Bao, who lives here, offered to go with us and act as a guide. I thought, why not - I'm in a beautiful Thai jungle, why not see the sites.

Bao shows up this morning wearing skinny jeans and an flannel long sleeve shirt... it's 90* with 100% humidity.... so I thought, this can't be that bad of a hike, if Bao is wearing that, it must be a breeze. I couldn't have been more wrong. This hike was bonkers. We hiked for 2 hours in the jungle heat -over 2 mountains, climbing over rocks and fallen trees, avoiding bugs, lizards, pricker bushes and god knows what else. Bao was honestly like sprinting through the forest and when we finally caught up to him, he would be sitting on a rock or in a tree smoking a cigarette. He might be a superhero, or an alien or something.

The views were beautiful and in the end the hike was worth it but honestly, I've never been so happy to see a 7-11 when we finally made it out of the bush. It must have looked like a scene out of a horror movie when we emerged from the forest - sweating profusely, covered in dirt, bugs and leaches and just zombie walking for the AC and coconut water. 

Post hike, we spent the day at the beach and shopping in Haad Rin. It was lovely and just the perfect lounge day that we needed... oh, and we took a boat back to our part of the island - there was zero chance any of us were hiking back. I honestly think we would have died. 

I'm sure I'll hate myself for my insane hike tomorrow when I have to wake up for 7:30am yoga - thankfully, I picked up some more Tiger Balm at 7-11.... Tiger Balm & Ibuprofen... both should be the official sponsors of All Yoga Thailand :)

 

Note the sweat... we were just repulsive at this point

Note the sweat... we were just repulsive at this point

Just casually climbing through the jungle - trying not to die

Just casually climbing through the jungle - trying not to die

A moment away to honor King Adulyadej

The king of Thailand, King Bhumibol Adulyadej, died today at the age of 88. He is considered the father of modern Thailand and was one of the longest reining monarchs in the world - serving for more than 70 years. After being ill for quite some time, he passed away peacefully in the palace surrounded by family.

The nation is in a state of mourning for the loss of their King - he was very much loved by people. My heart goes out to everyone in this beautiful country.

I'll update the blog tomorrow with yoga stuff, but wanted to take this opportunity to honor the passing of the King and respect the loss that the Thai people are feeling today.

Read more about King Adulyadej here.

Amazed...

I'm too sleepy to write a ton today... Day 7 is done!!!... so much studying... so many poses... so many Sanskrit words. gahhhh.

But, as difficult of a time as I'm having... I'd like to send a huge shout out to all of my classmates who speak English as a second language. These rock stars are having to hear instruction in English & Sanskrit, translate it into their native language to comprehend what has been taught, then take all assessments and teach in English. 

As far as non-native English speakers go, we have folks here from Estonia, Austria, Thailand, France, Sweden, Belgium, Holland, Philippines, Italy, Iceland and Singapore. The content that we are focusing on is hard enough in English... I honestly have no idea how they are doing it. It is remarkable. The group is just excelling at a crazy quick rate and are making this whole thing look like a cake walk. They are all so strong and determined - I mean, I feel totally lost for the first 10 times I do a new pose, and they are just breezing through the poses and teaching like experts already. I'm blown away.

I've said it before and I'll say it again - my favorite part of this whole experience is the people. I love that we now have a little All Yoga family across the globe. It is SO cool. 

We survived a week, team. Nice work to all. I'm so proud of us :) 

Sanskrit is harrrrd

As we enter our second week at All Yoga... I 100% have a new found respect for every yoga teacher I've ever had.

The way the amazing yogis and yoginis in my life breeze through a yoga flow while busting out Sanskrit terms has to be some sort of superpower. Add to that the ability to beautifully sing chants (again in Sanskrit) before and after each class, that are equal parts calming and inspiring, and I'm just totally in awe. 

We are all consistently teaching parts of our yoga classes now and while we are all improving - it is a totally intimidating experience. Trying to remember the order of poses, correct terminology in both English and Sanskrit, directing left from right, twists, extensions, modifications, all while trying to keep the flow going is proving to be ridiculously difficult. 

With all of that being said, I'm still loving every minute of the training. I just haven't hit that turn in the road where I'm like... oh yeah, I've got this. I'll get there I'm sure, I just can't wait for it to happen :) 

If you need me, I'll just be studying and dreaming in an ancient Indian language... Urdhva Mukha Svanasana... Adho Mukha Svanasana... Utkatasana...Virabhadrasana...Hasta Padangusthasana... :)

Shit just got real

After a lovely and relaxing day off, we were back at it this morning... Up to the shala at 7:30am for meditation and morning practice. 

We started our 2 hour morning practice as usual... a quick ohmmmm, a quick chant.... and then out of the blue, Corey (one of our amazing teachers) started calling out random students to teach each pose to the rest of the group. It was awesome and scary and I was totally not ready for it :) I wasn't called on, thank god, but the 4 or 5 who were chosen rocked it. Not kidding - they did so awesome... just spitting out sanskrit names and directing poses like yogi Eminems in a much more peaceful 8 Mile :) 

This continued in our afternoon practice as well and I definitely did get called on then - I totally messed up at first but saved it in the end. It's a pretty remarkable feat really... we've only been doing this for 5 days and we are already taking over parts of the practice. So awesome :) 

After that, we all worked on our homework book, explaining poses, verbal cues, drawing hilarious stick figures of how people are supposed to look while in each pose... they are amazing... not amazing as in super artistic, but more like - one pose looks like a yeti doing down dog or a person evolving from a lizard doing upward facing dog. So freaking funny. See photo of Jordan below - photo cred: Candace :)

I love this place, I love these people and I love yoga even more than before. 

Oh, and Thai food. I freaking love thai food. #tomyumforever

Owwww My Shoulderrrrrsssss...

Welp, I knew I was going to be sore... but I totally underestimated how sore I would be. It turns out, if you do non-stop yoga in the middle of a humid jungle after working at a desk for the majority of the past 5 years, you'll be in burning searing pain. 

With that being said... I am so impressed with how much better my practice is already. Even if you don't intend on teaching, yoga teacher training is an amazing thing to do. Of course, your knowledge and understanding of the methods and ideas behind yoga become crazy refined, but honestly the coolest part are the people. It has been such a gift to meet this incredible group of people.

Before I arrived, I was SO nervous about not being good enough at yoga or not fitting in, but after being here for just 3 days, I can honestly say that I am totally in love with our group. Everyone is so welcoming and SO much fun :) 

Looking forward and slightly scared for practice tomorrow after being so sore from our first full/real day of our program... 

Thank god for advil and Tiger Balm :) 

This place is amazing!

IMG_3295.JPG

This is the view from our yoga shala... I may never leave. Someone please send Dave and Huey immediately as I'm pretty sure I'm going to refuse to leave Thailand :) 

We had our first day of class, which was lovely - we had orientation, met and learned about everyone and did a lovely yoga practice, got our books, workbooks and learned a bit about Ashtanga yoga. We marked up our mats with permanent marker with the proper hand/foot placements for our bodies... It killed me a little to do this to my brand new lululemon mat, but actually, it's sort of cool. My mat now isn't just pretty... it's a custom mat aligned for me by yoga masters in Thailand :) Boom. So cool :) 

Also. Thai food is the best thing ever. Everything is fresh, coconut is in everything and a meal is like $4. Yes please :) 

Travel Marathon & Arrival!

Holy moly I'm here and am loving it already! The last 24 hours were a marathon incredible journey, but once I got here... It's a dream.

After connecting in Taipei and Bangkok, I finally arrived on the island of Ko Samui (just 1 island over from where our training is) into the cutest little airport ever... You deplane outside and there is one luggage carousel in one building and that's it... Maybe some orchid plants and ferns around to decorate the place, but really... This place was tiny.

I found a stand that was selling ferry tickets just outside of the airport, and for 350 Baht (around $11 USD) I got a bus transfer and ferry ticket to Koh Phangan

I read for a bit while I waited for the ferry and was just starting to wonder how I hadn't met anyone yet from my program en route to the island, when my new friend, Halla, came up and asked if I was headed to the All Yoga training :) It was such a relief to meet someone and chat about what we are doing here, how excited we are etc. 

Once we arrived and met everyone else, it became immediately clear that this is going to be the most amazing experience. Even though we all have different backgrounds, we all seem to have similar personalities and are all here for mostly the same reasons. The coolest thing yet is that everyone is from different parts of the world- 26 people from all over he damn place- New Zealand, Iceland, South Africa, Holland, Italy, Austria, etc.... 

I couldn't love this more :)  

8am is going to come super duper early tomorrow with my jet leg... Thank the lord for Advil PM