offering.
A confession: as much as I love teaching yoga, there are some days when I really, really don’t want to teach. I wake up, it’s cold and rainy outside, my bed is warm and cozy, and the last thing I want to do is get up and start doing yoga. There are days when I feel like I have nothing to offer and creative sequencing seems completely beyond my reach. There are days when my playlist doesn’t feel just right, or my energy is low, or my class attendance isn’t quite where I’d like it to be, and it takes every ounce of willpower I have to get up and drag my sorry self to the studio.
But then - when I get inside the practice room and I fumble my way through a class and someone comes up to me afterwards to say, “Thank you so much,” (with such profound gratitude!) - it makes everything else seem completely insignificant. All those fears about not being good enough or not having the perfect sequence dissipate with the knowledge that in some small way, I have done something good for somebody else. You see, teaching yoga isn’t just about amazing playlists or putting together the best sequence or being the strongest or most flexible yogi. It’s simply about showing up for yourself and for your students, and laying out whatever you have to give.
It is our obligation to serve and support one another in all the ways that we know how. This gift that I have to offer - the practice of yoga - is bigger than my own worries and insecurities, bigger than who I am as a teacher or what style of yoga that I teach. I teach and I write not only because it brings me great joy, but also because it serves my students and my readers. And within each and every single one of us is a profound blessing that we have to share with the world; a spark that only we can carry. So if you’re a comedian, keep on making people laugh. If you’re a teacher, keep on sharing all you know. And if you’re a human being, simply keep loving others, the best way you know how. That is the best gift you have to offer.
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