Right around this time a year ago, I taught my last yoga class. Yoga has changed a lot from when I first started practicing 13 years ago. Many of the changes are good. Things naturally evolve.
As yoga crept further and further into the mainstream, I found myself struggling with finding where I fit into the perception people had of yoga. Students were desperate to know what was good for them, and what was bad. To draw a line on how it "should" feel. The ever-increasing expectation of what a yoga class should look like, how a yoga teacher should be to me was exhausting and alienating. The feeling, the experience of a pose or sensation became secondary to the science, to the mechanics, to the whatever is in fad. Science and mechanics are excellent and needed; however, they are simply tools to communicate more deeply with ourselves, not holy canon. Being present with the sensations of your body should not be outweighed by the perception of how it should be.
I have been teaching people in Lancaster through the Trager Approach and massage to feel their body and love the feeling, to anchor to that feeling of wholeness. I have been slowly getting back into my own yoga practice and loving the simplicity of just this--enjoying the moment to moment in movement. I find that no agenda beyond that is needed for me right now. It is good for the body.
This blog article below is just a portion of movement community that is right there with me. Yes to this! Yes, yes, yes!!!
http://www.evolvedbodystudio.com/…/9/5/its-good-for-the-body