An Homage to Luna Yoga on its 14th Anniversary!
I first came to Luna Yoga in the late summer of 2008. Until that point, I had practiced a much gentler style of yoga with the first teacher I was blessed to find along my journey, Joan Ruvinsky. I was initially introduced to the deeply-rooted philosophical teachings that Joan incorporates, but I soon found myself craving a more physical practice. I had quickly formed a home practice after first starting in yoga, and as I found myself attempting more advanced postures at home, I always kept an element of caution to my movement, knowing I needed to find a space where I could be supervised as I went deeper into it. My sister from another mister, Sonia Papasimakis-Collins, was at that time the Store Manager of the Ste-Catherine St Lululemon store and had been telling me for months that I had to come try this teacher whose studio was in Old Montreal, and whose classes were beyond what she ever could have expected from a yoga session.
In A Nutshell
Late last week I received an email from someone creating a database of yoga teachers asking me to provide him with a short biography of myself in relation to yoga, and once I wrote it, I realized that it communicated more about myself and my reasons for following this path than any other bio I’ve written thus far, so I wanted to post it here for you all and hope that it tells you more about me than you already knew:
Truth or Dare
So things are changing at Centre Luna Yoga where I spend half of every week, as some of you already know. My extended family (and the founders of the studio) Jenn & Jason have welcomed their beautiful little boy into their family, and are both nesting with the little guy as I take the helm at Luna. Massive change for me, as my admin days there have always been shared with Jenn, laughing our way through each day as we get all that the studio needs to get done completed. My nearly sold-out Santorini Yoga Retreat is less than three weeks away, and I’m teaching more than ever. With this increase in my workload, I’ve noticed that by the end of the week, I need to take some real time for myself. To come back to myself, to recharge, to balance things out. It’s taken me a few weeks to realize that I need this – in the first week I felt like I needed to be everything for everyone, regardless of what point during my week I was being called upon, and what was being requested. From teaching classes to being a soundboard to my friends and family, I felt like I couldn’t let anyone down. They needed me, I was blessed to be needed, so I would make sure I was available for everyone..which left me reeling.
Without You…
The role of the students in our world of yoga is often discussed from the point of view of the students themselves, but rarely do we hear a teacher discuss it from their own perspective…so here I am 🙂 I know that on some levels, especially those that refer to Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras 2.7 & 2.8, the teacher should assume a purely objective stance in regards to his or her students, but to not communicate my thoughts on the matter would be doing an injustice to my students.
The Weight of Inversions
One of the funniest things I hear from students on a semi-regular basis is that they really want to “do the fun poses.” I’ve stopped asking them to define “fun” for me as the answers are always the same: headstand, handstand, crow, etc…The balancing postures, especially the inversions, hold a shiny allure for newcomers and experienced yogis alike. I am no exception, as one of the postures that encouraged me to explore yoga as a physical practice was Sirsasana. Standing on my head was a commonplace occurrence when I was a child, so when I discovered that there was a spiritual practice that incorporated what I already was familiar with, I began to dig deeper.
Where I Am
It’s been a couple of months now that I’ve been teaching yoga, and after solely being a student for 10 years, the transition has been so organic and natural that I know that I’m finally doing what I’m meant to be doing…